While the dough rested, he cracked the eggs.

Monster eggs were twice the size of anything he’d known before this world, with shells thick enough to need actual force, and yolks the colour of a deep sunset, orange-red and vivid. He cracked six of them into a bowl, added a long pour of the full cream milk, and grated a solid handful of the sharp cheese directly in.

The trick was the milk. Most people didn’t do this. Most people cracked eggs into a hot pan and called it done, and then wondered why their eggs were flat and rubbery. You added cold full cream milk, you whisked it until the mixture was pale and slightly foamy, and then you cooked it low and slow and didn’t stop moving them. That was it. That was the whole secret. The milk created steam as it cooked, and the steam made the eggs lift, and if you pulled them off just before they looked done, they’d finish themselves in the residual heat and come out soft and thick and almost unbearably good.

He’d thought about this more than was probably healthy.

The croissants went in first, split and layered with the ham and sliced cheese, then arranged near the heat to warm through and let the cheese start working. He started the eggs in the pan over the lower part of the grate, keeping the temperature controlled, wooden spoon moving in slow, steady passes.

The smell built quickly. Butter and rendered pork fat and the sharp edge of melting cheese, the faint sweetness of the dough coming warm. It filled the small kitchen and drifted, probably, toward the common room.

He heard footsteps on the stairs.

Then, from outside the building, louder than was necessary for someone standing in a yard at this hour of the morning, Rogue’s voice.

"DO I SMELL FOOD?"

It wasn’t a question.

Liam kept his eyes on the eggs. He pulled up his inventory screen. One flick and the whole spread vanished into the grid, still hot, still smelling like something that deserved more attention than a kitchen table.

From down the hall, a soft thump-thump-thump.

Midnight bounced through the doorway, caught herself on the edge of the counter, and shook. The shift happened fast, scales pulling tight, limbs stretching and condensing, wings folding out from nothing, and then she was small again, all blue scales and bright eyes, landing on his shoulder armour with the practised weight of a bird that had done this a hundred times.

Liam pulled up some omelettes and held them up. She took it delicately, which was funny for something with teeth that could probably go through bone, and nommed it with her whole body vibrating.

He scratched between her horns with one finger. She leaned into it hard enough that her tail curled around his neck.

The bedroom door opened.

Elizabeth stood in the frame. She had her arms wrapped around herself, pink hair standing in directions it had no business standing, and her eyes were fixed on the front door, as it had personally offended her.

She looked at him. Looked at the door, then looked back at him.

Then she shuffled across the kitchen, collided into his chest, and wrapped both arms around his chest hard enough that his ribs creaked. Her face pressed into his sternum. She was freezing. Actually, physically freezing, he could feel the cold seeping through his shirt.

She pulled back just enough to look up at him, cheeks pink, and pouted.

"Next time, warn me." Her voice came out quiet and flat, which was Elizabeth-speak for I am extremely embarrassed and would like to pretend I am not. "I only like you. I don’t want anyone else seeing me like that."

Liam smiled. He reached up and patted the top of her head, right between the ears, and felt one of them twitch under his palm.

"Okay. I’m sorry. Love you."

Her entire face went through about seven expressions in the space of two seconds. Her mouth opened. Closed. Opened again. The pink in her cheeks went nuclear.

"L-l-l-l—" She made a sound like a motor failing. "—love? HUH."

She stepped back, crossed her arms, turned on her heel, and walked straight out the front door.

There was a solid thwack from outside.

"OW—what the hell, Elizabeth!"

"SHUT UP."

"I was standing here! I was literally just standing here!"

"YOUR FACE WAS IN MY GENERAL DIRECTION."

"My face???"

Liam heard Jace start laughing. Not the polite kind. The kind that came from the stomach and had no business existing at this hour of the morning.

He grabbed his pack, checked that Midnight was settled, and followed Elizabeth outside.

The beautiful garden next to the stream was covered in flowers and pebbles, but right now it was having its party. Rogue was rubbing his arm and scowling at Elizabeth, who had planted herself with her back to the house and her arms crossed and her ears pinned flat. Jace was leaning against the wall with his hand over his mouth, his shoulders still shaking. Mirra stood a few feet away, looking like she was trying very hard to be somewhere else.

The fridge was sitting on the ground near Mirra’s feet. The lich mini-boss looked about as threatening as a garden ornament, which was to say not at all, with its small, robed body and the faint blue glow coming from inside its hood. It hid when it saw Liam.

