CH 9

Is there no rice in this world I wonder… I was about to give up, but the situation changed for better one day. It’s not like there’s no rice, it’s just that there’s no habit of eating rice in the Doristan Kingdom, so it’s not recognized as foodstuffs, is what I confirmed. Surprisingly, rice exists! Moreover, gulpingly close…!!!! Uu… so this is precisely what “go abroad to hear of home” means… it’s used as horse and livestock feed…

What a wasteful thiiiing~! (tears of blood)

I, who was strolling around after skipping classes have lost my way (on purpose to buy time) and came across stables… and rice husks. Eh? What’s this? Husks? … Rice? … It is rice, isn’t it?? Why is it at such place?? While staring and thinking such, the stables’ guard Thomas Jiisan taught me… that is the horses’ feed, he said… The chicken-like guys were also deliciously pecking it… Se.ri.ou.sly~! For the bluebird to be this close~!!!! Hyahou~! (dancing wildly in my mind)

You know my course of actions after that, right? It’s securing it. The stables guard Thomas Jiisan「This much? Are you going to feed the birds too?」looked at me in wonder as I filled a bag with unhusked rice!

Hooray~! Cristea.has.obtained.rice!!!! Tetere~!!!!

I thought of cooking with unpolished rice too after somehow managing to remove the husks, but because I want to eat white rice, I decided to do my best at polishing the rice. Relying on my past life memories, I put the unpolished rice into a bottle and tapped it with a stick, I polished the rice using the so-called bindzuki [瓶づき – No idea how this is called in English. It’s a traditional rice polishing method where you use an empty sake bottle, put the rice in and tap it using chopsticks] method. In my previous OL life, I yearned for slowlife, so I participated in a「Personal experience from rice planting to rice polishing」workshop. That time,「It was hella tiring! Slowlife is impossible!」I promptly failed, but for that experience to be useful here… I remember the crispy rice stuck to the bottom of the pot of that time. It was a tough job but I did my best. It a cooked white rice, you know? That brilliantly shining thing which sweetness increases with each chew, you know? Crispy rice at the bottom of a cooking pot is a treat, you know? I had no choice but to work hard, right~!! Why not~!!!!

In fact, Miria stood guard at the door even though she was frightened by me who was stealthily polishing rice in the middle of the night. It’s something I heard in the future, but my rice polishing with a ghastly expression while saying「Rice… white rice…!」words of uncertain meaning seemed like some kind of curse ritual to Miria…

S, somehow, I’m sorry…

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B, but. Finally! It’s the long-awaited! Rice! You know~! Hooray~! Let’s cook!