Chapter 161: Chapter 152

"Hey hey, Aru-ji, what do you want Sui do do-?" Sui-chan pyonged excitedly as we reached the room, obviously eager to help out. Darling Sui-chan...

"Aaah, it’s this thing..." I took the hand mincer from my Item Box. It rattled a bit as I pulled it out. It hadn’t been like that when I bought it from the Net Super, I had just used it a lot to make minced meat to feed the Gluttonous Trio over the past couple of months and it was pretty much worn out.

"I want you to make this please." I said, handing the mincer to Sui-chan.

"Hmm, wait a minute-?" Sui-chan absorbed the mincer into her body to examine it.

"Can you make one like it but a bit bigger, Sui-chan?" I gestured with my hands, suggesting something about 1.5 times the original mincer’s size and capacity.

"Well, this is big-." Sui-chan said after a while. "It’s complicated, bits inside go spinny and whizzy and choppy... but Sui will try her best." Ah, making the various parts inside the mincer would cause her problems, they’d have to fit properly and work afterwards, turning and cutting the meat. The Mithril knife and short sword she had made for me were simpler items, just single pieces of metal.

"Ah, I see. Well, do your best please." I passed Sui-chan some Mithril ore which she ingested. A new mincer was my number-one priority when it came to making cooking utensils. If it was made of Mithril it would surely be very strong and not wear out and the spinny and whizzy and choppy bits inside would be very sharp so it should be easier to use. My arm got tired turning the handle of the original Net Super mincer, I hoped a Mithril mincer would be less work.

A Mithril cooking knife is TOO sharp, if my hand slipped I’d lose fingers and the blade would cut through any sort of chopping board I could get hold of so I had given up on that idea, but the mincer’s sharp parts would be inside its Mithril-metal body so that shouldn’t cause a problem.

My next project for Sui-chan would be a Mithril frying pan, one bigger than the largest frying pan the Net Super sells. It’s not really essential but it would be nice to have a bigger one to use sometimes. I thought about a real commercial kitchen-sized stock pot, bigger than the half-sized ones I had bought from the Net Super but such a pot on the Black Magic Cooking Stove’s burners would be quite tall and it would be difficult to stir its contents since the lip would be so high. The half-sized stock pots were just the right size for my needs, it turned out and I had plenty of them anyway.

After that, hmm, I’d have to give it some thought but there was no hurry. I’d just be happy if Sui-chan could make things for me. She’s sooo cute... and as a reward I’d get her lots of cakes from the Sanke tenant shop, I decided.

I left Sui-chan working away while I started sorting through all the drop items from our dungeon explorations. Boy, there were a lot of them... I began by going through all the skins I had collected, starting with the most common ones. Let’s see, Orc skins - 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, ......... 123, 124, 125 skins. 125 Orc skins in total, that’s a lot. Next would be Lizardman skins? 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, ...... 61, 62, 63 skins, is that all of them? So 63 Lizardman skins, half the number of Orc skins. Ogre skins, there were a lot of them too, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, .......... 100, 101, 102 pieces. Oh, more than a hundred Ogre skins, that’s a lot too. Trolls next, I remembered there had been a lot of Trolls in the Giant Zone between the 21st and 25th levels and they usually dropped a skin so 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, ......... 111, 112, 113 skins? More than a hundred skins again. I had lost track of the drops I had been collecting while we had been travelling through the dungeon’s levels so the actual numbers were a surprise now I could sort through the piles of different skins and count them properly. I continued counting and organising drop items as the morning wore on then --

"Aru-ji, I’m hungry-" Sui-chan interrupted.

"Oh, sorry sorry. It’s lunch time, of course. Let’s go eat with Fer and Dora-chan." I said.

"Ah, Sui’s not finished yet-"

"Oh, that’s not a problem." I had expected making the mincer would take Sui-chan quite some time, what with all the spinny and whizzy and choppy bits inside. "It’s okay to stop for a bit to eat lunch."

"Okay-? Well then, I’ll make it more after I eat food-." Sui-chan pyonged off the bed and followed me down to the beast stables where Dora-chan and Fer were waiting patiently for me. Not.

"You’re late." Fer complained.

"Really late." Dora-chan added. Both Fer and Dora-chan seemed a bit grumpy.

"Sorry sorry." I apologised. "Please forgive me and I’ll make something special for you."

"Ooooh, the Earth Dragon dish in yesterday’s dinner was good."

"Really good! It was so delicious!"

Last night’s dinner ended with grilled strips of Earth Dragon meat in yakiniku sauce over rice. Everyone liked it and it was definitely delicious, I felt my mouth watering at the memory of how it smelled when I was cooking it, how it tasted...

"So then how would everyone like some Earth Dragon meat in yakiniku sauce?" I suggested.

* * * * *

Several bowls of Earth Dragon grilled in long-time best-seller yakiniku sauce over rice, a much better-natured Fer and Dora-chan were taking a nap. Sui-chan and I went back up to the room to start work again, me to continue sorting through the drop items and Sui-chan to continue working on the mincer she was (hopefully) making for me. It had been a revelation to discover she could temporarily pause her Smithing skill and eat food then continue afterwards without problems.

"You know, I had no idea there was this much..." The sheer quantity of our haul amazed me, I kept finding things I had forgotten about as I pulled one drop item after another out of my Item Box. It shouldn’t have been that much of a surprise, thirty dungeon levels full of defeated monsters... I pushed forward, determined to get it all done today.

