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A Heart Ninety-Seven Percent Pure
“Princess Mia, on that note… Even though it’s been a while, I’d like to offer my apologies for what happened in the Kingdom of Remno. It seems to me that my kingdom has given you a lot of grief.” King Abram lowered his head.
Mia replied by shaking hers in a quiet way.
“You don’t have to apologise to me, Your Majesty. We no longer have any problems with Remno because of what happened. Prince Sion has already apologised to me, too. It’s already happened, so let’s not keep going after it.”
“But…”
“I didn’t have to go through any trouble, and Prince Sion’s help was essential to solving the problem. There’s really no need to apologise.”
Abram sighed when he saw how kind she was.
“All right. Sion told me that Princess Mia of Tearmoon has a very big heart. I now realize that he was right.”
The queen consort seemed to agree with him, and they both gave a satisfied nod. So, it goes without saying that their assessment was a little off. Not Mia’s heart, but her stomach, was big. Right now, said gut was also very empty, and apologies wouldn’t fill it up. She was interested in the food, not apologies! Especially the kind with mushrooms!
“So, enough with the business stuff. Let’s eat. Due to how quickly this party came together, we could only make a few easy dishes. I really hope you’ll like them.”
Dinner was served when the king said so. Mia realized quickly that when he said “simple dishes,” he was being very, very modest.
“Wow, this is a great menu!” Mia let out a happy cry as dish after dish of gourmet creations were put on the table. Each dish was as good as or better than the food served at the Whitemoon Palace. The Sunkland bread was just right when it came out of the oven. Since this kind of bread was known to get hard over time, it was best to eat it right away to enjoy its crisp texture and slightly sweet smell. But her favorite, and maybe even the best part of the whole meal, was one of the first dishes she ate.
“For the appetizers, we have sunshine tomato gelatin salad and salt-fried champignons du soleil,” the cook said before putting the dishes on the table.
For the former, red, ripe tomatoes were cut into small pieces and used to make an aspic. It looked like a gem on the plate because it was clear and gelatinous. But the champignons du soleil were even more beautiful. Mia’s palm-sized mushrooms had been cut into thin pieces and fried with salt. That was all. The simplicity of the cooking process felt to her like a challenge from the chef.
No difficult handiwork, and no showy tricks. I understand what they’re trying to do. The idea is to cook the food as little as possible to bring out as much of its natural taste as possible.
Mia’s eyes sparkled with interest. First, she grabbed a nearby glass of water and drank a little of it to wet her taste buds. Next, she took her fork and, using smooth, measured movements, pushed the prongs into a slice of champignon.
A beginner would probably cut this mushroom slice in half and eat one half. Nope, not me. As an expert, I know how to eat these properly.
The piece looked a little too big to eat all at once. But Mia was smarter than that.
This was made by a cook who was ready to go into the ring with just heat and salt. I refuse to believe that no thought was given to how it would taste.
Simply put, she had come to the conclusion that this slice, no matter how big it looked, had been carefully cut not only to fit her mouth but also to taste best when eaten in one bite. So, she picked up the piece and ate it all by herself.
Her eyes filled with tears of happiness. She could taste a hint of saltiness, but it was just right. It was just the right amount to go with the simple but delicate taste of the mushrooms. She felt like she’d tasted the earth’s goodness. When she bit down, a soft barrier met her teeth. As she chewed more, she heard a soft snap, which was a very pleasant sound. She kept going until the flesh gave way. The mushroom had been fried just right. It was neither hard nor soft. Then she smelled something delicious, which made her nose tingle. Finally, the experience came to an end, leaving her with a sweet taste on her lips.
Search tinyurl.com/2p9emv8w for the original.
“Exquisite… Absolutely exquisite work,” she said in a voice that made her sound like she was in a trance. Her mind was filled with images of woods and mushrooms slowly growing.
Mia, who knew a lot about mushrooms, had the highest respect for the chef. King Abram smiled when he saw how happy she was.
