Gourmet Hunter - Chapter 223 (Patreon)

Chapter 223: The Illusion of Flavor

I don’t know if it’s because I’ve gotten stronger, but in the battle with Geru, Luo feels no pressure—perhaps because Geru’s trump card doesn’t work on him.

The stone house is furnished simply, yet the space isn’t small, with candles placed around as the sole source of light.

Outside, the rain continues unabated, though the frequency of lightning has noticeably decreased.

Sanbica Norton sits alone in a corner, while Luo and the others have taken their seats at a table.

Bisky briefly mentioned Geru's identity, with the latter adding a few details, allowing Luo to understand Geru beyond just a superficial level.

Luo recalls the members of the Zodiacs from his memory; a few of the female members don’t look like Geru. Could it be that there have been changes to the members of the Zodiacs by the time the story begins, or perhaps their appearances have drastically changed over the past decade.

Regardless of the situation, he feels the members of the Zodiacs should all be strong; if it's Geru’s level of strength, it seems below standard.

Geru is unaware of Luo's thoughts, and even if she knew, she wouldn’t bother to compete with him.

Everyone sits quietly inside the stone house. A middle-aged man who was fortunate enough to come in to avoid the rain behaves cautiously, daring not to speak a word, just listening to the conversation among Luo and the others.

From their conversation, the middle-aged man learns the identities of Geru and Bisky, not daring to interject rashly.

He is named Daihu, after a wild beast living in the plains—what his parents were thinking when they named him, he doesn’t know.

“This rain might last a few days, but I'll only let you stay for one night,” Luo says.

Geru raises her eyebrows slightly, but doesn’t object. She fought Luo the previous night, leaving her physically and mentally drained; a night's rest will do her good.

Daihu shamelessly follows along, grateful to have been taken in, with no room for complaints.

“Bisky.”

After settling Geru and Daihu, Luo turns to Bisky, who nods understandingly and then stands up.

The two of them leave the house, heading into the night rain to begin their training battle.

After Luo and Bisky leave, only three people remain inside the house.

Sanbica Norton watches Geru and Daihu silently; she doesn’t converse with them, maintaining her usual demeanor toward strangers.

Daihu fidgets, feeling awkward about where to place his hands and feet, terrified by the intuition he has developed from years living in the deep mountains, which warns him that the other two people in the room are very dangerous.

This means… both Geru and Sanbica Norton could easily thrash him.

In fact, in Daihu's eyes, the recently departed Luo and Bisky are of the same calibre, making him feel like a kitten among tigers and wolves.

Geru gazes at the closed stone door, her eyes reflecting deep thought.

During the conversation just now, she learned that Luo is Bisky's disciple, likely a newcomer who got his license within the last two years. She could look up Luo when she returns.

Half an hour later.

Luo and Bisky return to the stone house drenched, with their faces and bodies smeared with mud, looking quite disheveled after what appears to have been an intense battle.

Geru sees satisfaction on Luo’s face, which surprises her. She doesn’t know what happened in that half hour, and even if she wanted to, Luo wouldn’t tell her.

The half-hour battle didn’t give Luo any major advantages, but by leveraging the terrain, he managed to get the upper hand on Bisky for the first time in several months.

Had Bisky not observed his battle with Geru, the combination of rock traps and rainwater might have produced even better results.

Gaining an advantage over Bisky, even if he didn’t win, satisfies Luo. He aims to first defeat Bisky in his untransformed state before challenging him in his transformed state.

“I’ll help you first.”

Luo says, walking towards Bisky, who understands what Luo intends and nods slightly.

He had reserved some energy specifically to use Mr. Mighty, to cleanse the mud stains and rainwater from their bodies.

Luo lightly touches Bisky’s shoulder, drawing out the mud stains and rainwater from him, then repeats the process to cleanse himself.

After they're done, Luo looks at Geru and Daihu, who are still sitting down, and asks, “Aren’t you going to rest?”

“Where… do we sleep?” Daihu asks, voicing the question on Geru's mind.

Luo casually points to a spot on the ground, saying matter-of-factly, “There.”

