Dungeon Item Shop - Chapter 267: S-Rank eggs (Patreon)

Fresh’s arms shake violently, her entire body rattling around like a frightened skeleton as she rises up one more time with her teeth clenched as tightly shut as her eyes are. A loud, long, furious breath leaves her body as she reaches the apex of her movement and then, on arms that no longer work, she falls down forward, back to the ground and releases a wild battle-howl.

[STR: +1]

“Shove it!” barks Jubilee from the kitchen, waving a spatula at her in an attempt to get her to be quiet. “Your screaming is making me ruin the eggs!”

“I did ten, Jubilee!” says Fresh, still panting from her morning push-ups. “I did ten!” she exclaims again, looking over to Shamrock who gives her a proud thumbs-up from the table.

“That’s great,” says Basil, not bothering to look over from her tea-cup.

It is early in the morning of the next day and everyone is just starting to gather around for breakfast. Fresh, having found herself in a particularly energetic and productive mood today, decided to get her morning workout in like she has been doing for a few days now. Give or take.

She flips over, laying on her back for a second as she catches her breath and gets up, crawling under her blanket to change out of her pajamas and into her robe. Crawling around beneath her blanket, she pops back up at the foot of her bed and looks out from beneath the covers, staring at the others from the safety of her burrow.

Shamrock and Basil are sitting at the table. The two of them have come to an arrangement of sorts with their crafting for the store. Shamrock will be carving his figures somewhat larger and then hollow them out, so that they can be used as vases for some of Basil’s flowers that are ready to be replanted.

“So for the buttercups, I’d like the pot to be a -”

“- Slime,” says Shamrock, finishing her sentence for Basil.

“Uh, actually…” Basil stares at him for a second, before sighing. “Fine. A slime is fine,” she relents, taking a sip of her tea. “Then the Echinacea I’d at least like to be planted in something that looks like a -”

“Dragon.”

“Shamrock!” says Basil. “Not everything has to be monster-shaped,” she says. Fresh tilts her head, the two of them had been going over details like this for a while and at this point, Fresh isn’t even sure if it’s a real conversation anymore or if the two of them aren’t just goofing around.

As for Jubilee, they’re running around the kitchen and swearing up a storm as they try to manage everything on their own. Between balancing frying eggs for four people and getting the rest of the food ready as well, it’s a lot to juggle for one person. Especially for Jubilee, who, given their smaller build, has trouble reaching the stove, but not for a lack of trying.

Despite that, Jubilee makes the best eggs. Fresh nods, she’s certain of that. The official ‘egg-ranking’ is Jubilee in spot number one, as a clear winner. They really fry them up nicely so that the yolk is thick, but runny and the edges of the white are crispy. Plus they always seem to find the right mix of seasonings, so she looks forward to theirs every time it's their turn. All of them like a runny yolk, so it works out. She herself didn’t, at first. But she finds that it has grown on her.

Shamrock is number two on the egg-cooking totem-pole. He doesn’t make a great fried, in all honesty, as he seems to have trouble with the ‘flipping them’ part. Though this has gotten easier since she showed him the ‘lid trick’ that lets him fry the eggs without flipping them. But that means that they are still a bit wet on top and it’s not the greatest thing ever. But he does make a mean scramble.

As for Basil, well…

Fresh blinks.

The priestess puts a lot of love into them. That’s worth something, right? It turns out that despite having thousands of chores back in the church, cooking was never one of them.

Anyways, she obviously has to leave herself out of the official egg-ranking, as she would be a biased participant in the race. Though, her secret is that she herself is pretty confident that she even outmatches Jubilee, because while Jubilee knows how to add flavor to their food, she knows how to cook with love.

But not like Basil does, it’s different.

Of course, the game changes when pancakes are the topic of discussion. Shamrock is the pancake-king, by leagues.

Getting up out of bed, she quickly fixes it up and then scoots over to the kitchen.

“Let me help you, Jubilee,” she says, taking over bread reheating and toasting duty so that they can concentrate on the most important thing.

After another fifteen minutes, everything is ready and they sit together at the table to eat.

“So, what’s the plan for today?” asks Fresh.

“Same as every day,” replies Basil, cutting her toast.

“And every day before that,” throws in Jubilee from the side.

