Chapter 104: Real Kitchen
Setsuno opened a hidden door from the floor in her restaurant.
"Is your kitchen underground?" Komatsu was surprised.
Setsuno only smiled and said, "Let's go."
They entered the door and walked inside the tunnel together. They couldn't see their surroundings since it was quite dark.
"By the way, are you also going to search for the Century Soup?" Toriko asked. He knew that he had seen a lot of food hunters in this town earlier. At the same time, he had heard that that group of food hunters had come because of the Century Soup.
Luffy nodded, "Yes, we're going to search for the Century Soup."
"We won't lose to you," Toriko said with a smile.
"We won't lose either," Haru said.
Setsuno only smiled and turned on the light, "We have arrived."
They saw her real kitchen and their reaction was amazed.
"This is huge," Takimaru said.
In front of them was a huge space with an aquarium, a lot of tables with a lot of strange ingredients, there is also a place where there are two huge beasts which are fighting each other.
"Is this really a kitchen?" Tsunade had never seen this kind of kitchen before. She felt that her logic had been thrown away when she entered this world.
Komatsu was very excited and his eyes were shining looking at the scene in front of him, "I - I don't believe it that I can enter her kitchen."
Haru wasn't sure how to describe his feelings when he entered this kitchen. He was more curious about the name of each ingredient in this place since he didn't know any of them.
"GROWRRRRRRR!!!!!"
Haru turned his head and saw a beast with six eyes with a body similar to a bear, "What is this?"
"Lonely Grizzlies," Toriko said and explained, "Lonely Grizzlies meat is usually too tough for humans, that is why she let it fight each other to make the meat soften, they will keep fighting for a month to make its meat to reach the peak and you only have a few minutes of chance to make it since too long time will make the meat come back to become tough again."
Haru was wondering whether the taste of this monster was worth it to have such a preparation. He felt that he really couldn't become such a chef that could sacrifice a lot of time to prepare food for his customers. He was more concerned about whether he could make an artificial intelligence for cooking. He thought it would be great to discuss it later with Nasa after he had come back to his world.
They continued to move around while Toriko told them about the ingredients in this place. He told them that the preparation of these ingredients was really taking a lot of time and difficult at the same time.
"Now, I get it why, Setsuno-san only opens the shop once a month, because the preparation is very hard," Komatsu said.
"Bzztt!!! That's wrong, Komatsu!!!" Setsuno said and stood right in front of him.
"WAHHH!!!!" Komatsu was startled when he saw her right in front of his face.
"Hahahaha," Luffy laughed, looking at his reaction.
They also laughed at the same time.
"Let's go," Setsuno said and used a rope to cross over the other side of the kitchen.
'Is she a Tarzan? No, the mother of Tarzan?' They thought but also followed her.
"This is fun!!!" Luffy had an IQ similar to a child and only cared to have fun.
They crossed one by one to the other side using a rope, at the same time, they thought whether it was really necessary to have a rope to cross over the place. They continued to walk while following her.
"Then what is the reason you only open the store once a month?" Komatsu asked.
"It's the mood, it's not my mood, but rather the mood of the food," Setsuno said.
"The mood of the ingredients?" Tsunade raised her eyebrow.
"Is there such a thing?" Komatsu asked.
'Hmmm,' Haru wasn't sure what to say in this situation since he also wasn't sure whether he could hear the voice of ingredients. He was wondering whether he could really hear an ingredient's voice calling him to cook them or something.
"Hahaha, I know that it sounds silly, but it's true," Setsuno laughed and said, "Do you think the chef is picking the ingredient to make a meal?"
"Is that wrong?" Haru asked.
"Hnh! Hnh! How silly! No true chef believes that! It's the other way around, the food chooses the chef and the customer," Setsuno said.
"The food choose? Is it the same as you did to us?" Haru asked.
Setsuno nodded, "That's right, I'm not sure what making the ingredient wants to be eaten by you guys, even though, you have a handsome pompadour hairstyle but that is not the only reason why I'm asking you to eat in my place."
They looked at her with a strange expression and weren't sure how to respond to that statement.
'The ingredients that choose the customer...' Haru was in deep thought thinking about this sentence. He felt this sentence was full of profound meaning and had a lot of meaning.
"It's very complicated," Luffy said with a difficult expression.
Setsuno laughed, "That's true, all I do is check the ingredients from time to time to see how they're feeling, if they feel like it, I open the shop."
"T - then what about the meticulous preparation that you have done?" Komatsu asked.
"Well, you will understand that one day, you don't need to worry," Setsuno said.
"Have we arrived?" Tsunade looked at the light in front of them.
"Yes, welcome to the Century Soup Prep Room!!!" Setsuno said.
They entered the room and saw a large pot with a height of at least 30 meters tall and 30 meters diameters.
"Amazing!!!"
"How enormous!!!"
"Hahaha, let's go, I will show you the Century Soup," Setsuno said and jumped to the top of the pot.