Chapter 35 - The Celebrity Chef Who Called Me a Dishwasher
Hearth Core Realm came with dignity.
Eli lost his within twenty minutes.
He threw up behind a spirit-tea booth.
Tasha filmed nothing, which proved she was a true friend.
The Market's headline competition began immediately after the Trial: the Midnight Crown, a public cooking tournament whose winner received access to the Jade Table Hearth vault.
That vault contained the Living Hearth Core shard needed to repair the People's Ladle.
Eli entered.
His first opponent was Chase Sterling.
Chase had four restaurants, two streaming shows, nine million followers, and hair that appeared structurally engineered.
He looked at Eli's name card.
"You're the viral dishwasher."
"Former dishwasher. We covered this."
Chase smiled for cameras.
"Cute story. But cooking at this level isn't charity."
"Good, because entry was free."
Their challenge ingredient was salmon.
Naturally. Seattle had laws about these things.
Chase received a pristine spirit-fed king salmon worth thousands.
Eli received the fish's collar, belly trim, and bones.
"Random draw?" Eli asked.
The registrar avoided eye contact.
Victor's influence again.
Chase laughed.
"Know your place."
That phrase reached backward through Eli's week—to Roland Pike humiliating him over six dumplings.
He felt anger.
Then let it pass.
Knife Intent separated collar meat cleanly.
Bones became broth.
Belly trim crisped over Hearth Flame.
He made salmon rice bowls with charred scallion broth.
Nothing fancy.
Everything used.
Chase produced cedar-smoked salmon under a dome of spirit mist, plated with glowing roe.
The judges tasted his first.
Scores: 9.4, 9.6, 9.2.
Eli's bowl looked embarrassingly normal.
The first judge drank broth.
Then another sip.
The second picked the collar clean.
The third asked for more rice.
Scores: 9.7, 9.5, 9.8.
Chase stared at the board.
"That's impossible."
Eli shrugged.
"Collar's good."
The crowd laughed.
Chase's smile cracked.
He activated a hidden Taste Pressure technique, flooding the arena with spiritual aroma designed to make Eli's dish seem dull by comparison.
The Ledger flagged it.
[Illegal influence detected.]
Eli could expose him.
Instead he opened Shared Table Domain.
Chase's overwhelming aroma spread evenly across both dishes.
Now judges tasted his technique in Eli's broth too.
Chase realized what happened.
"You stole my aura!"
"Shared table. Thanks for contributing."
The audience exploded.
Chase lost.
As he stormed away, Eli's former boss Roland Pike appeared from the VIP section.
Golden Ox Prime was one of Chase's sponsors.
Roland stared at Eli like the universe had made an accounting error.
"You?"
Eli smiled.
"Career ended twelve seconds ago, remember?"
Roland's face reddened.
Satisfying.
Then the system Appraised him.
[Roland Pike]
[Hidden covenant: Ash Pavilion Informant]
Eli's smile disappeared.
The boss who fired him over leftovers had been connected to the enemy before the Ledger ever awakened.
Maybe the firing had not been about dumplings at all.
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