“Let’s COOK!”

The timer started and both teams rushed to get the ingredients for their dishes.

Meru and Nagisa rushed to their station, setting down all the ingredients. They took a look at everything and started coming up with ideas on how to prepare everything.

“I’ll butter up the pan.” Meru said. “Can you cut the bitter melon?”

“Yup.”

Nagisa took the two bumpy gourds and cut them each in half before scooping the insides out. She remembered how Meru showed her that a measuring cup could scoop everything out cleanly.

“Be sure not to cut them too thick, okay?”

“Right!”

As she cut the green melon skin, Isako was looking from a distance and started boiling up her potion in the cauldron.

“Make sure the takoyaki balls are ready when the potion is done.”

“Hai.”

Isako watched as Nagisa started frying the bitter melon. She looked at two bottles, oil and water, then shrugged and put some of the water in.

The demon chuckled. “She can’t even cook.”

Meru cut up some of the onions since Nagisa had forgotten to and was busy with the frying pan, then went to mixing the eggs in a separate bowl.

“That should do it.” She said before going and pouring the eggs in.

Then, she took the onions and poured them in as well.

“This looks good, don’t you think?” Nagisa asked.

“Un. Looks good.”

“What logic are they going by?” Isako sneered as she started putting in some herbs and spices into her potion.

Meru put some green peppers and other vegetables in.

“Wow, this looks amazing.” The reported said as the camera came to their team.

“I told you; I wanna make a Chanpuru that only I can make. Meru’s original Goya Chanpuru recipe.” She said before going over and taking a plate. “Nagi, I’m going to make the sauce, so fry the meat.”

“Roger!”

“Sauce?”

“Meru came up with a secret sauce she’s going to put in the Chanpuru.”

Nagisa grabbed some strips of meat and started to put them in, frying them with everything. She then poured some oil and poured it in to cook it.

Nagato was able to smell everything and became distracted by the smell.

“Oh~ that smells good~”

Nagisa happened to hear and looked over at him. “Does it smell good over there?”

“Oh. Uh, y-yes.”

“I can smell over on your side, too! I love takoyaki and it smells delicious!”

“Ah, arigat—” Isako grabbed his ear and tugged it.

“Do not chat with the enemy! Focus!”

Nagisa simply shrugged and went back to cooking. She was honest, though, she couldn’t wait to taste her competitor’s takoyaki.

“Nagi~” Meru called. “Is it time to put the tofu in?”

“Yeah.”

Meru smiled a came over, scooping up some tofu before putting it in the pan.

As Nagisa separated it, Isako was almost finished with the potion, but now she needed one last ingredient to her poison broth.

She looked over and saw Nagato trying to fry the takoyaki, but failing miserably.

She groaned and switched stations.

“I’ll take care of these,” she said. “Put the poison in the broth.”

Nagato ran over to the pot and saw it starting to boil over, so he blindingly reached for a bottle and poured all the content in the broth. It suddenly puffed up red smoke and started giving off a boiling heat, bubbling and burning.

He smiled and took it over to Isako, who dipped all the takoyaki into it.

“Perfect. Now, they’ll be finished.”

Meanwhile, Nagisa tasted one of the onion slices.

“Hm… I wonder if this is alright.”

“Nagi, I’m bringing the sauce~”

Meru walked over and poured the sauce into the frying pan, stirring it into the Chanpuru mix.

When Nagisa tasted it…

“Oh my gosh! It tastes just like takoyaki!”

They mixed the sauce in and started frying it a bit more before Nagisa started cooking more meat to put in with it.

Isako took out the takoyaki, now fresh and filled with her poison, setting it out on the plate. Meru and Nagisa finished up the Chanpuru and set it on their plate.

“TIME UP!”

“We’re done~”

Both teams brought their dishes up to three judges. First, they judged Meru and Nagisa’s dish.

“9-8-9. 26 out of 30.”

Then, there was Team Kaos…

“Uwaa~ this is hot! I think it’s melting the plate.”

“The sauce is still bubbling.”

“Um… is this really okay to eat?”

“Why, of course,” Isako answered. She then directed her attention towards the two Tentomu chu girls. “Would one of you like to try?”

Nagisa did admit she wanted to eat the takoyaki at first, but it looked like something that just came out of boiling magma.

