Chapter 258 Experience of Only Frontier Settlement
Edited by: Kanaa-senpai
The day after I consulted with Diana and the others, I found myself in the meeting room again for another discussion.
But this time, the people I was consulting with weren’t Diana and the others; in front of me were Niya-san, Iko-san, Mio-san, Moona-san, and Momoka──5 of them.
”Sorry for bothering you all when you’re so busy.”
”Seriously! We’re super busy helping the newlyweds with their shop (Haven of Love)!”
”Eh? Iko-chan, you have just been napping in the back of the shop and not really helping…”
”Mio! We promised not to say that, didn’t we!?”
”Eh!? We never made that promise, Iko-chan!”
”Both of you, stop joking around and listen seriously to Neil-sama.”
”Hehe, okay!”
”W-wait, I’m not joking, Niya…”
Once Iko-san was scolded by Niya-san and got into listening mode, I jumped right into the main topic.
”Um, let’s get started then. I think you all know I wanted to consult with you. The topic is, I’d like you to come up with ideas for something that will attract people to the frontier settlement.”
”Huh? Didn’t we already solve that? You know, the name that was decided yesterday, uh, A, A-ra──”
”‘Arafem (the food/vegetable)’.”
”Right, Arafem… what does that mean again?”
”Arastoferūm, it’s a spirit language term meaning ‘the fruits of the spirits,’ and it’s just a shortened version.”
”Ah! That’s right, that’s right, Neil-sama!”
”Iko, you just heard it yesterday, and you already forgot?”
”I can’t help it, Niya! There was so much info about new road developments and other stuff!”
”Sigh… let’s just ignore this fool. Sorry for interrupting, please continue.”
I felt bad for Iko-san, who was protesting to Niya-san about being called a fool, but if we kept going like this, we wouldn’t make any progress, so I followed Niya-san’s lead and continued.
”Arafem is indeed a new attraction for drawing people to the frontier settlement. However, I don’t think just that alone will bring in many visitors.”
”So, you want something else that can attract people.”
”Yeah, actually I talked about this with Diana and the regulars at the dining hall yesterday, but all the ideas that came up were just things you can find in other cities.”
”It’s tough to suddenly ask for a fresh idea that’s not done in other towns, right? Hmm? Oh, I see! That’s where we come in!”
”What do you mean?”
Momoka tilts her head and asks Iko-san, who has caught on to my intention.
”If we just copy what other towns are doing, no one is going to travel all the way to a frontier settlement for that. To draw people in, we need a unique idea that breaks the mold. If we ask people who grew up in this world, they’ll only come up with ideas that fit within the common sense of this world. But since we’re ihomono, Neil-sama believes we can come up with fresh ideas that aren’t bound by those norms.”
”That’s right.”
”Oh, Iko, you’re amazing!”
”Hehe!”
Momoka claps her hands, and Iko-san puffs out her chest proudly.
”So, do you have any good ideas, Iko-san?”
”Yep, leave it to this Iko-chan! How about an all-you-can-eat buffet? There aren’t any places like that around here, right? And not just any buffet, but one featuring the crops from the frontier settlement, including the famous Arafem! If Arafem is all-you-can-eat, it would be unbeatable!”
”Ah, I thought of an all-you-can-eat buffet first too, but it’s a bit tricky.”
”An all-you-can-eat buffet is a no-go!?”
I explain to Iko-san why an all-you-can-eat buffet wouldn’t work, as she looks shocked.
”There’s 2 reasons. First, it’s about the supply of Arafem. Right now, we’re using a small part of a field set aside for experiments, so there’s a limit to how much we can produce. We haven’t received any orders from the nobles yet, so we don’t know how much demand there really is. Considering the souvenirs for the people coming to the frontier settlement and what we serve in the dining hall, we just can’t afford to have an all-you-can-eat option. If we run out and people can’t eat during the all-you-can-eat, that would be a problem, right?”
”Are you not going to completely switch all the crops to Arafem?”
”Sure, Arafem is amazing in terms of flavor, and thanks to the earth spirit’s magical transformation, it has become something that just looks like vegetables. But it can’t meet the current demand for vegetables in the frontier settlement.”
According to Narsht-san, “Arafem is like a completed dish. Cooking it again is like trying to cook a dish that’s already finished, which makes it a real headache for chefs.”
So, since it can’t replace the traditional crops, they can’t switch over to Arafem. In fact, the demand for vegetables is slowly increasing, so there’s hardly any land available for Arafem production.
By the way, just as a side note, even though Narsht-san said that, he’s been working hard on developing new dishes using Arafem every day, so if he succeeds, it might become a new local specialty.
