I look at the bowl of soup in front of me and I realize something.

It’s been six months since I arrived among half-giants. We won a crucial battle, conquered a city and the mine connected to it. I rooted many [Spies] by having the entire population interrogated for simple things, had the average level of half-giants shoot up by six level, gave back life to a steel industry and even reinstated some trading deals now that we control the supply of iron from the massive reserve under our asses…

But I have not taken one look at the food I’ve been eating.

Six months.

I could probably recite almost every single monarch in existence in this world, every single political faction, all the info about levels, classes, and culture. I have been studying relentlessly, even checking which natural resources are in abundance or scarce where and how to profit from them. I have gotten two letters from Lady Goldith, the woman who slaughtered the enemy army of Ahalis, who had Sirens dispatch a world-wide notice about re-enforcing the ban on trade toward Kome. Not that there was much to start with, but this woman has…

I’m losing the thread of my thoughts once again.

What I have never paid attention to is what I’ve been eating. I have been eating without even looking at what enters my stomach. Just now, that something spicy has made its way in front of me, I look at the meaty soup in front of me. I don’t really know the name, neither what it’s supposed to be. I pass a hand through my hair, noting how oily they feel. Another part of me I’ve completely forgotten to take care of.

“Cordius,” I slam a hand on the table to make him jump straight. It’s one of the few entertainments I have. Making fun of the half-giant make everything livelier.

“Rizilius’s ears, Cassandre,” he stutters, looking up from some reports. “What, now?”

“One would think a [General] would have better manners,” I shoot back.

He looks straight at me, deadpanned, waiting.

“Do we have a kitchen in this place?” I look around the office we have in a building custom-made to house the council that has taken over the half-giants’ new city. No [Mayor] this time, not ever as a puppet for show.

“Yes, why?”

“Let’s take a break,” I say, getting up. “I want to make some food.”

“Is this another surprise quiz? I told that I have been studying, but I don’t want to waste another three hours in a room with a bunch of papers to test—”

“It’s not a surprise quiz. Come on, let’s go.”

The grumbling half-giant [General] gets up and follows me outside, toward the market.

…

Surprisingly, pig farming is not a priority of half-giants. Why that is goes beyond me. Even though there’s a substantial amount of meat in their diet, it comes mostly from beef and poultry. Cows seems to be more popular than any other animal, though. And some cows, as you can imagine, are even magical. Not the ones that are owned in Leggiadra.

But what this means is that no cold cuts are present here, nor popular. No salami, no ham. They exist, Cordius told me. But not anywhere close. It’s almost an exotic food, if you want to believe them.

That is, obviously, a huge problem when you get certain cravings. For all the women in my generation learned how to hate bread and flour-based products, that was never the case for me. Neither me nor the abundant Nadine had ever any complaint about a carb-rich diet. In particular, having a baker as a father, it was a given that we would mostly eat what didn’t sell at the end of the day. In a way, I always hoped that the day had not been good, so that we could eat the best bread, or the mini pizzas that he made.

Pizza.

That’s one thing I never tried my hand at. My father could make some small and rotund disk that he liked to call ‘mini pizzas,’ but that were more like bread with tomato sauce on top. Nonetheless, I always loved pizzas. Maybe even more than baguettes. That’s one of the reasons I took so many trips to that country, I think. Italian men, they are a pain; handsy, loud, and rude. But also charming and dark, less whining compared to the French counterpart. Nadine loved British men, but as for the why, that will always be a mystery.

I still remember when I went over to a chocolate tasting in Perugia, organized by a great academy of Chefs. A guy, younger than me, the only idiot with a blue and orange baseball hat, won. He was a kid, though. How the traditionalist Italians allowed him on stage with that ridiculous cap is a mystery.

“Softer,” I tell Cordius, while he forcefully kneads the dough.

We bought some flour and some vegetables. I felt like cooking to take the edge off, to let my mind wander a little.

Today is a bad day.

It’s one of those days where things are going exceedingly slow and my mind goes in the places I abandoned a long time ago; it goes to when I still had doubts about my life, about what I did, when I used to question everything.

Do you ever see a movie and hear some loser say: “Oh my God, it shouldn’t have killed that person!”

I root for the killing. I don’t know why. It makes me feel in peace. It’s so easy to whip a gun out and shoot your problems. The social interactions, those are much harder. Not that I despise them completely, to be clear. They are just harder. Much harder.

