Chapter 4: The Bigback Kitchen

"Where is this goddamn kitchen?"

Charlie had been walking for what felt like far too long, and the manor seemed determined to make sure he never found it. Every corridor looked like the last one, every turn led to another turn, and somehow the number of doors only seemed to increase the farther he went.

He slowed down when he reached another intersection and looked from one direction to the other.

"How big is this place?"

He had already passed several courtyards, two staircases, a study that he had no intention of ever entering again, and enough servants to suggest that the manor employed half the city. Yet somehow, despite all of that, he hadn’t seen a single person who looked as though they were heading toward a kitchen.

Charlie rubbed the back of his neck and continued down the corridor, trying to look as though he wasn’t lost.

"Charlie!"

He heard the woman’s voice before he saw her. She was standing farther down the hallway, watching him with an expression that suggested she had been looking for him.

"Are you trying to find the kitchen?"

"Yes."

She stared at him for a moment.

"You’re going the wrong way."

Charlie looked behind himself.

"Right."

She walked past him and motioned for him to follow. "Come on."

He followed her through several more corridors, and eventually the smell of food began to fill the air. The faint sounds of chopping and conversation grew louder until they reached a pair of wide wooden doors.

When they finally stepped into the kitchen, Charlie found himself slowing down.

He had expected a kitchen, but what stretched out before him looked more like a small restaurant operating at full capacity. Cooks filled almost every corner of the enormous room, fires burned beneath rows of pots, and servants moved constantly between the worktables and the doors with trays of food in their hands.

"Well," he muttered, "no wonder the master is so fat."

The woman looked at him.

Charlie gestured around the room. "Look at this place. You’ve got enough people cooking here to feed an army."

"It’s the master’s household."

"Yes, I’ve gathered that."

He watched another tray disappear through the doorway before looking back at the woman.

"How many people work in this kitchen?"

"More than fifty."

Charlie paused.

"Fifty?"

"More than fifty."

He looked around again, this time with genuine confusion.

"Then why the hell am I required to cook?"

The woman seemed to hesitate over how to answer that.

"Because you’re very good at it."

Charlie glanced toward her. "I’m what?"

"Cooking."

"I can cook?"

She gave him an odd look. "You know you can."

Charlie looked back at the kitchen. "Apparently I know a lot of things I don’t remember knowing."

She didn’t seem to find that particularly strange. Instead, she folded her hands in front of her and watched him for a moment.

"Your cooking is exceptional. The master has always preferred the dishes you prepare."

Charlie raised an eyebrow. "Then why employ fifty other cooks?"

"They prepare most of the household’s meals. You only cook when you want to."

"That makes even less sense."

She smiled faintly. "Perhaps. But whenever you do cook, everyone notices."

Charlie wasn’t sure whether that was meant as a compliment.

"And what exactly makes my cooking so exceptional?"

The woman opened her mouth, then seemed to reconsider whatever she had been about to say.

"There are... certain side effects."

"Side effects?"

She ignored him and glanced around the kitchen instead. "Where is the pig?"

"He’s with the servant. They’re taking care of him."

She nodded, apparently satisfied with that answer. Before Charlie could return to the matter of the mysterious side effects, one of the cooks across the room raised his voice.

"Ah! A! Come over here!"

Charlie turned toward the voice. One of the cooks was waving him over from across the kitchen.

"We’re starting the evening preparations!"

Charlie was about to answer when the woman beside him spoke more quietly.

"You should be careful."

He looked at her. "About what?"

"The master."

Charlie glanced toward the corridor.

"When he recovers, I don’t know what he’ll do to you."

"I’ll be fine."

"You don’t know that."

"No," Charlie admitted. "But worrying about it won’t change anything."

The cook called again.

"A! Come on!"

Charlie frowned slightly.

"Actually," he called back, "it’s Charlie."

The cook stared at him.

"Yes, A."

Charlie paused.

"No. Charlie."

The cook nodded as though he’d understood perfectly.

"Of course, A."

Charlie decided to leave it alone.

He looked around for something suitable to wear and found several sets of kitchen clothing hanging along the wall. Before he could reach them, an older cook picked up a folded set and handed it to him.

"Here, A."

Charlie accepted the clothes.

"Thank you."

He changed quickly, and the clothing fit so naturally that he barely had to adjust it. Once he had finished, he glanced back toward the woman.

"There’s something else I’ve been meaning to ask."

"What?"

"I never got your name."

Her expression immediately changed.

"You don’t remember?"

Charlie hesitated.

"Should I?"

She stared at him.

"This is probably the tenth time you’ve asked me."

Charlie went quiet.

Ten times?

He had a feeling the previous owner of this body had been spectacularly bad at remembering people’s names.

The woman sighed, clearly resigned to having to say it again.

"My name is Shen Tianyu Longxuan Haoran Mingzhe Xuanzhen Qingfeng Yulong Weiming."

Charlie listened carefully. By the time she finished, he was already certain he would never remember it.

"Right."

She waited.

Charlie gave her a polite smile.

