III-35 Commis (II)

“What the hell is this? 

“My apron, my knife. I understand that what I did today-”

“Shiv, fuck off. What are you doing? Get that thing, get that out of my fucking face. I'm not firing you, and you're not quitting.”

“I- I hit the chef de partie over the head. I splashed boiling water into his face.”

“Yeah, after the cunt threatened you with a knife, after he fucked up my order, after he tried blaming it on you, after he screamed and tried to abuse one of my Commis. She's gone now—probably not getting her back, so that's one more person down for the kitchen. Soon to be two. You want to know why it's going to be two, Shiv? Because I'm running out of a Chef de Partie as well, and so long as I'm here in this town, he's not going to be working at the Swan-Eating Toad. He's not going to be working anywhere. And you're not quitting. You're not quitting for defending yourself or telling a cunt to go fuck himself.

I told you before. I told you at the start of this. What did I tell you?”

“Uh, you told me a lot of things, chef.”

“What did I tell you about respect? Respect your fellowships and respect yourself. Don't take shit from them. I told you that. I told you that a thousand times. You are not a slave here, you're not a serf. You hitting him is a natural consequence of him being too much of a cunt that his cunt eyes have actually become working cunts, and he can't see what he's doing wrong. Well, he's gonna learn real soon. Yeah, he's gonna fail and learn.”

“It doesn't matter if he's more senior than you. This is a kitchen. We work together. We try to make food together, and if it went wrong with him, then he is the problem. It doesn't matter that he's higher up, it matters that the failure happened to him and not anyone else. We all fuck up. That happens. I scream, I lose my shit, I go outside and smoke, we talk about it. It happens.”

“Yes chef.”

“I can fire you for being incompetent as a chef, that's one thing. I won't hate you. This happens. Sometimes you're not fit for the job. Sometimes the skill just leaks out of you, right? It burns, and you're tired, and you don't want to do it anymore. Sometimes the world outpaces you. Never, never, never is there an acceptable case where a chef makes a mistake, tries to throw it on someone else, and continues working there. This isn't government. We’re not nobles or elites. We don’t get a free pass to be shit. You can't get away with this. People have to eat our food. There are other restaurants to choose from. Do you understand?”

“I think, chef.”

“Good. Now put your apron back on, pick up that knife, and get the fuck back in there. There are cabbages that still need preparing.”

“Yes, chef.”

-Georges Archambault and Shiv

III-35

Commis (II)

"We stand before you arrayed and at your beck and call, O Chef de Cuisine!" Whisper said.

A grin adorned the orc's face, and he flourished with two gleaming knives in his hands. Both of them glistened, pure and free of bacteria, cleansed by magic and faintest heat. Beside him, Mortar conjured a ball of flame in his hands and shaped a spatula from a hovering mess of metal. Tequila meanwhile juggled a series of condiments while Band stared at the Abyssal Gateway as he slowly dragged out wailing notes on his violin.

Shiv took in the orcs and squinted at them. This wasn't a cooperative kitchen. The orcs here were standing before him arrayed not in support, but to challenge his authority, to find any hint of weakness within Shiv's emotions—any weakness in his cooking. He had disciplined them by breaking a wall earlier, but that was merely the physical struggle. The battle here was social, psychological, and above all, egotistical.

Cooking, like combat, was an essential part of Shiv. And if the orcs thought they were going to shake him, to find weakness here, they were sorely mistaken.

I am the pillar, Shiv thought to himself as he drew in a slow breath. He studied the orcs’ bodies and found them utterly calm and studying him as well. Shiv’s fingers twitched. Whisper noticed. Band stopped pulling his bow. Tequila and Mortar grinned at each other as tension built. I am The Chef Unwavering. And today, these orcs are going to learn.

"Alright. Listen up. We’re going to prepare this basilisk methodically. Carefully. Properly.” Nearby, Gemstone lay unmoving, its heart stopped by Shiv's Biomancy—a merciful end delivered in prelude to a new culinary struggle. “You’re going to help me make this. You're going to man the stations I tell you to man and prepare the ingredients the way I ask you to. And when we’re done, you’re going to be the first to try the dish. And I will see you broken before me.”

“Oh, will you now,” Tequila said, yawning. “Do you cook with your mouth, chef? Do you have a Boasting-Cooking Skill Fusion?”

“Can’t be,” Mortar sneered. “He’s bad at the former. Might not be good at the latter since we’re wasting time.”

You son of a bitch! Shiv snarled inside. But outside, he kept his expression calm and his gaze focused.

