His élite squad looked at him with uncertainty.

Jacob had just served them more than two hundred grams of pasta each, almost the equivalent of three portions.

“Jake?” Helena hesitated.

“Try it! Trust me. It tastes super good!”

“Are this Tagliatelle?” Aunt Linda looked quite perplexed.

“Yes! I made the discovery of the century!” Jacob's fist pumped in the air.

“Pasta, Jake?” even Juliet was confused, for all she could see was the real excitement that was coming through the Ancestral Bond.

“For Christ’s sake, people, just put the damn pasta in your mouth!” Jacob was exasperated.

It took him three more hours to build the necessary tool to handle the pasta reliably and set up more ingredients for future batches. And it had been worth the trouble. Jacob had advanced by leaps and bounds in his Alchemy knowledge.

Jacob had actually felt a personal breakthrough in his path after making such a huge discovery. Sadly, his Cultivation was way too far from his insight to try and test it. Once he reached his old level, he would discover how much progress he had made on his path. It was just a matter of pumping Qi and Mana through his own Meridians as fast as possible until then.

The Alchemic Tagliatelle would go a long way in healing his body and reinforcing it, thankfully. First, however, he would have to experiment and see whether there were side effects in consuming so many magical herbs daily.

He could now feed his personal Suicide Squad without a problem.

Frederick put a spoonful of the bluish-brown pasta in his mouth and almost choked. Then, he started coughing, twisting, and turning, but he managed to swallow the pasta in the end.

Given the reaction, everyone was expecting that he would die any moment now, poisoned to death by Jacob’s terrible cooking skills.

“OH-MY-GOD!” Frederick's eyes went wide. “I think—I think I almost just leveled!”

“What?!” Helena eyed the weird pasta and immediately started shoving entire mouthfuls without a care in the world for manners nor the other people at the table. She looked like she would eat even the others’ pasta if they didn’t hurry up.

That was enough to convince everyone else to start tasting the weird concoction.

“Man!” Joseph was stunned.

“Kid, you should go on Masterchef!” Marcus slammed his palm on the table, almost smashing it to bits, and laughed heartily.

“What’s in this Tagliatelle?” his Aunt Linda marveled.

“Well, a few magical herbs that will help strengthen your body and cultivation. Start using your Cultivation Technique as soon as you are done eating.”

I’m definitely going to try donning this pasta with some Demonic Wolf ragù.

Jacob was lost in a universe of tastiness and cooking.

This new discovery would give them the edge they needed to fight off the Charbybdes. This could push Helena on the verge of the Mantis realm and Frederick up to the 8th level in both Qi and Mana. In addition, Juliet’s body would become so strong that low-level Charybdes would not be able to bite her flesh so easily.

Hopefully, every other person would become proficient enough with their Martial Style to not be an obstacle during the fight. They had weapons from the temple and Spells in abundance. It was time to prove how strong St. Peter had become.

…

Luis Albert was alone in his school office when Jacob ambushed him. He had been going through numbers for resources, people, and how to build the famed Contribution System.

“Principal,” Jacob nodded in his direction.

For a second, Luis Albert almost shot to his feet. He never had particular feelings toward Jacob before the apocalypse had banded them together. And not just that, he had been taught a lesson in humility and courage by the young man the day before.

He still wasn’t sure he wouldn’t leave if things were to go down, but he was decent enough to throw everything he got under Jacob to let St. Peter’s citizens survive.

“Any news?”

They had a little secret, him and Jacob.

“No news on Francis’s family, Jacob,” Luis Albert said. They had put some of the stronger adults on their tracks, even though Jacob had publicly declared that they were exiled.

The short and frail teenager who had never left behind his new sword trembled. It was a rare display of raw emotions from him. Even when he had seen him angry before, it had been controlled, wielded like a weapon.

“We have tracked down all the routes that you highlighted. We even switched the teams around so that they would notice something someone else missed.”

Jacob had come up with an interesting manhunt without telling anyone but him why.

The teen slowly breathed out.

“Please, keep me updated.”

Jacob turned on his heels and made to go out.

“Jacob. Why do you want to find them so bad? Haven’t they tried to kill you and my son? Frederick would never lie about something so serious; it is my understanding that he has a great debt with you, and he too seems to despise that family.”

“Principal,” Jacob’s voice was strained, “there are countless Demonic Beasts around us, and only a few humans left. I wanted to scare them, and I was not expecting that they would run away. I… At first, I thought I wanted them out. But now I see that…”

Jacob was struggling to find the right words.

“There is always going to be darkness among us,” he finally found the right words, “but there’s also going to be redemption. If we deny it to everyone whom f*cks up, I should be killing many more people than you would even start to believe.”

Jacob’s eyes became fierce while looking at the principal, and the latter felt a chill running down his back, like when one found himself in front of a terrifying predator.