”So what’s the other reason?”
”The other reason is the pricing. If it’s an all-you-can-eat, there has to be some sense of value, right?”
”Of course! If the price is the same as just ordering regular dishes and getting full, then what’s the point of all-you-can-eat?”
”Exactly! The dining hall in the frontier settlement mostly sources its ingredients locally, so the prices are kept pretty low. With just 3 platinum coins, even a big eater would be full. So, if we want to create a sense of value for the all-you-can-eat, the price becomes a real issue.”
”Why? Can’t you just set it lower? Oh, is it that even you, Neil-sama, don’t want to miss out on profit opportunities?”
”Exactly.”
”Hey, I’m just joking, don’t glare at me like that, Niya.”
Iko-san shrinks back from the sharp gaze directed at him by Niya-san.
”Anyway, I’m trying to attract tourists to the frontier settlement. And those who come from far away are likely here to indulge in luxury.”
”Sure, since they travel for luxury, it’s natural to want to enjoy fancy meals while traveling. But if the meal costs less than 3 platinum coins, it feels a bit lacking in that luxury vibe.”
”That’s right. But if we raise the price of the all-you-can-eat option now, it’ll just turn into tourist trap pricing, which we want to avoid.”
”Hmmm, a fair price that feels luxurious and can attract people, huh?”
A moment of silence follows. I didn’t expect a brilliant idea to come up so easily, and as I ponder with the 5 others, Momoka suddenly speaks up.
”How about yakiniku?”
”Yakiniku?”
”Yeah, I haven’t been, but I read a lot about it in old archives. It seems really popular.”
”Yakiniku, huh…”
There really aren’t any places in this world where customers grill their own meat like at a yakiniku restaurant, and it is a fresh idea, but…
”Is that a no?”
”I don’t think it would be accepted here. People might think, ‘Why do I have to cook my own food when I came to eat what the chef made?’ Plus, the hygiene situation is a bit scary; the sanitation standards in this world aren’t exactly commendable.”
”I see.”
”…Hey, Neil-sama, even though our worlds are different, you were Japanese in your past life, right?”
”Yeah.”
”Do you like yakiniku?”
”Uh? I do, but what’s that got to do with anything?”
”Well, I’ve always found it strange since I was digging through the old archives. What’s so great about yakiniku? I mean, it’s just grilling meat and eating it, right? But you could do that at home without going to a restaurant. So why do people want to go out for yakiniku?”
I think about the question thrown at me by Iko-san.
If all we’re doing is grilling meat and eating it, like Iko-san said, we can do that at home. So why do we go to a yakiniku restaurant?
Is it because we don’t have to prepare anything? Because we can eat whatever meat we feel like at that moment? Because we don’t have to worry about cleaning up afterward?
Thinking about the differences between grilling at home and at a restaurant, if all those issues were solved, it seems like grilling at home would be enough… but somehow, it just doesn’t feel right.
I doubt anyone goes to a yakiniku restaurant just because they find preparation and cleanup annoying.
So why do we go out to do something we can do at home? If there’s an answer to that──
”Maybe it’s for the ‘experience’?”
”Experience?”
”Yeah, it’s that special feeling of eating at a restaurant instead of at home, like a little escape from everyday life. I think that’s the charm of yakiniku.”
I never thought about why we go to yakiniku, but I wonder if I can convey this well.
”Hmmm… oh, is it like this? Even though a husband has a wife at home, he goes to a brōtḥel to be with another woman?”
”Eh? No… uhhh…?”
”Hey, don’t confuse Neil-sama with weird examples, Iko-chan.”
”Eh? I thought it was a good comparison! After all, both are about the meat, right, Mio?”
”Neil-sama, you can completely ignore this idiot’s comments from now on.”
”Gyaaa!? My head! My head is splitting!!”
Iko-san is caught in a headlock by Niya-san, and the other 3 didn’t help him, probably agreeing with Niya-san.
”An experience, huh? If we could offer something special that only the frontier settlement has, would that attract people?”
”Yeah… it would be great if we could showcase something unique that other towns don’t have, but if it’s too out there, I wonder if the locals would accept it…”
”Sounds tough.”
”For now, let’s list out experiences we could offer in the frontier settlement, one by one.”
”Gugogoo! In that case──ahgyah!?”
”Don’t talk, you make it complicated.”
With the dull sounds that come up regularly and Iko-san’s strange cries as our background music, we kept throwing out ideas, and one plan was born to attract people to the frontier settlement.
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Edited by Kanaa-senpai.
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