Most of their secondary ingredients were prepared nearby. Cauliflowers, mangoes, loomgrapes, glass peppers, mushrooms, and more lay in sectioned piles behind the orcs. At the center of the special cooking zone, the Deathless and the orcs continued their staredown as the Court Leviathan continued to wave the dead cave biter up and down. This made the dead monster’s shadow serve in place of rolling tumbleweeds.

A small audience of off-duty Umbrals, Weaveresses, mercenaries, and more watched from a distance. Behind Shiv were Adam and Uva. The former looked confused, while the latter held a look of utter exasperation on her face.

Shiv gave the orcs a final glare before he began. “We do this the standard way. Preparations first. Portioning first. Cutting and slicing first.” He stared at Whisper and eyed the stealthy orc as his first victim. He would break Whisper here and now so the other orcs knew what was coming.  "You good with those knives, Whisper?"

"Some might say so," Whisper replied. He flourished, the twin gleaming blades in his hands; bacteria avoided the shine. It was likely even sterilizing, judging by the heat that emanated off of it.

"Well then, pick a side, Whisper," Shiv said, gesturing at the dead basilisk. “Three hundred meters. Plenty of space. Whichever end you want.”

"And why am I picking a side, oh chef?" Whisper said. Intellect glinted behind his yellow eyes, and Shiv knew what the orc was trying to do. He was trying to annoy Shiv, trying to throw him off. This wouldn’t work.

"Because it's faster if both of us prepare the basilisk at once," Shiv said. "I could do it alone. But this makes it more interesting. Doesn’t it? Let’s see who's the better cutter.”

Whisper bared his teeth. “Ah. So it is to be a portioning duel, then. Do not blame me if I shame you, chef. I choose tail.”

“I’ll take head,” Shiv replied, barely suppressing a growl.

“Meet in the middle?” Whisper asked. He knew they weren’t going to do that.

“We’ll meet along the way. Whoever reaches the other first. This is a kitchen, Whisper, not a democracy. What we get to do here is determined by skill, by efficiency, by blade. If I get to you, that means you’re not keeping tempo.”

Band vigorously pulled on his violin to gave Shiv’s statement a bit more gravitas.

“Oh, I’ll keep tempo, chef. Don’t you worry.” Whisper bowed lightly. Not slight enough to be submissive, but just enough to let Shiv know he earned a bit of respect.

Everything the orc does is manipulation mixed in with some truth, Shiv remembered. Never get it confused. Not even when they flatter you, Shiv.

Shiv never broke eye contact with any of the orcs as he magnified the size of his Skysplitter. He placed below the huge pan he used to fry the Court Leviathan’s tentacles. With a casual flick of his hand, he channeled a rush of flame into the blade as it began to simmer. Then, he noticed the ball of fire circling Mortar’s right hand.

"Mortar," Shiv called out, "this knife is magic amplifying. You got Pyromancy?"

"A bit," Mortar said. "You want me to heat it up?"

"I want you to get it hot. Basilisks have some regeneration, so we’re going to need to burn this deep. We're making pan-seared basilisk with abyssal mango and loomgrape glaze paired with cauliflower, mushrooms, and glass peppers. Are we clear on this?”

“Yes chef!” The orcs barked as one. And they responded without a hint of irony. They were loving this. And Shiv was too. Godsdammit, this is kind of fun. Is this what it’s like to run your own kitchen.

“As of right now, you," he pointed at Mortar, "are in charge of the grill. Whisper, when we're done portioning out the basilisk—and we are going to portion this entire basilisk perfectly—you're going to be in charge of cutting the vegetables and other ingredients as well. Don’t fuck up the portion.”

“Of course, chef,” Whisper grinned.

Suddenly, a waft of smoke assailed Shiv’s nostrils. He looked at Tequila, the wand-using orc, who leaned his head back and grinned. He was smoking two cigarettes at once, and was placing sauce after sauce on a nearby table. The azure sun struck the bottles the orc placed down, and their insides came alight in a multicolored glow. "Smoking's for the outside. Snuff it out unless you’re resting. You don't smoke unless you're on break. Got it? And we're not going on break today.”

Tequila nodded, and drew in a long breath. Both his cigarettes were inhaled down to the nubs, and he spat them out, aiming at the back of Mortar's head. The large orc moved faster than Shiv expected. He caught the twin butts before they impacted him in a massive metallic fist.

“Use your Chronomancy next time, copper,” Mortar snorted.

