"Ryohei-kun, do you need my help with anything?" Yurine asked. Although she hadn't cooked much lately, she was still quite a capable cook herself.

"If you have the time," Ryohei replied, tying an apron around his waist.

"Of course I do." Yurine stood up and got the other apron.

"I-I'll go check on Jashin-chan," Medusa said, still worried about her friend.

Minos just scratched her head and followed along, not wanting to be left alone in the living room.

"Yurine, could you start the rice?" Ryohei asked, taking the large sea bream he'd bought that morning out of the fridge. "Use a 7-to-1 ratio of regular rice to sweet glutinous rice. After you wash it, add a third of a teaspoon of salt and vinegar. And the water-to-rice ratio should be 1.4-to-1." He was giving her the same instructions he had previously taught Jashin-chan.

"Once that's done, don't start the cooker yet. I need to add a few drops of oil to give it a buff."

"A buff?" Yurine paused. So that's why the rice has been tasting better and better lately, she realized.

"An ability buff. I need to have some participation in the process for it to work," Ryohei explained as he placed the sea bream in the sink to scale it.

"Oh," Yurine said, understanding now. "You can do that?" She was amazed, but she followed his instructions, mixing the two types of rice in the washing bowl.

Ryohei expertly scaled, gutted, and cleaned the large fish in one smooth motion. He patted it dry with a paper towel and placed it on the cutting board. With precise cuts, he filleted the two large pieces of meat from the frame, removed the rib bones, and set the fillets aside. The first dish he would start was the fish head and bone soup, as it would take the longest.

Just as he was about to marinate the frame, Yurine called out that she was done with the rice. He went over, added a few drops of olive oil to the rice cooker, and gave her a new task: peel the garlic. The two of them worked in perfect sync, a well-oiled machine even in the tiny, cramped kitchen.

Meanwhile, in the bedroom.

"So what happened earlier?" Jashin-chan, who was still regenerating, asked curiously.

"I don't know," Minos said, leaning against the wall with her arms crossed.

"I don't know either," Medusa added, her expression clueless as Jashin-chan rested her head on her lap.

"You two are useless!" Jashin-chan grumbled.

Minos shot her a look. "You're one to talk, in your state. That's actually hilarious."

"What about my state?! You try fighting Yurine! She'd beat you to a pulp!"

"Why would I fight her? I have no quarrel with her."

"You're scared!" Jashin-chan accused, pointing a finger at her.

Minos's eye twitched. "I told you, I have no quarrel with her!"

"You're scared!"

"Is that the only thing you can say?!" Minos was getting angry, her breath coming in heavy pants.

Jashin-chan just gave her a goofy grin. "You're afraid."

CRACK!

Minos stomped her foot, shattering a section of the tatami mat. "Who's afraid?!" Why did you have to say the quiet part out loud?! I have an image to maintain!

Jashin-chan's head shot up from Medusa's soft lap, her eyes wide with panic. "You broke it, you pay for it! This has nothing to do with me!" The damages from her own pre-dawn rampage had already cost her her entire savings of 25,000 yen, and Yurine had put her 20,000 yen in debt on top of that. She wasn't about to take the fall for this idiot's mess.

"What was that?" The noise brought Yurine to the bedroom door.

Minos immediately pointed at Jashin-chan. "Jashin-chan told me to fight you. I said we had no reason to, and she called me a coward and said I was scared, and I just got a little angry…"

"You're lying! I didn't! You're slandering me!" Jashin-chan shrieked, pointing back at Minos in disbelief. Unbelievable! Minos, the brute who solves everything with violence and doesn't have a single intelligent thought in her head, has learned how to snitch!

"Gulp—!" Feeling Yurine's ice-cold gaze land on her, Jashin-chan swallowed hard. "Y-Yurine, don't listen to her! Ask Medusa…"

"Eh?" Medusa, caught in the middle, looked completely torn.

"What are you 'eh'-ing about?!" Jashin-chan yelled, exasperated. "This is a conspiracy! Medusa, you betrayed me too!"

"It seems you haven't learned your lesson yet," Yurine said darkly, picking up the cross-shaped spear from the corner—her anti-snake treasure. A black, oppressive aura surged around her, making her look like a demon lord.

"Gulp—!" Minos broke out in a cold sweat. The human world is so dangerous. I want to go home.

"M-Medusa, save me, save me!" Jashin-chan grabbed Medusa's clothes, trying to hide behind her.

"What happened?" Ryohei asked when Yurine returned to the kitchen.

Like a parent with a problem child, Yurine recounted how Jashin-chan had goaded Minos into challenging her. Ryohei was speechless. Wow, that's our Jashin-chan. The instinct for self-destruction is really carved into her bones, isn't it?

