Chapter 425
Tondemo Skill – 425 – Four Arms Bear < Gigantic Minotaur
When we stepped out to the 40th Floor…
“Ehhh… more forest?!”
The sight that greeted us was the same as the 39th Floor, tangled undergrowth and huge overgrown trees.
“Hey Fer, how big is this floor? Is it as big as the one before?” I asked while staring at the trees that towered above us.
“Umu, it might even be bigger than the previous one.”
“Bigger, huh,” it took us almost three days to cross the previous floor, just how long would it take us to cross this one?
“Well, it can’t be helped, let’s get going.”
“”Ou! Let’s get through it!””
I sighed.
“Leave the monsters to Sui.”
“”Yay~~!!””
Well, at least one of us is excited.
At least there was a sharp decline in insect-type monsters here.
We were attacked by all kinds of beast-type monsters, including but not limited to: Red Boar, c.o.c.katrice, Rock Bird, Giant Dodo, Giant Deer, Giant Horn Rabbits, Wild Apes and so forth.
Sui fired her Acid Bullets from her position on Fer’s head.
[6] Dora-chan’s job was to collect the Drops, but only if they turned out to be meat Drops.
This way, we got through the forest with minimal fuss.
“”Right, let’s call it a day.””
Fer suddenly stopped and gave the order through telepathy.
“I supposed we might as well since it is getting dark.”
We might be inside a dungeon, but the field dungeons seemed to have their own rules regarding weather, light and temperature. Probably better not to think too much about it.
“”Here! Here! Here!””
“Here?”
“”Yeah, here! Anyway, let’s eat the bear. I never had bear before.””
“Bear is kind of a pain to prepare…”
I have never cooked bear before either. The only bear dish I ever had was during a hot spring trip where they served us bear stew. The bear meat itself did not feel too strange and it was pretty delicious in a miso-based stew.
[6] Since I am an avid cook, I asked the inn how it was prepared since bear meat is known to be rather stinky when prepared wrongly.
“I guess, I could make a stew…”
““Stew is great! Let’s go with stew!””
“Umu,”
“”Meat~ yay~!!””
Right, since everyone seemed quite enthusiastic about it, let’s go with a Bear Stew.
Hmm… [8]
I heard that the quality of bear meat could be influenced by age, the season in which it is killed and the [8] blood draining practices to reduce any weird smells, but…
I tried sniffing the meat.
[8]
There was no weird smell. It smelled kind of gamey but not in a bad way. Moreover, this was meat from a monster, so who knows whether common sense from my previous world would apply?
I cut off a small portion of the meat, season it with a little salt and pepper and pan-fried it carefully. My standard SOP for all new types of meat.
“Hmm, well, for bear meat it’s surprisingly not weird. Also, it’s a bit chewy but not too tough, typical of game meat but that’s about it. Hmm, let’s play it safe and remove the lye, but other than that, I guess it should be fine?”
For the stew, I decided to follow the recipe I had been given as closely as possible.
First, the vegetables.
Cut the daikon and carrots cut into cubes. Then, shave a whole burdock root and soak the pieces in water.
Next, I cut the bear meat into fairly fine slices. [6] I don’t plan to cook the stew for too long since I have hungry familiars waiting on the side.
[6] Since stews take time to cook, I decided to make full use of all four stoves and make four pots of stew at once. That was a lot of food but my familiars have big appet.i.tes, so…
Anyway, I splashed in sesame oil and stir-fried the slices of bear meat in the pots until the meat was mostly done before throwing the vegetables in, stirring every once in a while and letting the bear oil coat everything. I added kelp soup stock (made with granulated kelp stock and water) and raised the fire to medium heat.
After the stew had simmered for a while, I got ready with my fine mesh strainer, ready to clear out any lye that appear. Oddly enough, there was way less lye than expected. Once the stew was clear of lye, I added red miso and mirin and lowered the fire to a slow simmer.
While the stew was simmering, I got the enoki mushrooms, s.h.i.+meji mushrooms, green leeks and tofu ready. When the other vegetables were tender, I tasted the soup, hmm, not bad.
It was pretty much done at this point. All I needed to do next was arranged the mushrooms, leeks and tofu on the surface of the stew and it was ready to be served.
“Phew, that took a little while, but it’s finally done.”
“Finally.”
“”I’m tired of waiting.””
“”Hungryy~~””
“Sorry guys, stews need time to simmer. Anyway, here you go.” I ladled out the stew into bowls and served everyone.
“Mumu, the amount of vegetables is kind of obnoxious, but I’m hungry so I don’t mind.”
“”I’ve been looking forward to this!””
“”Yummy~~!””
[6] Woah, that first pot disappeared like nothing. These fellas really know how to eat.
By the time my familiars declared themselves full, all four pots were empty. [5a]
“”That was really good,”” declared Dora-chan. “However, it still can’t beat Minotaur.”
“Umu, agreed, it has its unique points, and is good once in a while. However, Minotaur is still superior.” [5]
“”Sui likes this~~ Sui likes the meaty meat too~~””
Hmm, I guess I have to agree, bear meat is good now and then, but Gigantic Minotaur has to be the winner.
Gumihou: Deleted ‘funny’ ending because it was more tedious than funny.
Eguchi Ren: Dungeon Arc still ongoing, please bear with us a little longer. Next, we shall have a story about the new tenant shop…
[1] Structural Change: Combine 2 paragraphs
[2] Structural Change: Combine 3 paragraphs
[3] Structural Change: Combine paragraph & dialogue
[4] Structural Change: Change pa.s.sive sentence to dialogue
[5] Delete Repet.i.tive or Pointless Information… starting to delete pointless scenes now
[a] Deleted strangely specific and wordy declarations of the subt.i.tle as well as Mukouda’s pointless ‘oi’
[6] Additional Information for Aesthetic Purpose
[7] Add Dialogue Tag
[8] Creative Licence Taken – Bear treatment, Gumi is going to take some common sense liberties on it.