Kitchen Nightmares

Christoph returned with fresh paper and a writing utensil which Omni took after fashioning a makeshift clipboard out of stone. The golem quickly drew up a chart with each of the current menu items in a bullet point list with machine-like precision. "We'll be going through everything, starting with the meat dishes; you may begin when ready," Omni stated. The air about it was different from before, and its stance belied a sense of constant judgement.

The elf coughed, and the two former adventurers began to prepare dishes as they always did. During the cooking, the clay golem started to move again. It got up from its spot in the corner and left to the restaurant's front, where they could hear the sound of moving furniture. Valentina kept glancing at Omni, but the golem remained silent, scribbling away on the board without looking away from them, or at least that's what she thought; it was hard to tell with the carved eyes being closed all the time.

Before Christoph could say anything, Omni raised its hand, "Ignore him, keep working," it said in a flat tone.

The menu wasn't that extensive; two meat dishes, three vegetables, four medicinal, and two types of alcohol. They also only had water; they didn't serve anything fancy like tea. With such a small menu, it didn't take long for the cooking to be complete. All nine dishes were lined up next to each other while Omni walked past, inspecting each. Christoph and Valentina felt anxious watching the golem.

"Sixty out of a Hundred for preparation, not bad, but needs improving," It stated before unfolding its extra arms from under the stone cloak. Grabbing six dishes, two each, in its left hands thanks to a modified hand structure, and the other three with two left hands, the third still holding the clipboard, it beckoned the two would-be chefs, "Come along, we have a second opinion."

They followed Omni out to the front, where it set down all nine dishes onto a single table that the clay golem made by pushing two smaller tables together. One of the tables pushed together was Ghorm's table, who was still asleep despite moving his table. Ghorm was quickly roused by both the smell of fresh food and the clay golem shaking him rather violently.

"You are Ghorm, correct? I have a simple task for you. Taste all these dishes with me and tell me your thoughts as someone who's been to many taverns; the reward is you get to finish the food for free," Omni stated.

Ghorm, still slightly hungover, sobered up when he heard 'free.' He laughed blusteringly, "Well, why didn't ya wake me earlier? O'course I'll help ya. There's booze too, right?" He asked with a grin. The golem shrugged, "You can get drunk after. I need you moderately sober, though eating with a good drink is an important experience too." It rattled off as it divvied food from each dish onto a single plate in front of it. With the portion sizes being as large as they are, Omni told Christoph and Valentina to get their own plates and eat as well instead of standing there awkwardly.

Once everyone settled in, they began eating. The room was silent except for the sound of eating, the clay golem sweeping the floor in the corner, and Ghorm, humming and hawing to try and make it obvious he was putting a lot of thought into judging the dishes. Halfway through, Omni sent another command to the clay golem, who disappeared into the back shortly before bringing out flagons full of freshly cracked open ale. Ghorm quickly lost track of which dish he was tasting and laughed madly to himself, clearly ecstatic at the idea of free alcohol. Thankfully he seemed to calm down after his first entire flagon of ale and got back to the task at hand, proving he had at least some sense of duty.

Omni was careful eating each portion; it had to ensure its sense of taste was working correctly to judge each dish. It also served as training to calibrate its senses and provide complete control of its body. Unfortunately for it, while tasting good, once Omni consumed the alcohol it was turned into energy just like the food, meaning it could not get drunk. Omni lamented the loss by drinking as much as it wanted. What a loss, what a loss indeed.

After packing everything away and converting it into energy, it picked up the clipboard it had set aside and began scribbling under each entry. "While nothing was inherently wrong, there wasn't anything that stood out either. I can't say much for the medicinal-type dishes as that is not my area of expertise, but for the rest, there were either too few seasonings, leaving the dish bland, or too many, messing up the balance and leaving a poor taste and texture."

Ghorm nodded along, "Aye, while good enough for any adventurer, ya ain't gonna attract regular customers with just 'good enough,' I can vouch for the medicinal stuff tho', cures hangovers like magic," He adds with a laugh.

Omni nodded back, "Good. I see you didn't have anything for measuring, which would be fine if you were an experienced cook, but you are not. I will make stand-ins until we can get some proper ones made of metal. Conveniently, civilization today still uses the measurement system I am familiar with, so there shouldn't be a learning handicap," it said while looking back through its checklist. The clay golem took Omni's plate to the kitchen and began to wash. "We'll need to remodel the pantry a bit; I don't know why it's only as big as a broom closet, but it needs to be larger and colder. I'm sure Krave can provide us with the necessary magic tools for cheap, and I'll also need more golems to fill in the workforce until we can hire actual people," the golem finished and nodded to itself, then turned to Christoph.

"Despite not being a full day yet, I'm sure Krave will be happy to see us again, shall we?"