"I’ll call you Yu."

Her eyes narrowed.

"That isn’t my name."

"It is now."

Before she could argue, another voice came from across the kitchen.

"A!"

Charlie turned.

The same cook was waving at him.

"We need you!"

Charlie looked back at Yu.

"I’ll deal with the name situation later."

He walked toward the cooking stations. As he did, a strange thought crossed his mind. He knew how to cook.

Not in the vague sense of knowing how to boil something or cut vegetables. His hands seemed to understand what they were doing before he consciously decided what to do. He picked up a knife and held it correctly without thinking. He knew how much pressure to use, how to prepare the ingredients, how to adjust the fire, and even where everything belonged.

It felt less like remembering something and more like his body had simply decided it already knew.

That was strange enough on its own.

What was stranger was that cooking had never really been his responsibility in his old life. Erika had usually handled it. She had cooked for him and the children almost every day, and Charlie had never given much thought to how much of their home life depended on those ordinary routines until they were suddenly gone.

His hands continued working while his thoughts drifted back to them. He wondered what Erika was doing now. Whether she had been told what happened. Whether she was grieving.

The thought of her having to wake up each morning without him left a heaviness in his chest that he didn’t quite know what to do with. He hoped she wasn’t blaming herself for anything. More than anything, he hoped she would eventually be all right.

Then his mind wandered to Carmen. The memory brought a quiet chuckle out of him before he could stop it.

"What’s so funny?"

Charlie looked up.

One of the cooks was watching him.

"Nothing."

The cook shrugged and returned to his work.

Charlie did the same.

He continued working, his hands moving with an ease that still made little sense to him. He knew how to use almost everything around him, from the knives and cooking pots to the strange utensils he had never seen before. It was almost unsettling.

Eventually, one of the cooks beside him glanced over.

"So, A, what are you making for the main dish?"

"So, A, what are you making for the main dish?"

"I haven’t decided yet."

The cook waited for an answer, but Charlie genuinely didn’t have one. His hands were already working through the ingredients in front of him, picking things up almost without thought as different possibilities crossed his mind.

Then he realized the kitchen had gone quiet.

He glanced up to find more than fifty cooks waiting to hear what he would say.

Charlie wasn’t quite sure what they expected him to announce.

"I’ll see what happens."

That seemed to satisfy them.

A few of the cooks smiled to themselves before returning to their work, and the noise of the kitchen gradually returned with them. Charlie let it go. Whatever was going on, he would probably understand eventually.

For now, he had food in front of him and an hour to do something with it.

"Sixty minutes!" one of the senior cooks called. "Everything needs to be ready by then!"

Some minutes after the doors to the manor opened and the announcement of arriving guests carried all the way into the kitchen.

"The Liang family has arrived!"

A few of the cooks exchanged glances, and the younger ones began whispering among themselves. Charlie couldn’t make out what they were saying over the noise of the kitchen, nor did he particularly care until another name was announced.

"The Yun Merchant House has arrived!"

Charlie immediately recognized the name.

The young merchant from earlier. He wondered briefly whether he himself had come.

Before he could ask, another announcement rang through the manor.

"The Azure Cloud Sect has arrived!"

This time, the reaction was completely different.

Conversation in the kitchen faded almost immediately, and even the cooks who had been joking with one another became noticeably more restrained. Charlie finally turned his attention away from the food.

"The Azure Cloud Sect?"

Yu gave him a look that suggested he had somehow managed to ask another question that everyone else would have considered obvious.

"You really don’t know anything, do you?"

"I’m learning."

"The Azure Cloud Sect is one of the great sects around Liangjing. You should probably avoid offending them."

Charlie gave a small nod and returned to his work.

That seemed reasonable. He had already offended one man today, and there was no particular reason to make a habit of it.

As the appointed time approached, the kitchen shifted into its final preparations. The first dishes were brought out in large covered trays, with servants moving carefully between the cooks and the dining hall while Yu directed them where to go. She checked each tray before it left, made sure nothing had been forgotten, and occasionally called another servant back when something needed to be adjusted.

"That one goes to the eastern table."

"Yes, Miss Shen Tianyu Longxuan Haoran Mingzhe Xuanzhen Qingfeng Yulong Weiming."

"And be careful with the soup. It’s still hot."

"Understood."

The steady stream of dishes gradually cleared the kitchen, but Charlie’s work was nowhere near finished. His main dish had become considerably more involved than he had expected, though his hands continued moving with the same strange confidence they had shown since he started. He wasn’t following a recipe or even consciously planning each step anymore. He simply seemed to know what came next.

One of the cooks finished preparing his own dish and, rather than leaving, wandered over to Charlie’s station. He stood there for a while, watching the ingredients being added to the pot before quietly asking, "What are you making?"

Charlie didn’t look away from what he was doing.

"I don’t know yet."

The cook nodded as though that made perfect sense.

A little while later, another cook came over. Then another.

Some had finished their work completely, while others found excuses to pass by Charlie’s station, checking the pot whenever they thought he wasn’t paying attention. A few exchanged quiet remarks about the smell, and before long the space around Charlie had become noticeably more crowded.

