Chapter 35

Chapter 35

I Became the Academy Mafia, Chapter 35...

What is this woman saying right now?

She wants us to teach the ‘Ranger Club’ that’s bullying her club a lesson?

“I’m not sure I understand... Could you first explain in detail what exactly they did to you, and in what way you want us to teach them a lesson?”

“Ah...! I forgot to explain the details! I-I’m sorry!”

Realizing her mistake, Lee Se-ri immediately bowed her head and apologized.

After taking a breath, she slowly began explaining the relationship between her club and the opposing club.

The Academy’s clubs often maintained close relationships with one another.

Just as bringing in foreign goods required the help of the ‘International Trade Club,’ clubs formed mutual interests and made requests of one another according to their needs.

“Our Recipe Development Club isn’t a club where combatants are active. Rather, our main purpose is to use disciplines like alchemy, manufacturing studies, and herbology to create recipes for beneficial foods.”

But the ‘Ranger Club’ was different.

They operated under the title of ‘Ranger.’ In dungeons, a ranger was an essential position for exploration, and to them, the title of ‘Ranger’ itself was a source of pride.

“The Ranger Club is mainly made up of students skilled in hunting or exploration, or who use ranged weapons. Because of that, whenever the Ranger Club went outside for training or exploration, we would sometimes request that they gather ingredients for us.”

And it seemed the incident had started from there.

“But from some point onward, the ‘Ranger Club’ began demanding more and more from us. At first they said ingredient prices had gone up, so they wanted buff foods along with the commission fee, but later they started making unreasonable demands for all sorts of ridiculous reasons.”

At first, the Recipe Development Club complied with their demands.

But little by little, they began demanding more buffs and more dishes, and eventually, when the club refused to make the food, they stopped supplying ingredients altogether.

On top of that, it seemed they kept dropping by and threatening them, even preventing them from making requests to other clubs.

Before they knew it, those bastards had begun encroaching on them.

Ever since they realized that the food provided by the Recipe Development Club was anything but ordinary after feeling their physical capabilities temporarily increase every time they ate it.

“And eventually, those people crossed the line. Later, they even stole the recipe for ‘Golden Walnut Pie.’”‘Golden Walnut Pie’.

She said it was the ultimate pie that the members of the Recipe Development Club had created after several months of effort and experimentation.

“That dish was the recipe we planned to submit for the second-year performance evaluation. I could confidently say it was the greatest recipe I had ever made, pouring in my ability, skills, and all of my strength. But... I shouldn’t have carelessly left it in the club room.”

Members of the ‘Ranger Club’ had come to the Recipe Development Club room to deliver supplies as usual.

And when they read the effect of the recipe lying among the members who had collapsed from exhaustion after continuous research, they copied down its contents.

“A permanent increase in physical abilities. That was the effect of the ‘Golden Walnut Pie’ discovered by my [Skill: Creative Cooking]

.”

The other kids’ eyes widened after hearing Lee Se-ri’s story.

A permanent increase in physical capabilities. That was the kind of effect normally only seen in elixirs.

“S-so, President of the ‘Recipe Development Club,’ are you saying you created the recipe for a dish that’s practically an elixir?”

Se-ah was so flustered that she stammered as she asked again. Lee Se-ri nodded.

“Yes, but I’m not that stupid! I always leave out one or two ingredients from the written recipe. And I’m the only one who knows what those ingredients are.”

That was why, at some point, the ‘Ranger Club’ had begun pressuring them.

To ask her why they had failed even though they had used the expensive Golden Walnuts and followed the recipe exactly.

To discover the final missing ingredient and obtain the method for making the ‘Golden Walnut Pie,’ which was practically an elixir.

“Those guys are complete delinquent bastards, aren’t they?”

Jin-woo grumbled furiously after hearing Lee Se-ri’s story.

As if agreeing wholeheartedly, Lee Se-ri nodded vigorously.

“E-exactly! They keep spouting nonsense about how they need to get stronger so they can bring us better ingredients... If they really cared about us that much, would they threaten us with an all-out war? Would they force us to cook for them?”

Apparently her resentment had burst out while talking, because Lee Se-ri continued with a deeply angry expression.

“Golden Walnut Pie is the masterpiece of my life. And they’re threatening me like that over it.”

According to her, the most important ingredient in ‘Golden Walnut Pie.’‘Golden Walnut’ was an extremely rare dungeon ingredient that she had barely managed to obtain after desperately begging Lee Haru.

And she only had enough to make it once.

“Even now, those bastards keep doing all kinds of cowardly things to us...! Stealing cooking ingredients from our club room, secretly breaking things in our club room, that kind of thing.”

As she spoke, her voice gradually began to choke up.

“We just wanted to enjoy cooking... I don’t understand why we have to be treated like this just because we made something excellent... Please... help our club.”

