210, 1/2

Erick and Quilatalap went into the dining room.

The beginning of their date was awkward, as these things often were, but their server sat them down at their reserved table in the back of the restaurant, and things flowed from there. Atalle herself came out and professionally, and happily, spoke of the foods they would be getting. She even served them their first glasses of wine, and assured them that their dinner would be amongst the best they would ever have. It would also be easy.

There would be no ordering except in the broadest of senses. A choice of chicken, beef, or fish. Rice or noodles. They could order something specific, and the Saucery could make that, if they really wanted something specific. Or they could choose Atalle’s recommended selection; a five course meal paired with twenty different sauces, from sweet and savory, to salty and nutty. Atalle recommended the five course event.

Erick picked the Cook’s Choice, and so did Quilatalap.

Atalle wished them a pleasant evening.

In the background, a good five meters away from Erick and Quilatalap’s booth, a quiet band played, as they often did here in the Saucery. The lights above were dim, and romantic. The booths were cushioned well. Other people sat at other booths a few meters away, at the closest, but mostly, Erick and Quilatalap were alone, in public.

The wine was fantastic.

Since Atalle was cooking, a different server brought out the first course.

It was a pair of salads, each perfectly divided into four portions and adorned with four different sauces, along with a dry white wine, or beer, whichever they wanted. Erick switched to beer. Quilatalap went with the wine.

Erick loved the ‘peanut’ sauce on the salad, though it wasn’t called that here on Veird. Quilatalap loved the ‘borgleber’ sauce, though it hadn’t been called that on Veird in a very long time; about 1450 years, to be vaguely exact. This meant that it had been called something else in the transition to Veird, after the Sundering.

They spoke of small things, like the nature of Cooking magic, and of the wines they had had before, and of the foods they had enjoyed in their own respective worlds. Quilatalap confided that he didn’t really remember the foods from all the way back then, but he did know of the broad sensations of ‘what they probably tasted like’, and the stuff that people had managed to recreate seemed pretty darn close to what they used to be.

The next course was rice and different meaty sauces. Erick chuckled as he tasted the sweet and savory pork, saying he had completely forgotten about Chinese food, but then that couldn’t have been right; he was probably just misremembering. Maybe he needed to make some ‘five spice fruit’, or something, to recreate those flavors of that culture. Erick wouldn’t be doing that part of Earth justice at all, but he missed those flavors, now. Quilatalap asked after what were his favorite foods back on Earth, and Erick honestly couldn’t say, but he was partial to fries and burgers and milkshakes; the simple stuff. When Erick asked Quilatalap the same question, Quilatalap spoke of how he really liked food exactly like this here; the fancy stuff that he only ever got to eat every once in a while.

“It’s only special because I only allow myself to eat like this every several years,” Quilatalap said.

And since nothing had exploded yet, Erick said, “We’ll have to come here again, then. Maybe a faster turn-around than several years.”

Quilatalap smiled, blushing.

The third course was the main meal. It was perfectly cooked meats of all kinds, and another four different sauces, and a different bottle of dark red wine. The wine was the preferred drink for this course. With that guidance, Erick switched to wine, and Quilatalap switched from the white to the red. The server identified the meats as grade 10 monster beef, specifically some breed from Songli called ‘singing cow’, a grade 10 monster fish, specifically a rainbow king from Treehome, a grade 10 monster bird called an abyss drinker, from Stratagold, and finally a grade 10 monster venison, specifically a lunar stag, caught in Treehome. There were more than enough little slices of perfectly cooked meats to try them in all of the different sauces.

Erick took his first piece of lunar stag, dipped in a pepper oil sauce, brought it to his mouth, and moaned at the flavor. It was the best thing he had ever tasted. Quilatalap smiled. Erick extolled how great it was, and then Quilatalap had him try the abyss drinker in the brown sauce, and Erick had to amend himself. That bird in that sauce was now the best thing he had ever eaten.

Quilatalap smiled brightly.

