Free Web NovelChapter 257: Small Banquet - Dessert
"It’s your training," Allina explained further, seeing Lucas’ look of incomprehension, "The regimen the General has you on is much more intense than normal for someone of your age and cultivation, not to mention all the running around you normally do with all the projects and operations you’re involved in. It’s only natural for you to have a bigger appetite."
This made sense to Lucas, but it had never really occurred to him as the only other kids his age he regularly ate with were Eris and now Tina; however, both of them ate just as much, if not more than him.
Thinking about it a bit more now though, Eris was following a pretty similar cultivation and training plan as him, while Christina’s was even more intense, so Lucas wouldn’t have noticed anything was off by comparing himself to them.
In any case, Lucas was quickly served his second helping of the Fourth Order roast and the young boy downed it with no issues whatsoever, finally feeling mostly satisfied.
If the main course of the banquet had been a pleasant surprise, then the dessert which followed was the exact opposite as it was just fruit.
That’s it.
Fruit.
Lucas was a bit taken aback when all that was served was a platter of cut up apples, pears, and some grape-like things he couldn’t identify, but no one else seemed to think anything was unusual about this, prompting him to remember that back in Redwood Town, he was the one who had introduced everyone around him to things like cookies, cakes, and other sweet pastries.
All of that was only made possible by Lucas’ creation of maple sugar, something he was running short on now. If not for suddenly having a large quantity of ’cheap’ sweetener, making fancy baked desserts, or any other kind of dessert for that matter, became much, much more difficult.
Sugar existed in the Rockwell Kingdom, but it was very expensive as it had to be imported from the Darr Kingdom with which they had a tenuous relationship.
The Royal Council had even set import limits for the sweet substance to prevent too much money from flowing into the hands of an enemy nation.
Even with all those factors taken into account, the Rockwell Kingdom still brought in 10 million Gold worth of sugar from the Darr Kingdom per year, which was no small figure.
Honey was actually much more commonly used in the Redwood Kingdom as a sweetener due to it being cheaper than sugar, but it was still quite expensive and maintaining a stable supply of it was difficult. On top of that, honey was notoriously difficult to bake with, so typically, desserts were just lightly sweetened breads or fresh fruit; this was true even at banquets held by most noble families.
Only the wealthiest and most powerful forces in the Rockwell Kingdom would regularly use sugar or honey to perhaps serve something more creative, and even then, it wasn’t all that common to see outside of large celebrations.
All this was to say, while food culture in the Rockwell Kingdom was underwhelming, its dessert culture was particularly poor; in Lucas’ opinion at least.
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After dessert came more mingling, with wine and spirits being served liberally. There was even music played on something that resembled a harp, allowing a few couples to take to the dance floor.
It was everything Lucas imagined a noble banquet would look like, and while it still didn’t sit all that well with him, since he had managed to secure some additional pledges of money, resources, and manpower for the evacuation, he had to admit it had its utility.
Having accomplished all he could, however, Lucas was now looking for an exit strategy, an objective that was complicated a bit by his new friend who very much didn’t want him to leave.
"Please? Just one more story!" Audrey begged.
With Lucas being the Disciple of her idol, and with him being one of the few children in the banquet hall tonight who was around her age, Audrey felt like everything would be too boring if he left now, so she kept pestering him to tell her more about his life, especially the parts involving his Master.
Allina, who was quietly watching him from her seat at the head table, had the same composed expression on her face as usual, but Lucas could tell there was a glint of amusement hidden in the depths of her eyes.
Paying his older companion no mind, Lucas decided to humour Audrey for a while long, seeing how there wasn’t anything more he could do until the ships from the Raging River Legion or from Herald City arrived.
There was something bothering Lucas, though.
All throughout the evening, although this young Carlson granddaughter was being extremely open with him, several other members of the Count’s family would give him unfriendly or even hostile gazes every now and then.
Unable to just ignore this silent malice any longer, Lucas decided to subtly probe his new friend to see if she knew anything that might help him defuse the tension.
"Hm? Why do some of my aunts and uncles seem upset?" Audrey parroted Lucas’ question back at him, scrunching up her brow slightly to think about it.
"Oh!" Audrey suddenly thought of something, "Mother told me that Uncle Ian was complaining about having to shut down his new business because of some peasant..."
Here, Audrey froze and lowered her head awkwardly, seemingly realizing why Lucas had asked her this question, and just who her youngest uncle had been complaining about.
Darting her eyes around, Audrey whispered quietly, "Please don’t tell my mom..."
Feeling a bit guilty he had tricked the girl into telling him something she shouldn’t have, Lucas readily nodded and promised, "Don’t worry, it’ll be our secret."
Fortunately, the pair of children had moved away from the head table earlier, and the Spirit Initiates from the Carlson Family were all too occupied to be paying attention to them, so Lucas was fairly confident that no one from the other side had caught on yet.
As for Allina, he wasn’t worried about her spilling the beans. freewёbn૦νeɭ.com
For now, Lucas thought the best thing he could do was change the subject, but he had also run out of amusing anecdotes that he could talk about without touching on more sensitive subjects, so he tried reversing the situation and asked, "So, what do you normally do for fun?"
Also eager to move on from her little slip-up, Audrey placed her finger cutely against her chin, pursing her lips as she mused, "When I don’t have lessons or training, I spend most of my time wandering around town with my friends. Sometimes we get snacks from the markets, or have tea parties at each other’s homes..."
Audrey went on to list a bunch of things that Lucas found perfectly normal for a young noble daughter to do. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary in Audrey’s life, until she suddenly mentioned her gardening hobby.
It wasn’t unusual for wealthy nobles, both male and female, to have extensive gardens around their homes, or for them to have a role in tending to those gardens; however, most noble women tended to plant beautiful flowers while Audrey seemed to have more interest in planting things like herbs and crops.
This came as quite a surprise to Lucas, especially the fact that Audrey even had her own field and greenhouse inside the Manor where she was growing all kinds of strange and exotic plants.
Some of the vegetables and spices used in tonight’s banquet even apparently came from Audrey’s experimental garden.
"I’d love to see that when we have more time," Lucas said with real enthusiasm. If his new friend had a truly wide variety of plants, he might be able to find some that were useful to his future plans.
If nothing else, he might be able to expand the menu options with some of the edibles she had available.
"Sure! Just let me know when and I’ll show you around personally!" Audrey, for her part, was also more than happy to agree to this request, "None of my friends ever want to talk about my plants... except for Kaden."
"Kaden?" Lucas tilted his head, wondering who this other plant enthusiast was.
"En! Kaden is... is my..." here, Audrey blushed a bit, looking a bit bashful as she lowered her volume slightly, "He’s the son of a friend of the family."
Raising his brow, Lucas found his new friend’s reaction quite interesting. Obviously, this ’Kaden’ wasn’t just some ordinary friend to Audrey.
This was the perfect opportunity for Lucas to tease the young girl, but deciding to be mature for now, he let it slide, instead just saying, "He sounds like an interesting person. I hope you’ll introduce me to him at some point."
"En," Audrey nodded meekly, fiddling with her fingers as she looked down at the floor and whispered, "I think Kaden would like you too, Lucas; he likes anyone who likes talking about plants."