Lee Se-ri’s eyes slowly filled with tears. Before long, she grabbed my hand and began pleading with me in a nasal voice.

“With what our club is capable of, the only place we can ask is the Bronze Club ‘Family’...! We’ll reward you as much as we possibly can, so please...!”

Lee Se-ri trembled as she tightly held my left hand with desperate eyes.

I naturally covered and held her hand with my right.

“We’ll accept.”

“R-really...?”

At my immediate answer, Lee Se-ri looked up at me with tears beading in her eyes.

To think someone this prone to tears would become that [Cooking Master]

in the future.

No matter how I thought about it, it was fascinating.[Cooking Master]

That name was one every player of [City of Seoul]

knew.

Five individuals who had been granted the title of ‘Master’ solely through crafting despite combat not being their main focus.[Alchemist Master][Blacksmith Master][Farming Master][Enchant Master]

And the final Master was the [Cooking Master]

.

The one and only existence capable of making food from every ingredient in the world, and of creating food that granted permanent buff effects.

Whenever you reached the mid-to-late stages of CS, she was someone who always rose to the position of ‘Cooking Master.’

The fact that such a talent was standing before me and making this request could only be considered extraordinary luck.

“Have there been any cases where they directly used violence against your members?”

“...

No, not yet.”

She nodded after slowly explaining everything that had happened so far.

“What you’re most worried about is them declaring an ‘all-out war.’ But generally, isn’t it difficult for the Student Council to approve an all-out war between a support club and a combat club?”

“...

Those bastards will probably try to pressure us somehow, even if it means sending in this year’s freshmen. If they say only freshmen will participate, even the Student Council could approve it.”

In other words, it meant we would inevitably have to step in.

“I understand the situation. Then as for the deadline... let’s resolve it within this week.”

“Uh... can something like that really be done so easily?”

It could. If I personally stepped in, I was confident I could make those bastards kneel within five hours.

But what we were doing now was club activity.

If I continued handling everything alone like this, not only would the club lose its purpose, but the others might also lose opportunities to grow.

That was why I had set this week as the minimum deadline.

A week was more than enough for me to make the others capable of fighting the ‘Ranger Club’ and winning.

“Of course. You can leave it to us.”

When I smiled and held out my hand, Lee Se-ri took it and smiled brightly in relief.

“See? Boss always has a plan.”

Jin-woo watched with a broad grin, unaware that the plan was him...

Well, all’s well that ends well.

Things were going extremely smoothly.

________________

After sending Lee Se-ri back, the expressions of the others gathered in the president’s office after finishing our strategy meeting looked extremely determined.

“Boss, bastards like that need to be taught a proper lesson.”

“I agree. People who act like they’re the law of the world only come to their senses after getting beaten.”

“I think so too. The ability to create elixirs... the Recipe Development Club’s growth potential is beyond imagination.”...

Maybe they were a little too determined.

Still, I decided to take it as a good sign.

“I agree with all of you. So... I’ll assign each of you a role for resolving this request. First, Young-je.”

“Yeah.”

Young-je nodded when his name was called.

“Starting tomorrow, attend the briefings and trial sessions held by the ‘Ranger Club’ and gather information. Mages who can use four attributes are extremely rare, so they’ll welcome you as well.”

“What if they find out I belong to Family?”

“We haven’t even started any real club activity yet, so they won’t recognize you.”

“Then it’ll be a piece of cake.”

Leaving the nodding Young-je behind, I looked at Jin-woo next.

“Jin-woo.”

“Yes, yes.”

“Until the situation is resolved, visit the ‘Recipe Development Club’ frequently and take charge of protecting them. If anything dangerous happens, it’s fine if all you do is buy time.”

“Boss. What do you take me for? You’re different because you’re Boss, but I don’t exactly go around getting beaten by people either, you know?”

Anyway, at least he seemed confident.

“Fine. For the sake of the request, I don’t mind if you hit first....

And Se-ah.”

“Yes!”

“You will investigate what kind of image the ‘Ranger Club’ has outside and what kinds of rumors follow them, then report back. And from now on, you and Jin-woo will train with me from 3 p.m. until club activities end at 5.”

No sooner had I finished speaking than Jin-woo’s body trembled.

“W-wait, Boss. We’re training during club activity time?”

“There will probably be plenty of situations like this from now on. Wouldn’t it be better to get stronger in advance?”

And that was why I had recruited all of you with growth potential.

Of course, I had no intention of simply tossing missions at them and leaving it at that.

“If this matter ends well, I’ll pay each of you a performance bonus of two million credits. Would that give you a little motivation?”

At that, the expressions of the two who had looked conflicted only moments before changed instantly.

“Eugene! Just leave it to me!”

“T-two million... I’ve always wanted to train!”...

So easy.

“Then get going.”