The senior cooks eventually joined them, standing farther back at first before gradually moving closer as the aroma from Charlie’s dish filled more of the kitchen. Even the younger cooks who had already carried their dishes outside seemed to find reasons to return.

Charlie finally noticed the crowd when he reached for an ingredient and found someone standing directly behind him.

"Am I in your way?"

"No, no. Continue."

Charlie gave him a brief glance before carrying on.

Yu was still busy directing servants near the doorway, apparently unconcerned by the growing group around Charlie. She had seen this before.

The cooks, however, were clearly interested in what was happening in front of them.

Charlie stirred the pot, tasted the sauce, and frowned slightly before adding another ingredient.

"Almost."

One of the cooks leaned closer.

"Almost what?"

"Almost right."

That was apparently enough to make several of them smile.

Charlie had no idea why.

Charlie stirred the pot again, trying to decide what was missing, when the system suddenly appeared in front of him.

[Special Cooking Ability has been successfully established.]

His hand stopped halfway through another stir.

[Special Cooking Ability: Heavenly Culinary Arts]

[The host’s cooking possesses extraordinary effects beyond taste.]

Charlie read the next lines with growing confusion.

[Possible effects include:]

[1. Taste Trance — The eater may enter a temporary state of blissful trance, during which the flow of Qi can become temporarily obstructed.]

[2. Clothing Disruption — When the taste exceeds the body’s ability to contain the sensation, the eater’s clothing may be forcibly removed or torn away.]

Charlie slowly lowered the spoon.

"Excuse me?"

[3. Temporary Cultivation Awakening — Certain dishes may temporarily stimulate the eater’s cultivation potential, allowing the body to access strength or abilities normally beyond its current limits.]

[Additional culinary effects are currently locked.]

Charlie read that last line twice.

"Locked?"

[Yes.]

"How do I unlock them?"

[Continue cooking.]

Charlie stared at the system.

"That’s it?"

[Yes.]

He couldn’t decide whether that was helpful or deeply irritating.

Then he remembered Yu’s earlier words.

Your cooking has certain side effects.

At the time, Charlie had assumed she was exaggerating or referring to something mundane. He certainly hadn’t expected his food to interfere with people’s Qi, strip their clothes off, or temporarily awaken their cultivation.

He rubbed his forehead.

"Right. Of course."

The system disappeared, leaving him alone with the pot and a kitchen full of cooks.

He tasted the dish again.

It was good.

Very good.

But something was still missing.

Charlie couldn’t explain what it was. His hands seemed convinced that the dish wasn’t finished, and after discovering that his cooking apparently came with supernatural consequences, he wasn’t sure whether he wanted to trust them quite as much as before.

Before he could investigate further, a servant hurried into the kitchen and approached Yu.

"Miss, the families are very pleased with several of the dishes."

Yu smiled.

"Which ones?"

"The braised lotus root, the cloud mushroom soup, and the eight-spice duck were especially well received. They would like to know which cooks prepared them."

"Very well."

Yu turned toward the kitchen.

"Master Chen, Elder Wu, and Mei Lan, prepare yourselves. The families wish to meet the cooks responsible for those dishes."

Three cooks immediately stepped forward.

The others congratulated them as they left, and several more servants came through to collect additional dishes for the dining hall. The kitchen slowly became less crowded as cooks were called away, until only a handful remained near Charlie.

"What are you looking for?" one of the remaining cooks finally asked.

Charlie frowned slightly.

"I don’t know."

He added another ingredient, stirred slowly, and tasted it once more.

"No."

The cook watched him for a moment.

"You’re usually very particular."

"Apparently."

Charlie reached for another ingredient.

In the dining hall, the first courses had already been served.

The Liang family occupied one side of the great table, the Yun Merchant House sat nearby, and several representatives of the Azure Cloud Sect had been given seats toward the front.

At the head of the table sat the master of the manor.

His expression had remained sour throughout the meal.

One by one, the cooks whose dishes had received praise were brought before him and the guests. They bowed, introduced themselves, and explained which dishes they had prepared while the families offered their compliments.

The master listened to each of them with increasing impatience.

The young master of the Yun Merchant House eventually noticed.

"Master, are the dishes not to your liking?"

The master glanced toward him.

"They are good."

The young merchant looked slightly surprised.

"Then why do you seem dissatisfied?"

The master leaned back in his chair, his eyes moving toward the entrance of the dining hall.

"Because these are not the dishes I’m waiting for."

The young master followed his gaze.

"Not the dishes?"

"There is something else being prepared."

A hint of anticipation entered the master’s otherwise irritated expression.

"Something far better than everything you’ve tasted tonight combined."

The young master raised his eyebrows.

"Better than all of these?"

"Much better."

The young merchant smiled, clearly intrigued now.

"Then I suppose I’ll be waiting for this grand dish as well."

The master said nothing more, while staring toward the entrance, waiting for the one person who had not yet appeared.