Chapter 36 : Kitchen Arsenal

Duri and his group were in a 20 foot long and 18 foot wide kitchen, and in front of that kitchen, was a hunch of hungry hotel guests at tables.

"KIDS are gonna be cooking for us?"

"This should be interesting."

"We did get invited to this out of nowhere."

Kedarah said to Duri and the others, "Alllright! Now! We have a bunch of hungry hungry people out there, waiting to be served! Before we start, any questions so far?"

Duri asked, "Can I leave?"

"Haha! Nooo! Unless..unless you wanna fail…then everyone will think you're…a quitter!"

"..I..I'm not a quitter. Tch. Forget I asked."

Seven asked Kedarah, "I know there's something else to just making food for these ugly people. What's the catch?"

Kedarah grinned, "Hm? Catch? I don't know what you're talking about."

"Yeah, okay."

Duri said, "Whatever. If this is how it has to be, I want no one helping me. I can do this on my own. Stay out of my work station."

Seven said to Duri, "It's impossible if we're going to be working together, idiot."

"Heh? Who're you callin' an idiot?"

"You, idiot."

Duri and Seven were getting closer to each other.

Duri continued, "You're the dumbass! For thinking I'm just some loose cannon murderer! I saved your life!"

"You killed a person who was asking for help. How is that saving me?"

"He MANIPULATED your senses! I sensed bloodlust coming from him."

"Yeah that DEFINITELY justifies why you've killed Katai and killed other people before, RIGHT?" 

"I have my reasons! And if you wanna keep talking, YOU'D be my next reason…"

"Oh, please try it! I wanna see. Duuuumbass!"

"You're the dumbass!"

Stepping in between Duri and Seven, was Espen.

Espen said, "I'll settle this. I have the power to read minds and emotions. Seven, from what I've read from your mind, you think about Duri, your powers, and your arm all the time. With Duri taking the second spot. And what I've noticed so far from your thoughts and feelings, is that you have a slight crush on Duri. But you still think he's a murdering piece of shit."

Seven blushed, and she covered Espen's mouth.

"Shut up or I'll murder you!"

Espen responded, "I speak the truth, Seven. And there is a stain on your shoulder sleeve. Clean it."

"Hehh?! Y-your little shitty mind powers are inaccurate."

"You're flustered. Embarrassed because we know the truth."

"Be quiet, you don't know what you're talking about."

"It's within the ranges of my power to know what I'm talking about."

Duri wasn't even paying attention to them, instead, Kedarah distracted him, trying to feed Duri some cupcakes she made.

Duri complained, "I'm not hungry. I'm not hungry. I'm not hungry."

Kedarah sighed, "Awww come on, one bite!"

"Not happening, lady."

"We won't start the test until you dooo!"

Tek said to Duri, "Just eat the damn cupcake Duri."

Duri yelled, "Fine!"

Duri ate it in one bite, and replied, "T-There! Happy?!"

Kedarah winked, "Greatly! Now! You should all know that in the kitchen, there are ALWAYS obstacles. In here, no matter what obstacles, and they WILL come, we do NOT stop helping the customers. Got it?"

Everyone said:

"Yeah yeah."

"Sure."

"Yokai!"

Duri and Tek and Seven didn't say anything.

Kazuma exclaimed, "Haha! This is in my calibur! I can cook well!"

Nine responded to Kazuma, "Oh really? Good. Don't fuck us up, ya hear?"

"Don't worry, I won't!"

Ren-Ren said to Nine, "Hehh? Instead of worrying about him, you should worry about your own contribution to this group. Peasant."

Nine replied to Ren-Ren, "Ehhh? You call yourself a villain, but you're okay with teamwork? Imagine."

"Who said anything about teamwork? You are all my subordinates. I shall be the one leading this kitchen."

"Yeah right."

Seven spoke, "Tsk."

Tek was leaning against the wall, ignoring everything, but reading the small black book he was always reading.

Kedarah said to everyone, "So! I will now assign kitchen roles to everyone! First up, is my precious Duri. He will have the role of taking orders from people and bringing it to the kitchen for the cooks to start making, he will also be doing other miscellaneous things around the kitchen. Next, is Seven. You will have the exact same role."

Seven scoffed, "Noooo! Nuh uh. No way. Definitely not with Duri. Pair me with someone else."