Erick wanted more of this stuff every single night! How had he not come here before?! A tragedy!

Quilatalap chuckled.

But eventually, the main course was done. Quilatalap and Erick had cleaned it up. Quilatalap, because the guy was an orcol and he could pack away the food if he wanted, and he very much wanted. Erick, because he hadn’t eaten in his dragon form in a while, which he probably should have kept on top of, but he was busy.

Atalle came out then, and asked if they were enjoying themselves.

Erick was, and he said as much. Quilatalap just nodded, opting to remain silent. Erick asked if Atalle was having trouble getting ingredients at all, and if she needed help; Erick wanted to ensure that she got everything she wanted, so she could continue to cook like this for as long as she wished.

With a happy expression, and a slight mist in her eyes, Atalle bowed, saying, “It’s all been rather great, Wizard Flatt. There’s nothing more I could ask for, except to be allowed to continue what I’m already doing. Though, if the Gates opened to Songli, I could get a lot more beef like this, a lot easier.”

Erick smiled, saying, “If you’ve got connections with the Cooking Guild to put pressure on the Highlands to accept the Gate Network, then go ahead and pressure them. I want that part of the Network up and operational, too, but I’m already doing all I can with the High Clans.”

Atalle rose with a happy expression. “I have some strings I can pull. I’ll see what I can do.”

Erick nodded.

Atalle went back to the kitchen, and then the server came out with the fourth course; the other main course. Tempura-like fried vegetables, roasted vegetables, grilled vegetables; alongside a whole platter of all the sauces that the server had seen that Erick and Quilatalap had enjoyed the most, and in large quantities. Erick absolutely demolished the not-peanut sauce, some sort of cheese sauce, and a thick almost-teriyaki sauce. Quilatalap went for his borgleber sauce, the spicy oil sauce, and a pesto-like sauce. They shared the brown sauce and the purple tomato sauce, as they talked of books in Quilatalap’s library, and of some basic technologies that Erick wanted to proliferate on Veird, like electricity.

They laughed at small jokes and talked of small magics. They drank and they smiled. Other people in the restaurant came and went as the two of them probably spent about an hour just talking and eating, because both of them were happy, and neither wanted it to end. There was still another course to go, though.

Eventually, they finished all the sauces and all the vegetables, each of which had been replaced a few times, for both men found themselves wonderfully entertained by each other, and by the food.

Atalle came out, herself, with two cakes, one brown, the other white, and with a bottle of silverberry wine that shimmered inside its green bottle. She explained that the white cake was the normal cake for dessert; a simple butter cake. But the brown cake was chocolate. She was still experimenting with how best to use this flavor, and though it was still in the experimental stage, she wished to know if Erick approved. And then she popped the cork on the silverberry wine and poured a glass for Erick, and a glass for Quilatalap, as another server cut open the cakes and portioned them out. And then Atalle left them to it.

Erick had to try the chocolate cake first, and so he did. It was probably the best chocolate cake Erick had ever eaten. Quilatalap agreed, and then joked that of course it was the best chocolate cake he had ever eaten, because it was the only chocolate cake he had ever eaten. The butter cake was probably still better, though, because that was a recipe that Atalle had perfected 70 years ago. Both cakes went well with the silverberry wine, too, which had an almost magical quality to the taste. A lunar quality, actually, which had been shared with the lunar deer, now that Erick had a moment to recognize that flavor.

“It’s the taste of a certain sort of peace. The peace of the afterlife, of knowing it’ll all turn out fine. Of the moons, and of the Silver Star in particular.” Quilatalap smirked, setting down his glass a little to say, “Koyabez has a special connection with that particular wine. A little bit of divine fire to make it taste that much better. Some would call it the taste of Peace Itself.”

“… Huh.” Erick looked to his half-full glass, saying, “Peace tastes pretty good.”

Quilatalap chuckled. “That it does.”

“How was religion in the Old Cosmology—” Erick amended himself, “How was your religion?”

Quilatalap laughed, smiling brighter. “Now there’s a conversation.”

