Request Completed
Grandpa Bishop’s warning didn’t seem to be about something immediate, but Father and Mother told me to be careful nonetheless — to avoid getting too close to the church whenever possible.
No problem there. I have no intention of walking straight into a mess I can already see coming.
Today, I’m offering new dishes to the gods.
Since yesterday, I’d asked the head chefs to make a large batch of new creations, even if it was a bit of an unreasonable request.
The menu: curry-seasoned skewers, curry soup, hamburg steaks with soft-boiled eggs and curry sauce, ice cream (vanilla, strawberry, berry, nuts & cream, cookies & cream, and matcha), dorayaki (red bean, white bean, and matcha fillings), matcha roll cake (both the sponge and cream are matcha-flavored), matcha cookies, matcha milk, and hot spring eggs — twenty servings each.
With this much, the gods should have no complaints.
I stored everything in the Magic Bag and moved to the church located on our estate grounds.
Father said, “It’s your request from the gods, so you should make the offering yourself.”
So, reluctantly, I did it. I really would’ve preferred someone else carry it all.
I set up four folding tables before the Three Gods of the church — the Plant God, the Sage God, and the Earth God — and lined them with as many dishes as I could fit, though not everything would fit.
Having no better option, I tried anyway.
“Plant God, Sage God, Earth God — I’ve brought the new dishes you requested, but they won’t all fit on these tables. Would you please accept these first?” I bowed my head and knelt in prayer.
When I looked up again, every single dish had vanished.
Perfect. I repeated the process three times, placing and praying until everything was gone.
Request complete.
Behind me, my family — who had silently watched the whole thing — reacted in various ways.
“Hardt, thank the heavens no one from the church saw that. They’d have declared you a divine child on the spot.”
“How mysterious… but what a sight to behold.”
“This must never be spoken of. Not to your friends, not to anyone.”
“Hardt, if you want to keep living freely, you mustn’t tell a soul.”
“But if we keep offering so many dishes like this, won’t the staff start wondering?”
“Brother Gerald, from now on it’ll only be the new dishes, not this entire feast, so it should be fine.”
“You say that so casually, but there’s always a risk of leaks.”
I thought, Even if someone found out, they probably wouldn’t come barging in, but I wisely kept that thought to myself.
Then—
“Trouble, Young Master Hardt! Please wake up!” Georges shook me awake.
“Come on, I finally got to rest. Let me sleep a bit longer.”
“I said it’s serious! Get ready, quickly!” He yanked off my blanket and forced me up to change.
“What’s going on? Tell me!”
“You’ll see when we get there.”
He rushed me along straight to the church on our grounds.
There, on the tables before the Three Gods, were neat stacks of cleaned plates and pots.
“Huh? Those are the dishes and pots from yesterday’s offerings, right? Looks like they cleaned and returned them. That’s nice of them,” I said, but Georges just gave me a strange look.
“There’s that, yes… but please, look over here.”
He pulled me over — and there, inside a wooden crate, were ten plump caterpillars, each about fifteen centimeters long.
“Eh? Caterpillars? Why was I called for this?”
“No one else can lift the box. Young Master Gerald said perhaps you might be able to, Young Master.”
Ah… just like Lucas’s egg, huh?
Urged on by Georges, I tried lifting it — and sure enough, it came up easily.
“As Young Master Gerald suspected,” Georges said in awe.
But wait—does this mean I’m supposed to raise them?
I carried the box to the living room, where my family was waiting. Seeing me enter with it, everyone looked unsurprised — apparently, they’d all tried and failed to lift it themselves before deciding to wait for me.
“What are these, exactly? Caterpillars as thanks for the new dishes?” I asked, setting the box on the table.
“That seems the most likely explanation,” Father said, looking grim.
“Hardt, has the stone tablet sent any message?”
“I thought that too, Brother Gerald, so I checked — but no message.”
“If they’re meant to be raised, I wonder if they eat your mana?” Mother mused.
“No, Mother,” Gerald said. “They’re eating the leaves inside the box.”
He picked up a small twig with some leaves still attached and examined it.
“Then we need to figure out what kind of tree these leaves are from,” Grandfather said thoughtfully.
“Oh, that’s easy,” Grandmother said cheerfully. “Hardt can just use the Plant God’s blessing to grow the twig!”
Grandmother — brilliant idea.
What do you think about this chapter?
Thanks for the chapters