Dungeon Bakery Chapter 5

“Hidden Quest……?”

“Just as it says, ppi. It means you completed a hidden quest, ppi.”

Baek Seol, who had sold most of the furniture and was now sitting on the one small chair she had left, nodded as she listened to Lucy.

She knew that much. A quest that did not appear in the quest window but was hidden was called a hidden quest. Usually, quests like these were supposed to be incredibly rare, weren’t they?

Was it really okay to clear one this easily?

As Baek Seol scratched one cheek with her index finger and merely blinked, Lucy stuck out his beak and casually spoke.

“What are you doing, ppi? You got a hidden title and skill as a reward for the hidden quest, so check them, ppi.”

“Mm-hm.”

When Baek Seol mentally muttered for her status window to open, a translucent window appeared before her eyes.

Name: Baek Seol

Class: Dungeon Bakery Owner (-) Lv.1

Title: (New!) Involved Party

HP: 100/100 Stamina: 100/100

Strength: 10 Intelligence: 25 Agility: 11 Luck: 2

Baek Seol’s eyes widened as she looked at her status window.

Good heavens. What was that?

“How can Luck be only 2?”

“……That’s what you’re surprised about, ppi?! Can’t you see that you got a new title, ppi?!”

Lucy stomped his feet as if he was about to die of frustration. Baek Seol, who had been deeply contemplating whether her bad luck was the reason she had fallen into Professor Kim’s clutches and became a graduate student, finally checked her title.

Involved Party?

She really had gotten a title?

Baek Seol had only just awakened and knew very little about the world of Hunters, so all she could do was tilt her head in confusion. But if another Hunter had seen her status window, they would have fainted on the spot.

The number of Hunters who had obtained titles could be counted on one hand. And there was a good reason for that. Only one of each title existed in the entire world, and the odds of even encountering an opportunity to obtain one were astronomically low. Even if someone did get the opportunity, the difficulty was absurdly high.

As a result, most Hunters who possessed titles were S-rank Hunters.

“But what does the Involved Party do?”

However, having spent her days buried in graduate school and living far removed from the outside world, Baek Seol knew nothing about the deeper circumstances surrounding titles.

Lucy sighed as he looked at Baek Seol as though she were hopeless.

“I suppose I should be grateful you didn’t ask what the title is, ppi……. I don’t know either, ppi. If you check the title, an explanation for Involved Party should appear, ppi. Why don’t you look at that first, ppi?”

Baek Seol quickly tapped ‘Involved Party’ on the status window. Another small window popped up, displaying its description.

<Involved Party: You who have discovered a loophole in the system. Impressive! You have been granted the one and only special privilege available to you. A bulletin board exclusively for you will be created within the system.>

“……?”

Even after reading the explanation, Baek Seol still couldn’t understand what it meant.

She immediately checked her skill window.

It was her first time opening the skill window, so there were other skills she had never seen before as well. But she decided to look through those carefully later and checked the hidden skill first.

[I Have a Suggestion (Hidden Skill)] Lv.1

You can now leave posts on the Suggestion Board. Please leave honest reviews and feedback about the system. Perhaps the system may accept your suggestions and modify itself……?

Even after reading the skill description, she still couldn’t quite grasp it.

She had only been exposed to something called a system for a week. A bulletin board, suggestions, system modifications…… There was no way those concepts would immediately click for her.

From what she could tell, it seemed to mean that she alone could write on the Suggestion Board.

“Isn’t this incredible, ppi……? You can actually interfere with the system. I’m even surprised by this…….”

While Lucy was the only one beside her making a huge fuss with an expression that practically screamed Oh my goodness, the world is ending, Baek Seol quietly closed the skill window.

Not particularly useful.

She had thought that since it was a hidden title, maybe it would help her make money.

Baek Seol pursed her lips inwardly. She had a debt to repay, and she needed to make money if she wanted to escape graduate school.

And only then would she be able to give her father an excuse not to send her money. Then the uncle and aunt wouldn’t have to worry about her anymore, either.

Isn’t it just asking me to tell them if I find anything strange while using the system?

Why, whenever you visited the website of some institution or store, wasn’t there usually a bulletin board like that?

Suggestions, inquiries, user reviews…….

Wasn’t this just a board where she could leave that kind of feedback?

It wasn’t exactly a title that appealed to Baek Seol.

Judging from the skill description, it didn’t even seem like the system would necessarily accept everything she suggested.

“Hmmm.”