"Hmm, I’ve finished..." I had finally reached the end and I could sit back. I looked over the list of drop items we had accumulated from our successful conquest of the Doran dungeon. It was... impressive.

Venom Tarantula Poison Sac × 3

Orc meat x 56

Orc’s Testicle × 31

Orc skin × 125

Lizardman skin × 63

Ogre skin × 102

Ogre’s Magic Stone (small) x 21

Troll skin × 113

Troll’s Poison Talon × 48

Troll’s Magic Stone (small) x 23

Minotaur meat × 42

Minotaur’s Horn × 49

Minotaur skin × 88

Minotaur’s Iron Axe × 15

Minotaur’s Magic Stone (small) x 20

Orc King’s Testicle × 1

Red Ogre’s Magic Stone (medium) x 1

Spriggan’s Magic Stone (large) × 5

Giant Killer Mantis Wolf x 38

Giant Killer Mantis Magic Stone (small) x 7

Murder Grizzly Fur × 21

Murder Grizzly’s Magic Stone (large) × 3

Cockatrice meat × 10

Cockatrice Feather × 7

Rock Bird meat × 6

Rock Bird Beak × 10

Rock Bird Feather × 13

Paralysis Powder of Paralyse Butterfly × 42

Giant Dodo meat x 3

Giant Dodo Wings × 9

Giant Centipede’s outer shell x 3

Giant Centipede’s Magic Stone (large) × 2

Wild Ape Fur × 61

Killer Hornet’s Poison Stinger x 286

Killer Hornet’s Royal Jelly × 1

Vasuki’s Fang × 1

Vasuki skin × 1

Vasuki’s Magic Stone (oversized) × 1

Manticore skin × 1

Manticore’s Poison Stinger × 1

Manticore’s Magic Stone (oversized) × 1

Gustave’s skin × 1

Gustave’s Fang × 1

Gustave’s Spine × 1

Gustave’s Magic Stone (oversized) × 1n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

Giant Sand Scorpion’s Poison Stinger × 6

Giant Sand Scorpion’s Magic Stone × 3

Sandworm teeth x 8

Sandworm Magic Stone (large) × 4

Death Sidewinder skin × 7

Death Sidewinder Poison Sac x 5

Death Sidewinder Magic Stone (large) × 3

Giant Sand Golem’s Magic Stone (Oversized) x 1

Behemoth skin × 1

Behemoth’s Magic Stone (Super Extra Large) x 1

Behemoth (dungeon boss) treasure chest x 1

Mimic Treasure Box (Small) x 1

Mimic Treasure Box (Large) × 2

Treasure chest drops, jewellry

Ruby (small grain) × 1

Emerald (small) × 1

Aquamarine (Small) × 1

Garnet (small) × 1

Amethyst (small) × 2

Peridot (Small) × 1

Gold ingot x 1

Imperial Topaz (medium size) × 1

Sapphire (medium size) × 1

Alexandrite (medium size) × 1

Diamond (large grain) × 1

Diamond (medium size) × 2

Diamond (small grain) × 2

Yellow diamond (large grain) × 1

Diamond ring × 1

Tanzanite Necklace x 1

Magic items that were in treasure chests

Magic bag (small) × 1

Magic bag (medium) × 1

Magic Recovery Ring × 1

Detoxification necklace × 1

Cursed Demon sword Caladbolg

(from Behemoth’s treasure chest drop)

Laid out in black and white like that, I was really surprised just how much there was but, really, I shouldn’t have been. Fer, Dora-chan, and Sui-chan were defeating dungeon monsters bam bam bam, boss rooms full of A-rank and B-rank opponents wiped out in a few seconds. All I needed to do, all I could really do to assist them was just collect the drops afterwards.

Elland-san had said he would take all the skins but the rest of it, I didn’t know... and there were more jewels than I thought. I’d discuss this all with him later, but now I was done. Yosh.

Just then, "Aruji-, it’s ready-" Sui-chan announced.

"Oh, you’re finished too?" Good timing. Sui-chan extruded a gleaming mincer, a bit larger than the one I had bought from the Net Super. It looked really good and I decided to give it a trial run right away. First of all, Orc General meat... Oh wow, this mincer is amazing! I put the meat in and tuned the handle but it was so light, it took nearly no effort as the minced meat poured from the mincer’s opening and because it was bigger more minced meat came out for each turn of the handle. Next, Bloody Horn Bull meat, just the same, light and easy to operate and lots of minced beef coming out. I kept turning and turning the mincer’s handle, delighting in how effortless and smooth it worked... I stopped suddenly, looking at the immense piles of minced meat I had produced while I was in a daze. Oh.

"Aruji, what’s wrong-?" Sui-chan asked.

"Oh, I’m sorry, I got lost there. This mincer Sui-chan has created, it’s wonderful! Sui is amazing! Thank you so much." I said as I put the minced meat away in my Item Box along with the Mithril mincer.

"Wow, Aruji praised me-. Sui’s so glad- " Sui-chan was happily pyonging around the room.

"Oh," I said, realising what time it was, "Fer and Dora-chan will start getting angry again if I’m late making dinner for them. Let’s go, Sui-chan."

"Unh-" Sui-said as we headed for the stairs.

"Oh, and Sui, I’m looking forward to giving you something good to thank you for making the mincer after you eat your dinner."

"Something good-? What is it, aruji-?" Sui-chan asked.

"Just wait until we’ve finished eating dinner, OK?" I said.

"Okay-" Sui-chan agreed happily.