After tasting the Mont Blanc for the first time, Nakiri Erina, feeling something germinating within her body, was about to taste it again when she was horrified to discover that she had actively put down her knife and fork.
Her body was moving on its own?
Nakiri Erina expelled the absurd thought that flashed through her mind and, refusing to believe in heresy, continued to drive her arm to pick up the cutlery.
The table knife felt as heavy as a thousand jun, and the movement of bringing the fork to her mouth was impossible to advance even an inch.
As Nakiri Erina's mood became increasingly anxious, the right hand holding the fork resisted even more violently. She discovered with terror that there was a completely distinct force in her arm defying her commands.
The scene was as if an invisible strong man had firmly grabbed the arm with which she held the fork.
Her slender fingers appeared pale due to gripping the fork with excessive force, and her entire right arm began to tremble violently.
The conclusion of this wrestling match ended with the Mont Blanc falling onto the tablecloth.
At the same time, the arm that had been resisting Nakiri Erina finally returned to a normal state. Just like her worldview which had fallen from a height and shattered into pieces on the ground, her fingers loosened, and the silver fork landed with a crisp clatter.
"What is going on?!"
Faced with this super-common-sense event occurring in her own body, the frightened Nakiri Erina stood up in panic, knocking over her chair and nearly falling to the ground in the process.
The near-falsetto scream and such a large commotion naturally attracted everyone's attention.
The Mont Blanc that had fallen onto the pure white tablecloth magnified infinitely before his eyes. Combined with the bloodless face of the judge Nakiri Erina after her fright, Mark's head exploded with a buzz.
He lost the ability to think.
This Mont Blanc was entirely a work of his confidence, and he also knew of Tōtsuki Academy's God's Tongue, Nakiri Erina.
There was only one possibility that could make the other party disregard the relationship between the academies and perform the utterly provocative act of discarding the dessert.
Seeing that all the judges had put down their knives and forks after merely a light taste from the plates beside them, Mark's expression solidified. He opened his mouth, and the sound he emitted was like sandpaper rubbing together.
"My cuisine..."
"Has there really been a major error?"
"No, you did very well. I couldn't even be more excellent than you when I was your age," Auxis said with a sigh.
"Then why..." Mark's dazed eyes regained a slight brightness.
"It is a pity that what you encountered is a genuine monster."
"The Main Dish in your set menu has indeed reached the realm of High-Star cuisine, and it can be said that it possesses the potential to go even further."
"But... every single dish in Mo Bai's set menu has reached the Quasi-Special level. Under the stacking of several dishes, he has already pried open several cracks on the barrier of the Special-Grade dividing line."
As Auxis spoke, he pointed to his heart.
"It's not that we don't want to eat a second bite, but that we cannot."
"Here, it is now filled with the craving of the body thirsting for Special-Grade cuisine."
"Even though Mo Bai did not use his Culinary Heart to interfere with the judges' sense of taste, the characteristic of Special-Grade cuisine crushing all cuisine below Special-Grade is urging the body to resist."
Mark stood dumbfounded as a wooden chicken.
The large culinary room, accommodating nearly a hundred people, was completely silent.
After a good while, whispers began to sound.
"...Did the judge just say Special-Grade cuisine?"
"Hehe, I probably haven't rested well recently and am having auditory hallucinations, right?"
"No, no, no, I heard it very clearly. Professor Auxis indeed said Special-Grade cuisine, and also said that Senior Mark's opponent had reached the Quasi-Special level with every dish."
Following the first affirmative statement after the doubts, the noisy scene instantly boiled like a pot of oil.
The words 'Special-Grade cuisine' magnified infinitely in Mark's mind.
He turned his head in disbelief to look at the young man using the cooking station down below. The latter, eyes fixed tightly on the oven, was currently shining all over with a sun-like golden radiance!
"Complete!"
This time, the golden glory, unwilling to show weakness, broke directly through the limitations of the oven, penetrated the ceiling, and shot straight into the cloud layer!
"It looks like the completion rate is very high." Mo Bai breathed a sigh of relief and opened the oven. Small cakes shaped like flowers wrapped in syrup looked like translucent gems under the illumination of the lights.
It couldn't be helped; that fellow Sena Hiromi was still lying in the hospital. And it was unknown whether his brain was damaged or if an expert was guiding him, but that fellow actually feared neither Chef Zhang Yu's Iron Palm nor words, stating emphatically that to learn French baking, one must involve oneself in French cuisine to achieve twice the result with half the effort.
Going back and forth, Mo Bai hadn't even started learning desserts yet.
Naturally, the only thing he was good at was this Jewel... which was now renamed 'Green Crown' to cater to the set menu.
"Sorry for the wait. Dessert: Green Crown."
Like Mark, Mo Bai personally carried the final dessert and walked to the judges' table.
Opening the lid, the golden light rose again!
Under the central glass cover was a three-colored bouquet carved from white radish, red heart radish, and carrot.
The cakes, with slightly differing colors, were arranged around it like clovers.
The appearance of the cakes wrapped in translucent sugar shells was extremely gorgeous. Upon close observation, one could see the flower shapes depicted by the faint golden liquid within the sugar shells, as well as starlight-like fragmented golden spots.
"Modified?" Seeing that there was no honey in the plate, Chapelle and Zhang Yu nodded with satisfaction.
"Hmph! I'm going to see just how your dessert is." Nakiri Erina, having been forcibly interrupted from tasting a satisfactory dessert, expressed that she held grudges.
She directly skewered a crystal-clear syrup small cake and stuffed it into her mouth.
"So sweet!" The moment the maltose sugar shell touched the tip of her tongue, it conveyed a wonderful sweetness.
Biting down on the crisp shell, a warm thermal current and a rich floral fragrance exploded in her mouth simultaneously.
"Mmh!!!"
Golden light exploded in the mouth for the third time! The judges each transformed into a Little Gold Man!
"I see! Layers!" Chapelle stared wide-eyed, his deadpan face breaking!
"Using maltose as the first layer of sugar shell, baking it, then using flower juice maltose as the second layer of sugar shell, and then continuing to wrap a third layer of syrup outside the flower juice maltose."
"After baking is complete, carve patterns on the third layer of syrup shell, pour in honey, and seal it with maltose!"
"Precisely because it is wrapped in the center by the third layer of sugar shell, the fragrance remains abundant."
"By reducing the amount of flower juice, the taste appears even sweeter."
"The moment the crisp and sweet sugar shell is bitten open, four kinds of fragrances and three kinds of sweetness explode together."
"If Mark's dessert is an exquisite pyramid piled up with primitive simplicity and innovation, then Mo Bai's dessert is like a Castle in the Sky created by the flashing inspiration of a genius."
"Unfettered! Unconstrained and bold!"
The malt aroma, flower fragrance, honey scent, and baking fragrance combined into one to become a sharp sword edge. The maltose sweetness, honey sweetness, and cake sweetness merged into a stable sword body. The precious sword formed by this dessert struck fiercely against the Special-Grade barrier that had several cracks; the latter shattered at the sound!
The Forgiveness Set successfully broke through to Special-Grade!
Wind! Endless wind gathered and struck once again!
"Yaaaaah!"
This time it wasn't as simple as a mental clothes explosion. Accompanied by the sound of tearing fabric, Nakiri Erina's entire person was swept up into the high sky by the sudden storm.
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