So Baek Seol left the still-excited Lucy behind and stood up from the chair.

Then she sold even the last remaining chair to the shop.

Clink!

She could hear the sound of money piling up.

With her arms crossed, Baek Seol stood in the middle of the store and began looking over the furniture available in the shop.

Perhaps because she had completed the Beginner’s Quests, many new items had appeared in the shop.

“Baek Seol, ppi? You got a hidden title and skill. Is this really the time to be sitting around like this, ppi? You should try using the skill at least once…….”

“I’m busy right now, Lucy. Shh.”

Baek Seol pinched Lucy’s chattering beak and focused on figuring out how best to spend the ten thousand points she had earned from completing the quests.

I should probably have at least one display shelf…….

Should I have tables for customers in the bakery? Maybe I should buy one for now.

“Mmff!”

Lucy struggled before hurriedly flying away, but Baek Seol actually felt relieved now that the distraction was gone.

Ding! Ding!

The sound of Baek Seol carefully purchasing items echoed throughout the shop as she sank into deep thought.

Baek Seol pursued extreme efficiency, but the interior of a store she would have to look at every day was also important to her as a gamer because it provided a sense of aesthetic satisfaction.

She began concentrating as intensely as she had during her graduate school interview.

 

***

 

Baek Seol didn’t know it yet, but when someone awakened, a window allowing Awakened individuals to exchange information would become active.

It was something like a website that could be accessed anytime, anywhere.

A space called Another.

And right now, an unexpected commotion was taking place there.

[Title: Let’s Figure Out What This Suddenly Appeared Bulletin Board Is. Author: Noble Hunter]

Hey guys. Is everyone running their dungeons well?

I know everyone’s busy, but as you all probably know, something weird happened on ‘Another’ yesterday.

This place originally only had this one bulletin board, right? The only place where we could post.

Suggestion Board <- But suddenly, this separate board appeared. You know what I mean, right? You’ve all seen it.

Does anyone know what this thing is?

—Comments:

Pure-Hearted Kid: I saw it too. I tried to write something there, but when I tried to post, it said I wasn’t authorized.

All of My EPs: Whoaaa. What is that? I’m freaking curious.

.

.

.

Noble Hunter (Author): So nobody knows. Looks like there’s no one who can post there either. Guess we’ll have to keep watching until someone posts something?

 

***

 

“Up we go. Uuugh. Morning came again just like this.”

Baek Seol stretched her stiff body, which had become sore from spending a week cleaning.

Still, at least she didn’t have to clean anymore starting today.

In a cheerful mood, she brewed coffee with the coffee machine she had bought from the shop yesterday and sat down at a table she had set up in one corner of the store.

Thanks to spending the entire previous day carefully planning the interior, the shop looked quite nice.

She had changed the cold gray concrete walls to warmer tones and replaced the flooring with wood. She had also changed the display shelf and table to white tones and enlarged the windows, giving the whole place a cozy yet spacious feel.

Store Status Window.

As soon as she muttered the words inwardly, a window appeared.

<Dungeon Bakery

Aesthetics: 17 (E) Cleanliness: 100 (A)

Appeal: 7 (F) Reputation: 1 (F)>

This was the store status window she had learned about through Lucy.

Thanks to all her hard work, Cleanliness was at 100, but the remaining stats were absolutely terrible.

The system window’s design was still nothing to write home about, either.

Still, thanks to redecorating, Aesthetics has gone all the way up to 17.

Considering it had been 3 before, that was a tremendous improvement.

I’ll probably be able to add more display shelves later, right?

There was only one display shelf in the store. She couldn’t buy another one even if she wanted to because it was stated that she needed to raise the level of the Dungeon Bakery class first.

Five red bean buns were displayed on the shelf.

After clearing as many as ten quests at once, her inventory had filled up with quite a few items.

This red bean bun was one of them.

She checked its information.

[Red Bean Bun]

Description: Bread filled with sweet red bean paste. Some people love it, some people hate it.

Race Compatibility: ???

Effect upon Consumption: Causes the consumer to recall memories.

The effect upon consumption makes sense, but what is Race Compatibility supposed to mean?

Race?

What kind of race was it talking about?

She had asked Lucy, but the bird had subtly avoided her gaze and dodged the question, which made him seem suspicious.

Besides, there wasn’t even a price listed.

How am I supposed to sell this?

Clicking her tongue inwardly, Baek Seol took a sip of warm coffee and opened her skill window.

