Cooking with Wild Game: Volume 1

1. Auflage 2019
ISBN: 978-1-7183-3400-7
Verlag: J-Novel Club
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: Adobe DRM (»Systemvoraussetzungen)

E-Book, Englisch, 317 Seiten

Reihe: Cooking with Wild Game

Chef Trainee Asuta Tsurumi was just a normal Japanese teenager, until one day the harassment against his family's restaurant went too far. Desperate to save his father's precious cooking knife, he dove headfirst into a sea of flames. Rather than waking up in the afterlife, though, he found himself in a whole new world entirely!
Fortunately for our hero, he soon gets picked up by the huntress known as Ai Fa. This guardian angel packs some attitude, though, so it won't be all smooth sailing for Asuta! Plus his savior seems to have some issues of her own to worry about, too...
Just how well will our rookie chef be able to parlay his skills in this utterly unfamiliar world? And with all the danger lurking around, will he even be able to survive long enough to put them to the test?! Come learn a thing or two about Cooking with Wild Game!

Autoren/Hrsg.

Eda

Weitere Mitwirkende

Kochimo

Warner, Matthew

Leseproben

While pondering such questions in the back of my mind, I ran desperately as fast as I could. I ran a whole lot back when I was alive, and now I’ve got to do it in the afterlife, too?

Maybe I didn’t have anything to fear now that I was already dead, but I’m sure getting stabbed by those horns and tusks would hurt a whole lot more than pinching my cheeks did.

And so, I ran as fast as I could. I may have had enough leeway to turn around, but instead I leapt over underbrush, shoved past branches, and darted between trees. I ran, and ran, and kept on running... And then, another disaster befell me.

“Waaah!”

Suddenly, the ground fell out from under me.

It was a pitfall.

The world was spinning, and I felt a dull shock running through my head and back. I had reached the bottom of the pit before I even knew what was going on.

“Owwwwww... Damn it, what the heck is going on here?!”

Now sprawled out on the bottom of the pit, I looked up overhead. I could see a circular cutout of the forest scenery. From eyeballing it, I’d guess the hole was around 3 meters deep. If this was manmade, it must have taken quite a bit of effort to put together.

“Damn it! Give me a break, already...”

Fortunately, it didn’t seem likely at this point that the boar-looking thing would fall in after me, so I stood up and tucked the knife into my coat. But then, a sudden hot pain shot through my right ankle. Looks like I must have sprained it when I fell.

I was thrown into the depths of this forest without even knowing what was going on, and was chased by some unknown creature, and then to top it all off I fell into a pit. And as a bonus, I even went and sprained my ankle!

Ugh, this is just the absolute worst. It’s so bad all I can do is laugh.

“No wait, this is no laughing matter!”

I couldn’t just laugh at the matter, so I got mad instead.

“Damn it! I don’t know if it’s a god or a devil doing this, but what’d I do to deserve this?! Did I really screw up that badly in life?! My death may not have been anything to brag about, but I can’t imagine I earned such a malicious punishment. Even if you’ve got some sort of problem with me, you could at least pick a bit nicer of a hell to throw me into!”

“You sure are a noisy one...”

That sudden voice was as much of a shock as getting hit in the head with a metal bat from behind. Suddenly, a dark silhouette appeared in my circular view of the sky overhead.

“What are you doing causing such a ruckus in a place like that...?” It was a young woman’s voice, but there was a masculine tone to it. It was a bit husky and blunt, but still had a pleasant sound to it. The sunlight filtering through the trees only provided backlighting, so I couldn’t quite tell what she looked like.

I decided to try to strike up a conversation, feeling truly relieved to find that there were people in this world.

“As you can see, I seem to have gotten caught in a pitfall. I don’t know who made it or why, but it sure is an awful prank on their part.”

After a short bit of silence, an unfriendly voice shot back, “I’m the one who set that trap...”

“Eh?”

“That trap was meant for catching giba, but a human won’t fill my belly... Do you have any idea how hard I worked to prepare that?”

“Huh? No, well you see... I’m sorry...? Wait, am I the one who should be apologizing here?”

There was no response.

“Right. But yeah, it was my bad, ruining all that hard work. I’m sorry. I’m apologizing already, so won’t you please help me out of here?”

“It shouldn’t be so deep that you can’t climb out on your own...”

