The dungeon was large.
Looking carefully, there were surprisingly emergency rations everywhere.
However, most of those ’emergency rations’ were for supplying nutrition to chimeras.
It was powder that thickened when mixed with water, and tasted terribly bad.
So I just packed some in the ring’s subspace. It would serve as emergency rations someday.
There was also a very small amount of Pelerian’s food.
Even with preservation magic, perhaps due to time passing.
There wasn’t much that was still edible.
However, I packed some honey, spices, and tea leaves that were there.
The furniture that Pelerian would have used was made of wood.
I gathered several chairs and broke them myself.
I lit them on fire.
This makes a campfire complete.
The important thing was finding a metal plate to grill meat on.
There wasn’t anything suitable.
So I just ripped off the crystal plate from the control room.
Thinking it could be used as a grill plate.
Actually, since I’m a monster, I could just swallow it raw, but.
Isn’t this about the mood too?
Moreover, these chimeras are so ugly it really kills the appetite.
It should taste better grilled well-done.
First remove the tough skin, then cut the body.
Slice.
After cleaning the innards, it looked similar to cut fish.
At this point you could call it a bone-in steak.
Sprinkle on salt and spices I had.
The spices were dried herbs, which according to Pelerian were more expensive than their weight in gold.
The scent was similar to rosemary.
I put the meat on the heated grill plate.
Sizzle!
An amazing sound came from the meat’s fat melting.
It would have been better with butter.
Grilling meat like this reminds me of the past.
The time when I escaped from Medusa Mom’s nest and fell into the Arkam Basin.
‘Well, this is huge progress compared to then.’
When was the first time I grilled meat after being born as a snake?
I think it was after escaping Pelerian’s first dungeon.
I went through all sorts of trouble, digging into the ground and putting charcoal and heated stones underneath to cover it, so the rising smoke wouldn’t be noticed.
How delicious it was even just grilled without salt.
Though I don’t remember what meat it was, it melted in my mouth.
In that sense, this is nothing short of luxury now.
At least it’s a seasoned steak.
Even if the ingredient is chimera.
From what I saw on YouTube before, letting large cuts of meat rest helps them cook evenly inside.
After grilling it golden brown on both sides, I set the meat aside.
While waiting I practice rolling.
That was the plan, but.
“Wait.”
Pelerian was about to order something again.
“Turn that command pin then click right twice, down three times.”
Without voice recognition, operating the magic spirit wasn’t easy.
Carefully operating the control room machinery like entering a complex password…
The magic spirit responds.
“No recorded journals found.”
Then Pelerian bursts out in anger.
“Argh!”
‘What did you do?’
“I checked if my main body left any journals. Not even leaving journals…”
Pelerian too was doing his own contemplation and reflection.
That in life he tried to transfer into a chimera body out of fear of death.
For Pelerian who was like the incarnation of pride and self-respect, it must have been a huge shock.
But giving up there would be amateur.
A first-rate person would try to clearly understand the truth.
Pelerian was indeed a first-rate villain.
“Unless there are more chimeras, but there were no empty tanks. In my opinion this was clearly an incomplete experiment.”
‘Well, certainly the last chimera was…’
It wasn’t wrong.
Though Pelerian’s hopes might be mixed in.
“And I overlooked something more important.”
‘What’s more important?’
“So in the end, did I die? Why isn’t there a corpse?”
From what Pelerian remembers.
He planned to return to this dungeon when facing death.
If fatally wounded, forced teleport to the dungeon.
If reaching end of lifespan, terminal illness, or lethal poison, the plan was to come to the dungeon himself.
If Pelerian died in either case.
Shouldn’t his corpse at least be here?
‘In those ruins before, it said you were killed by humans.’
“That was an unreliable record.”
‘Maybe you died before managing to teleport here?’
“Hmm…”
Pelerian let out a deep hum.
No hypothesis seemed completely impossible. That’s why it was more confusing.
But there was something that needed to be clearly established.
“At the mana stone storage in Palamu Rainforest, when I transmitted the signal.”
In that dungeon Pelerian noticed the transmission function was directed toward Delfram.
“The collected information definitely went to Delfram.”
The dungeon’s information was set to go where Pelerian’s main body was.
Since it clearly reached here, Pelerian thought his main body had died.
‘But there’s no corpse here.’
Nothing like Pelerian’s dead body could be seen.
‘Where exactly did the signal go? Did you walk around with a chip in your head?’
“I had a receiver I carried around.”
‘Shouldn’t that be somewhere here first?’
But no receiver could be seen either.
“There might be hidden spaces.”
Hidden spaces not even on the map viewable from the control room?
Maybe there are.
Since memories of this dungeon seem to have been erased from the Pelerian before me.
‘Ah!’
“What! Did you think of something?”
‘No, just worried the meat might get cold.’
Pelerian’s face twisted.
But we need to eat to live, right?
The chimera steak moved to the iron plate.
It looked well cooked on the outside.
When I cut into the steak with a dagger.
The cross-section was beautifully pink.
“Saak!” (Let’s eat!)
No need to cut it up like humans.
Or swallow without tasting like ordinary snakes.
Chomp.
Because Crystal Crown Python is good at biting and tearing too.
The perfectly medium rare cooked chimera steak could be bitten into smoothly.
Very juicy.
Mmm.
No matter how I dress it up, I can’t say it’s delicious.
Terribly bad beef >>>>> Chimera rotten kimbap > Grilled mosquito rat >>> Gray cockroach
That’s about the ranking.
Of course, being an excellent snake who doesn’t complain about food, I quietly ate up the steak.
Good medicine tastes bitter, they say. Maybe it’s good for health?
Tick tick.
Isil seemed quite envious of that.