“Go on then! Teach me,” Erick said, for the third time this evening.

Quilatalap’s soul flexed, his teeth seeming to sharpen on the edges of his body, and then he began, “I was anointed as a Holy Necromancer of Koyabez at the early age of 75, which was very, very old for an orc back then. 60 was old for an orc, back then. I was also quite a lot shorter. Veird was also a lot smaller, but it still had a Script-like thing hanging around it. Rozeta maintained that proto-Script along with a similar protective space around several other worlds, but it was here, on Veird, that she was most active, though she wouldn’t become a goddess for another almost 1,600 years. Melemizargo was the God of Magic back then, and well into his eighth millennia of duty. Phagar was ancient and powerful; far more ancient and more powerful than almost all the other gods. Koyabez was marginally strong, but it was here on Veird that Koyabez was the strongest, for this was Koyabez’s homeworld.

“Koyabez and Melemizargo used to be great friends, though when they met, Melemizargo started off as the new-god on the scene, while Koyabez was rather old-hand at this godly thing.

“Phagar, Melemizargo, and Koyabez, were my gods of choice back then, and they remain my gods of choice.

“They’re all much, much smaller than they used to be, for what they used to be were the maintainers of the Old Cosmology. Wizards went out and did a lot to expand the universe, yes, but it’s hard to say who did more to actually help the common person. In the daily, people talked to gods; prayed and worshiped in houses of the divine, and were similarly answered in those houses. No one ever talked to Wizards directly, except for those who were very special, or who positioned themselves next to Wizards through luck, courage, or stupidity.

“But anyway.

“I was an orc who saw death, and hated it. I was a warrior who saw war, and knew it for evil. I was a caster who saw magic and knew it for a way forward, to power, and to gaining the ability to change my fate… Ahh. But… I think I’d like to have that conversation in private.”

Erick perked up. He looked around—

Oh.

People were listening.

They had been listening anyway, but…

“It’s getting late, I suppose. Let’s go elsewhere?”

Quilatalap smiled and nodded.

Erick signaled to the server.

Soon, Atalle was back, asking how the dinner was. Erick told her the truth; that it was absolutely wonderful, and that he would be back again. To forestall Atalle telling him that the meal was going to be free, because Erick had already mana sensed that conversation happening between her and other servers, Erick told her that he was paying the full price for the meal.

Atalle paled. “Sir. It’s free. I cannot accept your money—”

“I’m still paying. So by my calculations and looking at the menu, the cost is 8,900 gold? How about I make it an even 10,000?”

Atalle’s eyes went wide. “… Uh. If you think that is best, sir.”

“I do. Send the bill to Zolan and we’ll get it sorted. It was a lovely meal, Atalle. Thanks for coming to House Benevolence. I think I have offered this to you already, but if any of your Cooking Guild friends want to come and get a [Reincarnation], you can tell them they’re welcome to partake of that. I’ll probably be doing at least 10 of those per day starting on the Triumph of Light. Probably more like 50, actually. A little celebration for the world. Those people won’t have to work here after that; they can go wherever they want.” Erick smiled. “But I want you to stay here as long as you want. It was truly a great meal, Atalle.”

Atalle’s eyes misted up again. She bowed, then rose and stepped away, her throat too tight for her to do anything more than whisper, “Thank you.”

Erick held a hand out to Quilatalap. “Short cut?”

Quilatalap grabbed the rest of the bottle of silver wine and the two cakes in a telekinetic grip, then he put his hand on Erick’s. “Short cut.”

And then they left.

– – – –

Briefly, they reappeared in front of Quilatalap’s library, but then Quilatalap suggested somewhere else, and Erick, blushing, obliged. They reappeared in the house Erick had made for Quilatalap days ago.

The kitchen was attached to the dining room and next to the living room and the front door to the cottage. A few rooms of various sizes and accommodations were set to the side of all that, down a short hallway. It was a single story [Fairy Stronghold] cottage on Yggdrasil’s boughs, and it was perfectly sized for Quilatalap, and maybe two guests, if he wanted guests.

