The Chef’s Hidden Blessings

Chapter 3: Testing (1)

“Ceres. A goddess of Earth that appears in Greek mythology. Born between Rhea and Cronus…” 

Heading home on a bus after a long day, still lost and confused, Jungdong accessed Wikipedia on his phone and looked for any information he could find on Ceres, who claims she has given him her powers. 

I thought a god would be someone like Jesus or Buddha, but she is a goddess from Greek mythology. 

At first, he thought this was all a dream. He couldn’t react because he was simply shocked. As time passed, however, he had no choice but to accept this situation. 

That random voice that came from above earlier… These screens in front of his eyes that won’t go away.. Even if he tried to brush things away as a dream or an illusion, these screens lingering in front of his eyes reminded him that all of this was real. Even the written words. It didn’t take a long time for Jungdong to accept his reality. 

“Satisfy them by using the power of god on this world? This power mentioned here must be referring to these blessings, right?”

When he shouted the names of his powers, description boxes popped out. 

Physical Recovery(F) 

You can infuse your food with healing powers of the Earth. 

Rank F! Because your rank is low, you can only apply a low-level of healing power. 

Increase of Energy(F) 

You can infuse your food with the Earth’s energy. 

Rank F! Because your rank is low, you can only apply a low-level of energy. 

Cooking Skills of the Earth(F) 

Earth is the mother of all ingredients. This allows you to master any cooking methods related to ingredients grown on Earth. It also allows you to see information about the cooked dish. 

F Rank! Because your rank is low, you can only apply a low-level of skill and see a limited information. 

You may activate or deactivate powers freely, at your will. These powers only apply to you.

Use the powers skillfully to upgrade each power’s rank! 

Current KP(Kindness Point): o 

Current MP(Miracle Point): 0 

You can convert 100KP into iMP. 

Make miracles happen and collect KP and MP to satisfy your gods! 

3 powers were given to Jungdong. 

Apparently, 2 powers allowed him to bless foods, and the remaining one helped him to impr his cooking skills. Based on what he read on Wikipedia, it seemed every power mentioned the Earth because Ceres was a goddess of Earth. 

“And I have to collect KP and MP, Which stand for Kindness Points and Miracle Points… Also, MP seem way more important, seeing that I can convert 100 KP into 1MPS… But, this is all still difficult to understand.” 

None of this made any sense to Jungdong. 

*** 

Lost in his thoughts for a while, Jungdong realized that he was already home.

“I’m home!” He shouted out as he opened the front door, but no one answered. “Oh, right. My parents were going to be late today.” 

He recalled his parents mentioning the day before that they had a couples-gathering today. 

9 p.m. 

He would have usually hit the shower and passed out, but he didn’t feel tired, perhaps because of everything that happened today. Instead, a grumbling sound came from his stomach. 

“Geez… I’m hungry. Maybe it’s because I hardly ate earlier.” He couldn’t eat properly at the time due to the shock, but he could feel the hunger now that he was a bit settled down. “Ordering something in… is going to cost too much.” 

He was nowhere near comfortable, so he had to save up as much as possible. Pondering for a moment, he took out a pack of ramen from the kitchen cabinet. 

“Nothing beats ramen, late at night!” 

Fried chicken, burger, pizza, etc. There were many late-night favorites, but Jungdong’s top choice was ramen. Cheap, easy to prepare, quick. Ramen had everything a late-night snack needed. 

“But…” 

Something at the corner of his eye kept grabbing his attention ever since he grabbed the bag of ramen; those screens from earlier, ever since he heard the strange voice that came from above. These screens explaining how he could use Cares’s many powers continued to float around in front of him. There were also many different powers he could use. 

Physical Recovery, Increase of Energy, Cooking Skills of the Earth… 

It felt as if they were saying, if you are going to cook, use us! 

I guess I have no choice. 

The reality genuinely struck him. Thinking that there was nothing to lose, he decided to give these powers a try. 

After reading through the descriptions, Jungdong selected one. “Let’s give Cooking Skills of the Earth a try first…” 

Cooking Skills of the Earth(F)

Earth is the mother of all ingredients. This allows you to master any cooking methods related to ingredients grown on Earth. It also allows you to see information about the cooked dish. 

Cooking Skills of the Earth allowed one to master information regarding ingredients and learn new information about the cooked dish. Understanding information about ingredients was a huge advantage for a chef. 

Thinking that he genuinely wanted to use this skill, he murmured his wish to use the power in his heart, and another small box popped up at the side of his peripheral vision. 

Cooking Skills of the Earth/ON 

Syncing will begin. 

And a moment later. 

“Ahhh!” 

As Soon as the skill was activated, information that Jungdong could hardly keep up with flowed into his head; everything from the qualities of ingredients that grow from the ground like potatoes and carrots to cultivation methods, preparation methods, and even cooking methods.

Shocked at the pace at which information was getting registered into his head, Jungdong fell to the ground with his hands wrapped around his head. However, in 30 seconds, the pain stopped the moment the synchronization was over.

 “Whew… I thought I was going to die. The least you can do is warn me!” He shouted into the air, but Ceres, who gave him his powers, maintained her silence. 

Grumble. 

Having been worked up, he felt hungrier than before. He placed a small pot with water on the stove and opened the fridge door to look for some subsidiary ingredients. 

“My goodness.” 

Jungdong froze the moment he opened the fridge. It wasn’t a matter of not having enough ingredients or the fridge being too messy; it was the fact that every single item that belonged to the fridge had an information box associated with it. 

Mom’s Kimchi 

Ingredients: Napa cabbage, spring onions, fish sauce… 

This is the kimchi your mother made. It is a little salty.

Spring Onion 

It is a type of Allium. It has a bitter, spicy flavor and is high in antioxidants… 

Cooking Skills of the Earth was one of the powers Ceres had. 

A brief description and the recipe would pop up when looking at a dish, and a description with a name would pop up when looking at an ingredient. And besides the details on the screens, a substantial amount of information was automatically registered into his head. 

“This is amazing… It really is the best!”