“I’d heard that the princess of Tearmoon was really interested in food. It looks like the story is true.”
“Oh, well, that might be a bit of an exaggeration, but I do like to eat a lot.”
“Then, mostly true. Good enough. I think you also went to Perujin in the last few months?”
“Yes, you’re right. If there was a famine, Perujin would be a very important food source for us. I thought it was important to build a relationship with mutual trust with them.”
Abram’s eyes lit up with a sharp glint.
“Princess Mia, tell me something. Sion told me that you had predicted that there wouldn’t be enough food. Not only that, but you also said that bad yields would keep happening for years to come, which would lead to a large-scale famine. Is that right?”
“I said those words, that’s true. As for their veracity, I do not know. No one knows what the future will bring. I can only tell you that our kingdom is getting ready for a famine. We have ways to make sure our people don’t go hungry.”
“I see… To be honest, I have a number of retainers who think Tearmoon is stockpiling food for a fight to expand its territory.”
“What? Father, that’s a crazy idea! Who said that?” Sion asked, clearly upset by what he had just heard.
“Common sense would suggest,” Abram said in a calm voice, “that the most likely reason for such strange behavior is not that she knows the world’s worst famine is coming, but that they are preparing for a military operation.”
He looked at Mia, who answered in a way that sounded more like a thought than a sentence. “My, what a slaphappy way of thinking…”
“Oh? You say’slaphappy’?” Abram’s eyebrow rose.
“Yes. Slaphappy.”
Having lived through the hell that was the Great Famine, she didn’t know how else to describe how people felt. It was the worst kind of being lazy.
“War…” she strarted again. “In times of abundance, maybe… But when famine is knocking on my door, I don’t have much money to waste on such nonsense.”
It made no sense to go to war right now, so she didn’t even bother to think about it. Some people might suggest an attack to get more food, but no one would give up their land or crops for free. A war would destroy good farms, kill a lot of people who worked on them, and make everyone hungry the next year.
Even so, it might be worth it if we were so strong that we could scare our enemies into giving up before they got desperate and burned their fields…
For example, letting a hundred Dion Alaias loose in a nation might do the job. She had a short moment of fun by imagining how that would happen.
He is already a one-man army, so sending him would be like sending a hundred armies. In fact, I’m not sure I could look at a hundred Dion creatures all at once and not faint from fear…
In the end, she thought that war was not the answer to hunger. It was only good for a short time and didn’t solve anything; it just put things off until later. If it didn’t fix the problem, it wasn’t a good choice.
“If you have enough food and enough people, you might be able to seek fame and conquest. But the next time will be one of hunger and lack. Now is not the time to fight. Right now, we can’t afford to be killing people and destroying the fields.”
A thought suddenly occurred to her and she added, “Oh, but using that as an excuse could be very useful.”
“An excuse? What excuse?”
“Using what I just said. Tell your people that there may be an invasion planned by the Tearmoon Empire. Use this as an excuse to start stockpiling food. That’s my honest advice for you, Your Majesty.”
“Interesting… So you know for sure, Princess Mia, that there will be a famine,” the king said. “But if that’s the case, you should be busy. So, why did you bring yourself here to Sunkland? Is there anything more important?”
“Why, yes, there most certainly is…”
Mia thought for a moment about how to take advantage of a chance that came up out of the blue. This was the best chance to find out more about Prince Echard and why Sion was killed. She couldn’t say everything, of course, but she had a good reason to say just enough to get things going.
“I’m here because one of my best friends, Esmeralda, had received a marriage proposal, and I wanted to find out how good her potential groom is,” she said with pride.
Her voice was clear and pure. There was neither guilt nor deception. It was the truth. Just that… it wasn’t all of the truth. Esmeralda was important to her in some way. No matter what other reasons she might have, they couldn’t account for more than, say, 3% of the whole. The mistake in that number could be in the dozens, but that doesn’t matter. It was 3 percent. So, at that moment, Mia’s heart was as pure as a jellyfish is water, which is to say that it was 97% pure.