Quilatalap flickered with magic, rapidly sending the cakes into the cold storage boxes and conjuring some gold-fire flickering spellwork. The gold spell was a [Ward] of some extraordinarily Divine sort, wherein he [Duplicate]d the bottle of silverberry wine. Before Erick could even widen his eyes at that casual display of divine and magical power, and at the reveal of [Duplicate], Quilatalap poured two large glasses for the two of them and then suddenly handed a full glass to Erick. The silver wine glowed with visible golden fire—

Quilatalap was nude. Completely. Erick’s heart thumped hard.

Quilatalap asked, “You want this, right? Because I certainly do.”

With a flicker of power, Erick was nude, too. “I want this. Quite a lot.”

Quilatalap smiled brightly and downed his drink. Erick did the same. The wine tasted divine, which made a whole lot of sense, actually.

Quilatalap asked something about taking their time. Erick agreed.

Strong magic surrounded the entire cottage.

The world slowed down.

– – – –

A long time passed in a single hour.

Most of it was simple talking about nothing that important, and yet oh so wonderful; foods, people, places, history.

Some of it was spent enjoying a meal together that Erick or Quilatalap had cooked.

The rest was a vacation for Erick, in the best possible way, with a person he didn’t know that he liked so much until here, and now.

– – – –

Erick relaxed on his chair, sighing out, “That was a great dinner! You cook so well, Quilatalap.”

Quilatalap smiled, blushing a bit as he sat across from Erick. He still had a bit of bacon left on his plate. “It’s nice to cook for someone. I usually don’t even eat.”

“Ha! What?” Erick asked, “What do you mean— Like. You have an organic body, yeah? That means you need to eat?”

“I do. I also have [Create Food and Water], and [Duplicate], and I’m surprised you haven’t asked me about either yet. I’ve used both of them rather openly in the last day, or whatever—”

“I think it’s been over a day.”

Quilatalap nodded. “But I suppose you must already have both of those?”

Erick smiled brightly. “I don’t have both of them.”

Quilatalap grinned. “Let me guess! [Duplicate]!”

Erick shrugged. “I might have promised never to reveal certain things, and so I will likely not answer that question—”

“Say no more, say no more. You’re a heck of a lot better at that than I am. Look at me! I met a nice guy and I’m already spilling out secrets all over the place.”

Erick grinned. “So what is it? Like an internal blessing that ensures you never run out of food?”

Quilatalap laughed. “Almost! But actually the exact opposite of a blessing. [Curse of Sustenance]. No need to eat at all. Ever.”

Erick’s eyes went wide. “A curse?”

“It was cast on me by a Wizard who had captured me once in the year… 150ish. Something like that. Like really captured me. Couldn’t get away at all except through death, and I was desperately trying to kill myself to make that happen. One of the ways I was trying to escape was through overcharging my metabolism and causing me to starve to death. So he cursed me with a Sustenance effect. It makes maintaining a healthy, physical body truly easy. But death through starvation? Not happening.”

Erick blinked a bit. “… Wow.”

Quilatalap waved a hand. “I’ve modified the curse into more of a blessing since then and kept repeating that magic on myself every time my body is killed. It’s very useful! Easy to switch into an automatic-suicide spell, too— Ah. Hmm. That upsets you.”

“Well… Yes. I’m… I’m sorry that all happened to you, Quilatalap.”

Quilatalap smiled softly. “Don’t worry about it. Feel free to change the subject, too.”

“… Uh. Okay— Oh! 150 years was before the Fall of Quintlan, when [Create Food and Water] was widespread. I know why that was Restricted; because Atunir was about to turn Dark, whatever that means. I can guess why [Duplicate] was restricted, too, but [Duplicate] is still widely used in the world by all the powerhouses, and none of the common people. So why not give [Duplicate] to everyone? Was there a problem with [Duplicate], too?”

