"Okay," she said to no one. "Okay, that’s good."

She worked quickly after that, adding the seasoned pork slices in batches, pressing them flat against the bottom of the pot and listening to the way the sizzle changed as the meat made contact. She turned them when the edges went pale, let the other side catch colour, moved them aside and started the next batch.

The broth was rolling gently now, a low steady simmer, the bones giving up everything they had into the water. She added crushed garlic to that too, and pepper, and let it keep going.

The air filled with the smell of it.

Lin Wan stirred the broth, turned the last of the pork, and was tasting a small piece off the end of her wooden spoon to check the seasoning when she heard it

More than two sets, footsteps.

She looked up.

Wang came through first, a bundle over one shoulder, his nose already lifted slightly in the air. Behind him came Qin Mo, carrying twice what Wang was carrying and looking, for the first time since Lin Wan had met him, genuinely uncertain about something. And behind them, two males she did not expect to ever see, both moving carefully, both looking like they had recently been through hell.

Lin Wan took all of this in.

She didn’t ask, because she knew Wang would tell her.

Instead she straightened up, wooden spoon still in hand, and smiled at all four of them.

The late afternoon sun had shifted while she was cooking, dropping lower and coming in at an angle through the caldera opening. It caught her from behind, warm and golden, the steam from both pots rising around her and curling gently in the light.

She didn’t know what she looked like from where they were standing.

But Wang stopped walking.

Qin Mo, half a step behind him, stopped too.

For a moment neither of them moved. The bundles in their hands seemed to have been forgotten entirely. The two unfamiliar males behind them nearly walked into Qin Mo’s back.

Lin Wan tilted her head slightly. "Are you going to stand there or are you going to put those down?"

That broke it.

Wang started moving again, setting his bundle down near the cave wall. But before he could take another step toward her, Qin Mo had already crossed the distance between them with an alarming speed .

His eyes were on the fire.

"Get back," he said, and his hands were already reaching for Lin Wan’s arms, pulling her firmly away from the cooking pit with an urgency that was completely at odds with his usual composed manner.

Lin Wan blinked. "What are you doing?"

"fire." Qin Mo’s voice had gone tight. He had positioned himself between her and the flames without appearing to realize he had done it. "How’s there fire here?, you shouldn’t be close to it, it’ll burn you."

Wang, who had watched this from three steps away, made a sound that was very close to a laugh but managed to stop itself in time. "Qin Mo," he said, his voice patient. "She knows what she’s doing."

"I have seen what fire does." Qin Mo’s jaw was set. The composure was still there but it was working harder than usual. "I visited a tribe in my younger years. A fire escaped containment. By morning there was nothing left."

Lin Wan looked up at him.

She hadn’t expected that.

The memory was clearly not a small one. It sat behind his eyes in a way that had nothing to do with being a Beast King and everything to do with being someone who had watched something terrible happen and had not forgotten it.

She reached up and patted his arm once, the way you would with someone who needed to be gently returned to the present.

"Qin Mo," she said. "In my homeland, this is how we eat. We cook everything. Raw meat would make me very sick. It could actually kill me." She held his gaze steadily. "I can’t eat the way you do."

Qin Mo looked at the fire. Then at her. Then at the pots.

"Then Wang and I will do the cooking," he said. "You tell us what needs to be done."

Lin Wan opened her mouth.

Then she looked at the pots.

Then back at him.

"Next time," she said pleasantly. "It’s already done."

Qin Mo looked like he had more to say about this. Wang looked like he was actively enjoying watching Qin Mo discover that Lin Wan was unmovable once she’s determined to do something.

Lin Wan turned back to her pots without further comment.

She served the broth first, ladling it into the clay bowls she had received from Weiwei’s system compensation. Rich and clear, fragrant with garlic and pepper, steam rising from each bowl in slow curls.

Then the pork, golden at the edges, darkened where the spices had caught the heat, arranged over the top.

She set a bowl in front of each of them and then settled down with her own.

Keal and Da Jun looked at the bowl.of hot food, not knowing what to do.

Lin Wan watched them out of the corner of her eye as she blew gently on her own broth.

Wang lifted his bowl first. He was already familiar with the idea of Lin Wan’s food being different. He drank.

Then he went very still.

Then he drank again, longer this time.

Qin Mo picked up his bowl with the manner of someone performing a formal evaluation. He took one measured sip, and then took a drag.

He did not put the bowl down.

Keal, watching the Beast King drink without stopping, apparently decided that was endorsement enough. He lifted his own bowl and drank.

His eyes went wide.

Da Jun was half a second behind him, and his reaction was less composed. He made a sound that was almost embarrassing and then seemed to decide he did not care and kept going.

Lin Wan watched all four of them work through the food with the quiet focused intensity of males who had genuinely never tasted anything like this before. The pork disappeared. The broth disappeared. Qin Mo, with great dignity, turned his bowl slightly to make sure he had gotten every last drop.

And subconsciously, no one asked why and where the pots, bowls and spoons came from.

Lin Wan sat with her own bowl, eating at a reasonable pace, and felt something warm and thoroughly satisfied settle in her chest.

She knew she was not a great cook. Back home she had been an average cook at best. Her roommates had only allowed her to cook when every other person was too tired to cook.

But here, in this valley, with four beastmen who had never once in their lives tasted salt or garlic or anything that had been touched by heat and spice and actual seasoning?

Lin Wan stirred the last of her broth, her lips curling high.

She was absolutely the best cook in the entire Beast Continent.

No one could convince her otherwise.