“You won’t use milk, butter, or cream, but you’ll make the best dessert, serve it salty, and let the damn elves eat it all, so you can press the other chefs’ noses down!”
“Yes? So how can I…”
“It’s not ‘Yes?’ but ‘Yes!’”
“What?”
“Whew.”
━━━✦❘༻༺❘✦━━━
“To be honest, I don’t want to bake snacks if I can’t use milk, butter, or cream.”
<Is it that important?>
“Of course! Along with sugar and flour, they are the three musketeers of my love. Milk, sugar, flour. Butter and cream are milk siblings, so…”
After briefly digressing, Asha hardened her expression and glared at the books stacked on the desk. They were all books related to Noctis Elves.
The yellow chick trotted along and looked up and down the spine. Asha pushed Phoebe all the way with the back of her hand and opened the topmost book first.
“They don’t drink milk or butter because it’s Noctis Day.”
<They don’t want to eat it. What can we do?>
“But they say we have to do something.”
<It’s the chef’s job, not your job, isn’t it?>
Asha took a deep breath and closed her mouth tightly. There was a reason to encourage Pavel to come back and open the book immediately.
“Well… that cook. Pavel… I think it was because of me that he was being bullied like that for no reason.”
<How come?>
“Pavel used to be a person who didn’t bake snacks. He would just make bread. But why would he be in charge of dessert?”
When she first met him, he hated baking snacks, but it was strange that he had to be in charge of desserts for such an esoteric party.
“Because I keep baking snacks in Pavel’s kitchen… Others probably thought that I didn’t bake them myself, but that the mister taught me how to cook…”
Other chefs deserved to be confused because even the snack made was praised like that by the Emperor and Crown Prince.
<If it’s because you baked snacks, you should take responsibility.>
“Yes! That’s what I mean. And finding out about the Noctis Elves is even…”
But the more Asha read about the Noctis Elves, the more ambiguous the conclusion was.
“But I have no idea what this is.”
Objectively confirmed things about them could only be counted on one hand.
The main residence of the Noctis Elves is in a circular basin named “Ube Wilson,” the leader is randomly elected, the skin color is bluish grayish brown, the tip of the ear is pointed, and they lived in communication with nature. Other than this, everything else was written in a high-handed tone that bordered on superstition.
“I wanted to check why they don’t drink milk…”
Asha, who was a little sullen and muttered, glared at Phoebe, who fell asleep in the meantime. Phoebe showed her belly with her wings wide open and fell asleep. It was funny that spirits slept, but the little bird was sleeping like a human.
“Phoebe! Wake up!”
<What, what?>
Phoebe, who got up, looked around hurriedly. Asha put her chin on the book and flipped through her bookshelf.
“It’s Noctis Day. Did the first Noctis Elf really ride the Sacred Cow to the north?”
It’s a world with spirits, so what’s a Sacred Cow? As Asha said so, Phoebe, who stood on the bookshelf and looked down, snorted.
<It would be ridiculous to say that they dared to ride the Sacred Cow, but where is the Sacred Cow among the cows? It must have been the strongest cow ever.>
“…!”
<Yes, there may be mixed blood between humans and Noctis Elves. It seems we both have a knack for coming up with these strange words, alike, very much alike.>
Asha realized that the word referred to the entire mythology related to the Noctian Festival.
“Why does Phoebe hate the Noctis Elves?”
It seemed more like contempt or hatred than dislike. It is the first time that a spirit that has always been pleasant has shown such feelings.
<Is there a reason to like sinful things?>
“Sinful? Noctis Elves? What crime did they commit?”
<Aren’t they the geniuses who separated the heaven and earth!>
Asha opened her eyes wide at Phoebe’s frustrated words. It was something she had never found in any historical book.
“Split heaven and earth…?”
This time Phoebe looked at her like she was an idiot, then her beak quivered bitterly.
<Does nobody know anything? Could it be possible?>
“You have to be told to know.”
<When I talked about the Sword of Sin before, you just understood it!>
“At that time, I was scared because it was night and I wasn’t in the mood to ask that!”
<…Originally, humans and spirits could communicate with each other without such a contract.>
Asha opened her eyes wide. The little bird tapped the paper in the notebook with its beak with a clear annoyance on its face.
<But some stupid humans and some stupid spirits had a unexpected thought.>
“Unexpected thought?”
<The earth belongs to man and the heaven belongs to the spirit. The spirit was to be removed from the ground, and humans are told not to interfere with the spirits.>
“Why did you do that all of a sudden?”