“Copper?” Adam muttered.

Mortar gave Tequila a disgusted look. “Tequila here was a detective for a while. An inspector, even. HKPD.”

“They let you be an investigator?” Adam gawked.

“Why not?” Tequila shrugged. “It’s my Path.”

The Gate Lord’s expression grew three times more incredulous that very instant.

"Anyway, Tequila, you're going to be in charge of the sauces," Shiv continued. "I need you to prepare the mangoes and the loom grape."

"Can I offer a suggestion, chef?" Tequila said, now folding his arms behind his back.

Shiv's eyes narrowed. There was going to be a trick here. "What kind of suggestion?"

"I think we could use some wine with this. Rice wine. The people here look parched, starved of a good accompaniment. We focus so hard on the main course and the side. But what about libations?"

The swan-eating toad always had a set list of drinks. In truth, it was not Shiv's expertise. He was mostly focused on food. So focused that he wasn't that good at baking either. And just then, Georges’s voice echoed in Shiv's head again.

"You can't possibly be skilled at everything, even in your desired art. You don't have enough time. And those who'd have enough time still can't do everything at once, no matter how powerful they are. The important thing for you to learn right now is that you have to rely on other people. Let them do their felling work. Let them be who they can be, and don't get in their way. Even if they are an asshole, especially if they are an asshole, sometimes you just need the asshole to shit himself hard. That way, he can propel himself and drag the rest of the group with him or make a mess and clean it up on his own.”

“If you can handle the wine without it getting in the way of your actual station. Sure. But doesn’t it take months to ferment wine?”

“Only for the unskilled,” Tequila replied. “I just need some rice and wine.” And then he was looking at Uva.

“Turn your eyes away from me, orc,” Uva said, her voice low and unamused. “I am not a maid for you to command. And neither are my sisters.”

“But Sister Uva,” Tequila said, making his voice seem childlike, “I don’t know where anything is here. Please. Can you lend me your aid…”

“No.”

Tequila frowned and turned a troubled expression on Shiv. “Is she this cold when you fuck her? Does she feel like an icebox? Do you enjoy that kind of thing.”

Adam sputtered. Shiv gritted his teeth, and Uva’s stare turned to a vicious glare. The Umbral’s right eye twitched. “Shiv. Dearest. I fear this brute has tragically lost the will to live and is fated to die in his next mission. He will be surrounded by enemies after wandering too deep into an ambush. I mourn for him in advance.”

“Poor bastard,” Shiv said, shaking his head as he looked at Uva. “Always said the wrong thing at the wrong time.”

“Why are you looking at each other?” Tequila asked. “What are you saying? If it’s tips you want, I can offer them. I served as a sexual consultant for some of my colleagues while I was an Inspector.”

“They will miss you,” Uva muttered darkly.

Tequila’s smile broke for a moment. “What?”

“That rice wine better be godsdamned good, Tequila,” Shiv said. “Otherwise, I’m not sure if I’ll remember you in a few years.”

“Ah,” Whisper sighed as he waggled a large finger at Tequila. “Our habitual line-stepper has stumbled over another line again.”

“What? It was an honest question.”

“And yours will be an honest death,” Whisper replied with a casual shrug. “Between the Deathless and the Sister, I think the former offers a better end. Especially since none of us will euthanize you if something happens.”

Tequila grimaced. “That’s a horrible thing to say to a fellow orc.”

“Think. Before. Talk.” Band grunted each word at Tequila while shaking his head.

And that was another thing about orcs—if you bit down on one of their mistakes, the other orcs might just join in on bullying them with you. Because everyone was fair game for domination and abuse.

“Should have just mixed the sauce, sauce-mixer,” Mortar laughed. Then, Band and Whisper laughed too, leaving Tequila to contend with the hard gazes levied upon him by Shiv and Uva.

“Oh, Challenger, this might be a short life,” Tequila mumbled to himself.

"And Band," Shiv said, staring at the final orc.

Band lowered his violin and grinned at Shiv. "Yes." His voice was like gravel grinding against a chalkboard surface. "Your. Orders. Chef."

Shiv had something special planned for that one. They had a knife—the same kind Georges gave Shiv. And there might be something there connecting Georges to the orc. Something Shiv wanted to know about. “I want you preparing the main dish beside me later. But start with the vegetables on the side. I want to see how good you do.”

“Why’s he special?” Mortar grunted. “This is bloody favoritism, chef. I ran the chain.”

“Yes. But he has a Moonsteel chef’s knife,” Shiv said. “And I want to know why and from where.”