…

The next morning, the rain is still falling, but much lighter

 compared to last night.

Luo wakes up early, but Geru and Bisky wake up even earlier.

Bisky, undeterred by the rain, goes outside for morning exercise, while Geru stands by the corpse of a Misfortune Toad, her eyebrows furrowed. She woke up to find the toad’s hind legs gone.

Luo enters the hall and immediately notices the missing hind legs of the toad, with the cut so clean, it looks as if it was done by an extremely sharp blade.

Seeing the cut, Luo’s face darkens, and he immediately guesses it was the work of the black cat, who ate it without removing the poison, apparently fearless of the venom.

Moreover, of the entire Misfortune Toad, only the hind legs are worth eating, so the black cat only ate those.

Geru shifts her gaze from the cut on the toad’s legs to Luo, saying, “The toad’s legs are gone.”

“I see that,” Luo replies.

“Who did it?” Geru tries asking.

Luo stretches out his hand, showing the silver flame tattoo on it, and says, “He did.”

Geru’s puzzled expression deepens, prompting Luo to pull out the black cat from the back of his hand.

The first thing the black cat says when it emerges is, “Luo, those mushrooms taste amazing. I’ve been here so long and never realized how delicious they are.”

Although Geru intended to ask about the toad, the black cat’s topic drifts to mushrooms.

Luo, having encountered Happiness Mushrooms the previous night, roughly understands what the black cat means by mushrooms, but he doesn’t dwell on it and cuts to the chase.

“Cut the nonsense. Did you eat the toad’s legs?”

The black cat glances at the toad missing its hind legs, licks its lips with a reminiscent look, and, though not answering, makes the answer obvious.

It had sneaked out in the middle of the night, first swallowing the toad’s hind legs, then devouring the Happiness Mushrooms in Daihu’s bag, before contentedly returning to Luo’s hand.

Geru doesn’t mind that the toad is missing two legs, as it’s a corpse, not a live creature, and its research value is not diminished by the missing limbs.

She looks at the black cat with a surprised gaze, asking, “Is this your Nen beast?”

Such intelligent and autonomous Nen beasts are extremely rare.

“Yes,” Luo rubs his forehead.

“That explains why it’s not afraid of the Misfortune Toad’s poison,” Geru whispers, understanding if it’s a Nen beast, then it makes sense.

The black cat shows no remorse for eating the toad’s legs, ignoring Geru and flying up to Luo’s face, eagerly saying, “I’m going to pick mushrooms for breakfast, mushroom soup!”

Seeing the unabashedly gluttonous black cat, Luo’s mouth twitches, saying, “Mushrooms? You mean the Happiness Mushrooms?”

The black cat nods vigorously; it found seven in Daihu’s bag the previous night and devoured them all, each mushroom tasting different but all delicious.

At this moment, Daihu is still asleep, blissfully unaware that his freshly picked mushrooms have been ruthlessly consumed.

“The flavor of Happiness Mushrooms… is an illusion,” Luo states blandly.

“An illusion?” the black cat questions.

“The taste you experienced isn’t real, it’s just the mushrooms making your tongue hallucinate,” Luo explains calmly, his interest in the mushrooms low because of this fact.

The flavor isn’t genuine, more like a special drug in the food.

Luo isn’t interested in this false flavor, but, if he uses his abilities to remove the mushroom’s toxins while preserving the properties that cause the hallucinations, any dish made from this ingredient, no matter how it’s cooked, will turn into a top-tier delicacy.

With such an ingredient, even a mediocre chef could run a nine-star restaurant, and if entered in a culinary competition, could easily clinch the championship.

Of course, that’s provided one has Luo’s ability to remove the mushroom’s toxicity while retaining its hallucinatory traits.

“Tongue producing hallucinations?” Geru is quite familiar with Happiness Mushrooms but has never heard of this phenomenon.

She looks at Luo, about to ask what he means when a surprised shout comes from inside the house.

“My mushrooms!” It’s Daihu, waking up to find his mushrooms gone.

His shout not only attracts everyone’s attention but also wakes up Sanbica Norton.

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