Arcane Chef - Slice of Life x Adventure LitRPG

Once it was all over, I felt… relieved. Sure, I'd need to cook more drake, but the pressure wasn't as crazy this time—I didn't have a three-day deadline.

I was also relieved that Liane was okay. Both because she ate the drake, but also because the cat didn't get upset or notice she'd stolen some of its food.

"Well, are you going to cook the same or change it up?" Liane asked, now sitting next to me.

"Honestly, probably change it up a little. I want to try some of that Dawnroot myself, and I don't know when I'll get in the forest again to find more," I said.

"Ohh, the shiny gold stuff. Yeah, I want to try that too!" she said excitedly.

With all the excitement of the cat arriving, I had nearly forgotten about the Grumfels. Luckily, Crisplet was on the case and had cooked them all perfectly. Pulling them over, I used Infuse, and then—before my eyes—one was missing.

"You were waiting for that, weren't you?" I said with a chuckle, looking at Liane next to me, pretending to be innocent with her hands behind her back.

I knew I was going to lose some of these anyway, so I stored the three, leaving Liane with her stolen prize. I was trying to think up a plan for how I'd do the next piece of drake. I could try roasting the giant chunk, but that felt like a waste when I could get at least four or five more steaks from it.

I couldn't make a stew because the cat had never touched a stew before, that I knew of, and likely wouldn't trust it.

I'd sleep on it, but before I could get to that, I was interrupted.

"You need to do some studying before you go to sleep. You've been avoiding it," Milo said, holding out the Runescribe book and the notebook to practise in.

He was right, of course. I hadn't even looked in the notebook I got from Char, and I really needed to. I had a skill I hadn't even used yet. So I took the offered books from Milo and got to work practising the basic structure again.

I went from the beginning because it had actually been a while. This time, I got it near perfect much faster, showing Milo my progress.

"Nice work. Now keep going with the same thing. Building muscle memory is all about practice. This should become second nature to you," he said.

Once he was satisfied I had some consistency—

"Okay, before we look at Char's book, we're going to practise the basic barrier one this book provides," he said, pointing to the open pages.

It looked fairly simple. I had to do the base rune circle, then there were three additional shapes and some letters that didn't look like normal words. Milo explained that the shapes set the size, position, and shape, while the words were magical words and would represent the desired spell.

"How do you learn what the words mean?" I asked curiously.

"Well, that's part of learning to craft your own runes. You'll need to study the language, and then, as you're writing the words, you will feel rather than see what they mean. It's very difficult to describe, because what's written there is not as simple as just saying barrier," Milo began to explain.

"It's describing a desired effect that will be interpreted by the mana in the rune to produce a barrier—which is a very complicated way to say you can't simply learn the language of magic. You need to feel it, understand it, and then create it."

I got some of what Milo was trying to tell me, but it also sounded really complicated…

"Well… couldn't anyone create and make runes then?" I asked curiously.

"No, that's just the thing. Unless you have a skill, you can use already crafted runes by injecting a small amount of mana. But if you attempted to create or craft a rune—even if you copied it exactly—the words you write wouldn't be recognised as an actual rune by the System, so it won't work," Milo said.

"It's why you can't just go up to someone else's rune and copy it exactly without understanding what it is you're copying. You need to understand the intent, the actions to achieve the results," he finished.

And honestly, that made sense. I hadn't seen why another Runescribe couldn't just copy a rune and sell it, but if there was more to it than simply copying the circle, then it clicked. It would also explain why Char had a full notebook of her basic runes.

Once Milo was satisfied with my shapes in the circle and my consistency with them, we moved on to the words. Milo said I was supposed to feel something—but there was nothing. It was just scratching what I saw using the quill.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

"Do you think I need to do this into a food item for it to count?" I asked curiously.

Milo swore under his breath. "Of course, that would be it. Yes, do you have anything you can carve into fairly easily?" he asked.

Looking at my inventory, I didn't think any meat product would work—it was too soft to get a clean circle and shapes.

"Uh, I have tubers. If I get some of the larger ones, I think I can carve into the side of them?" I said. I'd need to buy some melons or something in the future.

"Perfect. Let's do that. When you carve, treat the tip of your knife as if it were the quill," Milo said.

I tried… and immediately failed.

The knife was nothing like the quill, and trying to stop it from going too deep or slipping off was impossible. It felt like I was learning how to use the quill all over again.

By the time we finished that night, I was defeated. I had carved into sixteen of the tubers—and ruined the base circle on all of them!

Luckily, I could still use the tubers later for food, or it would have been a gigantic waste.

"You're doing fine, Trev, don't worry. Once you get the hang of this, it'll be second nature to you," Milo reassured me as I was preparing to go to sleep. Even Crisplet gave me a reassuring burst of sparks.

"Thanks. I'll get it, I promise," I said before lying down.