Mortar eyed Band and let out a grunt. “I could tell Deathless. I could tell you all about this sentimental bastard. All kinds of things.”

“Fuck. You.” Band snarled at Mortar, but the big automata-armored orc just blew Band a mocking kiss.

Shiv’s Outside Context Problem trembled—and that provoked a reaction from Band. The musical orc’s eyes widened, and his violin immediately came aglow with violet energy—so much Divination mana it spilled into the visible spectrum. He pulled hard on his bow just as Shiv started to have a vision—the screen gone since there was no Rose to filter the details through. Before Outside Context Problem could trigger, the orc canceled it out with a screaming note from his instrument.

Outside Context Problem 61 > 64

A splash of Vitaemancy broke away from Shiv. The vision died. He clenched his fists—but froze as Band held his violin high.

“Tell. After.” Band said. A mana strand hovered just a meter away from his head. The musical orc glared at Mortar with an expression of loathing. If this hate was fake, Band was one hell of an actor.

“Shiv?” Uva said, her tone focused and cold as winter. “Are you alright?”

“Just fine,” Shiv said. “Not idea what he just did, though.”

“He canceled out something,” Adam said. “I saw a pulse of Divination—broke my focus for a moment. It conveyed a message to me too…”

“Told. World. Stop. My. Secret. Tell. Later. Cook. First.” Band sneered at Shiv. “Tell. Everything. If. Cooking. Not. Shit. Most. Cooking. Shit.”

And that confirmed something for Shiv. Band definitely had an encounter with Georges before. “Not shit, huh? Fine. I’ll show you not shit. Commis! Stations!”

Shiv and his orcs broke to perform their designated tasks. 

Immediately, Shiv locked eyes with Whisper, and an instant rivalry was born. Shiv pulled out his chef’s knife and a bone dagger. Meanwhile, Whisper gestured with one of his glowing blades and summoned a swarm more from the depths of his billowing midnight robes. The summoned blades danced around him, flowed to the movements of the blades like an orchestra would obey a conductor.

Shiv and Whisper briefly circled each other before breaking and moving to the opposite ends of the basilisk.

“Is walking around each other like two stray cats truly necessary,” Uva deadpanned.

“Yes,” Shiv said, finally ending his turn and backing away from Whisper.

“Not doing this affects the cooking,” Whisper replied, never taking his eyes off Shiv.

"What is even happening anymore?" Adam muttered off to the side.

"What is happening," Uva began, "is that you might be getting replaced as Shiv's favorite companion."

"What?" Adam said, frowning at Uva. "Favored—By these orcs? Impossible. And also, I'm not his favorite companion. That's not where we are." The Gate Lord fell silent as he went back to staring Shiv and Whisper. Then, he flinched. "Do you actually mean that, or were you just making fun of me, Uva?”

She eyed him with a flat stare that turned into a look of pity. “Oh, Adam.”

“What? What?”

"You better watch yourself, little bird," Mortar growled out as he looked at Adam from the corner of his eye. The large orc released bursts of flame from the mortar on his back, slashing it upon the flat side of the Skysplitter. The prismatic blade came alight and conducted the magic, and the pan above it grew dull red with heat. “Think you’re not that interesting compared to us. Can’t even cook, can you?”

The orc's declaration made Adam scowl. "You—I can learn, you bastard.”

Uva covered her face, trying not to cringe. "Adam, they're provoking you.” 

“And they succeeded. I don't care if I'm a favorite companion or whatever," Adam snapped, showing exactly how much he didn’t care with his frustrated outburst. "I don't even care if Shiv likes me, but I'm not being replaced by bloody orcs."

Mortar then threw his head back and barked a loud laugh. "Ha! Goarded!" The other orcs wheezed. Tequila slapped his knee, and that just made Adam sneer at them. He instantly accelerated next to Shiv, who was standing beside the head of the dead basilisk.

"All right, what are we doing?" Adam asked.

"What do you mean, what are we doing?" Shiv said, barely noticing Adam's presence. Right now, there was only him and Whisper in the world, and he wasn't going to let the orc clean, peel, and slice this basilisk better than him.

"They're bullying me, Shiv," Adam hissed. "The orcs, they're attacking me, socially. I really don't care about this whole favored friend thing. We're not really even friends, we're just... but still, come on, you're not actually going to replace me with an orc, right? And you said you’d teach me how to cook.”

