100 — Elven Forest (3)

The number of times I can cast summoning magic has increased from once to five times a day, so I confidently summon the ingredients.

The main ingredient was balsamic vinegar.

Balsamic vinegar is vinegar made by aging the finest grape juice in wooden barrels.

Like whiskey, the longer it ages, the better the aroma and deeper the flavor. It’s an item where the expression “the taste matures” fits perfectly.

What I wanted to teach the elves was a dressing using that balsamic vinegar.

Since it doesn’t contain mayonnaise, the elves can easily make it as long as they find fruits similar to grapes.

Of course, this is assuming they like the taste.

Determined to rescue the elves’ hopeless taste buds, I first chopped onions finely. I mixed the chopped onions with minced garlic. Then I mixed in the finest balsamic vinegar.

I added the sweetness of oligosaccharide, the saltiness of salt, and the fresh taste of lemon juice to enhance the flavor. This creates a perfect dressing to boost the flavor of the elves’ usual meals.

I sprinkled the dressing on the vegetables in front of us and looked around.

Elena seemed to be the most suitable person.

I handed her the vegetables with the dressing.

“Try it.”

With all the elves’ eyes on her, Elena brought the vegetables I gave her to her mouth without any hesitation.

When she first came to the restaurant, she hesitated to try my cooking. But now she is a complete believer, coming every day to eat my food.

“Wow! Mr. El, you’re amazing!”

Elena expressed her amazement with uncharacteristically exaggerated movements.

It seemed like she wanted to convey the taste to her fellow elves more. That’s nice of her.

“The vegetables we always eat have become much more sophisticated. There are various flavors, yet the texture of the vegetables is intact, especially the deep sweetness and aroma!”

“Really? Thank you.”

As Elena made such a fuss, I sprinkled the dressing on the vegetables in front of the Chief, Neria.

Thanks to Elena, Neria, who had been curious, absentmindedly brought the vegetables to her mouth.

She was startled and her long ears pricked up.

“Our Elf Forest is in a great crisis right now. So it’s not the time to be happy, but this gift from our guest is amazing. How does it have such a taste?”

It felt like she was speaking to the elves rather than to me.

It seemed like she thought this could give the lifeless elves a fresh shock.

When the Chief said that, the elves began to give me intense looks. So I went around sprinkling dressing on all the elves’ vegetables.

“Oh my!”

“Oh!”

“Oh!”

Exclamations burst out from all directions. It was natural, as their taste buds were stimulated for the first time in their lives.

“What’s so tasty about these plants? No matter what you put on them.”

“I prefer meat. You.”

Sereina and Rurin shook their heads, rejecting the offered plants and dressing. However, while it was expected from Sereina, Rurin would ultimately side with me.

Just as I always sided with Rurin.

“Rurin, come here, ahh.”

“Huh?”

Rurin, who had been shaking her head at the plants with Sereina, was drawn to my trick and eventually opened her mouth to take the dressing.

“Hey! You unprincipled black thing!”

Betrayed, Sereina rushed towards Rurin.

“Hmm, it’s delicious. Sweet and sour. Well, of course, since you made it.”

Thud!

At the same time, Sereina kicked Rurin. The two began rolling on the floor, wrestling and putting on quite a show.

But the shocking thing was that the sunglasses came off in the process.

At that moment, Neria’s eyes met Rurin and Sereina’s.

A major catastrophe occurred immediately.

“O, Great Being!”

“O, Great Being!”

The elves, who had been eating, stood up with pale faces and started bowing their heads to the ground.

Just like when Elena first met Rurin.

And not just one, but two.

“Hohoho! We’ve been discovered!”

Sereina, who had been rolling on the ground, got up and started laughing heartily. What incorrigible creatures.

“E-Elena! To bring such a Great Species… What is this…!”

Neria, looking like she might faint, managed to speak to Elena.

“Quiet! Pay attention to me! To this Red Dragon, Sereina!”

Sereina went berserk and released her polymorph. In the center of the Elf Forest, in the square with the building, the Red Dragon roared and flew up, and the startled elves couldn’t even lift their heads.

A storm of mana erupted.

“How vulgar. Red ones are always like that.”

Rurin, not paying attention, continued eating the vegetables in the same position she had been in while fighting with Sereina. She must have been quite hungry.

“Lady Neria.”

“Y-You, guest…? You are human… How can you not kneel to the Great Ones? You will incur great wrath!”

When I called the Chief, Neria trembled and scolded me instead. The way to resolve this chaotic scene was to calm Sereina down first.

“Sereina!”

“Why are you calling me! This is just getting exciting.”

“If you don’t polymorph and return to my side by the count of three, you’ll have to stand with your arms up in the middle of the Elf tribe. As always, if you don’t like it, you can leave Greek City.”

“That’s so unfair!”

“One… Two…”

“Okay! Okay! Geez, why do you count so fast!”

Sereina polymorphed back and landed in front of me, her red hair fluttering.

“Lady Neria, please stand up with the others.”

The elves looked at me in shock, seeing a dragon obeying the words of a human.

Their faces showed disbelief.

“Chew chew, elves. El is equal to me. So if you don’t listen to El, you’ll be chewed up like these vegetables.”

Rurin, who was clearly a dragon to the elves, said this. And Sereina, who had boasted about being a dragon, stood by me in human form, unable to move.

“Well, for now, let’s have a conversation. Please stand up.”

The elves began to obey my words. They stood up abruptly with very frightened faces.

Elena, who clearly didn’t want this situation, approached Neria with a troubled face.