Liam waved at the fridge.

He pulled the breakfast platter from his inventory and set it on the low wall. The eggs were still steaming. The croissants had just been made.

"Eat first," he said. "Then we’re going with Elizabeth to catch horses."

Rogue stopped rubbing his arm. "Horses?"

"Mounts. Walking sucks. Carriages suck worse."

"Mounts." Rogue’s face did something complicated. "You’re telling me we’re about to go try and take down a supreme egirl and you want to stop and wrangle horses?"

"Yes, and then we are getting coffee."

Jace was already pulling a croissant apart. "I’m with Liam. I walked twelve miles yesterday. My feet have opinions."

"Your feet can..."

"They’re good opinions."

Mirra took a plate without saying anything. Fridge reached up and tugged at the hem of her robe until she broke off a piece of croissant and handed it down. The lich held the bread in both hands and stared at it for a moment before the hood tilted upward, the blue light inside brightening, and it took a bite that was somehow both delicate and unsettling.

Elizabeth hadn’t moved from her spot. She was still facing away from everyone, arms crossed, but Liam watched one of her ears swivel toward the food.

He fixed a plate and walked it over to her. She took it without looking at him. Started eating. Her shoulders dropped about an inch.

Rogue was already three bites into his eggs and had apparently decided the argument wasn’t worth having with his mouth full. "Fine. Horses. Where are these horses?"

"Grasslands east of the river," Elizabeth said, around a mouthful. She still wasn’t looking at anyone. "About an hour’s walk, they run in herds. Fast. Hard to catch without—"

"Without what?"

She turned just enough to give him a look that was pure, distilled, you’re going to hate this.

"Without getting kicked, BUT I have a lure and some rope."

Jace, who was making gleeful progress through his own croissant, snorted hard enough to send a few crumbs airborne. "I can’t wait to see you get face-planted by a wild horse," he said, grinning in Rogue’s direction.

Rogue looked offended at the very suggestion. "I’ll have you know," he said, primly, "that I’m extremely good with animals. Animals love me."

Mirra, who had up until this point offered nothing but a series of slow, deliberate bites, stopped mid-chew. She stared at Rogue, then at the plate, then back at Rogue. "Wasn’t it you who tried to pet a wolf last week and ended up in the river?"

"That wolf was rabid," Rogue said, with the indignant dignity of someone rewriting history in real time. "There’s a difference."

Elizabeth’s mouth twitched, betraying a hint of a smirk. "These are worse than wolves," she said. "The last time I went out there, one of them kicked a tree in half."

Jace brightened at this. "Wait, really? Like, vertically or horizontally?"

She thought. "Both."

Rogue set down his fork, as if physically preparing to distance himself from the idea of vertical tree-halving. "So," he said, "just to be clear. We’re walking into a field full of wild, possibly mutant horses, and we’re going to catch one. Without dying."

"Correct, we are going to catch a few, though." Elizabeth finally met his eyes, her own sparkling. "You’re coming too. Liam said."

Liam, who had been quietly observing the spectacle while topping off his own plate, nodded once. "We need three, one for you, one for Jace, one for me. Elizabeth already has hers. Mirra and Midnight double up."

Jace feigned a look of betrayal. "What if I want to ride with Elizabeth? She’s literally the only one here who’s done this before."

Elizabeth shot him a look so flat it could have been used as a building material. "You’d get us both killed. You scream when you panic."

"I’d also kill you," Liam muttered.

Status: E-Girl Vengeance: Delayed

The "L-Word" Critical System Failure: Liam casually dropping an unprompted "Love you" onto a freezing, pouting Elizabeth has caused her vocal interface to simulate a motor failing. The server notes that her immediate tactical retreat resulted in a high-velocity physical assault on Rogue simply because his face was "in her general direction."

The Lich Pastry Tithe: The miniature Lich raid boss, Fridge, hiding behind Mirra’s robe until she physically broke off a piece of high-tier croissant has permanently reduced the party’s local threat matrix. The system registers the Lich’s tiny, robed consumption of baked goods as both delicate and unsettling.

The Mutant Horse Wrangler Calculus: Elizabeth confirming that the target wild herd contains entities capable of kicking trees completely in half has triggered Rogue’s [Historical Revisionism Passive] regarding his recent wolf-petting disaster. Liam scheduling a three-mount capture quota before they hunt down the scammer confirms the guild’s current logistical trajectory is entirely chaotic.