The Cooking Princess - Chapter 96

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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As soon as Chloe made eye contact with the Kraken, she quietly lowered her gaze.

‘It looks really angry.’

The Kraken instantly approached the ship where Shuel and Chloe were located and began attacking frantically.

It wasn’t just a simple tentacle attack.

“Wow, it’s even shooting beams.”

Chloe spoke as if she truly lacked any sense of crisis.

“This isn’t the time to be carefree, Chloe. It’s dangerous, so let’s go inside.”

Shuel was startled by her reaction and tried to take her inside… but then discovered something strange.

“What the hell?”

The octopus had turned purple.

The ordinary reddish-colored octopus had suddenly changed to a purplish hue, and its eyes were dyed bright red.

With the intensified attacks, the ship they were on began to tilt.

‘Wait a minute. Really?’

She knew it might have magical powers, but wasn’t it a bit unfair for something that size to use magic too?

It wasn’t like it was some game boss monster, yet it was absurd how it suddenly awakened just because it faced a little crisis.

However, under Shuel’s command, the ships succeeded in surrounding the octopus and finally caught it.

The octopus’s corpse was heavily damaged, but there seemed to be many edible parts. Probably.

‘I heard giant squids taste terrible, but surely this octopus we caught after all this trouble won’t be tasteless too, right?’

Still, since it was a monster, she tried to hold onto hope that it would be fundamentally different from Earth’s animals.

“Preparing this will also be a problem…”

At Chloe’s displeased muttering as she held her forehead, Shuel also agreed in a displeased tone.

“Right.”

‘Since it already looks unappetizing enough with just the purple color, let’s just make broth!’

Since Eshir said it just needed to taste good, he would probably accept ‘soup,’ which was considered a symbol of the lower class, quite well.

***

The Pope was currently in a bad mood.

It was because the ‘fake’ Saint, who was nothing more than a puppet, had dared to act on her own and provoked the Merchant Prince, revealing that she was ‘fake.’

And in the midst of all this, none other than the Merchant Prince was inviting the Pope.

‘It’s a signal that even if he gets rid of the Saint, he wants to maintain good relations with me going forward.’

Currently, the Temple was just keeping a fake Saint in place for their own interests. Since the Merchant Prince clearly held the Temple people’s weakness, they had to accept the invitation without complaint.

The Pope headed to the Magic Tower accompanied by Cardinals and Holy Knights.

The young Merchant Prince, who seemed to have just come out from handling official business while still wearing glasses, greeted them with a crooked smile and said.

“You must be hungry, so let’s have a meal first. Since Your Holiness has personally graced us with your presence, I’ve had the cooking done with special care this time.”

Eshir smiled mischievously as he guided them to the dining room.

Upon seeing the food that was served, even though they knew it was rude, they couldn’t stop the questions from coming out of their mouths.

“What is this?”

The food that was served was purple.

The complexions of the Priests who saw the food’s appearance also turned purplish.

Not only the color but the shape was also grotesquely bizarre.

The Priests couldn’t help but be horrified by the visual that looked like large tentacles had been cut up and boiled thoroughly.

No matter how you looked at it, didn’t it look like it contained poison?

However, the young Merchant Prince paid no mind and forced the Priests to eat while adding.

“Ah~ the color is a bit unusual. This is a dish I personally! requested to be made.”

Leaving out the part about deliberately ordering a grotesquely-looking dish, Eshir added with a beaming smile.

This was a dish that the Merchant Prince was personally serving, or rather, personally giving a hard time to the Pope and other corrupt forces.

“Since you are people who live frugally, I specially requested it to be made as a stew.”

Although the Merchant Prince’s intention to deliberately torment the Temple people was clear, as long as he held the secret that she was a fake Saint, they couldn’t dare to rebel.

“Ahem.”

Finally, the Pope cleared his throat and barely put a very small amount in his mouth.

Surprisingly, both the taste and texture were quite excellent. If it had looked ordinary, he would have wanted to take another spoonful right away.

But… the appearance was still not right.

Ignoring the Pope’s displeased feelings, Eshir added with a beaming smile.

“Since this is a dish made by none other than Chloe Garnet, it couldn’t possibly taste bad.”