“I need to teach them first,” Shiv whispered as The Chef Unwavering activated. The world glistened with a soft, white glow. Focus consumed him. “I am the chef. I am the kitchen. I am my knife.”

“Shiv… Are you entering a bloody fugue state in front of me?” Adam gawked.

“I am the chef,” Shiv muttered, holding up his knife. 

Whisper was reflected along the blade’s edge, and the orc sneered at Adam.

“You don’t belong here, Gate Lord. Here in the kitchen. You’re not chef. You should go back to where you're most useful." And Whisper grinned. "Maybe your mother needs another hug. But… maybe we might be better at holding her than you are? We do have longer arms and more body heat.”

"You piece of shit," Adam snarled.

Shiv held Adam back and simply shook his head. "Don't," Shiv said.

"Don't what? He mentioned my mother! He’s trying to—”

"He's trying to use you to throw me off," Shiv breathed. Shiv felt his Deepest Edge trembling within its blades, and it yearned to be unleashed. It yearned to glide across the entirety of the basilisk. When he cut, he wouldn't chip any of the shiny scales. He wouldn't hew too deep or cleave off an improper amount of flesh. No. The scale would be degloved perfectly from the prime meat. “Adam. Stand back. This orc thinks he’s gonna shake me—that this is going to split my focus. It won’t. No more tricks, Whisper. I come for you.”

The robed orc held out his arms. “I await your skills, Deathless. Show me!”

“Witness the end of your culinary ambitions, Whisper. In this kitchen, there is no god, no system, only me. We start when you slice.”

“Of all things that induce megalomania in a man,” Uva sighed.

“This is hubris, Deathless. But so be it.” Whisper scowled. And as soon as the orc finished speaking, a swarm of blades exploded out from his body and began gliding along the basilisk's glistening scales. 

Shiv's eyes widened as he glimpsed the path of Whisper’s cuts. A swarm of blades was splitting between the crevices of every scale, loosening every single piece of the basilisk’s body. Immediately, one hundred meters of the basilisk were flensed through. The cut was almost perfect, with only the thinnest slice of meat still attached to the scales. Precise. Controlled. Slight meat loss… His focus must be incredible to control this many blades. He must have Parallel Thinking. Too bad that all this work will be brought to an end by Deepest Edge.

Awareness 14 > 15

Whisper intended to chip away every part of the basilisk piece by piece. Shiv was going to flay the skin clean off with a single blow.

He took a step forward and gathered his concentration. The Chef Unwavering lit the path of his cut. Instinct took hold thereafter. Shiv knew the path for his slash. He let his blades fly. All he needed to do was—

His chef’s knife twisted unnatural out of his grasp, twisting at an angle!

Shiv caught sight of a sudden shine lighting his blade—the same gleam that lit every single one of Whisper's blades. 

It's part of his skill, Shiv realized. He has control over knives.

Whisper grinned. Shiv’s cut went off course while more of the orc’s flying daggers zipped toward him.

Then, everything halted in a flash of gold. Before Shiv’s blade could commit a mistake he couldn’t recover from, he cast himself back in time and jolted back to where he was a second ago. Rage flared in the Deathless as he looked upon the offending orc. He was well within his rights to throw Whisper out of the kitchen. Competition was one thing, but risking the food over ego? That was unacceptable.

But before that, he needed to finish showing this orc how things were properly cut.

Yet, even as with time frozen, his daggers glowed with the same hue as Whisper’s flying knives.

Shiv just scoffed. “Like that’s going to stop me. Fine. Take my knives. I’ll do this the painful way.”

He summoned the power of his Biomancy and immediately flayed his skin clean off his body. Pain consumed Shiv, but after all he endured the past few days, he barely grunted. He poured that injury into a Woundeater and then unleashed it into the basilisk as a spell. At once, its scales detached with a shudder.

The faintest cracks formed on his shell.

He conjured lacerations thereafter. The Chef Unwavering allowed him to tune the scope and severity of the cuts while his Biomancy showed him where to unleash the slices. Not having Deepest Edge made this harder, but still, he relished the challenge as he unleashed spell after spell into the massive serpent. A neat grid formed across its body as Shiv cleaved it apart with magic rather than steel. He glided through the air, spiking his gravitic field faster and faster to buy himself more time, surging his Reflexes. Inertial Overdrive thundered around him, and Shiv felt himself grow faster. With Plaguefueled boosting his physical attributes to an absurd degree, he shot past fifty spikes before his marrow began combusting within his bones. Even then, his flesh was slow to tear.

I love basilisk venom. Have to learn how to make my own.

