Chapter 11 – The First Dinner

By punctured coin, I assume she means the old Asian/current Japanese style coins. Basically like American coins, but with a hole in the middle.

“Innkeeper, thank you for the tea. It was delicious.”

When I reached the dining room, I called out towards the kitchen.

“That’s fine. I’m glad it suited your taste.”

The innkeeper gave a light smile and took the tray from the Squad Chief, before heading back to the kitchen.

“Dinner for three, please.”

The Prince spoke to a nearby employee (the daughter of the innkeeper?), and sat down at an empty table.

The Squad Chief sat down at the table as well, so I also vaguely decided to sit down as well.

Somehow or other I ended up listening to them talk about the bandits from today, and the knight squad, before our food was carried to us.

“Tonight is bread with grilled herb chicken, and a vegetable and sausage stew.”

When I looked at the food, the innkeeper explained them to me.

Since I was hungry, I decided to immediately begin eating.

If you looked around, the other two at the table were already eating.

“Itadakimasu.”

After bringing my hands together in thanks, I tasted the food.

One by one, I took a bit of each of the foods, and chewed them.

After that, I took one of the pieces of bread from the basket in the middle of the table, and tearing off a little, I tried eating it.

“…”

I had forgotten…

The taste of the food was no different from in the knowledge of my old life.

In other words, it was not tasty.

It was by no means bad tasting. For the sake of protecting the honour of this shop, I have to say that it’s tasty for this world.

But to this tongue of mine that has gotten used to the food of Japan, it’s not food that can satisfy me.

MSG doesn’t exist in this world, but the way you use herbs and spices can greatly affect the taste of the cooking.

I know from the knowledge of my old life that the herbs and spices in this world are basically the same as those on earth.

In this world, most of those are used in medicine or talismans, and there’s no concept of using them in cooking.

The bread is also black coloured, and is extremely hard. It seems that there’s no bread that uses the fermentation of yeast. I must quickly reform this situation. If I remember correctly, spices and herbs should be sold in general stores or adventurer-related stores. Let’s have a look at them later.

While I was thinking this, perhaps because they had noticed that I had stopped my hand, the Prince and Squad Captain were looking my way.

“What’s wrong? You’re not going to eat? Does it not suit your tastes?”

“I thought that this place had pretty good cooking though.”

The Prince and Squad Captain asked me in confusion.

“No, it is fine. I was just a little shocked.”

While giving a small lie, I finished off my dinner. Whilst thinking about what I would do from now on.

After finishing dinner, I decided to try asking for a favour from the two who were now chatting while drinking fruit liquor.

“Umm, I’d actually like to go have a look at the general store and the stores that sell tools for adventurers after this.”

The two of them looked my way.

“Well, that’s fine but, did you need something from them?”

Well, if I suddenly wanted to go to a store, I suppose that’s a natural doubt.

“Yes, there are a few things that I want, you see. And so, umm, this is something difficult to ask, but…”

Indeed. Even if I go shopping, at present I have not a single one of the Golshu coins used in this world.

In this world, a single punctured copper coin is the lowest denomination ‘1 Golshu’, 10 punctured copper coins are 1 copper coin, 10 copper coins are 1 silver coin, 100 silver coins are 1 gold should. That’s how I remember it.

Above gold coins are treasure coins used for business dealings, which are worth 100 gold coins.

Comparing living expenses, 1 punctured copper coin corresponds to 10 Yen.

In other words, a punctured copper coin = ¥10, copper coin = ¥100, silver coin = ¥1000, gold coin = ¥10,000.

As for treasure coins, one of them is worth ¥10,000,000.

If I remember correctly, the living expenses of a normal commoner should be 5000 Golshu per month, so about 50 silver coins.

While recalling such a thing, I began negotiating to make money for my shopping funds.

“Umm, I have only just come to this world, so I have not even a single Golshu. It’s obvious, but I need money to purchase the things that I want. So… umm, Prince Sedrim…”

I cut off my sentence there, and looked at the Prince’s face.

What I have to negotiate with are my ballpoint pen, and the new notebook that I bought as a spare.

I’ll need the notebooks I’m currently using and my binder notebook for when I return back to Japan after all, and my permanent marker and mechanical pencil are probably not all that useful. As for my textbooks, they’re meaningless to the people of this world after all, so I’ve judged that amongst my belongings, the ballpoint pen and new notebook have the most value in this negotiation.

“Please… buy my most important thing(, the stationery that I brought from my old world)!”