Free Web NovelChapter 86: Chapter 86 Memory Is Not Always Good, But It Is Indispensable
"I’d rather not try it," Stan shook his head and walked back to his seat.
Chen Ze glanced at Stan curiously; it wasn’t that he found it strange why Stan wouldn’t eat. In Chen Ze’s view, every guest had their own preferences, and he didn’t insist on guests trying new dishes.
What Chen Ze found odd was that Stan seemed preoccupied today. Although there was no expression on Stan’s face, Chen Ze could sense that something was on his mind.
"Maybe I’ve been a bit neurotic lately?" Chen Ze scratched his head.
"Uncle Manager..." Andrew and Elena came downstairs and then saw Stan with a gloomy expression.
Andrew instinctively shielded Elena behind him. For some reason, he felt that something was off about Stan. Whenever he saw him, he felt uncomfortably tense.
Stan turned to glance at Andrew, noting the pure Holy Light Power emanating from the boy.
If nothing went amiss, he would certainly be able to reach the level of a High Grade Professional in the future.
But what of it? Stan lowered his head, still more interested in the Buffet in front of him.
"Andrew, Elena, come over here, let’s have hotpot together today," Chen Ze said cheerfully, carrying several plates of sliced ingredients from the kitchen, both meat and vegetables.
"Okay, Uncle Manager!" Elena ran over excitedly and sat down in the chair with anticipation.
Andrew looked at Stan warily and slowly moved to take a seat as well.
"Mr. Stan is a guest, don’t look at him like that," Chen Ze said, half laughing, half crying, as he observed Andrew. He didn’t understand why Andrew was so guarded against Stan.
"Alright, Uncle Manager," Andrew nodded and focused on the steaming hotpot in front of him. He had never seen such a thing before, but that didn’t stop Andrew from thinking it looked tasty.
That was a shared understanding between him and Elena: in this magical restaurant, even a glass of water could taste better than the black bread provided by the Holy City Church.
Andrew glanced at Elena, who was continuously swallowing her saliva.
"Come on, let’s put the food in. It’s ready to eat once it’s cooked," Chen Ze first added several plates of sliced lamb, which contained some pieces of lamb tail fat.
Chen Ze had heard that putting the lamb tail fat in first could greatly enhance the deliciousness of the entire hotpot, and he chose to trust the netizens online about this.
Meanwhile, Stan was lost in thought. He had just eaten a Buffet, but it tasted completely different from the ones he had before.
If the previous Buffet only allowed Stan, who lacked a sense of taste, to revisit the sweetness once experienced, then this Buffet was even more unique.
"How long has it been..." Stan looked silently at the cup in his hand, wondering how long it had been since he last tasted something like this.
It was just a Buffet, but eating it, Stan felt as if he was consuming his own past.
The him that still had a physical body, the inexperienced him, the him who once believed in oaths, the him who was still human.
Stan silently touched his chest, where there should have been a wound, a frightening wound.
"Alice, why did you do this to me!"
"Mr. Stan, the past I shared with you was merely to obtain this Magic Book," said the pretty girl, smiling at him, but the dagger in her hand dripped with blood—Stan’s blood.
Chen Ze frowned as he glanced at Stan, for he had been feeling an unsettling presence slowly emanating from Stan since the beginning.
Stan was still the same, silently sitting in his chair, but the unsettling aura around him was getting stronger.
"Mr. Stan?" Chen Ze asked with concern. Stan was a good customer, and Chen Ze didn’t want the restaurant’s magic circle to perceive him as a threat.
The cold Manchester, with blizzards covering the city, couldn’t compare to the chill in Stan’s heart.
He had never expected that, in the face of the entire Magic Guild’s disbelief in him, this woman would come to his side, encouraging him, comforting him.
Even when Stan was destitute, even when he was mocked as a failure, the woman who protected him, after getting hold of the magic book, buried him with her own hands.
"Mr. Stan, I’m really sorry, I forgot to tell you, I indeed have your child, but I will kill it myself, because he has a worthless father." Alice said with a smile, her expression so enticing, yet her words suffocating.
The child... his own child... his unborn child...
Stan looked at the sky in despair as the white snow in his vision slowly darkened, getting blacker and blacker, until he fell into an abyss.
At this moment, Stan finally remembered, finally recalled his past, all of his being, the memories he had deliberately forgotten.
Nobody could continue eating in the restaurant, as the unsettling presence grew stronger. Just as Chen Ze was about to summon the magic circle, all the uncomfortable aura disappeared, and calm returned to the restaurant.
Stan took a deep breath. Looking at everything before him, from his fall into the abyss to now, must have been over a thousand years, and he had grown from a weak skeleton into a major figure of a negative plane.
Alice... must be dead by now.
Stan remembered that magic book; although it was considered magical in the positive plane with its meditation methods and magic theories enough to help a mage grow into a high grade professional, that was all there was to it.
"Mr. Stan, are you okay?" Chen Ze asked worriedly, Elena was nearly in tears from the oppressive aura emanating from Stan just moments ago.
"Manager, thank you," Stan said with genuine gratitude as he placed a black stone on the table.
"This is for today’s meal." Stan sat back calmly in his chair. Although the item was quite precious, he felt that compared to his memories, the memories were better.
As for why he could recall this deliberately forgotten memory, Stan was very clear—it was all because of the Buffet he had just eaten.
Therefore, this debt Stan must repay, even if Chen Ze was unaware. fɾeewebnoveℓ.co๓
Chen Ze curiously accepted the stone, feeling its cold touch, which seemed no different from an ordinary stone.
[Energy source detectable for absorption in progress.]
[Current progress: 50002/100000]
Chen Ze blinked, suspecting he had just experienced a hallucination?
A stone had provided him with fifty thousand progress towards an upgrade?
Chen Ze insisted on another stone, please.
[The restaurant’s portal has been upgraded, the portal will appear in more planes.]