Woundeater > 90

The drunkenness threatened to overtake him at several points without Uva keeping it at bay, but The Chef Unwavering kept him from the edge, and his Psychomancy did just a bit more to center his focus.

Soon, he was gliding beside the orc, finishing the slices on Whisper’s end as well. As he concluded his cuts, Shiv glared down at the orc and let time flow—just as his temporal shell nearly shattered.

Whisper’s blades stabbed down, but they were dragged out of position as Shiv plucked the basilisk’s scales clean from its body, and extracted its organs from its open mouth thereafter. The scales were flung into Whisper—but it phased through him as he activated his Dimensionality Skill. Even so, as the massive swath of gleaming outer skin finished passing through the orc, his eyes widened, and he started in awe as Shiv extracted the basilisk’s skeleton with a gesture. The Deathless pulled every bone in the basilisk’s body between its split flesh without displacing any of the meat.

The Chef Unwavering 57 > 59

The cuts Shiv made were delicate. Perfect. Unwavering. The bones hovered in the air for a moment, and then they were dropped beside Whisper as a statement. When the skeleton impacted the ground, Shiv slammed down as well.

“Clean this,” Shiv said, pointing at the skeleton. “Move it somewhere else and come back. You’re done with the cutting. You support everyone else, you understand? You’re not commis anymore. You’re just helper. You’re lucky I let you stay here at all.”

Whisper’s eyes widened in surprise as he sensed Shiv’s genuine anger. “I… Yes, chef. Of course. But—”

“Facing off against each other is one thing. But risking the dish is shit I will not abide. You have the skill, but you’re not the chef. You disrespected me and yourself when you pulled the trick with my blade. If the cut went wrong, the basilisk would be split, and the cuts wouldn’t be right. In my kitchen, we do things right. No fuck-ups. And that includes you. Cleaning duty. Apron off.”

Dread Aura 93 > 94

Whisper’s mouth fell open, but Mortar interrupted him with a loud laugh. The pan before the large orc was white-hot now. “You always did like that underhanded shit too much. Told you. Told you he wouldn’t appreciate it always. But you don’t listen. Always think you’re smarter than the humans. Or me.”

The midnight-robed orc let out a slight grunt of discomfort and bowed. “I… Apologize chef.” He handed over his blades in response. “Here. Take these—”

Shiv shook his head. “I don’t want that. Those are your knives. I want you to clean the kitchen and do what the other orc tell you to.”

Whisper looked uncomfortable. “Everything they tell me?”

“Oh, shit,” Tequila said, rubbing his hands. “Someone’s been demoted to assistant.”

“Within reason,” Shiv said. “Now. Bones. And then support. Mortar!” He called out, turning away from Whisper. The stealthy orc almost looked ashamed. “The pan’s ready?”

“Aye, chef. Come here and see for yourself.”

“Good. Band—” And to Shiv’s surprise, he saw a small army of air dimensionals circling the air, bearing the ingredients for the side dish in their grasp. Cauliflower, mushrooms, and glass peppers formed a whirlwind in the sky. There at the eye of the food-storm was Band, hovering and playing his music. From his bow then came flashes of flame as fire dimensionals combusted into existence beneath the air. They unleashed their flames upward in bursts that splashed through the vegetables, and slowly, every single ingredient was being seared and prepared at once.

Shiv’s The Chef Unwavering Skill showed him just how well they were being cooked. The heat of the flames kissing the mushrooms weren’t the same as that which coalesced over the cauliflower. Somehow, Band was adjusting and focusing the temperature and reactions of his dimensionals—and he fixed Shiv with a proud stare as he did.

“Alright,” Shiv said, slightly impressed. “Good leadership. Good eye. But I’ll see you on the skillet soon.”

“Skillet.” Band growled. “Make. Food. Good. Or. You. Are. Shit.”

The Deathless bared his teeth and removed the bone armor around his torso. He wanted to feel the heat more;  he wasn’t going to half ass anything with Band.

“Mortar! Keep the grill going.”

“Aye, chef,” Mortar chuckled. He offered Band a quick glance. “Looks like we got ourselves a showdown, Tequila.”

“My mithril’s on Band,” Tequila said. Somehow, and from somewhere, the orc managed to find a large lump of gelatinous rice. He was now mixing it in a water-filled barrel for some reason. “He’s got a spell for everything.”

“Heh,” Mortar grinned at Shiv. “I don’t know. I think our new Insul’s going to take more than a spell to put away.”