The following day Kyrion awoke in an Inn, on top of a pretty meh bed with cheap blankets. He was no longer on a boat. He could tell by the lack of water nearby. In fact, he couldn’t sense any saltwater close by. The closest thing was a river of freshwater and what seemingly passed through the roots of a giant tree.

“Karl… How long was I out?” Kyrion popped his shoulders.

“Eight hours master.” Karl stated.

“Can you tell me how I’m in a totally different place?” Kyrion sat up calmly.

“It seems you were taken to a teleporter built into the ship.” Karl said with a rather annoyed monotone.

“How did I sleep through that?” His sheets now tossed off the bed.

“To be fair you did use alot of your mana yesterday and as you hadn’t turned off your abilities in the tower, you temporarily entered a spirit broken state when you were taken out of range.”

Kyrion squinted. “Really… That… uggg….”

“I honestly didn’t know your range had extended so much. Quite interesting.”

‘Yeah…” A roar came out from Kyron’s stomach as he got to his feet. Hopping out of bed, Kyrion realized two things. First, his weights had been removed, and he was famished.

Walking down the stairs, Kyrion looked for anyone he recognized in the lobby and dining areas. He found none. So he looked at the menu and found the portions were small and expensive. Kyrion needed a buffet for breakfast, as that wouldn’t cut it.

Leaving the inn, Kyrion saw that he was in a strange place. Buildings made on top of branches and trees are connected by ladders and bridges. Large birds carry citizens from one place to another in an orderly fashion. Children played down below in a freshwater lake. Most of the people here had pointed ears and slender frames. An older elven woman stood infront of a market stall buying ingredients only to be annoyed by a scarcity in their ingredients. Next to the woman was a child playing with a wooden sword. Another was an older elven man was casually walking by a breifcase in one hand and a cane in the other.

So Kyrion approached the nearest native and asked the question. “Where can one go to eat a ton of food?”

The older elf blinked twice and stepped back before running for the tree’s screaming. “Demon!”

“Ah right.” Kyrion begrudgingly made his horns retract, unsure where they went as his anatomy hadn’t been altered.

“Hm?” Kyrion felt someone tug at his pants leg and looked down to see a gap-toothed child with a scar on their forehead and a wooden sword at their hip.

“Are you really a demon?” The kid puffed out his chest to make himself look more prominent.

“Who’s asking?” Kyrion put a hand in his pocket and leaned forward.

“I am a defender of justice! Vile demon’s shall be slain.” The kid bellowed.

Kyrion saw a woman slap herself on the forehead before turning around.

Sadly Kyrion was too quick. “Is that so? Then this demon will take something important from you.”

“You will not beat justice!”

Kyrion pinched the kid’s forehead and ripped off the scar. “Mua ha ha ha! Your character has been forever changed! You have lost your badge of honor! Now go train and in a hundred years you may be able to beat me!”

The kid looked at the skin in Kyrion's hand and felt around for the scar, only to find smooth skin. The child began to cry in outrage and drew their wooden sword. Swinging it at his legs.

Kyrion could have dodged. He could have taken it and not reacted. But no, that wouldn’t be very sportsmanlike. Kyrion took the hit and let himself fall back, defeated.

The kid having none of that, pulled the scar out of Kyrion’s hand and kept trying to stick it back on.

“Noooo!” The young kid cradled the scar in his hands.

The kid’s mother arrived, and she was quite ashamed. Before becoming perplexed by the scene. “M-m-mommy!”

“What’s wrong?”

“That vile demon! H- he.” The kid held out the piece of dead skin.

The mother looked at the scab, the unblemished portion of skin, and the figure twitching on the ground. “That isn’t a demon, you dolt. That’s a healer.”

Kyrion stood up without using his arms and stretched. “That would be correct. Now. Where is the nearest all you can eat buffet?” Kyrion's sixth sense for detecting food kicked into overdive as the woman in front of him smelled of spices and had the hands of a sous chef.

“It’s been closed down. They ran out of food a day ago.”

“A buffet. Ran out of food...” Kyrion didn’t understand.

“Yeah. Some orcs and their chief came by and left the restaurants empty over the course of two weeks. All that’s left are those new ritzy places that charge a hundred gold for beans on a cracker.” The kid stated.

