Chapter 1

  Ren Saito had spent the last 36 hours awake; running entirely on espresso, kitchen fumes, and the kind of manic energy that was only present in a kitchen.

  In the heart of Tokyo, nestled in a narrow alley barely wide enough for a delivery truck, stood Atelier Saito, his restaurant-slash-temple to fine dining. It was small, exclusive, impossible to book unless you knew someone—or unless Ren deemed your palate worthy. Three Michelin stars glimmered like badges of honor at the entrance, but Ren didn’t care about accolades. He cared about flavor. Precision. Mastery.

  And right now, he cared about duck.

  This specific duck was presently in a sous-vide bag in a steel bath set to 57.5°C., seasoned with salt, Sichuan pepper oil, and a rare fermented citrus peel he’d flown in from a village in the mountains of Hunan. The recipe had come to him in a dream. Or maybe a hallucination. Hard to tell the difference at this point.

  He glanced across the kitchen to where his sous-chefs cleaned up, unaware(or more likely just used to) his late-night culinary episodes. One of them, a quiet new hire named Masaru, caught his eye briefly before going back to scrubbing a prep board.

  Ren didn’t know much about Masaru. The guy kept to himself. Always came in early, left late. But something about him had always seemed… off.

  The immersion circulator let out a soft beep.

  Ren perked up. “Finally.”

  He retrieved the duck, removed it from the bag, and set it on the cutting board. Crisping the skin was the final touch—just a sear, hot and fast. As the pan screamed with heat and duck fat crackled like firecrackers, Ren grinned. He was close. So close.

  And then everything went wrong.

  The pan ignited. Not like a normal grease fire. It exploded. A sound like thunder cracked through the kitchen as a blast of searing force knocked Ren backward. His last thought wasn’t fear or regret.

  It was - damn it, I was so close.

  ________

  In a space that didn’t follow the rules of shape or time, two beings floated. One was cloaked in radiant light, a divine presence of wisdom and authority. The other was a lesser attendant god, holding a clipboard made of stars.

  “Oh crap,” said a voice. “That’s not the one we were aiming for.”

  “You said Sous-Chef Masaru,” the light-being said, voice tinged with frustration. “Not Head Chef Saito.”

  “They were standing right next to each other, Your Radiance!” the assistant protested. “The mortal realm’s targeting system is garbage!”

  The god sighed, rubbing its celestial temples. “Masaru was a rogue god. Exiled. Hiding as a chef. The sou-vide malfunction was supposed to eliminate him cleanly.”

  “Well… Masaru did get caught in the blast, so that part worked. But now we have a mortal soul displaced. Very promising resume though. ‘Chef, innovator, obsessive genius, tyrant with a whisk…’ Hmm.”

  The god paused.

  “Perhaps it’s fate. The Culinary Thread has been dormant for centuries in our other realm. Maybe it’s time someone stirred the pot.”

  With a flick of divine fingers, the god reached toward Ren’s flickering soul.

  _______

  Ren woke into nothingness.

  No pain. No duck. No fire. Just… silence. Until a system prompt blinked into his vision:

  [You have died.]

  [Cause of death: Magical combustion ( divine targeting misfire).]

  [Compensation package initiated…]

  [ Class Assigned]

  [World Transfer: Aetherial Shardlands (Medium Mana Density)]

  [Bonus Skill: Flavor Sense]

  [Warning: System support experimental. Proceed with caution.]

  Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.

  A booming voice followed, like someone had turned on the world’s most dramatic narrator:

  “Ren Saito. You died not by fate, but by error. As compensation, you are granted a second life in a world where flavor is power, and cuisine can change the course of nations. Feed the world, or let it starve. Your fire is yours to wield.”

  And just like that, the void fell away.

  Ren blinked and found himself standing on a grassy hill beneath a sky too blue to be real-like someone had cranked the saturation up to max. Puffy clouds drifted overhead, lazy and slow. The sun was warm, but not hot. The air? Crisp, clean, untouched by the reek of car exhaust or fish markets or burnt oil.

  It was… beautiful.

  Too beautiful.

  He took a few slow steps forward, then glanced down. His clothes were different—no longer the smoke-stained chef’s jacket or worn kitchen clogs, but a simple black tunic, reinforced leather boots, and a messenger-style satchel slung over his shoulder.

  “…What the hell,” he muttered.

  Thoughts slammed into him like a cartload of prep orders. He had died. That explosion, that fireball—no way that was a dream. Right?

  But this? This felt like a dream. Not in the surreal way, but in the painfully vivid, wish-fulfillment kind. The kind he used to get back in high school, before the restaurant, before the stars and the schedules and the screaming. Back when he still had time to play RPGs on weekends and pretend he was an adventurer instead of a busboy.

