Frontier Chef: My Cooking Skills Are Broken-Chapter 28: Knife Versus Spear

The spear left the wall before Ezra could say anything.

It whirred once in the air like a compass finding north and shot across the kitchen aimed at Ezra’s throat. Culling Arts moved his hands before his brain caught up. The knife came up from the counter and met the spear tip mid-flight.

The end of the spear circled around faster than anything he’d seen and caught him in his back.

The impact sent him stumbling forwards through the open front of the kitchen and into the street.

Theron cracked his neck and stepped out after him while his sister was scribbling again in her ledger. Whatever the hell she was writing, it didn’t seem to bother her that Ezra just got fucking hit.

> HP: 154/240

Ezra knelt on the road, gasping for air that wouldn’t come. The sun was glaring at this time of day, gloating at the blood that dripped out his mouth.

’Okay, that fucking hurt.’

Harkenians stopped again to watch. The smith was still chewing on a vegetable chip and had a brawl for entertainment now. Guards reached for their weapons and stopped because the man throwing the spear was one of their own.

It definitely didn’t feel like a brawl.

Theron walked to the edge of the kitchen and raised his hand. The spear ripped itself free from the black stone where it had buried itself three feet from Ezra and flew back to hover at his side.

His fingers were open, palm out, and the weapon orbited him without fail.

’That’s what he did at the gate, when we first arrived.’

Ezra spit out the blood and watched it sizzle on the stone.

’He raised the spear at us and I thought it was protocol.’

It wasn’t protocol.

It never was.

The spear shot forward again. Ezra rolled and the point buried itself in the road where his shoulder had been, spraying debris across the stone.

He got to his feet and the spear was already pulling free, spinning, resetting and aimed at his throat.

’Every fucking one of the attacks is trying to kill me. This man is insane.’

"As big as you are, you’re surprisingly quick to block my spear." Theron hadn’t moved from the kitchen entrance. His blue eyes were calm and his hand made a small adjustment and the spear responded. "Still, I can’t believe it might be true."

"I thought you were a pretty cool guy." Ezra brought the knife up as the spear came back in a wide arc aimed at his ribs. The deflection rang through the dull blade and up his arm. "I mean your cape is fucking cool."

The spear came again, faster and lower, skimming the ground before rising at his knees. Ezra jumped back and the point missed his thigh by inches. It carved a line in the black stone and did not intend to abide by it.

He blocked a second thrust from behind that meant to end the fight right then and there.

Theron didn’t seem to give a shit about fairness.

Not like Ezra could blame him. He’d do the same if a man was accused of touching his sister.

But accusation required a confession, and the spear didn’t seem interested in waiting for a verdict.

"This," Ezra huffed, "this crosses the line."

Theron closed his fist and the spear froze mid-air, vibrating, then reversed. This time it came straight down. Gravity did the rest and Ezra heard it before he saw it, a whistle that cut through the air.

’Move, Ez, move. Fucking move.

It’s too fast.’

The spear zipped across his cheek, leaving a trail of blood that painted his shirt. The rest of it impaled into the ground, sending chips of obsidian into the crowd.

Theron whistled. "I thought you’d dodge." He called the spear to his side again, spraying debris as it flew. "You absolute moron. Being frozen actually saved your life."

> HP: 148/240

’Don’t think anymore. Learn the weapon and work around it. Thinking will get you killed, Ez.

Learn. The. Weapon.’

"Appraisal!"

[ Theron’s Bonded Spear — ★★★ ]

> Profile: Magnetite-core polearm. Bonded to user through sustained Art application; returns on recall.

> Threat: Controlled remotely via user’s Art manipulation. Attack patterns mirror user’s combat training. Operates via vision-based application.

Ezra stopped watching the spear and started watching Theron’s eyes.

They moved with the spear, the pupils. Every adjustment, every shift in trajectory, his gaze tracked the spear like a tether. When the weapon went left, his eyes went left.

When it rose, his chin tilted.

The eyes were the real control.

’If he can’t see it, he can’t steer it.’

Theron covered his mouth and yawned, pointing his finger at Ezra. His pupils followed and the spear launched forward.

’Bingo.’

Ezra raised his left palm and set the dial to full blast. Fire erupted from his hand in a wide arc aimed at the air between them, a wall of heat and light that bloomed across the commons and burned the eyebrows of the bystanders close enough to feel it.

Theron put his arm up as the flames crept forward like a tsunami, and the spear veered hard out of its trajectory. It skidded off the road and buried itself in a building wall and destroyed three more walls before going dead.

At the height of the flames, Ezra threw the knife.

The blade left his fingers before he could regret it.

"STOP THIS AT ONCE."

Theron fell to one knee and the blade cut through an inch of his hair before it clanged into something metal on the kitchen counter.

The commander stood at the edge of the commons with two guards flanking her.

Behind them, half a step back, stood a girl with green eyes.

On her own two legs, no less.

The Emerald Avian.

’Great.’

The commander walked forward, each step a death sentence that had Ezra’s name written all over. She looked at the spear in the building wall, at the scorch marks on the road, and at the blood on Ezra’s face.

She finally looked ahead at the helmet pinned to the kitchen wall with a knife through its metal skin designed to stop wyvern claws.

"Theron," she said, "I commanded you to assess him, not try and skewer him like a Dunecrest cow."

He stood and put a fist to his breastplate. His eyes were somewhere else. Smart man.

"You were right," Theron said. "He’s what we think he is." He looked back at the kitchen. "Leyla, come out."

The registrar poked her head out from behind the kitchen counter, eyes blinking at Ezra then the Harkenians. Her face was blanketed in soot and sweat.

"Is it over?"

"Yep," Theron said.

The commander snapped her fingers and Leyla straightened at once.

"Tell us your class," Leyla said, "or you get jailed for good."

Pretty much all of the Harkenians were watching now.

’I guess I don’t have a choice anymore."

"My class is—"

Neve stepped forward, green eyes steady and pointing a finger with the arm that was once useless.

"Frontier Chef," Neve said. "You’re a Frontier Chef."