“Caviar, not beans.” The mother corrected.

The kid looked at her for a moment. “It comes from a plant. It’s beans, tricking a demon is bad manners.”

“Plant based Caviar?” Kyrion asked.

“The places left are mostly vegan in nature. Hence why they haven’t been raided.” The mother said solemnly.

“That makes some kind of sense. Orcs can be rather picky about their food. At least in my experience. Never play with an orcs’ food.” Kyrion recalled an episode where Wura snapped and challenged the academies chefs to a cook off.

“Right.”

“Did they just out of food? Will they be able to cook if I can refill their stock?” Kyrion asked.

“To reopen business or just feed you?” The lady asked.

Kyrion took a minute. “Either or. I can pay for my own dishes per plate if necessary. Just don’t have a talent for cooking.”

“Per dish. How much will you pay?”

“Ten gold per dish and I will provide the ingredients. Here’s a down payment.” Kyrion handed the woman a sack of gold coins.

The mother’s eye’s shone like gold coins. “Polaris show this man to the stuffed goose. I’ll go get grandpa.”

“Grr…” Polaris grumbled.

“That’s a rather feminine name….” Kyrion looked at the scrappy kid with short hair and a sword at their hip.

“So what! Can a girl not beat a demon?” Polaris drew her blade again.

“No? Yes? A girl can beat a demon. I’ve met too many strong girls to think otherwise. Just cursing my luck.” Kyrion sighed.

“Why?”

“The Almighty Scarlet Maelstrom, bested by a little girl with a wooden sword.” Kyrion laughed to himself.

“Does it matter?”

“To a man with a chip on his shoulder, possibly. But I want that news to spread if you catch my drift..” Kyrion bent down and gave the child a silver coin.

“You’re a strange demon.” Polaris said with a deadpan expression.

“The strangest demon you’ll ever meet. Now hop on and point, we’re leaping there.”

“You want me to get on your back.”

“I’m in the middle of a city in a place I don’t know how to maneuver around. I can tour later but I need to offload my ingredients before I pass out from low blood sugar or something.”

Polaris pointed towards a building far off on another branch of the tree. The long way would have taken half an hour to get there. Longer if he’d gotten distracted.

Polaris boarded. “Now what?”

“Hold on tight.” Upon feeling a good amount of pressure, Kyrion backed up before taking a long jump off the branch, propelling himself with his legs and leaping off of solidified wind walls until he reached the location in around a minute. While Polaris screamed the whole time.

After they landed, the girl took a few steps before she collapsed from dizziness, and her body readjusted. “That. Was. Awesome.”

Kyrion sent a wave of healing mana through her, and she was back to her feet in seconds. “Can we do that again?”

Kyrion looked at the concerned group of elves that saw the commotion and shook his head. “Could be a very bad idea. Is this the place?”

“Yeah, I’ll unlock the doors. My brother should be able to start prepping the ingredients.”

“Brother?”

“Oh right. My family runs this place. Although it isn’t usually a buffet unless outsiders are here.”

Kyrion shrugged. “I got lucky then.”

“I’m still mad at you. I was grounded for three weeks after getting that scar! And you just went and took it away.”

“Uh huh. Well, get me back in a century or so. Right now it’s time to get cooking.” Kyrion entered the restaurant.

“We’re closed!” Yelled a blond boy who was currently sweeping an already clean floor.

“Too bad. Your mom said I can drop off some ingredients. And I eat alot.” Kyrion stated.

“Polaris?”

“Yes. Mom took his money and asked me to lead him here. It’s a good thing we aren’t bandits.”

“What about the other groceries you went to get?”

“Nothing. The stalls were mostly empty.”

“What do you need?” Kyrion asked as he pulled out a cloak and approached a table.

“40 Dozen eggs.”

Kyrion raised his cloak over the table and lifted it. “That’s 45 dozen, I can eat five by myself. Do they need to be chicken eggs?”

“80 Onions. 60 whole chickens.” The boy rattled out faster.

2 Boxes of onions appeared on the floor. “Fifty in each. I don’t have chickens to spare, but I do have birds that taste like chicken.” A coffin appeared on the ground containing over a hundred plucked and cleaned large bird carcasses.

