God of Cooking

Instead of answering, Jack looked at him as if he really took a load off his mind. Obviously, there was sadness in his eyes as if he was preparing to say goodbye to Min-joon. Although Min-joon noticed it, he could not bring himself to express it to Jack.

“Well, our golden age has passed.But you guys can grab it. Just show people that there is something ever ending in this world. Show them they can find our happiness in your kitchen.”

“Sure.”

“I’m tired. When you grow old, you don’t sleep much, but that’s not the case with me. I just fall asleep easily nowadays, though I know I’m going to sleep for a long time later.”

“Jack…”

“I’m sorry if I have ruined the atmosphere. Let me endure this ruined atmosphere by myself, so you just go ahead and take a rest.”

Although he hesitated a bit at Jack’s gentle order to leave, Min-joon eventually left the room. The sound of Min-joon closing the door was heard, then there was a quiet silence. Jack closed his eyes, overhearing the quiet conversation over the door in the kitchen. And he suddenly opened his eyes at somebody’s presence.

“You’ve been sleeping quite long, Jack!”

It was Rachel who was standing before him. Jack looked at her blankly, then looked around her. Their conversation outside the room was still noisy. He felt like he slept for long, but he didn’t.

“When did you come, Rachel?”

“Just a moment ago. I looked for you when I got here, but they said you were in your room.”

“How long have you been waiting?”

“I just said I came here a moment ago. I didn’t wait long.”

He wished he hadn’t shown his miserable looks to her. He wanted to show her how stubborn he was until the last moment. Regretting he didn’t, though, he rubbed his face with his bare hands.

Watching him, Rachel opened her mouth.

“I hear you handed over Daniel’s cooking journal to Min-joon.”

“Oh, you already heard about it from him?”

“As soon as he saw me, he mentioned it, as if he was pretty proud of it. But it looked like he felt it awkward to hide it from me.”

“Well, it’s more ridiculous for him not to know about Daniel while he was working for you. I gave it to him because I thought he needed to know the situation a little more. Did I go too far?”

“Yeah, you went too far.”

“I’m glad to hear that,” he said, giggling as if she deserved it.

She watched him quietly, who was soon facing his last moment in this life.

“Are you going to put down everything like this?”

She didn’t even have to ask what he was going to put down.

While watching her blankly, he opened his mouth in an emotionally charged voice.

“I don’t think I’m in a position to hear you asking me that when I already let go of my desire for ten years.”

“Are you going to make the same mistake I did? Jack, you and I have lived until now without even thinking about giving up, right?”

“I’ve never given up, Rachel. I just tried to convince myself that I don’t have much time left in this world. All I can do during that time is just prepare to bid farewell to those around me so that they won’t remember my last days sadly.”

“There is something you haven’t achieved yet,” Rachel said in a sad voice. “You have to give me bread. When I make the most perfect dinner, I need the bread you make for it. If you can’t, you have to have Lisa make it for me.”

“Man, you’re so spoiled! If you want to say that, you shouldn’t have been missing for the past ten years. If you haven’t, I can understand your feelings.”

“Well, I’ve been doing it my way all my life, Jack. Anyway, I’ll never let you go if I don’t receive your bread when I make the most perfect dinner. Remember it!”

“Gosh, you’re a bully as always!”

Jack sighed as if he couldn’t help it. But he knew well that she mentioned it because she loved him so much. That’s why he felt so sorry for the lost ten years when she was in hiding. If she had not gone into hiding for ten years, he could have had more dialogues with her, and comforted her.

“I hope Min-joon can achieve more than you want.”

“Yeah, he will do it. So, you have to survive and watch him!”

“Hope you can take care of Lisa. I don’t even think that she’s going to die. She’ll get over it. She has endured her wounded heart alone. So I believed that by the time she could overcome it, she would be able to see happy days every day. Yeah, she should. If there is God, and if God can sympathize with someone like who has suffered a lot, Lisa should not die now. No, never!”

As a matter of fact, Jack didn’t say that with the firm conviction that she would not die. He was earnestly praying that she could survive and lead a happy life. Watching him quietly, Rachel grabbed his hand tightly because it would be too irresponsible for her to say that Lisa would be okay in this situation. If she said that just to please and comfort him without any good grounds, she would be lying to him.

But she decided to be irresponsible and said, “Lisa will be okay…”

She felt that such irresponsibility was a shabby gift granted to incomplete humans.

<hr />

Daniel’s recipe book was originally one of the chefs’ dream gifts. It contained all the recipes he developed. If they could make the same dishes based on his recipes, so they could change the way people enjoyed their food, it would be able to give them a different pleasure and glory than they worked at restaurants.

In that sense, Daniel’s cooking journal felt like literally a journal rather than a recipe book. But that’s why it was also more valuable as a cooking journal. By examining the journal, Min-joon could grasp how Daniel examined the ingredients and how he understood cooking techniques.

Since Daniel didn’t write the journal with the intention of publishing it, Min-joon found several pages full of swears that Daniel uttered when he felt frustrated because he could not come up with a recipe that he wanted. Min-joon felt good about it, though, because he realized that Daniel, who he thought was like a monster and a perfect genius that he couldn’t even imagine, was a human like him, after all.

What Min-joon looked for in his recipe book with the most attention was something like a memo that could confirm he also relied on the system. Fortunately or unfortunately, there was no mention of anything like a cooking score in his cooking journal.

So, Min-joon thought for a moment that Daniel might have nothing to do with Yorikyoju, or the cooking master, but he could not make a conclusion at this point, for Daniel might have had a different ability from the system, and he could not conclude that Daniel also had the same benefits as him.

‘Did he become a cooking god because he was so good at cooking? So, he helped a chef who had talent but could not fully realize it?’

If Daniel were the culinary sect leader, that would not be the only reason because he knew well Rachel’s agony and suffering. Just because Rachel regained her vitality by pinning lots of hope on Min-joon, she made a big difference in her life. Rachel’s life without Min-joon back then would have been much different from now, which would not have brought about a good result from the standpoint of Rose Island.

‘Well, there is no way for me to find the answer to such a question even if I try…’

The situation where Daniel was in was nonsensical and illogical when examined by common sense and logic. When Min-joon thought as far as that, he stopped thinking about the culinary sect leader and began to quietly explore what Daniel’s cuisine was like.

In no time, he had no choice but to be shocked silently.

“I really can’t believe it…”

Only then did he seem to be able to understand what Chef Daniel was like. He could also understand why people always talked about his name. Daniel’s cuisine had an unexpected novelty and subtlety. So much so that he could not believe that it’s the recipe developed by somebody who passed away more than a decade ago. In other words, his dishes were refined and revolutionary enough by today’s standards.

His cooking scores were just perfect. Almost all the single recipes in his recipe book were cooking point 10. It was the same for the dinner recipe, which was made in a full course format. A full course with no dishes with less than cooking point 9. This was a level that even Rachel or Min-joon could not achieve.