7-The crowed lured in by the smell

I...I was so exhausted. I couldn't move an inch.

Norn and Couge probably felt the same way, as they were both slumped down in their chairs when there were dirty plates all over the tables.

Me, I didn't even have the energy to pull myself up to a nearby chair and was just sitting on the floor. Just hung my chin on a chair that many an old man had sat on.

Because the chairs were all so damn tall. I had to jump a little to reach. Couge looked like he wanted to pick me up and set me down on a chair, but it would be a pain to hop down from it so I declined.

Even for Couge, having to toss that frying pan over and over had his arms shaking. He was probably exhausted right now, so he'd have a hard time carrying me.

That's why I refused his offer.

"Even back when my old man was still well enough to run this restaurant, I don't think he ever had a day with this many customers," Couge said.

Norn concurred, "Yes, I've been coming over a lot since I was a child, but this was the first time I've ever seen it this busy."

Oh, so they were childhood friends. So that's why they got along so well.

The omelet and bread always finished cooking at the same time, that's how in sync they were. It was really moving.

Just as the previous two customers had eaten and left, another customer had come. After him, there wouldn't be any eggs left so I'd thought he'd be the last, but another three people came in as I was serving him some water so I didn't even have the time to refuse them.

Apparently that first bearded old man had spread the word that the food was good. The new customers said they were looking forward to eating, so I couldn't drive them away.

Norn had worried, "What should we do? We don't have any eggs or bread left."

"G-go, buy some with this!!" I'd said.

We'd still had a lot of vegetables and soup, and there'd still been some butter.

So I'd grabbed the money that the last three customers had paid with, and thrust them towards him.

Couge realized, "I see, we can just buy the missing ingredients. Norn, can I leave it to you?"

"Yes!! I'll do it at once!!"

Norn then grabbed a basket and rushed out. Soon enough, he was back with tons of eggs and monster baguettes.

Seeing that amount of ingredients, I'd thought, wasn't that too much? But it turned out Norn's judgment was completely right.

As soon as Norn had brought back the eggs and bread, a ton of customers came. Some of them said they'd smelled something delicious so they came in, while others became interested when they'd heard about the place from previous diners.

So the kitchen became a battlefield.

More than half of the seats had all been filled, and some brought company, so the number of orders flew through the roof. There was no way we could cook each serving of omelette one at a time. So we'd cooked five eggs all together and made one huge omelette, then cut it up into five pieces for each plate.

A frying pan full of five eggs, I couldn't even lift the pan, it was so heavy.

Even the well-muscled Couge had his arm straining as he lifted the pan, that was how heavy it was.

Norn had been busy cutting the baguettes, sprinkling garlic powder on top of each slice and toasting them the whole time. The climate was already pretty hot, and with the fires going in the kitchen, we were all red and sweaty in no time.

It would have been bad if we all got dehydrated, so I told them to drink some water whenever they had a moment to spare.

I'd been in charge of the salad, and I was cutting vegetables so much I'd thought I'd get tendinitis.

The Chinese-style dressing had been such a hit. There were a lot of people asking for second servings of salad, so I really had to cut up a storm.

Norn and Couge had both been busy doing tasks with an open flame, so greeting the customers, bringing out the food, and receiving payment had been all left up to me.

Because it was dangerous for the others to do it. Grandma had often told me that when you had an open flame, you should never leave it unattended.

There had been a lot of customers who'd helped me carry the plates when they saw me slowly and awkwardly carrying them out, so it wasn't all that bad.

Similarly, when they saw the pile of dirty plates I'd been carrying swaying dangerously and clinking with each other, some of them directly carried their empty plates and left them on the counter near the kitchen. The rest of the customers saw them and copied them, too. They were really a bunch of nice people.

After two hours, the two bottles of butter I'd brought and all of the soup had all been finished, and we'd finally been able to flip the sign to 'closed'. Even then, there were a few people who'd peeked in to see if we were open.

We'd had to bow to each one of them and tell them we were done for the day and to please come again.

I said, "The butter was really popular. But now we've used it all up."

"Making them takes so much but using them up only takes a moment, huh," Norn commented.

There'd been two small bottles of butter. I was glad I'd brought my own stock or else we'd have been in trouble.

But if Couge needed the same amount of butter every day, what should we do? Those two bottles took two days' worth of Hanako and Hanayo's milk to make.

That would mean for each day the restaurant opened, it'd have to close the next day. As I'd thought, using only the amount of milk I had at home wouldn't be enough.

We really had to look for a dairy farmer who'd be able to supply the butter soon.

Besides, if he got the same amount of customers as today, what would happen? Even with Norn and I here we were as busy as bees. Maybe he could hire some staff?

"Couge, do you usually work alone?" I asked.

"I didn't have the leeway to look for more staff. Norn would come help out on his days off, but we've never had so many customers before now. Honestly, I've been wondering how I was going to handle customers tomorrow," Couge replied.

I grinned hard. It was because, just now, Couge was wondering 'what he'd do tomorrow'.

That meant, he now wanted to continue on with the restaurant.

Norn jumped up from his seat and held tightly onto Couge's hand. "Couge, you're continuing the restaurant?!"

"It's thanks to you, Norn. I was really thinking of giving up earlier this morning."

"It's not me. Everything is thanks to Shinobu."

Hearing my name mentioned in the conversation between these two close friends had me grinning with happiness once more. It felt like I got closer to them too.

I said, "No, I think it really is thanks to Norn. If you hadn't told me you wanted to help out someone you know and asked for my advice, I wouldn't be here."

Thinking back, the timing really was kind of a miracle. If he'd asked a day later, Couge might've already sold the restaurant.

I was glad we were on time.

"What, Norn. You didn't introduce me as your lover? That makes me sad," Couge teased.

