As much as he hated to admit it, at that moment Kowal couldn't help but see Charles in a new light.
He'd clearly misjudged the young man—who would have thought Charles would actually experiment with ways to cook such cheap ingredients?
Honestly, with this kind of new cooking method, even the poorest fisherman could make himself a great meal.
And even in the darkest, most hopeless moments, if you have a delicious dish like this to look forward to, you could find some happiness—a longing for life itself...
Kowal mulled this over, a little conflicted. "So, you've already taught this to all the fishermen here in South Harbor District?"
Charles shook his head. "Not yet—there's a lot of steps, and the seasoning prep is pretty complicated. Most fishermen don't really want to learn it."
"We're still working on refining the process. Once it's simplified, everyone will pick it up."
He glossed lightly over the truth. Kowal, who had never cooked a complicated meal in his life, assumed that technique and seasoning were trivial details—easily improved so the whole South Harbor could enjoy it soon.
What he didn't know was that technique and seasoning were actually the most critical—and the hardest—parts. To say nothing of the flawless knife-work possible only from an automated kitchen, and the refined salt Charles used, which simply couldn't be sourced in this era.
But all of that went right over Kowal's head. His own daily meals were very basic. Right now, he was thoroughly satisfied with Charles—for the moment, his appetite opened up, and he happily finished off all his bread and stew, not leaving behind a crumb.
Seeing the old dwarf eating with such gusto, Charles felt pretty confident about the upcoming inspection. He kept smiling, making small talk while he finished his own meal.
But as time ticked by, he started to feel something was off. Even though this famously strict dwarf was here to inspect the place, over the entire meal, Kowal just chatted about random things and never once brought up the real issues—like how the monastery was being run, or the incident where over five hundred people were killed, or any of the current affairs.
It was as if he'd changed personalities, acting like the inspection was just a formality and he was really just here for a good meal.
No, that couldn't be right.
If it were Evan or another pastor, maybe they'd treat the inspection as a box-ticking exercise. But never Kowal. He absolutely hated pointless bureaucracy and red tape—he'd never do this in person just to put on a show.
So what was his plan?
Charles couldn't figure it out. The only thing he felt sure of was that, as far as phase one went, his hospitality had made a good impression on the dwarf—but everything that came next, he was suddenly a lot less certain about.
Finishing the meal, Kowal wiped his mouth with a napkin, then hopped down from his chair and said, "I heard you've trained up a squad of battle nuns? Where are they now? Would you mind letting me see them in action?"
Charles glanced at the clock on the wall. That meal had taken longer than he thought. "They should all be in the training yard right now—I'll take you over."
He stood, leading the way. Kowal nodded and toddled along behind with his short dwarven stride; together they walked through the corridor and quickly arrived outside the nuns' training hall.
From the outside, everything seemed quiet. But as soon as they pushed open the door, the piercing war cries of the battle nuns nearly blew out their eardrums.
This was a fully upgraded level-three training chamber, but Charles had spent a bit of extra Purification Points to expand its size so it could accommodate dozens of nuns training for battle at the same time.
Ever since Charles's reputation skyrocketed for defeating the Abyssal Lord and then quashing so many criminal gangs in South Harbor, word of his abilities—both his virtue and his fierceness—spread further, and the monastery went through another round of rapid expansion.
Now, the number of battle nuns was close to fifty. Half were Storm Domain pastors. There weren't enough ion emitters to go around, so only the most senior storm nuns were equipped with them.
The newcomers had to settle for shields and warhammers until they had the funds to arm everyone with these more powerful weapons.
So, the girls with access only to cold weapons were left to spar with training weapons and shields—duking it out the old-fashioned way.
Even for a seasoned war pastor like Kowal, the sight of this brawl was a little shocking. It was winter, sure, but the training hall was warm, and with such intense activity, the girls wore only rough white practice uniforms for modesty and protection.
Each one wielded a shield and weapon, fighting in groups of three, with two or three squads squaring off in brawling melees.
Despite holding shields, the nuns' fighting style was aggressive—they used their shields, not for blocking, but for shoving and bashing aside opponents' weapons, upsetting their balance before slamming them with their own attacks!
With everyone thinking along the same lines, the practice turned into a full-on slugfest rather than any kind of technical duel—a brutal slugging match with every blow landing solidly.
The sound of training sticks thumping into young flesh echoed dully in the room—so much so that even a battle-hardened dwarf like Kowal winced at the imagined pain. But the girls seemed completely unfazed, shouting encouragement and launching attacks at their sparring partners.
Their faces were flushed, brows slick with sweat—clearly, these beatdowns weren't painless. Yet none of them looked like they couldn't take it; on the contrary, their stares were hard as steel and not one gave in.
"Is this how they usually train?" Kowal couldn't help but ask Charles. "Is this the combat style you've taught your battle nuns?"
"Don't you realize that, in real battle, this kind of fighting style would rack up serious casualties?"
Hearing this, Charles looked a little awkward. "Well… actually, I'm not that good at shield combat myself. I don't have much experience, so I just had another instructor teach them the basics. After that, I let the girls find their own path—developing the fighting style that works best for them."
"So this… is where we've ended up."
A wry smile flashed across his face. That so-called "other instructor" was, of course, Anno—she was a master at shield defense and redirection, and her fighting style mixed attack and defense, disrupting her opponent's rhythm with her shield before striking decisively.
But most of the battle nuns didn't have Anno's grounding in advanced shield use. They only picked up the part where she'd bash and shove to upset an enemy's balance and then hammer them—not the subtleties.
Plus, most of these girls grew up in South Harbor, where life forced them to develop tough and aggressive personalities just to survive. After trying things out in actual combat, it was easy for them to conclude that "defense is useless." That's how things turned into what was now happening before them.
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