Quilatalap nodded, then began, “Let’s start with the root causes of the Fall of Quintlan. Everyone knows about the widespread use of [Create Food and Water] causing nobility to ascend to a higher lifestyle and the common people to subsist on gruel. This caused a widespread inequality which eventually led to widespread war. But! What most people don’t know is that the problem with [Create Food and Water] was a lot more than Atunir turning Dark, to her beginning to believe Melemizargo that this world was a cage that should be destroyed.

“[Create Food and Water] allowed for Sustenance effects, which is what happened to me.

“But the truly insidious thing was when people started blessing monsters with Sustenance. It got real bad when they started doing that to oozes.”

Erick’s eyes went wide. “That sounds bad.”

Quilatalap nodded. “Yup. Now that was bad. Every single Sustenance Ooze was both ravenously hungry, and full; willing to eat everything in sight, but also constantly splitting off smaller oozes that went on to do even more damage. That was what killed Quintlan. And not right away, either. In the beginning of that tactic in like, the year 300, or something like that, a Sustenance Ooze could only go through about 50 splits before the constant splitting caused a degradation of that blessing.

“It was only in the very last decade of Quintlan that someone managed to make a Sustenance Ooze that could last indefinitely; that needed to be killed to end that threat.”

Erick pondered that for a moment. “I suppose you could do the same thing with [Duplicate]?”

“That’s still doable, but it’s a lot harder. That’s not why [Duplicate] is restricted, though. Widespread [Duplicate] is the breakdown of society as a whole, since no one ever needs to interact with anyone else ever again.” Quilatalap said, “And when that happens, we get an ‘all the gods turn Dark’ problem— Well. Most of them. Not all of them. Phagar, Rozeta, Koyabez, Melemizargo… They would all be fine. Atunir would probably turn Dark in a bad way— Colloquially that’s called ‘turning Dark’, because Melemizargo was the Dark and also insane for a long time, but it’s not really ‘turning Dark’ at all; it’s more ‘turning insane’. Though that might be more a question for the philosophers than for me.

“In the advent of widespread [Duplicate], Sininindi would turn Dark, since no one would care about the ocean or storms; they could hunker down on land and never see the ocean at all if they wanted. Same for Fangorl, god of the wilds, and Zephyr, god of travels. Bunch of minor gods, too.” Quilatalap added, “Not sure about Sumtir, the god of righteous war. Could go either way. Maybe the only wars ever fought again would be over ideology and land… or something. Never did agree with Sumtir. There’s no such thing as a righteous war.”

Huh.

Well all that was a lot to think about.

Erick put that train of thought on hold for another day, though.

“Sumtir was the ‘god of war’ before the Sundering, right? Not just ‘righteous war’?” Erick said, “Seems rather diametrically opposed to Koyabez, the god of peace. How did he managed to make it onto Veird after the Sundering?”

“Koyabez banned him from entering Veird during the Sundering, telling Sumtir that he wasn’t welcome. Rozeta popped up and told Koyabez that Sumtir’s power was absolutely necessary for their survival, if Sumtir was willing to give up at least 75% of himself. Koyabez relented, allowing that to happen. And so Sumtir sacrificed a lot of his power, dedicating that power to the manaminer that would become the Script, in an effort to be let inside.” Quilatalap said, “Sumtir went from a major, universe-wide god, to what he is today. Still rather powerful, but… They’re all a lot less than they used to be.”

“… Huh.”

Quilatalap changed the subject, “So you’re hosting the Feast this year, yeah?”

Erick leaned back in his chair, suddenly groaning as the weight of responsibility reasserted itself. And then he turned back to Quilatalap. “Let’s leave that topic for after.” He stood up. He was still nude. “I do want to talk about the Feast with you, at length. But… Later.”

Quilatalap smiled wide as he stood up, also fully nude, knowingly asking, “What else do you want to do then, Erick?”

“I’m sure we can think of something.”

– – – –

Zolan shouted, “Another!” as he cracked open a third bottle of high-alcohol liquor. He took a swig directly from the thing, the harsh liquid burning his throat. And then he passed the bottle along.

