The Max-Level Chef’s Magical Town Game

When the Xibel team arrived at the restaurant at 6:30, they had new plans in mind. Xibel rushed to the kitchen to find Ye Mu, who was thinking of new dishes for the next day. Xibel excitedly shared her idea, and Ye Mu took a few seconds to respond, “Huh? A part-time job?”

“Yeah!” Xibel sincerely tried to convince her. “Look at how busy you are right after opening! It must be exhausting during peak hours! We can take turns helping you, and I promise we’ll do our best!”

Ye Mu chuckled, “Alright, alright, I know what you want…”

Xibel chimed in, “It’s a win-win for both of us!”

Ye Mu shook her head. “But I really don’t need more hands right now.”

With these words, the surging hope in Xibel’s heart collapsed.

Ye Mu continued, “If you want to improve your meals, how about supplying ingredients for me? I can list the ingredients I need each day, and you can see what you can gather while farming. I’ll buy the rest from the market. I’ll pay you for what’s needed, you just give me a relatively discounted wholesale price, and I’ll provide one meal for you each day.”

“Oh, that sounds great!” Xibel’s hope reignited as she thought it through, feeling it was even better.

The original part-time job plan would have taken up their time, forcing them to choose between delicious food and farming experience. Ye Mu’s proposal allowed them to enjoy both while eliminating the hassle of occasionally selling materials at the market.

As for Ye Mu’s request for a “relatively discounted wholesale price,” that was only fair!

Xibel quietly resolved to help Ye Mu minimize costs without losing her.

Just as this joyous collaboration was settling in, Xibel was about to jump out when someone tapped the island counter behind her: “Tap, tap.”

Turning around, she saw Isaac, who nodded at her before addressing Ye Mu. “Good evening, Miss Ye. I noticed the paper you posted at the window seems a bit rudimentary. The menu needs to be handwritten and changed daily. I can make a small panel for you to hang at the window, how does that sound? We can finalize the details for just three meals.”

“Oh, then it’s a deal,” Ye Mu calmly agreed.

Xibel glanced at Isaac and then down at herself, feeling a mix of emotions.

She suddenly realized their arrangement resembled making offerings to a deity.

First, they presented their gifts (the services they could provide), then they made a wish (requested dishes), while the power to grant their wishes (whether or not to provide food) lay entirely with the deity.

It wasn’t a bad setup, a culinary god is also a god!

Xibel accepted this arrangement with ease.

—

“Have you heard? The new Nightfall Restaurant in town sells noble food, which is genuine and cost-effective.”

“Some dishes have continuous recovery effects, a must-have for monster farming!”

“After eating these dishes, the battle mages can use these dishes to frequently unleash area attacks, reaping significant rewards by the end of the day. Support classes like priests also become stronger, greatly reducing team losses!”

—These rumors quietly spread throughout the small town, and within seven days, Ye Mu noticed she had significantly gained some… social status.

For instance, when she went to the market, many vendors she was familiar with would take a moment from their busy work to greet her with “Hello, Miss Ye!” or “Miss Ye is here!” and often someone would give her small gifts.

As for those people who weren’t familiar with her, someone must have started it, as everyone began calling her “Goddess of Cooking,” which made her feel a bit embarrassed.

But putting aside her embarrassment, Ye Mu wasn’t too concerned about this empty title. Such verbal praise had little substantial impact on her, she cared more about the information conveyed through these praises—adventurers seemed to prefer food with continuous recovery effects over food that directly restored large amounts of stats.

This made sense.

If one disregarded the aesthetics of taste and smell, those ordinary foods that she considered “dark cuisine” could also restore stats.

But to provide continuous recovery effects, only her high-quality dishes could achieve that.

In other words, from the perspective of game attributes, this was the Nightfall Restaurant’s greatest feature.

Once she grasped the market preferences, Ye Mu temporarily fixed the menu. She made a list of the dishes she commonly prepared, offering 2 to 3 different dishes each day and rotating them every ten days. This way, she wouldn’t have to worry about what to cook the next day, and Xibel and the others could supply ingredients more regularly, making it easier for the staff to handle preparations.

This gave her more free time, which Ye Mu used to research new dishes. She planned to create a few dishes with better additional effects, allowing her to set slightly higher prices and earn more money.

