“Parent-teacher meeting?” Mag had been so busy dealing with elf hunters that he had forgotten all about this. He remembered now. But Amy’s teachers were Krassu and Urien. Did Krassu sent her here?

  Luna seemed to have read his mind. “Yes. The school holds a parent-teacher meeting every semester. I know Amy is studying under Krassu and Urien, but the school has assigned her to me, so……”


  “I see. Thank you for coming all this way to tell me this. I’ll be there. When is the meeting going to be held?”


  “1:30 PM tomorrow.” Luna paused a moment. “But the school wants both parents to attend.”


  Mag smiled. “Amy has told me about this. Don’t worry, I’ll figure something out.”


  Luna looked relieved. “Okay, I’ll see you then.”


  Mag nodded with a smile.

  “Hopefully Aisha won’t say no,” Mag muttered as he watched Luna leave. “If she don’t want to pose as my fake wife, maybe I can ask Firis. She’s not ideal, but she’s much better than Blour.”


  Mag was riding to a job center when he suddenly remembered the food competition which would start in a couple days. “I have to perfect the eggplant with garlic sauce fast, or I’ll fail the system’s mission!

  “System, why don’t you give me a recipe for the eggplant with garlic sauce?” Mag asked.

  Five words went across his head. “Inventing fertilizer. Do not disturb!”


  Mag responded, “What the hell?!”


  Mag arrived at the job center. Although there were creatures from all kinds of species looking for jobs, he found no one to his liking.

  He discovered a fact about himself, though, and that was that he liked his waitresses to be beautiful.

  Even though he was not a womanizer.

  As competent as some older women were, he couldn’t bring himself to hire them.

  He then went to the Find All Job-finding Service to see if the balding Crease could help him out.

  Crease felt Mag had gotten the better end of their last deal, but he was a smooth businessman, and he didn’t show the least displeasure. Mag’s requirements were difficult to meet, so he demanded twice the normal fee.

  Mag nodded. “No problem.”


  “I’d put up a ‘we are hiring’ poster on the wall if I were you, since your restaurant is so popular,” Crease spoke without thinking.

  Mag’s face lit up. “Yeah! That could work!” I keep hearing many people talking about how they want to work for me for free as long as I give them food, and some of them seem pretty capable. “Thanks, man.” With that, Mag turned around and left.

  Crease looked like he was going to slap himself on the face. Why did I have to tell him that?

  Mag rode to the market. There were eggplants in this world too, but compared with their counterparts on Earth, they were much larger, about the size of a wax gourd. They were said to be found in forest trolls’ territory, and they tasted the same as the ones on Earth.

  Mag picked one up and reckoned it weighed over five kilograms. A large eggplant like this is enough to feed several people.

  The vendor was a middle-aged man. When he saw Mag interested in his eggplants, his sleepy eyes flicked open. “Freshly picked eggplants. Look how big they are! And cheap at twice the price! 10 copper coins each. I can give you a discount if you buy five.”


  Less than two copper coins for a kilo. It is cheap, Mag thought. People here didn’t know many ways to cook eggplants, and everyone hated this soft, weird-tasting vegetable save for forest trolls. That was why the vendor had almost fallen asleep.

  “I’ll have three. I’ll come back if they’re good.” Mag picked three and handed three silver coins to him.

  “If you buy five, I’ll give you one for free,” the vendor said as he tied the eggplants up with a length of straw rope. Even forest trolls seemed to be getting fed up with eggplants, so he needed to find a way to sell them before they rotted.

  Mag shook his head. “No, thanks. Three is enough for me today. I’ll come back tomorrow.” Now he needed to buy seasonings and spices for chili broad bean paste, which was a deciding factor in making the eggplant with garlic sauce.

  Mag saw Firis carefully choosing beef when he was buying spices. He watched for a while and left without disturbing her.

  Choosing ingredients was a basic skill a cook needed to master.

  Mag went upstairs after he got back, and found the notebook in which he had written the recipes he had come up with for the eggplant with garlic sauce. He would test them out one by one.