"You don't need to promise us. Think of the possibilities when you work it out!" Milo said with a giant smile. "And to make it more enticing, you'll likely be able to use them yourself once you figure it out. Runes like that aren't just buffs."

With that, Milo went to set up his own bedroll.

Was he right? Could I get buffs and effects myself if I worked out runes?

That thought was what sent me off to sleep that night—dreams of gaining spells by eating fruit.

The next morning I woke up and decided to prepare strips of smoked boar belly and eggs with some rolls. I couldn't infuse the boar belly because I hadn't smoked it myself, but I figured I knew how to smoke things—it couldn't be that difficult, right?

I had a couple of whole boars too, so I put them on my mental list of things to test later.

When we had packed up camp and mounted the horses, we made our way towards the mountain pass. It didn't take long for us to reach our answer. As soon as we arrived at the path that cut through the mountain itself, we found it blocked by dirt and rocks.

I really hoped everyone got out okay, but I couldn't see how it was possible.

The look on everyone's faces showed they were probably thinking the same. Once we'd confirmed it, we turned around and took the path away from the mountain, heading back towards Forest's Edge.

The appearance of the cat raised several questions. Reports had said the shadows of the forest were fighting, so it was assumed that was the cat. But if the cat was here, getting food, did that mean the fight was over?

Also, the cat didn't look injured in any way… but would a shadow cat even show injury?

I had so many questions bubbling up inside me, but the mood was very sombre. Nobody had spoken since we left the mountain pass.

Liane hadn't even pulled out a snack.

Feeling like I needed to break the silence, I asked,

"Uh, so… do you think the fight is still going?"

"It's impossible to say, Trev. If it's happening deep in the forest like was said, only the highest-level scouts, or people with very tailored abilities to see long distances, would be able to know for sure," Hari replied.

"Sorry if this is a silly question," I began, "but they're called continent destroyer beasts… does that mean if they fight, they'll destroy the continent?"

"No, not exactly. They get the designation because that's the level of destruction one would expect before they're finally put down. If a continent destroyer went on a rampage, it would be expected to destroy a continent before enough people were able to bring it down," Jen explained.

That made a lot more sense. The attack on Boltron had seemed overwhelming, but if one of those creatures could truly destroy a continent outright, why would it hold back?

Jen gave a humourless chuckle. "Oh, and before you ask—the cat's likely at the same level, now that we've seen some of its power. Just to add to the terror of the thing!"

She continued, "As for the fight, it's said to be between two dragons. Truth is, we didn't even know there was another dragon at the centre of the forest, so we have no idea how strong it is. Combine that with the cat itself, and… well, they could have driven the Storm Dragon off in retreat, killed it, or they could still be fighting and the cat just decided to leave for a snack. All are possible. Hopefully, we'll find out when we reach the town."

The rest of the journey was mostly silent. But what had taken us an entire day when travelling with the wagons away from the town, we now saw the first signs of Forest's Edge just after lunch. It looked a lot busier than the last time we'd seen it.

There was a lineup at the gate, but unlike before, Hari didn't join it. Instead, he rode straight to the front, dismounted, and approached the guards.

When one came over, he said, "Polite Company, here on official guild business. We'll need to speak with your Guard Captain and the Guild Master as soon as possible."

He handed over a letter sealed with wax. I hadn't even known he carried such a thing, but the guard's reaction said enough. He bowed quickly and practically ran off with the letter in hand.

"Uh, what was that?" I whispered.

"The letter basically explains our situation," Jen said softly. "The Guard Captain will get a very basic version without much detail—just enough to let them know the importance of our entry and mission. The wax itself has its own meaning depending on which one is used. Ours was a very high-ranking seal."

A moment later, the same older woman we'd seen last time approached. If I remember correctly, her name was Greta.

"Ah, you lot again," she said. "I read the letter. You're free to pass. Our guards won't hinder your entrance or exit for the duration of your mission. But if you'll indulge an old lady, did you run into anything particularly dangerous on the road? Also—how did you even get here? The refugees from Rockhampton said the whole mountain came down behind them."

"We did run into some anomalies in the forest as we took the long road around the mountain to reach here," Hari replied. "On the outskirts we encountered a Baelvryn. There was also a significant lack of smaller beasts, so we believe they may have been driven out."

"And the last time you came, you mentioned multiple encounters with a shadow cat. Is that ongoing still?" she asked.

"No," Hari said.

Well, at least the note to the guard isn't calling it my cat, I thought.

"Thank you for the information. It's very concerning. We've had more and more reports of creatures usually only seen in the inner forest being driven out. Alright then, you may pass." Greta gave a nod and returned to her post.

As Hari mounted his horse, I thought I heard someone call my name. Turning around, I saw a woman near the gate.

"Trevor! Is that you?" a female voice shouted.

Then I saw her. "Micca?"