The process wasn’t quick, as this world was still quite unfamiliar to Ye Mu, and various mechanics needed to be explored gradually, but she was uncovering many patterns.

First of all, she discovered that the recovery of various stats was closely related to the types of ingredients used.

The effects of various potions she used as seasonings would provide corresponding results. For example, white sugar was a health potion, so dishes with added sugar would restore health. Yellow wine and cooking wine were stamina potions, and using them in cooking would restore some stamina.

In addition, meat, eggs, and milk could restore health, while vegetables and fruits generally restored mana. Staple foods typically provided stamina, and oils used in cooking sometimes had no special effects, while at other times could provide defensive effects or even special easter eggs.

The various combinations and seasonings she applied while cooking could better activate their original properties and additionally trigger popular special effects.

When Ye Mu summarized this pattern while looking at her notes, she thought: ‘Hey, isn’t this just categorizing according to proteins, vitamins, carbohydrates, and fats?’

‘You’ve got a pretty scientific approach in this magical game world!’

Then she tried to find patterns for enhancing effects and had been busy for nearly a month…

So far, she hadn’t found any obvious pattern.

During her busy days, the temperature dropped again, and winter was quietly approaching. Dragon Town was noticeably colder than before, and residents pulled out their winter clothes to prepare for the season. The relatively deserted Dragon Mountains were even chillier.

Ye Mu realized this a bit late. Her thoughts had been consumed by researching dish development, and she had been absent-minded even while shopping for ingredients. In the end, it was her regular supplier of potions, Colin, who reminded her.

…Because when Ye Mu lifted her head while picking out potions, she was taken aback to see Colin with tears streaming down his face.

“What’s wrong? Who bullied you?!” Ye Mu exclaimed, while Colin wiped his tears with a bitter smile, “It’s nothing, really. No one’s bullying me, it’s just too cold today, so I downed a bottle of [Intermediate Cold Resistance Potion]… It’s quite a kick! But it works well! Want one? I’ll give you a bottle!” Colin didn’t forget to promote his wares.

Ye Mu looked around in surprise and slapped her forehead: “So it’s already this cold!”

She wasn’t entirely oblivious, normally, she should have felt the temperature change.

But since she had been focused on studying the properties of dishes lately, she had been cooking almost nonstop outside of business hours. She regularly used chili as a seasoning and had unconsciously given herself a cold-resistance buff, thus ignoring the cold.

Now it seemed like it was time to introduce cold-resistant dishes!

“No need for the cold-resistance potion for now, just calculate the cost of these potions.” Ye Mu picked out the necessary potions, hurriedly paid, and while packing her bag, she added, “Come by my restaurant tonight when you have time, I’ll treat you to a meal!”

“Uh… huh?” Colin almost didn’t react.

After over a month of business, he was somewhat familiar with Ye Mu, but he hadn’t visited the increasingly popular Nightfall Restaurant because he didn’t want to spend that much money, and his youthful pride made him too embarrassed to ask her for a free meal.

But now that Ye Mu had taken the initiative to invite him…

Colin quickly nodded before Ye Mu could leave: “Sure, no problem! I’ll definitely come!”

“I’ll wait for you!” Ye Mu shouldered her bag and hurried away.

She rushed back to the restaurant, where the staff had just started their shift and were preparing to chop vegetables. Ye Mu promptly called out, “Let’s not prepare according to the menu today, I’ll change the dishes!”

“What?” The kids were all taken aback. Ye Mu walked into the kitchen and glanced at the original menu for the day, which included [Tomato Scrambled Eggs] and [Diced Chicken and Tofu], along with regulars [White Rice] and [Fried Rice with Sausage].

After thinking for a moment, she said, “Cut the tofu as planned, but chop up some extra chilies and a bowl of minced meat.”

Ye Mu planned to make [Spicy Pepper Scrambled Eggs] and a simplified version of [Mapo Tofu]. The [Mapo Tofu] had been offered as a sample during her stall phase, receiving great reviews, though it was lacking the numbing effect due to the absence of Sichuan peppercorns. Overall, it still tasted good, as for [Spicy Pepper Scrambled Eggs], it was a new dish, mainly because… Della had already diligently cracked dozens of eggs for the originally planned [Tomato Scrambled Eggs], and it would be a waste not to use them!