"Sorrrry, hehe! Okay next, is Tek. You will be in charge of heating the food in the ovens and cooking. Kazuma, you will use your fire powers to smoke up some of the food too. Nine, Ren-Ren, Jiyu, Shiryu, you four will be in charge of cleaning the food. Espen, you will be in charge of cleaning the dishes and making sure everything is spotless. The other students in here, you will focus on taking the trash out and getting the eating utensils together. Oh, and remember each others roles. They'll come in handy later."

Espen grinned, "Keeping things clean excites me more than anything. I am up for the challenge."

Shiryu said, "This…is a nice kitchen.."

Kedarah clapped her hands together once, saying, "Let's get to work!"

Jiyu said, "I-I've never worked in a kitchen before..I hope I do o-okay. Th-there's a lot of people here.."

Duri and Seven looked at each other, and grunted, looking away from each other.

Espen stepped in the middle of them again, saying, "Seven. We can avoid all of this strife if you tell Duri how you really feel about him-."

Seven started shaking Espen, "GET OUT OF MY HEAD. YOU'RE WRONG, YOU'RE WRONG, YOU'RE WRONG, YOU'RE WRONG!"

"I can't help getting inside people's heads. And I'm not wrong."

Duri asked Espen, "What about me? What am I feeling?"

Espen stared at him for a few seconds, and answered, "You want to fight someone. You're not angry, just tired. You have a bloodlust. And you're thinking about punching everyone in this room. And you also wanna know why my eyes are two different colors. That's all I'm reading."

"...Mmm. She's the real fucking deal."

Minutes later, everyone was doing their assigned duties, cooking, cleaning, and heating everything up.

Duri and Seven were dressed in male suits, Seven wanted to wear the male suit, she said it, "Suits me better."

Duri walked up to a table of adults, asking, "Welcome to whatever the hell this place is called. What do you want?"

The table answered:

"Well, I would like a triple stacked cheeseburger with no onions, just pickles and ketchup would be fine."

Duri replied, "You came to a restaurant just to order a burger? You alright?"

"I'm fine, haha. Please, I would like a burger."

"..I guess. Anything else?"

"No, that'll be all. And you look..AWFULLY familiar. Oh..you're Duri."

"Anybody else want anything?"

The other people at the table ordered their food, and Duri was quickly writing it down so he could get the hell out of there.

Duri said, "Okay."

He started walking away, and he walked past Seven. When they walked past each other, they bumped shoulders.

Duri wanted to say something drastically mean, but he realised it would attract too much attention.

'So she still thinks I'm a murdering piece of shit. Cool.'

Duri stepped up to the kitchen counter, and stuck the note of orders on a wire at the top of it.

He said, "Read it and make it."

Duri turned around, and Kedarah walked up to him.

Kedarah put her arm around Duri, saying, "Durrriiii. When we are taking orders, we have to be a little NICER to the customers, yeah?"

"I'm pretty sure you know how I am by now, Kedarah."

"Wellll you could at least TRY. This will also be graded too."

"What? Really? The hell.."

"Mhmmm. Go get em', Duri!"

Duri sighed, walking over to more tables. He walked up to one table, and he put on the most forced and fake smile he's ever done. It looked like he wasn't even smiling, but trying so hard to smile but couldn't type of way.

Duri said, "M-may I take your order?"

The people asked him, "Are you okay? You look kind of Ill."

"I'm fine. What would you like to e-eat today..?"

They began to order, and as they were, Duri could see Seven laughing with some of the customers, she was doing a good job. And Duri knew she was doing a better job than him.

'She's trying to challenge me it seems.'

In the kitchen, the exam students were doing their duties, continuing to do what they were assigned to do. 

Kazuma was lighting food on fire with his powers, Tek was tossing food into a big oven while reading a book; Nine, Shiryu, Ren-Ren, Jiyu were cooking and making the food, and the other remaining students were cleaning up and taking trash bags out to the back.

Kazuma asked Tek, "So uh, guess we're heat buddies now. Right?"

Tek didn't answer.

Kazuma continued, "So uh, guess we're heat buddies now. Right?"

Tek responds, "I heard you the first time."

"I always wanted to ask, what are you reading? I always see you with that book and stuff, so I got curious."

"It's a book."

"Oh…cool!"

Espen was washing the dishes thoroughly, not missing a single spec of food or mess. 

'Messy people. They could at least wipe the plate with a napkin first.'

Kedarah smiled, "You guys are doing so well, like you've done this before! Also, I forgot to give you all a pair of these."

Kedarah snapped her fingers, and black earpieces appeared in everyone's ear.

Kedarah continued, "This is for us to communicate with each other. Since I can't talk to people telepathically like the other Hosts can."