Since all the Priests here knew that she was a madwoman who even used monsters to cook, they all made faces that said ‘of course.’ However, since this was their first time with such a bizarre monster dish, their faces also showed disgust.

“I heard the ship was attacked and they almost lost their lives. My, what a precious dish this is.”

The Merchant Prince added somewhat frivolously, then took a big spoonful to taste and nodded.

“Mm~ delicious.”

It was a performance asking how delicious a dish would be when the cooking-obsessed Duchess risked her life for it.

The Priests squeezed their eyes shut and began forcibly eating the octopus soup. And they were surprised.

“Th-this taste…!”

It was definitely delicious.

It didn’t seem like it would be very divisive in terms of preference either.

However, the visual was absolutely unacceptable.

A purple tentacle monster?

It was fortunate beyond measure that the dish came out sliced.

It was terrifying to think what kind of tentacle monster had been cut up to make this dish.

They didn’t even have the courage to ask the Merchant Prince what kind of dish this was.

Several Priests, who felt this monster from hell seemed to be the complete opposite of God’s benevolent teachings, couldn’t bring themselves to put it in their mouths, but were forced to do so under the Merchant Prince’s insistence.

Watching their pale faces, Eshir had an extremely refreshed expression.

‘This feels a bit better.’

Although he had called the Pope first to adjust relations between the Temple and Magic Tower, it was something he himself didn’t want to do. Thanks to that, his uncomfortable feelings were finally somewhat relieved.

After tormenting the Priests once with monster cuisine, they entered negotiations.

The meeting didn’t end in one day.

Despite being in a disadvantageous position, the Temple’s greedy behavior of constantly trying to adjust conditions made Eshir finally fed up.

Thoroughly fed up, Eshir took Chloe’s call during break time, partly to get some fresh air.

“Oh, Duchess.”

[How are people reacting?]

At Chloe’s question, Eshir answered while holding back laughter.

“They really hate it.”

[The visual is fierce, but it was quite tasty.]

“Wow, you actually ate that?”

If asked who was most serious about cooking in the Luzhiere Empire, Eshir would choose Chloe without hesitation.

But still, to ‘personally’ eat a purple tentacle monster deliciously when there was no need to eat it.

Eshir admired her madness and giggled.

‘As expected of friends, both the Duchess and the Saint are interesting.’

The Saint was probably racking her brains right now trying to somehow make the operation she had planned with Eshir succeed.

‘I wonder if it’s going well.’

***

Shurya thought.

Simply acting as a puppet named Saint wouldn’t be enough to defeat this rotten religious order.

If she was destined to function forever as a fake,

then she just needed to break away from that fake and become real.

Someone might view Shurya’s challenge as reckless.

‘But things can’t stay like this.’

The high-ranking officials of the Temple already knew well that Shurya was a ‘fake’ Saint.

A powerless puppet set up for the Temple’s interests.

Therefore, there were limits to the authority Shurya could possess.

The high-ranking priests outwardly seemed to greatly respect and revere Shurya as a saint, but in reality they only regarded her as a puppet.

‘At this rate, the Empire will face destruction just like before.’

The corrupt Temple could abandon Shurya, or in the worst case, send her to Claude, the source of all evil, to push forward their union.

If that happened, there would be no turning back.

The world would fall into chaos, the Temple would lose trust and plummet straight down.

‘It was good that I placed my hopes on the Mage Tower Master being replaced with someone else.’

The previous Mage Tower Master only cared about his own interests, so if it hadn’t been for Chloe, Shurya might have had no choice but to join forces with Prince Shuel, who was at least someone she could communicate with.

‘I’m truly fortunate that the Mage Tower Master is on my side.’

She felt great relief knowing she could achieve her goals much earlier, more precisely, and more safely than the plan she had established before.

Even though it wasn’t Chloe’s intention, it had helped Shurya, so she decided that if this matter went well, she should express her gratitude to Chloe and Eshir.

“Are you saying that fake has been walking around with her head held high all this time? Oh my.”

There were people who openly mocked Shurya while looking at her, but she was truly fine with it.

As long as she could somehow bring down the corrupt people, Shurya was prepared to endure any pain.

Even if she herself were to be brought down in the process.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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