—

“It’s freezing today, you can’t stay outside at all!”

At the entrance of the town, a burly man walked in, grumbling. He was the captain of a trading caravan named Bart. The group consisted of two melee fighters, two ranged fighters, and a priest.

They didn’t normally reside in Dragon Town but merely passed through while trading. According to their original plan, they were supposed to continue their journey and reach the northern post of the Dragon Mountains by evening. However, the sudden drop in temperature forced the team to stop in town first to replenish their cold-resistant supplies before continuing on.

By coincidence, Xibel team had also cut their monster-hunting short due to the cold and hurried back to town. Xibel, leading the way, rubbed her hands together to warm them but wore a cheerful expression: “Let’s go, let’s go, we’re off to wait for the food! Ye Mu told me there are two cold-resistant dishes tonight! We’re in for a treat!”

Cold-resistant dishes? What are those?

Bart furrowed his brow, intending to call out to them for more information, but the Xibel team was eager for food and had already run off, leaving the trading group with only a general direction of their departure.

“He must be talking about some kind of noble food,” the priest in the group remarked, warming his hands with his breath. “But I haven’t heard of any nobles in Dragon Town.”

Everyone didn’t dwell on that topic much. Bart asked a passerby for the direction to the market, and the team started making their way there, preparing to hold their noses and drink the cold-resistance potions.

Unexpectedly, just before reaching the market, someone ran up from behind, shouting to a friend not far away: “Darren, Darren! No need to buy cold-resistance potions! The Nightfall Restaurant has two cold-resistant dishes tonight, and the prices are decent! Let’s go try them!”

Bart watched as an adventurer, who had been selecting potions at the stall, suddenly showed excitement, dropping what he held and rushing towards his friend.

This time, Bart was quick to react, intercepting Darren as he ran past: “Excuse me, can I ask you something?”

Darren halted: “Hmm?”

Bart asked, “What is… the Nightfall Restaurant?”

Seeing that he wasn’t a local, Darren, though eager to eat, answered his question: “It’s the best restaurant in town, serving noble dishes! At first glance, the prices don’t seem cheap, but if you calculate the value and effectiveness, it’s actually more effective than buying regular food!”

Having said that, he didn’t want to wait any longer. He grabbed his friend’s hand and they sprinted towards the restaurant, not forgetting to point the way for the trading group: “It’s this way, three streets over! If you’re interested, you can check it out!!!”

Noble dishes?

Everyone was skeptical of this claim.

They found it hard to believe that high-end chefs serving nobles would be willing to lower themselves to open a restaurant here.

However, Bart decisively waved his hand: “Let’s go check it out!” and led his team towards Ye Mu’s restaurant.

Nightfall Restaurant.

Although it was still before opening hours, Ye Mu looked out the window and noticed that the number of customers waiting outside had increased by at least 50% compared to before.

This was quite normal, given how cold it had become…

Earlier at noon, she had been outside with the cold-resistance buff accidentally activated while developing dishes. But once the buff wore off, she instantly started shivering and quickly ate half a bowl of [Mapo Tofu] with rice to warm up.

She had to admit, her own [Mapo Tofu] was delicious!

The tofu was mixed with minced meat that had been stir-fried beforehand, infusing the dish with a rich aroma that enhanced both the texture and flavor.

The sauce was spicy and fragrant, and when mixed with rice, it warmed her all over with each bite!

The Xibel team arrived just as Ye Mu finished half her bowl. Having become her “ingredient suppliers,” they were more familiar with each other now, so even though it wasn’t opening hours yet, Ye Mu welcomed them inside and directly served them tonight’s dishes.

“Wow, what is this? It smells amazing!” exclaimed the team’s priest, Nala, whose cooking skills were at level 0. She dove into a mouthful of [Mapo Tofu] with rice, not even noticing the ingredients.

She hurriedly checked her status panel, which displayed:

[Mapo Tofu]

—Restores health continuously while eating,

—Can restore up to 8000 health points (total restoration depends on the amount consumed),

—Grants immunity to the “cold” effect for up to 4 hours (total restoration amount is affected by quantity consumed).

“Four hours!” the team members who were forced to cut their monster-hunting short due to the cold, gasped in unison.

If they ate this three times a day, wouldn’t they be able to hunt monsters steadily all day long like before?!