“This isn’t good! The broth should be the noodles’ partner! If the partner pushes them aside and steps right to the front, the whole meal falls apart!”
“Mother! How about we use some flour from Horn? I’ve heard there’s a special kind that is only produced in one region! It’s a mysterious flour that can make dough without even needing to rest.”
We were left sitting there, ignored, as the mother and daughter began discussing possible improvements to their noodles. It wasn’t as if the ramen tasted bad, though. If you could eat this in Japan, people would pay for it. Maybe not a million yen, but...
Oh, wait.
“If you want flour from Horn, I got some as a gift from the Prime Minister during one of the world summits. I think he said it was a rare variety used only by the royal family or something.”
“What?! You never told me anything about this!”
“Really? I thought I gave you it.”
“You did not!”
I didn’t? Maybe I thought I could hand it to her later and forgot. Was it still in my [Storage]? I glanced up and was immediately greeted by Lu and Arcia staring at me, eyes begging for me to hurry up and take it out. Actually, forget staring, they were practically glaring at me.
“U-Um, okay, let’s see, flour, flour...”
I took out sacks of flour one after another, though none of them were the one I wanted.
I have so much flour! Why do I have so much? I really need to sort through this at some point.
“That’s it!”
“It has the seal of approval from the Royal Court! This has to be it!”
The mother and daughter were getting excited over one of the bags I took out. I guess that was it.
“We can definitely make the perfect noodles for a Dragon broth with this! Arcia, let’s go make some dough!”
“Yes, mother!”
The two of them took the flour, called out the personal kitchen I’d given Arcia as a present, and began making the noodles right then and there. The flour was mixed and kneaded into dough, and then they used a large bamboo stick to stretch it out.
Wow, they’re serious about this.
“This is amazing dough! With this...!”
“I’ll make the soup!”
They were totally off in their own world as they made the noodles.
You know I can’t handle a third bowl, right?
I couldn’t eat ryukotsu ramen, Wyvern ramen, and Swiftdrake ramen all at once. At least if we had to wait for the dough to rise, I’d have a chance of being able to eat it! Not that I really badly wanted to or anything!
“Nothing else for it!”
I whipped my phone out of my pocket and sent a message to everyone in the castle: We’re having a ramen fair in the courtyard.
Just as the two were finishing their noodles, the staff, who were free for their lunch break, had already started lining up in front of the stalls. I left my seat, together with my leftover ramen, and moved to a couch and table I’d taken out of [Storage]. I set up similar seating areas for everyone else as well.
“We’re done making the noodles...! Whoa!”
Lu’s eyes opened wide as she saw the line in front of her stall. Arcia was looking over at me with wide eyes. I continued slurping away at my ramen, feigning innocence.
“Why is there suddenly a queue? Is it time for lunch already?”
“M-Mother, let’s just get some ramen made, quickly! We can have this serve as a pre-opening!”
“R-Right! Arcia, I’ll handle boiling the noodles! You get the soup!”
The mother-daughter chef duo immediately began getting to work. Crea popped out from the castle’s kitchen in order to lend them a hand.
At this rate, the cafeteria’s gonna be deserted.
I couldn’t help but feel bad for all the kitchen staff who would’ve prepared meals for everyone. There was a fridge equipped with [Storage] in the kitchen, though, so at the very least, they could store it there for the next day so it wouldn’t go to waste.
“This is amazing! It isn’t soba, but I could work with this!”
“I can see myself getting addicted to this...”
When I heard a loud shout from behind me, I turned around and saw two of Takeda’s Four Heavenly Kings, Yamagata and Naito, slurping down their own ryukotsu ramen. Opposite them were Baba and Kousaka.
So even they’ve fallen for it...
The knights had come here for lunch as well, including Lain, Nikola, and Norue. Over there was Tsubaki and her three kunoichi girls, Homura, Shizuku, and Nagi. Laim and Renne were here too. I guess it was perfectly timed with their lunch break. Lapis and Cecil weren’t here, but it seemed they were going to swap with Renne afterward.
Everyone seemed to be enjoying their food. There were even those asking for seconds.
“It was a huge success! But it’s so much of a success that it’s becoming a huge failure instead!”
“Mother, we’re going to run out of noodles! We have to start making more!”
The portable kitchen was becoming a battlefield at this point. Lu kneaded the dough, while Arcia prepared the broth and Crea boiled the noodles. The other kitchen staff, who had arrived to help, were cutting any toppings and putting the bowls together.
Maybe I called too many people to this thing...
We were starting to run out of free seats, so I pulled some more out of [Storage]. Our courtyard was starting to look like a ramen alley.
At least it being this well received among the castle staff meant revealing it to the castle town was a good idea. If we could get it popular in state-run restaurants and inns like Silver Moon, people would start to imitate it. That meant those people had the potential to come up with their own ramen. New types of ramen unique to this world could be born.
Wait, but I guess Lu and Arcia have already managed that.
I prayed that more ramen beyond just this ryukotsu ramen would be born as I slurped down what I had left.
✦ ✦ ✦