<It was a land dispute between landlords.>
“Leader? Oh!”
Asha noticed that the power of the spirits intervened in the battle for the throne at the time Phoebe was talking about. A contender for the throne who failed to make a contract with a powerful spirit, and a spirit who became disillusioned with being swayed by humans.
<They finally made their wish come true. They succeeded in dividing the heaven from the earth. It is the Sword of Sin that separates the two worlds. Divided into five prasti.>
“Ah, I see… But what did the Noctis Elves do…?”
Elves had not yet appeared in the story. Phoebe continued talking as if she had been waiting for Asha’s question.
“More accurately, I should say they thought they had succeeded.”
The chick teased its beak with a look of contempt.
<Darkness was created by forcibly splitting what was originally one.>
“Darkness?”
<Sure. Let’s try dividing the cream and bread after having a well-made cake. Will it be divided properly? It will create chaos. That dark residue, along with the Sword of Sin, attacked humans and spirits, and the continent was stained with blood.>
“Oh my…”
<Then, with difficulty, they succeeded in dividing the Sword of Sin into five pieces and sealing the darkness in the north. But the seal wasn’t perfect, so they needed someone to take responsibility and manage it. Then, of course, wouldn’t it be reasonable for the person who committed the crime to take responsibility?>
“Then you mean that the humans and spirits who decided to separate the heavens and the earth at that time decided to take responsibility? Huh…?”
Asha tilted her head. Wasn’t it the Noctis Elf trapped in the North?
Phoebe said.
<They became Noctis Elves.>
“What?”
<While fighting against the darkness that was about to leak out of the harsh environment, humans and spirits were mixed together. That’s the Noctis Elf.>
Asha opened her mouth wide. It was unbelievable, but there was no way Phoebe would lie.
“Ah… No… Humans and spirits merged?”
<Yes! It’s funny. After putting together the things that claimed to separate spirits and humans, they became one body.>
“Oh my goodness. They even denied the possibility of a hybrid between Noctis Elves and humans. Is that even possible?”
<That is a different matter!>
“Aha…”
<How sinful things added together made a mixed blood with prasti…>
The little chick kicked its tongue like a pout.
<It’s funny to erase all of their history and create a myth like a ridiculous joke on such a topic.>
In the heat of anger, Asha quickly turned her words away.
“Then, why don’t they drink milk on Noctis Day? Am I just matching the rhythm to the myth I just made up? But in the North, where there’s not much to eat…”
There is no Sacred Cow. There is no myth. And yet, in the north, where food supply and demand are hard, there is a week in which you do not eat anything related to milk for pious reasons…
<There are only two reasons why they can’t eat food.>
“Ah, poison or…”
Asha realized.
“Noctis Elves will get a stomachache if they drink milk!”
It’s not good for their health.
Noctis Elves were lactose intolerant.
━━━✦❘༻༺❘✦━━━
Of course, knowing that the majority of Noctis Elves are lactose intolerant did not change much.
The restriction on elves’ dairy intake was limited to Noctis Day, which means that more elves can digest milk over time, and yet there is a period of restriction not because of possibility and impossibility, but just because of faith.
“Whew, from now on, I’m going to have to ask for the milk to be taken out of even eating… But really, how should I do this? Should I use vegetable oil instead of butter? But they won’t even eat cream…”
The first thing she thought of was a chiffon cake made using vegetable oil. Although it did not contain milk or butter, you can bake a sheet that is moist and light, yet soft and elegant.
But it felt too empty to make it with no cream at all. It was not enough for the entertainment of the peace delegation.
Asha quickly scanned her recipe notes from home. However, because of the years she had longed to use butter and cream, all the recipes in the notebook were like that.
“Ah!”
Asha, who was flapping over the paper so quickly, opened her eyes at the last chapter.
The recipe was written at the end, because this cake contained a lot of things she didn’t like and nothing she liked.
“How about this?”
Asha opened her notebook and asked Phoebe. Phoebe raised her head, looked slowly through the recipe with dark eyes, and cried with satisfaction, “Peep.”
“Okay! Let’s go get ready now!”
As Asha jumped up from her seat, Phoebe flew up and settled on Asha’s shoulder. But the brisk walk to the kitchen stopped quickly.
Asha took one step over the corner of the corridor, then turned around and hid behind the pillar. Two people were walking from the opposite side.
‘Karnov? Why is Karnov here?’
She also remembered seeing the man next to Karnov.
‘Wasn’t that the Commander in Chief of the Northern War? His name… what was it? Gilhellam… what was it?’