“Why?” Polaris asked.

“At first, I did it because I was hungry. And then I tasted their meat after cooking it. I can’t cook but it was so delicious that I nearly hunted them to extinction. I have captured a good number for breeding purposes.”

“And you’re just giving it away.”

“If you can cook better than I can ,then take it. I’ll be here for a while and know of a place to go get my own groceries.” Kyrion smirked.

“Your own personal buffet. Anyhow, 1200 pounds of pork and 2000 pounds of beef.” The boy didn’t expect the subsequent response.

“I am not a butcher so I have that in storage. Where do you want me to leave them?”

“We have a special table. Get it there and our butcher can get to work.”

A bald orc with toned muscles entered the restaurant, his grey skin the most apparent feature to notice. His tusks were small and plain, meaning he wasn’t affiliated with a clan.

“Chad?”

“Chad is here. Chad hears there be meat. Where is meat?”

Kyrion removed the lid from a stasis coffin, revealing the bird corpses. “I need a place to put the beef and Pork equivalents. They are, however, monster meat.”

“Meat is meat. Show.” Chad ordered.

Kyrion pulled a large boar from his domain. Well over two thousand pounds yet being carried as though it was nothing.

“New hire?” Chad asked.

“Customer that claims they can eat alot.”

Chad pinched Kyrion on his arm and smirked. “No fat, all muscle. Condensed muscles. Orc decent or dedicated to the way?”

“The way. My body is a temple for mana. Trained and hardened till my bones burn and my skin is stone.” Kyrion muttered a strange mantra.

“The way?” The older boy asked.

“Can I tell them?” Kyrion asked.

The orc nods.

“A sound core requires a strong vessel. To have a strong vessel, one must have a strong body, willpower, and Wurakjah(Ru-Ahk-Ajah). From there you build up everything slowly and simultaneously through everyday activity. Everything is training. Everything must require resistance. There is no easy way for true power. One of my secondary teachers was an orc, and my body type led to me learning the way. Don’t spread it around too much, though. It’s not secret but tends to put you on their radar.” Kyrion explained as he handed the boar to the orc, who smiled in appreciation.

“Far along. Betting on you.” The orc said knowingly.

Kyrion then understood at that moment, he was speaking with an expert. He bowed before taking out an elephant size cow which he hefted onto the table to be cut.

“Good. Now go. Many tasks are left for you.”

And so Kyrion spent most of his morning producing ingredients to later be cooked up for consumption. The chef arrived around ten minutes after the rest of the staff and eyed Kyrion suspiciously.

The chef was surprisingly stout. Not quite plump, but there was meat on him. Which made him look more whole than the other elves he’d seen. A poofy white hat atop his head kept his blond hair mostly hidden.

“I’ve seen you before.” The chef said knowingly with a wistful expression.

“No you haven’t.”

“60~ years ago, although you looked paler.”

“I don’t.”

“Thirty years before that I also saw you again, same eyepatch. Same curious look. You have family history here. Young human, to us elves, it’s quite interesting watching multiple generations of people enter my restaurant and order their meals. The similarities in your actions and differences are something we observe.”

“So you’re saying I look like my uncle and grandfather?” Kyrion caught on.

“Yet you have your own way. Now then what will you order today?”

Kyrion looked at the menu and scowled. It was in a different language and was squiggly. “One of everything you can make, minus any alcoholic beverages.”

“Are you sure? We normally make big portions.” The older elf asked.

“Yes.” Kyrion had yet to meet a chef that could best him.

“Well I hope you can eat as much as you think you can, otherwise you’ll have a lot of leftovers.” The elf laughed at a joke only he understood.

Polaris approached him. “Your stomach is going to explode if you try to eat all that. Even the orcs had to come here multiple times before we ran out of stock.”

“How many.”

“Three times a day for breakfast, lunch and dinner for about a week straight. They’d have been given a discount if they replaced anything they ate. Mostly the meat. You better be able to replace what you consume if you really eat as much as you say.”

“You’re mighty demanding for a brat.” Kyrion squinted.

“Fine. Suit yourself.” Polaris walked away.

Moments later, a sizeable family-sized dish was placed in front of Kyrion by the young blond boy who had been sweeping earlier.