PHA – Chapter 151 – How Tasty
“Wait. You say that you won’t interfere with this world’s development, but is it alright if I do it?” Alice asked. Although the Loli Goddess was a bit insensitive in dealing with her world, when Alice recalled the scene where she was playing console games with the Loli Goddess, she really couldn’t take the other party seriously. So, she didn’t give up on helping the elves and quickly thought of another solution. “If I satisfy your appetite, will you give up on the Fruit of God?”
After all was said and done, the reason the Loli Goddess had taken the Fruit of God away was solely for the fruit’s taste. She wasn’t interested in its healing properties whatsoever.
In other words, if Alice could figure out a way to satisfy the Loli Goddess’s appetite, wouldn’t that mean she could get the Loli Goddess to give up on the fruit and leave them to the elves?
“Oh? Are you trying to make a deal with me?”
The Loli Goddess grew a little interested when she heard Alice’s words. While she might be cold when dealing with her world, outside of that, her personality and thinking remained the same as an ordinary little girl.
“But do you have a way to satisfy my appetite? If you’re talking about Earth’s delicacies, I’m afraid that you’ll have to be disappointed. You can’t satisfy me with them,” the Loli Goddess said.
Alice wasn’t surprised to hear the Loli Goddess’s words. The world barrier might be preventing her from traveling back to Earth, but that wasn’t the case for the Loli Goddess. The Loli Goddess could travel to and from Earth freely, even with the damaged world barrier. She could even bring Earth’s gaming consoles back to her world. So, it was only natural that the Loli Goddess could also procure Earth’s delicacies.
Not to mention, Alice had previously tasted her arm when she was holding the Fruit of God previously. Even with just a lick, she could feel her soul shuddering in delight. In other words, the Fruit of God was no longer a simple delicacy. Instead, it was food that had already touched upon the realm of souls. Thus, she could confidently say that even Earth’s cuisine was far from being comparable.
“I’m not sure if it’ll work, but I have to give it a try at the very least,” Alice said, chuckling. Then, she picked up an apple from the nearby coffee table.
“That’s just a normal apple. It won’t become delicious no matter what you do to it,” the Loli Goddess said. Although she couldn’t figure out what Alice was trying to do, she still decided to give the blonde girl a kind reminder. The apple Alice held was only an ordinary apple, and it was something she had swiped from Earth. After all, the Fruit of God was something that ripened only once every few hundred years, and she couldn’t possibly go on a hunger strike for such a long time. So, she would still consume normal fruits from time to time.
“No, it might become incredibly delicious in a moment.”
After saying so, Alice stuffed the apple in her left hand into the confused Loli Goddess’s hands. Then, she placed her right hand on the Fruit of God the Loli Goddess had taken out of her cabinet and cast one of the taboos she had just learned—Aspect Separation.
Indeed, Alice intended on attaching the “God’s Appreciation” concept to the “apple in God’s hand” concept.
Immediately, Alice could feel all of the mana within her draining rapidly. However, she couldn’t help but frown as she noticed that her mana was still far from enough to complete her spell. She didn’t think that the “God’s Appreciation” concept would consume so much of her mana.
Just when her mana pool was about to dry out, Alice hurriedly tugged one of her “hair ties” off and gripped it in her right hand. However, even with the huge boost to her mana pool, she had just barely managed to complete her Aspect Separation before her mana got depleted again.
It seems concepts associated with God cannot be trifled with.
Alice couldn’t help but shudder when she sensed her nearly empty mana pool. That was several thousand points’ worth of mana. Yet, she had spent nearly all of it just to complete such a specific Aspect Separation. The “God’s Appreciation” concept must be incredibly powerful for it to consume so much mana.
“Are you done?” the Loli Goddess asked in confusion when she saw the dazed look on Alice’s face. Then, she tentatively took a bite out of the apple Alice had stuffed into her hands. “Hm?! This taste…?”
“How is it? It should taste the same as the Fruit of God, right?” Alice asked. When she saw the look of surprise on the Loli Goddess’s face, she knew that her plan had more or less succeeded. “I used Aspect Separation to attach the Fruit of God’s taste to the apple in your hand. In the future, all apples that you hold with your hand should taste like this.”
“Aspect Separation…? I see. Do you mean the taboo the elves developed? I didn’t think it could be used like this,” the Loli Goddess said, a look of satisfaction on her face as she took another bite out of the apple. “Leave it to you to come up with such a solution. If all of the apples that enter my hand will taste like this in the future, I can indeed go without the Fruit of God.”
Alice breathed out a sigh of relief when she heard the Loli Goddess’s words. She was glad that her idea worked. She also didn’t think that the taboo she had just learned would come into play so soon. With this, the elves could keep the Fruit of God and research its healing properties to improve this world’s medical industry.
“If you knew about aspect Separation, did you never try to use it to attach the Fruit of God’s taste to something?” Alice asked when she recalled how the Loli Goddess talked about Aspect Separation.
“Gods do not learn magic. There is no point in doing so,” the Loli Goddess said, shaking her head. “If I intended on harming this world, I can flip the world upside down with just a thought and bury all existing civilizations in the ground. I can also do whatever taboos can do using laws. However, using Aspect Separation for such a purpose is something that has never crossed my mind.”
Alice nodded in understanding when she heard the Loli Goddess’s words. The Loli Goddess had created this world, and she had absolute control over the world’s laws. If they excluded the Demon King’s Power and the laws the Demon King’s Power had destroyed, the Loli Goddess was essentially omnipotent in this world.
However, unless it was something related to the Demon King’s Power, the Loli Goddess would not use her abilities in this world.
“I’ve canceled the Fruit of God’s automatic collection effect. They won’t disappear when plucked in the future, so you can do whatever you want with them,” the Loli Goddess said as she licked the remaining apple juice on her fingers. She looked nothing like an indifferent God whatsoever. “They should also take much less time to ripen now. Originally, they should take several hundred years to ripen since I wanted to concentrate its flavor… But if I dismiss the flavor, the growth cycle should shorten.”
So that’s why those fruits take several centuries to ripen? Alice thought. “How long will they take to ripen now?”
“Around two years?” the Loli Goddess said nonchalantly. “If you return now, the fruit on the tree should ripen in a few days. You can tell the elves to harvest them when the time comes.”
Alice didn’t know whether to laugh or cry when she heard the Loli Goddess’s words. The growth cycle of the Fruit of God had shortened from several hundred years to just two short years simply by skipping the flavor concentration phase. This meant that the Loli Goddess had artificially prolonged the growth cycle by over a hundred times just to concentrate the fruit’s flavor…
Regardless, this was good news. The elves shouldn’t mind the Fruit of God’s subdued taste. It was fine so long as they could retain the fruit’s healing abilities.
However, how she should relay this information to the elves was a problem. After all, she couldn’t possibly go to the elven patriarch and tell them about the changes to the Fruit of God. Even if she was the Gryffin Kingdom’s princess, it didn’t make sense for her to know such information. And if her words turned out to be true, the elves would definitely suspect her identity.
It seems I’ll have to relay this information as the Hero.
After thinking it over, Alice made her decision. So long as there was something she couldn’t explain, all she needed to do was push it onto the Hero.