Ren-Ren replied, "The other Hosts are doing the same thing you're doing, right?"

"Yes. We are taking turns shifting to different kitchens. But we'll always end up back to the one where we started. Oh, and Duri, Seven."

Duri and Seven looked at Kedarah, not answering, but looking at her to show her they have their attention towards her.

Kedarah smiled, "Could you two please be dolls and go get another batch of wine from the cellar? All the tables have been ordered already, and you're at a stand still."

Duri and Seven looked at each other, answering, "Fine."

Duri and Seven started to walk out of the room together, and Kedarah smirked.

She got on her earpiece, and contacted Host Tetsuya.

"They're moving to the cellar."

Tetsuya answered, "Good. That'll start the party. Arsenal isn't the type to be defeated easily, but he isn't overpowered. They can take him. They just have to figure out how."

Duri and Seven were almost at the cellar, walking down a set of stairs side by side.

It was quiet between the two of them, their feet pressing against each step on the stairs.

Duri said, "Smells like shit down here."

Seven answered, "It's probably you."

"Shut up."

"Nah, don't want to."

"You say I'm a murdering piece of shit, but you're talking to me."

"You hate me, don't you? Why are you talking to me?"

"I don't HATE you. I just don't LIKE you."

"I don't like you either."

"That's not what Espen said."

Seven blushed, and said, "Shut the hell up…" 

Duri and Seven made it to the cellar, and they looked at all the barrels of wine around them. They were destroyed, with wine all over the floor. There were only two barrels left that were intact.

Seven said, "Ugh!"

Duri didn't say anything, he was silent and had a straight face. 

"Somethings wrong."

"You sense it too then. That makes two of us."

"Don't move."

Duri sniffed three times, then he dashed away from Seven. He darted to the middle of the cellar, and punched an invisible force in the stomach.

Duri knocked the force back, and it was the prisoner Arsenal. He rolled back on the floor, and he sat up immediately.

Arsenal's stomach was growling, and he said, "Ouch."

Duri asked, "Start talking, bastard."

Seven moved beside Duri, and said to Arsenal, "Ahhh shit dude you are hella ugly."

Arsenal remarked, "Your skin…"

"...What of it?"

"I need the skin..off both of you."

Duri scoffed, "Don't think so."

"It's not your bodies that I want. But the skin..I need to feed off your skin…if I don't…I won't be myself.."

"What do you mean by that?!"

"Hand yourselves over…and let me feed upon your skins. Consuming the entire body will make me vomit my insides out…but the skin will do nicely.."

Seven threatened with a promise, "We're gonna say no to that. Gonna just beat your ass."

Arsenal's stomach growled again, and he responded, "It's no use. You can't beat me. Everytime I take damage, I either grow bigger, get stronger, or a clone of me pops out of me and kills my opponent."

Duri and Seven dashed over to Arsenal, and punched him in the face together. 

Arsenal skidded across the floor, his head bumping multiple times, over and over. He crashed through the wall, and he was outside in the grass. Dirt was coming from the ground, and Arsenal had a clone of him jump from his back. 

Arsenal and his clone looked at Duri and Seven walking towards them.

Duri said, "I thought he was bluffing."

Seven replied, "Dammit. Me too. Now there's another one. There's only so much ugliness I can take. If he gets stronger after being attacked, then the only way we can beat him is.."

Duri and Seven said together, "Killing him."

They both looked at each other, and started arguing.

Duri scoffed at Seven, "Oi! Don't copy me, dumbass!"

Seven scoffed back, "Heh?! You're the one who copied me, dummy!"

"Hehhhh?! Fuck you!"

"Birthmark boy! Birthmark boy!"

"Your NAME IS LITERALLY A NUMBER. Is it even considered a name?!"

"Oh I'm so gonna kill you, dude! I'm gonna kill you ten times!"

"Ohohoho I would just LOVE to see you try."

Arsenal tried to interrupt them, but Duri and Seven said to him, "Shut up!"

On their earpieces, Kedarah said to Duri and Seven, "Nowwwww come on in. This is a team effort! Also, you are not allowed to kill Arsenal. Find another way to defeat him. And keep him AWAY from the hotel. His goal is to eat the skin of everyone he sees. He can't eat a whole body."

Duri responded, "He's another damn prisoner from the void?"

"Precisely."

"I figured that shit out as soon as I saw him."

"Good luck! And be carefullll!"

Duri got off the earpiece, and Arsenal and his clone blasted over to Duri and Seven, screaming, "Give me your skins!!!!"

Duri and Seven replied together, "...Hell no!"