Fresh nods. “Mm!” She likes the sound of that. They don’t get enough ‘everyday’ days. There’s always something happening or some drama or some trouble or some sad feeling or something. So these days that are the quietest, these days that are the most peaceful and unremarkable, these are her favorite of them all.

“Anyways,” says Jubilee. “We’re making a killing here. The fucking ice-cream,” they say, shaking their head. “I hate to do it, but I gotta hand it to you,” says Jubilee, looking at her.

“Huh?” Fresh blinks, looking around. “But we don’t have any ice-cream here,” says Fresh. “Besides, you shouldn’t have ice-cream for breakfast, Jubilee.”

Jubilee sighs. “Just once. I want a normal conversation. Shamrock,” says Jubilee. “Hit her.” Shamrock lifts a hand, with his finger ready to flick her and Fresh yelps, cowering back in fear. “Shamrock,” says Jubilee again, watching her. “I changed my mind. It’d be like hitting a limping puppy. She’s suffering enough already.” Shamrock lowers his arm.

Fresh opens an eye carefully, looking out at him. “Were you really going to hit me, Shamrock?” asks Fresh.

The man looks at her before looking down at his eggs and then back at her. “Yes.”

She clutches her heart in anguish, feeling it shatter into a thousand pieces. “How could you?!”

He lifts a hand, pointing at Jubilee. “They’re good eggs,” he says. “The best.”

The shards of Fresh’s broken heart shatter into the finest dust imaginable, leaving her distraught and lost in her endless hopelessness. Everything that she knows is a lie.

“You’re damn fucking right they are,” says Jubilee, tapping against the table with their finger.

“There, there,” consoles Basil, patting her on the back. “You’ll get there too one day, with enough practice.”

“Don’t you like my eggs, Basil?” asks Fresh.

Basil looks at the others before, continuing to vigorously rub her back. “You certainly uh, put a lot of love into them!” she says.

Fresh dies.

How could she have been so foolish? So brazen? So egoistic and so very, very wrong about everything that she had held to be an inalienable fact?

“If you’re gonna die, go do it outside!” barks Jubilee at her. “Looking at your sad ass is ruining my breakfast.”

Fresh un-dies, sitting back upright in her chair.

“Anyways,” says Jubilee, shaking their head. “I was talking about the profit margins on the ice-cream,” they explain. “It costs shit-all to make and we’re selling it by the bucket-load.”

Basil nods, sipping her tea. “Honestly, everything is going pretty well,” she says. “I don’t know if it’s because of the beach or the sun, or what it is. But people really like spending their money here.”

“Told you,” says Jubilee. “It’s a port-city with a mid-level dungeon,” they explain. “Once you get strong enough to leave crab-city and go into the dungeon, you’re making good money here.”

Fresh scratches her cheek, considering. “And they’re all walking right past our house if they want to go to the dungeon or to fight the crabs,” says Fresh, realizing. “So we’re getting double the traffic, right?”

“Makes sense to me,” says Basil. “Honestly, I don’t really know what to do with my money.”

“That’s a surprise,” says Jubilee. “Why don’t you buy more gaudy jewelry?”

Basil lifts her nose. “How about we buy you a mask that sticks to your face forever? Preferably one that covers your mouth.”

“How about you go fuck yourself?” asks Jubilee, pointing at her with a fork.

“How about YOU go fuck yourself?” replies Basil.

Hearing the priestess swear, Fresh gasps. “Jubilee!” she exclaims. “Stop corrupting Basil!”

“Basil’s a lost cause,” says Jubilee, taking a sip of their tea. “I told you we should have ditched her back then.”

Basil rolls her eyes. “Please. As if you could run away from anyone with those short legs of yours,” she quips.

“You’re one to talk,” replies Jubilee. “I think you’re getting spoiled by us. I’m pretty sure your legs used to be half the size that they are now.” Basil gasps. “Another month and we’ll have to buy a cow-bell.”

“Ju~ bi~ leeeee~!”

“Oh shush,” says Jubilee to Fresh. “Why don’t you focus your energy on learning how to cook a decent egg?”

Basil laughs and then so does Jubilee and she’s pretty sure that Shamrock even joins in. Then she herself starts laughing too. Sure, she’s crying at the same time. But she’s also laughing. So maybe it evens out in the end.