“Lady Neria, it’s alright. Mr. El has mana surpassing dragons. But he loves peace. There’s nothing to worry about.”

“That… really…”

Neria looked at me in disbelief. Just as elves couldn’t gauge the mana of dragons surpassing them, my current mana was at a level even dragons couldn’t fathom.

Because I could freely hide my mana.

---

It took a long time for the elves to understand El’s existence after that. The sight of a human commanding a dragon was hard to believe.

After understanding that fact, they began to show reverence to El.

“Isn’t it worth it for me to act out? A human who subdued me! It means it’s a structure I can submit to. How about it? Doesn’t it seem like I could make a harem with elves? Hohoho.”

“You, did you do that on purpose?”

“Who knows?”

Sereina looked at El with a meaningful expression. Indeed, this woman is a dragon with a fox in her head. El evaluated Sereina like that.

And Neria hurriedly arranged a meeting, bowing her head, and had to explain why she had called Elena.

“The truth is, there is a Gold Dragon named Ilimantium nearby.”

“A Gold Dragon? Those greedy ones?”

Sereina frowned. She seemed to have some bad memories.

“I knew there was a dragon, but I couldn’t tell it was a Gold one. I thought it was sleeping, but it woke up?”

“Yes, Great Being.”

Neria nodded affirmatively to Sereina’s question.

To El, the Gold Dragon had significant meaning. The Dragon Heart that occupied most of his heart. The owner of that Dragon Heart is the Dragon Lord.

And the Dragon Lord, who is traditionally considered the head of all dragons, came from the Gold Dragons.

After the previous Lord passed the Heart to El and died, the next Dragon Lord has not been chosen yet. That’s why the Reds and Blacks are fighting harder.

The race that produced the Dragon Lord. But there was one major flaw.

They are greedy enough to worship treasures and beautiful things.

Of course, such a being cannot become the Dragon Lord. So El speculated that maybe the position of Dragon Lord remains vacant.

“Lord Ilimantium, who has a lair nearby, woke up from a long sleep recently. And he demanded a tribute from us, the elves, specifically, to send an elf as a servant.”

“Is that so?”

Anyway, there are many strange beings among dragons. El thought so and asked again.

Then Neria took a breath and continued speaking.

“If I hadn’t been inadequate, I wouldn’t have called Elena. But neither I, Celine, nor Noria caught Lord Ilimantium’s eye. So naturally, we had to call Elena, who is next in line for chief.”

Elena, who had been quietly standing next to El, was startled by Neria’s words. It was the first time she heard this.

And Ilimantium.

He was the dragon that had given Elena severe trauma in her childhood. That’s why she was so frightened when she first met Rurin.

But the situation was clearly her responsibility. The hierarchy couldn’t be changed. It was set from birth.

“Is that so. If it’s my turn, then it’s natural for me to take responsibility.”

Elena quietly nodded. Of course, she didn’t want to go. But Neria, Celine, and Noria had all gone, so refusing would be abandoning her rights and duties as someone born in the Elf Forest.

Of course, she could ask for help.

The people beside her had the power to help.

She knew that if she asked, they would step forward to help her, but Elena couldn’t easily bring herself to say it.

No.

That’s not it.

She had already insisted on El coming with her to this place. To ask again now…

Elena was afraid of being seen as a nuisance to El.

She didn’t know before.

The existence of humans.

No, she didn’t know that she could have such feelings towards others beyond just humans.

All these feelings were her first experience.

But El clearly had someone he loved.

Elena was happy just watching from the sidelines. Sometimes she found her lack of greed laughable, but maybe it was because she was born as an elf with no greed.

But sometimes, even she was surprised by her desires. The desire to watch over him until she died.

When El and Rurin left Greek City and didn’t return for a while. When they disappeared without any contact.

Elena felt like she had lost the world.

As Elena was engulfed in such emotions alone, Sereina suddenly asked El.

“What are you going to do?”

“Well, Ms. Elena is the doctor of Greek City. We can’t give her up.”

El answered as if it was the most natural thing.

“That’s why I came along too. Don’t worry, Elena.”

Sereina patted Elena’s back. Even though Elena hadn’t said anything, they naturally thought of stepping forward.

Well, these people are not elves.

Elves are a race that grants requests if asked. But they rarely step forward first.

Elena, who wanted to ask but was hesitating, received a simple yet saving hand.

Red Dragon Sereina.

In fact, it was Sereina who suggested bringing El. She wanted to show El the Elf Forest for some reason.

“B-but… such a bother…”

Elena unintentionally said that. At that moment, Elena regretted being an elf for the first time. Such words coming out were purely an elf characteristic.

“We’ll go to the lair together and either persuade or use force, whatever it takes. So, Lady Neria, don’t worry too much. Ms. Elena is one of us at the Greek City restaurant, so we will protect her to the end.”

El clearly emphasized to Neria that Elena was one of them.

One of them.

Elena realized for the first time that she was part of the group with the dragons and El. She liked the sound of that word so much that her ears perked up.

It was such a joyous statement.

“Th-Thank you!”

In the end, Elena bowed her head and accepted their kindness.

“Elena, you’ve made incredible friends.”

Neria, with a face that couldn’t believe any of this, took a deep breath.

There could be nothing better than ending this without having to pay tribute. Moreover, there were two Great Beings. It was impossible to oppose.

“Huaam…”

At that moment, when everyone had serious expressions, the sound of a yawn spread throughout the building.

The Black Dragon, who had been dozing off leaning against El’s back, rubbed her eyes and was surprised by the gazes directed at her, and uttered a word.

“Why are you looking?”