"So? Did you punish her again?" Ryohei asked, using a slotted spoon to lift minced garlic from a bowl of water.

"No, Medusa stopped me," Yurine said as she scrubbed an abalone shell. "But I added the cost of the damages to Jashin-chan's debt."

Fair enough, Ryohei thought. He heated some peanut oil in a wok—it made the most fragrant garlic sauce—and added a few slices of ginger to infuse the oil. As the ginger sizzled, a rich, nutty, and spicy aroma filled the kitchen. He removed the ginger and slowly added the drained garlic mince. The sizzling intensified, and the powerful scent of garlic bloomed.

In the bedroom, the three demons caught the scent. "That's garlic…" Minos said, sniffing the air. Jashin-chan, who had been in the middle of a tearful rant about how Minos was her nemesis, almost choked on her own rage.

In the kitchen, Ryohei fried the garlic until it was golden, then turned off the heat and stirred in the other half of the raw mince, seasoning it with salt, sugar, pepper, chili flakes, soy sauce, and sesame oil. The finished garlic sauce glowed with a soft, pale golden light.

"That smells amazing," Yurine murmured, drawn in by the scent. "I never knew garlic could smell so tempting."

"Just wait until you combine it with the smell of seafood," Ryohei said, pouring the sauce into a bowl. "You'll be drooling for real."

"I'm already drooling now," she joked.

"Well, there's no cooked seafood for you yet," he replied, "but I can slice up some sashimi to tide you over." He cleaned his knife and cutting board and took one of the sea bream fillets.

"Eh? You don't have to," Yurine said, a little flustered.

"It's fine. Consider it a perk for helping out," Ryohei said, his knife already a blur. A series of crisp, rapid taps echoed through the kitchen as he sliced the fish into paper-thin, translucent, glowing pieces.

"So thin!" Yurine gasped, her reddish-brown eyes wide with amazement. Her genuine reaction spurred Ryohei on.

"How thick is that?" she asked.

"0.5 millimeters."

"Sugoi!" Standard thin-sliced sashimi in Japan was usually 3 to 5 millimeters. If her hands weren't dirty, she would have covered her mouth in shock.

"Just a second," Ryohei said. He took a small dish and a bowl, then grabbed some ice from the freezer. "Wash your hands and crush these for me."

Yurine: "..."

What are you asking a helpless girl with no strength to even tie up a chicken to do?! she thought, almost losing her composure. But she washed her hands and dutifully crushed the ice. Ryohei held out the dish, and she spread the crushed ice on it. She knew what he was doing: making an ice bed to keep the sashimi perfectly chilled.

He laid a piece of plastic wrap over the ice and arranged the fish on top. He then began to prepare a dipping sauce, mixing together shredded ginger, sliced garlic, lime leaves, green onions, onions, carrots, sesame seeds, soy sauce, salt, peanut oil, and crushed peanuts.

"So many ingredients?" Yurine asked, surprised. "It's so elaborate."

"Mhm. This is my signature sashimi preparation," he said. "It's all about the balance of flavors and textures." He handed her a pair of chopsticks. "Here, try it. You can eat it with some of the shredded vegetables from the sauce."

"Okay," Yurine said, not standing on ceremony. She said, "Itadakimasu," picked up a few of the glowing, paper-thin slices of fish, dipped them in the sauce, and brought them to her lips with anticipation.

Glub-glub-glub-glub—!

Golden sunlight pierced through the clear ocean water, dyeing everything in a warm glow. Yurine's eyes widened, her pupils reflecting a school of red sea bream, their scales shimmering brilliantly in the light. She was completely submerged, the water pressing in on her from all sides. A stream of bubbles escaped her lips, rising to the surface like countless transparent pearls. Instinctively, she clapped a hand over her mouth and nose.

Back in the real world.

"Mmm—! The sea bream… it feels like it's come alive and is swimming in my mouth!!" Yurine gasped, her hand flying to her lips. Her eyes were wide with disbelief, her expression quickly melting into one of intoxicated bliss.

The paper-thin, translucent fish melted the moment it hit her tongue, an exquisitely delicate texture. The pure, clean flavor of the fish bloomed on her palate, as if it had been given new life. It intertwined with the rich, complex flavor of the dipping sauce, creating a harmonious yet powerful taste that completely stunned her.

"What's that? The fish came alive?" Ryohei asked, his curiosity piqued by her description. "Let me try," he said, holding out his hand.

Yurine paused, tilting her head as she looked at his outstretched hand. Are we short on chopsticks in this house? she thought. But she handed him the pair she had just been using anyway.