Mox took the offered drink. Three glugs later, she passed the bottle along, saying, “Holy fuck I might need something stronger, Zolan.”

Raingorl downed half the bottle in four long gulps, then passed it along, saying, “I can get stronger stuff.”

Volaro shook his head at the offered bottle, saying, “I’ve had enough. I have an important case in the morning.”

Burhendurur took the bottle instead, saying, “Nothing is going to get done tomorrow, Volaro.” He took two long sips, and then passed it to the next person.

Aisha took a sip, and then set the bottle on the table in front of the other overseers of House Benevolence. “I think this romance of Erick’s will be fine.”

Grumbles filled the room. It was just the six of them in this private space.

This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author’s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

Discovering that Erick was on a date with Quilatalap had been a disaster of massive proportions, but no one had threatened war yet, so it might be fine. As for the overseers, none of them had known about this until then. Every single one of them only found out how deep Erick’s connection with the ARCHLICH OF NECROMANCY…

Zolan sighed.

Zolan was still having trouble with this. Everyone of them and a few others knew about Quilatalap being here at the House. Neither Erick or Quilatalap had been completely secretive about that fact. Burhendurur even had a guy in custody right now because Quilatalap’s skeleton golem defender had dropped the guy off at Enforcement. But then there was the date. The Wizard Dragon of Benevolence and the Archlich of Necromancy had been at Atalle’s Saucery for the last few hours, publicly enjoying a full 5-course meal, the deep hospitality of Atalle, and the easy company of each other.

Burhendurur started giggling again— He shook his head hard, trying to get rid of that uncouth emotional response. He grabbed the bottle again and drained it, then said to Raingorl, “What else you got?”

Raingorl laughed. “I lied. I got kegs. You want a keg?”

“I want a keg,” Volaro said. “Recovering from a kegger is easy.”

Burhendurur chuckled again.

“But you were done? You have a case in the morning?” Mox asked.

“Changed my mind,” Volaro asked, “Where’s the keg?”

Raingorl got up, saying, “Hold on hold—”

He vanished in a bit of pale light.

Zolan joked, “Wonder if he fell down after leaving.”

Mox said, “If I stood I would fall—”

Raingorl reappeared, holding two great big kegs, one under each arm, looking like a teenager Arcanaeum student at his first real taste of freedom from Treehome, being out on his own. “I got beer— Whoops!”

One of the kegs slipped, but Volaro caught it with magic, and then brought it over to himself. With an expert tapping that would be the envy of any graduate, the orcol-shaped dragon slammed a conjured tap into the top of the barrel and magically lifted it up, conjuring big mugs and then pouring drinks. He handed one to Raingorl who started waterfalling the beer, and then one to Mox and Zolan, and then Burhendurur and Aisha. After refilling Raingorl’s drink again, Volaro sniffed his own mug, and then waterfalled it all down, putting Raingorl to sudden shame.

A sudden bout of orcol competitiveness flashed between Volaro and Raingorl. It was drinking time. Zolan tried to keep up but failed miserably, while Raingorl crashed onto his seat and conceded the win to Volaro.

And Aisha said, “Volaro only won because he’s a cheating dragon who cheats.”

“He didn’t drink nearly enough of the good stuff!” Mox loudly proclaimed.

Burhendurur brought the conversation back around to the current predicament, saying, “They’ve been at Quilatalap’s house that Erick built for the last 2 hours. The entire place is still under that Time spell. Holy gods. Is everything going to change once they come out of there?”

Aisha [Decay Rain]ed on Burhendurur’s everything, “You still can’t talk to Quilatalap.”

“What! Why not!” Burhendurur demanded.

Volaro laid it out, “If they come out of there dating, then you moving on Quilatalap is a terrible breach of conduct— I amend my statement: You talking to Quilatalap at all will now require oversight by Erick at all times. If they come out of there angry at each other, then Quilatalap is gone. If they come out of there amicably quits, then you might be able to make a move.”