“I’ll eat it,” Meru said.

“EH?!”

“Go on. Just one bite won’t hurt, right?”

Meru nodded and took the place. She then popped the whole ball in .

Once it hit her tongue, she felt an intense, unbearable burning like lava rock in . Her whole body heated up, her face turning so red and sweating rapidly.

“Meru-chan, are you okay?”

Steam came out of her ears and she covered , screaming as she ran out of the studio.

She felt like she was going to puke, so she ran to the bathroom. All the stalls were taken and now she felt the firey burning in grow stronger.

After a long while of impatient waiting, banging on doors and jumping and kicking her feet, someone finally left the stall and Meru rushed in. She locked the door, and…

…..

*BROOOOOOOOM*

“What the—?!”

We all left the studio to look for Meru, but then heard a loud explosion somewhere. The fire alarm suddenly went off and the sprinklers .

All of us got wet and had to evacuate the building while the fire department came to find the fire. I saw Meru in the crowd and caught up to her.

“Meru-chan! What happened?”

She coughed a few times, drinking some milk.

“Th-that… takoyaki…” she spoke in a raspy voice, like she broke her vocal chords screaming. “Too hot…!”

“Oh, you poor thing.”

Miichan walked up and handed her a glass vial. “Here.”

Meru shot down the liquid inside, and when she tested her voice, it was good as new.

“Woah. What was that?”

“*Angel tears. There are some Light angels in Eterna who have healing abilities, and there just happened to be some Angel tears in my inventory.”

“Thanks, Miichan.”

“What happened back there?”

“I don’t know… I just put that takoyaki in my mouth, and the next thing I knew, I was breathing fire!”

Breathing fire? Was it that bad?

Well, I know she didn’t actually breathe fire…

“I think that was Isako and Nagato. We need to find them and stop them.”

“Go ahead,” a voice rang from behind.

Isako snapped her fingers and time froze. We teleported up to the roof of the building and time unfroze again.

“I’m actually quite surprised. Who knew you could withstand such poison.”

“Poison?”

“Yeah. Have another taste!” She took a takoyaki ball and threw it into Meru’s mouth.

She suddenly doubled over, holding . The poison was probably disgusting and powerful for her to react like this.

“Meru!”

Meru opened and screamed, but fire came out and shot at Isako and Nagato.

“What?!”

“Woah… ”

She meant that when she said she breathed fire?!

“Ah~ it’s worse the second time!” she said.

“Miichan?”

She shrugged.

“Nagato… what did you put in the potion?”

“Um… I just grabbed the first bottle. It was full of the red stuff.”

“The poison is GREEN!”

“Does that mean what he put in was… hot sauce?”

Isako growled and ran to attack us. Just then, Nagisa came out and whacked her in the back of the head with a frying pan.

“Eh?!”

Nagato came and helped her up, but then Nagisa came behind and tapped his shoulder.

*“A pan is a pan, but what kind of ‘pan’ can you not eat?”

“Um… I don’t—”

*BANG*

She whacked him in the face and knocked him out instantly.

“A frying pan~!”

Isako simply sneered again before teleporting both of them out.

Nagisa bowed. “Thank you. Thank you.”

“Looks like you were right. Those things are useful as weapons.”

“Well~”

I smiled, then realized something…

“So… can Meru breathe fire now?”

“Maybe,” Miichan simply said. “Let’s go.”

…..

Meanwhile…

“I’m here for Oshima-san. My name is Takahashi Minami.”

“Ah, yes. Miss Takahashi. Right this way.”

Minami followed the nurse upstairs and saw Yuko leaving a group of elder patients, sitting in a wheelchair. She walked up to the girl and tried to smile.

“Hi…”

“Oh, hey.” Yuko said simply, also trying to force a smile. “Thanks for coming. I honestly needed some company.”

“That’s good. Here…” Minami handed her a small box wrapped in a blue ribbon.

“What’s this?”

Minami gave her a serious look before bowing down.

“..Eh?”

“Please be my best friend.”

================================

Footnotes

*1. Angel tears – Light angels who possess healing ability can often heal themselves or their allies after coming in contact with their tears, either by pouring them onto the wound or drinking them.

*2. “Pan” is the Japanese word for “Bread”.