And so, when I see some brain simply explode instead of countless hours of whining, my heart finds peace.

I root for the killing. Always have.

I choose something and stick with it. I am aware that if one day I should ever question all I did, I might become paralyzed. I don’t think I can function as a person. My life goes too fast to have any semblance of normalcy in it. There’s no space for love, family, not even for real friends. It’s just something that I accepted. It’s like leading a huge corporation. Once you have so many things to manage and oversee, life goes at a different speed for you. You start thinking in different ways compared to the normal person, you have to take split-second decisions. It’s easy to criticize the positions of power without understanding the struggle they go through. And that’s precisely why those up there should have firm principles. If you don’t the speed will swallow you whole, chew you up, and spit the bones right after. Unless something anchors you to reality in a powerful way, you stop being yourself, you become the figure, an actor.

It's not too bad.

I know that what I’m doing is good. I can’t certainly reign over the kingdom that I’m building, but I’m sure it will be for good. Or that it will bring good changes down the line. When a system is corrupt, a reset gives people opportunities. The well-being of people should be above the well-being of the economy, always. But for that to happen, certain things will need to die. Certain people will need to die.

“Is this good enough?” Cordius asks, looking at his fingers sticky with dough in irritation.

I nod.

If it comes to it, I’ll kill the half-giants as well. They are in the weak position. But if they were to abuse their power, I’ll bring them down. I like to think of myself as a countermeasure to tyranny and oppression. Nothing more. [Warlord] is a good class to enforce it.

Days such as this one are not unique. They come and go. Once a year. Every few months. Surprisingly enough, not when someone dies. When Nadine died, it was all silent. There was some ache somewhere, but it was mostly white noise. There was no blaring need for anything. Life went ahead. It was like a breakup that helps with losing weight and going to the gym more regularly. And maybe that is an apt metaphor. If you are in a relationship or, worse, you get married and have children, there are only so many things you can do. Your time is not yours anymore. You have to tend to your children or/and to your relationship. It’s not bad, but it is a responsibility. Once people get out of that responsibility, they have more time on their hands. And if you have more time, you can obviously do more. Not everyone does more, to be clear. Not everyone has what it takes. Some fall to depression, drug, binge-eating. But some others go back to the gym, maybe hoping they will soon have their appeal back on the meat market.

…

“Hey, miss, how you doin’?” the kid who won the competition, still in his white chef uniform and his baseball hat asks.

“Your chocolate was very good,” I smile at him and reply in English, almost with a maternal instinct in me. The kid speaks perfect English. He’s probably American, given the accent. I was among the jurors and I voted for him.

“Heh, not too shabby, am I right?”

“Not too shabby,” I reply, savoring the foreign expression.

“Now, listen, do you want to go out and have dinner with me to celebrate?” he asks with a big wide smile.

“I’m sorry, I’m not sure I got that,” I say, confused by how fast he speaks.

“Oh, don’t worry. Not even the Chefs speak good English here! Anyway. You. Me. Dinner. Date. How about that?”

How about that?

“Oh, no, no, you are too young,” I say in my heavy French accent.

“Too young? What’s the matter with you? How old are you, eighteen? I’m seventeen. Isn’t that about right? What, afraid they are going to arrest you? Don’t worry, I’m not a rat. And besides, what’s so wrong with some dinner, huh?”

I concentrate on his words and I believe I got everything this time around.

“I’m sorry, cher, I’m busy. Tomorrow I’m going back to France.”

“Holy macaroni, are you French? Oh, I hear the accent now. How old are you?”

“Bye, bye!” I tell him, turning away from him.

“Goddamn Frenchie…”

…

I don’t remember his name, which is highly unusual for me. But still, it was a funny memory. And the small chocolate compositions he made were truly otherworldy…

I sigh, wondering what would have happened in a different life. But that doesn’t matter. In this one, I’m in a different business. As I was saying, I’m ready for anything, even for the half-giants to turn treacherous and vile as the ones who oppressed them so far.

I look at Cordius and wonder if it would be hard to snap his neck, and all the others who would come after.

Not too hard.

It’s never too hard.

I look at the dough under my hands and I realize that my baking skills have gone down the drain.

The dough has clumps.

Putain.