  “Okay, so I died. I think. Or I’m in a coma. Or this is a stress dream brought on by foie gras and caffeine.”

  He looked up again.

  The hill sloped down into a small valley, thick with green. Trees dotted the edge of the woods below, and a sparkle of water glinted between them—a river, maybe. No buildings, no smoke, no signs of civilization.

  “Definitely another immersive dream,” he said aloud, trying to make himself believe it. “Screw it. Might as well enjoy it.”

  Something tugged at his attention. Not sight or sound or smell, exactly—more like an instinct, or a sense just on the edge of consciousness. He turned his head slightly, and his eyes fell on a small cluster of herbs growing near a rock.

  The leaves were long and jagged, tinged with a faint bronze sheen. They looked bitter. Earthy.

  But more than that,—he could feel something coming off them. Like heat off a stove, but without the burn. Energy. For some reason, he immediately thought of the word mana.

  Ren crouched beside them.

  “…What is this?” he muttered, reaching out. The moment his fingers brushed the stem, a strange flavor bloomed in his mind: bitter, mineral-heavy, grounding. The same kind of sensation he got when he nosed a spice blend and instantly knew it needed more cumin.

  “Okay, that’s new,” he said. “Smells like dirt and black tea had a baby.”

  He tugged a few stalks free and stuffed them in his satchel.

  “No idea what you are, mystery herb, but you’re coming with me.”

  He stood, took one last look at the horizon, and started down the hill.

  ________

  The descent was easy.—soft grass alongside firm footing let even someone like him traverse it. As he reached the treeline, the air cooled. The sound of flowing water grew louder, and he caught glimpses of a narrow river threading through the trees like a silver snake.

  Ren kept walking, eyes sharp. His instincts from years in the kitchen kicked in automatically, looking for ingredients even now. He spotted a few wild berries—plump, blue-black, faintly translucent—and added them to his collection. He didn’t taste anything yet. Not until he had a fire, a pot, and some kind of control.

  “This is definitely a dream,” he said again, mostly to the trees. “I mean, come on. Mana herbs? Fantasy forest? RPG status screen?”

  As if on cue, the system pinged in front of his vision.

  [Ingredient Identified: Loamleaf (Common)]

  Affinity: Earth Mana

  Effect (Raw): Minor defense enhancement (Temporary)

  Culinary Potential: High

  Note: Effects unstable if uncooked.]

  Ren stared at the message for a long second, then exhaled a breathless laugh.

  “Hey, at least it’s a fun one.”

  _____

  Ren followed the river downstream, sticking close to the bank. The water was clear—so clear it looked filtered—trickling over smooth stones and flickering with tiny darting fish. The air was fragrant with wildflowers and moss, the kind of clean that felt impossible for anywhere on Earth.

  The deeper into the forest he went, the more unreal it all became.

  Bird calls echoed overhead, but they didn’t sound like anything he recognized. The trees were tall, ancient, with bark that shimmered faintly in the sun like it had been dusted with flour. Every now and then he’d pass another patch of wild herbs, and that strange sixth sense—his Mana Sense, apparently—would nudge him with a flavor impression.

  Peppery. Citrusy. Cool and floral. Some bitter and bracing like dark chocolate, others oddly metallic.

  It was like walking through a living pantry.

  “I swear, if I find a lemon basil bush that shoots lightning, I’m turning around,” he muttered. “Not doing magical salad today.”

  He’d been walking for maybe an hour when he crested a small ridge along the river’s edge—and saw smoke.

  Not the dangerous kind. Cookfire smoke.

  His heart kicked up a beat.

  He pushed through a thicket of brush and stepped out onto a slope overlooking a clearing. And there it was, nestled in the crook of a bend in the river: a town.

  It looked like something ripped out of a Renaissance painting—stone cottages with thatched roofs, smoke curling from chimneys, carts moving slowly along a cobbled road. A wooden palisade surrounded the perimeter, though it was more symbolic than defensive—just tall enough to keep livestock in or lazy wolves out.

  A wooden bridge crossed the river at the far end, and Ren spotted a couple of people moving across it. Real people. Dressed in simple tunics and leather boots, carrying baskets or tools. One had a shovel slung over his shoulder. Another was leading a goat.

  “Holy crap.”

  This wasn’t a dream. This was way too detailed for a dream. He could smell the smoke. Hear the clatter of hooves on stone. Feel the faint pressure of gravity, the kind that dreams never quite get right.

  He stood there for a long moment, just watching.

  And then—because what else was he going to do?—he started walking toward the town.