Norn replied, "But, that's... it's too embarrassing to say."

"Heeh, so you're lovers," I listlessly observed.

I was so tired, I couldn't really think. What was 'lovers' again? .........Wait, lovers?

I suddenly felt wide awake. My body straightened up, head whipping to the two of them. They were still holding hands, and Norn was pink in the cheeks.

Norn explained, "The two of us are engaged. I was thinking I'd quit my job and just help out at Couge's restaurant. But we can't live on the restaurant's revenue just yet, so that's still far into the future."

Whoaaa. Weren't you both men? Or maybe, even though you both look like men, one of you was actually a woman?

But having either the glasses-wearing, cool type Norn or the model-looking, sexy type Couge be a woman, would be...whoaaa.

"Ummm, ummm..."

Could I ask? But it would be rude, wouldn't it?

If I asked one of them, 'Are you a girl?' and got it right, then they'd get depressed at my having to ask them before I realized they were a woman.

But if I asked one of them and got it wrong, then the other one would get depressed at looking less like a woman than the one I'd asked.

What should I do? Who should I ask? No wait, maybe I shouldn't ask in the first place?

Maybe I should just leave off asking this question entirely and just go straight to congratulating them?

While I was staring wide-eyed, so lost in thought that I even forgot to blink, Norn cocked his head. "......? Oh, that's right. In Shinobu's world, only men and women can get married to each other. Even your marriageable age is set by law, right? In this world, anyone, no matter what gender or age, can get married."

Ahh, I'm so glad I didn't ask anything weird!!

"Ohh, I see. I thought one of you was actually a girl so I was shocked. That's right, in the country I lived in, only men and women can get married to each other. So for a moment, I thought you were that kind of couple. But if I remember correctly, same sex couples can get married in other countries."

Which countries were those again?

Couge asked, "So it differs according to where you live? Shinobu's world sounds really complicated."

In my opinion, this world was just too imprecise. But I guess that also meant more freedom, huh.

What was important was that Norn and Couge both looked really happy together.

"Ehehe, congrats!! Don't forget to invite me to your wedding, okay?"

""Wedding'? What's that?" Norn inquired.

Oh man, so they didn't have that either, huh.

I answered, "Erm, it's a way to announce to the people around you that you've gotten married. How it goes depends on where you live, though. I see, so you don't have weddings here. Then, when you get married, let's hold a party to celebrate!! You invite family, friends and colleagues and celebrate together. As for the place, well, isn't here fine?"

"That sounds fun! I see, so in Shinobu's world, you celebrate marriages like that. I'll have to inform my superior about 'weddings' tomorrow. Please keep telling me more about your world from now on, Shinobu."

"Sure!! If you're alright with me."

I did say I wanted to help with enticing tourists.

Norn really was such a workaholic. He even turned the conversation into work talk at the end.

Right, we went off-topic. We were talking about what we were going to do with the restaurant tomorrow.

"Well, let's get back on track. Couge, can't you close tomorrow? We don't have any more butter, and if we think about things long-term, we'd need a plan of action. No matter how we hack it, if the restaurant got so many customers like today, Couge wouldn't be able to do it alone. Besides, as I've told Norn, the amount of milk I have at home won't be enough. For the amount of butter we used today, I'd used two days' worth of milk, so I'd need two days to make more butter."

Norn blinked. "That's right. We initially came here to talk about that. I'd forgotten once customers started pouring in. You said we'd need time, effort and a lot of milk to make butter."

I explained the simple process of making butter. Couge rubbed his chin, seemingly deep in thought, then said he wanted to see the whole thing with his own eyes.

"Sure~ Then, come over to my house tomorrow? Let's try making it together."

"Okay, let's do that," Couge agreed.

Norn was apologetic. "Unfortunately, I won't be able to join you as I have work tomorrow."

I felt bad for the depressed-looking Norn, but there was nothing we could do about it. Work was work.

They can just talk about it after Couge leaves my house tomorrow.

We forced our tired bodies to move and clean up. It was a really tiring day, but the one who'd been flipping the frying pan and was bound to be tired the most, Couge, still looked happy even as he washed the plates. My chest felt light; I was really glad to see him like that.

It was a temporary disbandment for today. But before I could leave, there was still one small thing we argued about.

Couge and Norn both wanted to give me today's earnings, saying that all of the ingredients, the butter, eggs and vegetables, were brought by me.

I refused, saying that I'd brought those things as gifts. They were free in the first place so they didn't have to pay me.

Besides, all the seeds I'd grown those vegetables from were given to me by Norn.

I declared, "Then, let's just say that this is my wedding gift to you guys. And once you get married, let me celebrate with you. In exchange, when I get a lover and get married, you'll throw a party for me and cook me a feast."

Since I've moved here, then the one I'll be marrying will be a person of this world.

They do say that weddings are for brides, plus I'd want to show my best to my in-laws.

My parents.....I wonder. They didn't really care about me. Even if I informed them of my impending wedding they'd probably just hum disinterestedly in reply.

Finally, Norn and Couge smiled. Norn looked really happy with his arm around Couge.

I was excited to see their wedding. I wondered if they'd let me cook the wedding feast. After all, we couldn't have one of the grooms be the one cooking it!

I was an amateur and definitely couldn't make any pro chef-like meals, but I'd do my absolute best!!

Brian had been waiting all this time in the shade beside the restaurant, so I hurried to the wagon he was pulling and started heading home. Naturally, I dozed throughout the whole trip.

When I woke up, I was already in front of my house. Pochi, who'd noticed our arrival, immediately jumped towards me and started licking my face.

I thanked the clever Brian. As I was about to unhook him from the wagon, I received another surprise and couldn't help jumping.

"The candy mountain grew twice as big......"

Were the people of this world mistaking my wagon as a candy box?