Yesterday, when she had opened the skill window to check her hidden skill, she had noticed that she had other skills as well.

[We Are All Neighbors] Lv.-

No fighting inside the store. Those who interfere with business shall die. (This skill is automatically applied without activation. Basic Buff Skill.)

[Baking] Lv.1

Let’s make delicious bread.

[I Have a Suggestion (Hidden Skill)] Lv.1

You can now leave posts on the Suggestion Board.

The skill called We Are All Neighbors seemed to be a skill that was applied to the store itself.

Well, it is true that you shouldn’t fight inside a store.

But Those who interfere with business shall die was a rather vicious description.

The other skill, baking was far too obvious for a bakery owner.

“Are you awake, ppi?”

At some point, Lucy had appeared and was sitting sullenly on the table.

He was still sulking over what had happened earlier.

Baek Seol hadn’t had the chance to placate him because she had spent the past week working on the interior, but that was no longer the case.

She needed Lucy now.

Baek Seol greeted Lucy with a bright smile.

“Welcome, Lucy. Did you sleep well last night?”

“……Hmph. I slept well enough, ppi. But why are you suddenly smiling like that, ppi? It makes me nervous, ppi.”

“No, it’s just…… I thought about it and realized I’d been so overwhelmed with work that I didn’t pay much attention to you, Lucy.”

“H-hem.”

Lucy cleared his throat softly and turned his head away.

His wings were trembling slightly, so apparently his mood had improved a little.

Baek Seol cut up an apple she had bought earlier and handed it to Lucy.

Pretending he couldn’t help it, Lucy began pecking at it with his beak.

Once she confirmed that his mood had improved somewhat, Baek Seol carefully broached the subject.

“Come to think of it, since I skipped ahead through the quests, I don’t know how to use the baking skill.”

“Hmm. If that’s the problem, just try using the skill once, ppi.”

Lucy answered casually as he pecked at a small piece of apple.

Following Lucy’s instructions, Baek Seol decided to try using the skill.

It was her first time using a skill, so she was a little nervous.

Feeling her heart pounding, Baek Seol quietly activated the skill.

Baking.

A series of system windows immediately popped up.

<System: You currently have no recipes acquired. Switching to Recipe Creation.>

<System: You do not have the ingredients required for Recipe Creation.>

<System: You do not have the tools required for Recipe Creation.>

<System: Closing the Recipe Creation tab.>

No recipes.

No ingredients.

And no tools……

Baek Seol stood there dumbfounded, when Lucy pointed somewhere with his wing.

“As you’d expect, ppi, it would be best to use the baking skill in the kitchen over there, ppi.”

“Ah…….”

The place Lucy was pointing toward was a small room tucked away in one corner of the bakery.

It was there from the beginning, with a small oven and various baking tools that had already been inside the bakery when she first entered.

“And first, you need to obtain the ingredients, ppi. Normally, you would discover the ingredients inside the statue that was in the store and gradually learn the baking skill, ppi…… But someone went and sold all of it, ppi…….”

“…….”

Who on earth would do something so stupid?

Oh.

Me.

Baek Seol grabbed at her hair.

“If something like that was supposed to happen, you should have told me beforehand!”

“I didn’t have a chance to, ppi!”

Ugh.

Baek Seol, who had been trained by failure after failure at the hands of Professor Kim, didn’t give in so easily.

She quickly pulled herself together and muttered,

“Then I need to get ingredients first……? Should I just go outside and buy flour and sugar?”

“No. Ordinary ingredients from the human world won’t work, ppi.”

Lucy pointed with his wing toward the closed brown door.

The very door she had opened through a loophole the other day.

“You need to get them from there, ppi.”

“Where is that?”

Baek Seol casually tossed out the question she had been curious about all this time.

She had clearly been told that customers would enter through that door.

But since the space beyond the door couldn’t be seen at all from outside the store, she had always found it strange.

Lucy casually answered while pecking at an apple and swallowing the bite whole.

“A dungeon.”

“……?”

“The dungeon next to the store, ppi. The very first one □□□□□ prepared for this world…….”

Lucy continued explaining something after that, but Baek Seol couldn’t hear a word.

Wait.

What did I just hear?

A dungeon?

That dungeon right next to here?

The very first dungeon to appear on Earth, which no one had ever managed to enter?

Then that meant no Hunter had ever conquered it.

And naturally, that meant terrifying dangers were lurking inside.

“Whaaaaaat?!”

Realizing it far too late, Baek Seol shot to her feet.