The silhouette looked like it was about to leave, so I desperately called out, “No, wait! The thing is, I twisted my ankle when I fell! It’s nothing too bad, but it’s enough to keep me from climbing out of here! Sorry, but could you please lend me a hand?!”

“...That’s your issue. Just go ahead and take a dirt nap.”

The silhouette disappeared from view.

“Hey, hold on! That’s way too heartless! Come on, save me!”

There was no response.

Is she really going to leave me to die?

“Heeeey! I’m begging you! If you leave me here I’m gonna starve to death! If you have a heart, then come back and save me!”

“You truly are a noisy one...” the voice replied, still out of view.

It was then that a strange object suddenly dropped down and dangled in front of me. It was made of the vines that I had seen here and there about the forest. The thing was made out of five or so of them bundled together, and when I went to pull on it, it felt plenty sturdy.

“Hurry up and climb already.”

Oh, so she intended to save me from the very start, huh? What a mean-spirited woman. Is this what people call a tsundere?

At any rate, I let her mercy wash over me. The bizarre circumstances I found myself in just made me feel all the more grateful. I placed a foot on the wall while thinking how once I was out of here, I’d give her my wholehearted thanks.

My twisted ankle throbbed, but it wasn’t bad enough that I couldn’t bear it. At any rate, I desperately pulled myself up, the black soil crumbling beneath my feet as I went.

If this was hell, then it was awful strange for a savior to come rescue me from that predicament. Plus, my senses felt like they were working just like they did before I passed away, so the fact that I was dead just hadn’t quite sunk in.

I thought as I wrung out the last of my strength to reach the surface.

And with that, I’d safely escaped the pitfall.

It had grown a good bit darker, so I figured night must be fast approaching.

“Owwwww... Ah, thank you. You really saved me!”

I flopped down on the ground, then bowed to my savior. She stood there staring at me imposingly, then without a word, she thrust what she was holding right in my face. It was the shining silver tip of a savage-looking blade.

2

“Now then, just who are you?”

The shining, savage blade remained pressed up against the tip of my nose. It sure did look sharp. The length looked to be about 80 centimeters, while it was approximately 10 centimeters wide. The whole thing was rather thick like a machete, but even so, the edge of the blade was certainly plenty sharp. Something like that could hack through the flesh and bones of any prey.

Hey, wait, this isn’t the time to be getting all impressed by something like that!

“W-What the...? What’s with the violent greeting?! I already apologized for the pitfall!”

“Cease your chattering. Just hurry up and answer the question.”

The girl seemed to have calmed down... but that actually just felt all the more frightening.

I looked back and forth between the face of the girl and the tip of the blade, then gave a sigh.

“Before that, just where exactly am I? It doesn’t quite have the feel of the afterlife, somehow, but...”

“This is the forest at the foot of Mount Morga.”

“Mount Morga?”

“In the territory of the Western Kingdom of Selva, ruled over by Duke Genos... Just where the hell did you come from?”

I seriously had no idea what was going on. But still, considering the circumstances, I saw no option but to answer truthfully.

“I was born in a country called Japan. The Chiba Prefecture, to be specific. Do you know of it?”

“Japan... Chiba...?”

Yeah, she hadn’t heard of it. Of course she hadn’t.

In all likelihood, this was a world completely removed from the country known as Japan in every sense imaginable. I mean, in the world where I was born, there weren’t any boars with horns, nor were there any girls who walked around with such huge blades.

And besides, this girl looked different than anyone I had ever seen before. Her skin was dark, like a sort of creamy chocolate color. And yet, her hair was a dull blond. And on top of that, her eyes were a deep blue. Her golden-brown hair seemed to be quite long, but she had it done up in an unusual manner using a leather strap. Her blue eyes shone with a strong, sharp shine about them, even in this dim light.

As far as her facial features went, well, she was definitely good-looking. Her slightly arched eyes were reminiscent of a wildcat, and she had a thin, perfectly formed nose and petite lips the color of cherry blossoms. She had nice, soft cheek lines, giving her face just a bit of a childish look, but she must have been around the same age as me.

Yeah, she was a pretty high-level beauty. Actually, maybe it would be better to call her an unparalleled one, at that. At least on a personal level, I couldn’t help but find that combination of dark skin and pink lips incredibly sexy.

Still, what was with that outfit...? She had a thick, blackish-brown fur cloak draped over her shoulders. Underneath that, she had some cloth of a stunning hue wrapped around her chest and waist... and nothing else on. There were complex, beautiful...