Despite his best efforts, John didn’t think gathering ingredients looked particularly grand. However, there wasn’t much else he could do in a limited time span, and he also doubted Aldara would appreciate watching a months long journey where he struggled against various beasts to harvest a thousand year spirit tomato. That was theoretically one that took a thousand years to grow, not a really old and rotten one.
Why did he want to put on a good display? He could have tried to justify it with something like making the continental alliance appear better in the eyes of Aldara and the Empire of Elements, but it would have been pretty weak. Mostly, he just wanted the one real thing he’d brought with him from Earth to be seen positively. Even if hot sandwiches weren’t entirely original.
When he’d first begun his burger production, John had missed various modern conveniences. Mechanical slicers and proper grills had been chief among them. However, he found there was something appealing about an imperfect flow of heat being regulated by the cook. He could do so much more than simply change the settings to ‘high’ or ‘low’. He could redirect the temperature to one stubborn spot of a patty that was cooking slower. A little extra heat on the edges could make it perfectly crispy.
Slicing things perfectly was simple. A sharp knife and a steady hand as well as awareness on a level he couldn’t have envisioned on Earth all added together to overcome what was missing. Though in truth, most of the tools had existed somewhere and what didn’t had been recreated in some form due to his explanations or the needs of those who had taken up his mantle as burger chef.
If he was making many burgers, John would likely take advantage of the conveniences. Here, however, he was only making two. Meat was fried along with a relative of onion. Likewise, tomatoes hadn’t developed along quite the same path but there were recognizable replacements. John was pleased that they weren’t all a single color and hoped they never got homogenized to that extent.
He had purchased a bun, because John had never been a fan of baking. Furthermore, a proper bun would take more time to put together just like any bread, needing time to rise. Perhaps there was something he could have done with spiritual energy, but he already knew which buns were good.
The final step was a sauce. Something like mayonnaise mixed with a few spices, spread just perfectly to provide flavor without overpowering the other parts of the burger. John could smell the sizzling meat, fresh bread, and chopped toppings.
He found he was smiling. He wasn’t really thinking about anything but cooking. Not whatever was going on in the wider world or anything that had happened in his personal life. Just focused on a simple task, though he did make it a bit more complicated than it needed to be. He manipulated things with his spiritual energy until they were as perfect as could be- though John recognized that true perfection was worse in some ways. If every bite was exactly the same, things could get boring.
John whisked Aldara away to the top of the highest tower the Crossroads had. It didn’t have any seating or anything, but they really didn’t need any. He rested his own plate on the wall, picking up his burger with one hand.
“It doesn’t have anything amazing,” John said. “Though around here, everything at least has a bit of spiritual energy mixed among the elements. It’s not terribly healthy, but it tastes good.”
He took a big bite. Aldara was a bit more hesitant. She’d watched silently as he worked, and John wondered what she thought. So far, her face was decidedly neutral. She picked up the food with two hands, turning it. She took a bite, and just a little bit of sauce fell out the back squeezed out the back and fell onto the top of the tower. John could have caught it with his spiritual energy. He could still separate it from the rocks, if he wanted to. However, sometimes cleaning should be left for later.
Aldara chewed silently, and John wondered what she was thinking. So far, she hadn’t been timid with her opinions. If she liked it, he expected her to say so. And if she didn’t…
“I’m not going to start a war if you don’t like my food,” John commented.
Aldara tilted her head, then grinned. “I was just thinking about something.”
She took another bite.
“Should I ask what?” John responded.
“I was thinking about you. I have presuppositions about what you were supposed to be like. And about how you have acted in front of me recently. I thought maybe you might poison me.”
John nodded. “There was one in the western seas that was surprisingly hard to detect. It almost went extremely poorly for me.”
Aldara raised an eyebrow. John was quite certain she hadn’t been serious about that comment. “Is that so?”
“If I hadn’t gotten into advanced body tempering, it really might have caused a disaster.” He might not have died, but the berserk properties it had might have led to significant harm to Astrid. He didn’t know if he would have been able to forgive himself. He barely knew if he could forgive Aldara.
Why did everything come back to Astrid? The same reason they could lead back to any major component of his life, he supposed. Once they’d been married, they were always together. John was glad, because he’d already made the mistake of waiting for some future time when things would be easier to spend the maximum time with Matayal. Rarely more than two months out of the year… it wouldn’t have been bad if they had more years together. But they didn’t.
“How do you see the future?” John asked Aldara idly. “What do you want?”
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He wasn’t really sure why he asked. He hadn’t really expected a response, either. But Aldara took the time to give one. “I envision a prosperous future for all of our peoples,” Aldara said. “Assuming there is no great foe remaining among the foreign elemental regions. But even if there is, I intend to be strong enough to face it. I imagine it is your desire as well, to reach the peak of cultivation. To prove to ourselves that we can. And so that we do not have to be afraid.”
John didn’t have to ask what she feared. He knew, at least well enough. There were certain fears that stood above others. Mainly, the fear of death and loss. Living for over a century now, he was more attached to his family and friends than ever before. And personally, he also had fear of his own death. That things would be the end. Even if that hadn’t been true once… it was expected that it would be the case in the future.
It was one thing if it came slowly. However, John wanted to live a complete life before that point. That made him wonder, though, if his current life couldn’t be considered complete. From a certain perspective, he’d had everything. It almost felt greedy to want more.
“I hope that we can remain at peace,” John commented. It was, in part, because Aldara was strong. Her people were dangerous. Aside from such practical considerations, however, he simply didn’t want the conflict. With everyone. With her. Even if some part of him told him that he still hadn’t gotten revenge.
Aldara placed the final bite in her mouth, slowly chewing. She swallowed it. “I enjoy your food. It is not the sort that people see fit to feed an Empress. I was worried my palate might have grown impossibly delicate and that I could not enjoy simple foods.”
John nodded. “It would be so easy to ruin my appreciation of anything that doesn’t cost a boatload of condensed spiritual energy.”
“I also appreciate that you do not believe my stomach would be overfilled by a single pea. I barely get to eat more than a few bites in public.”
John looked around. The thing about being atop a tower was that everything you could see could also see you. “It’s hard to get more public than here.”
“Yet nobody dared look too close. We can tell them that we dined on the purest phoenix feathers.”
“... I don’t think feathers are food.” Phoenixes might have also died out, though maybe they’d simply merged with other sorts of fire birds.
Aldara nodded. “In that case, I would suggest avoiding the northern parts of the Empire of Elements.” She made a face. “If it has spiritual energy, they will eat it.”
John shook his head. “That sounds like a terrible way to absorb it efficiently.”
“I can’t speak much for the efficiency. But it is terrible.”
-----
Having successfully not started another war, while at the same time John hoped having suitably impressed the people of the continent, John was pleased to return Aldara to her ships and see her away.
With her physically present, it was easy for him to think of her and the Empire of Elements as the only possible threat. The dissonance he felt with his certainty that she didn’t want to hurt him just made the whole duration extremely stressful.
They really weren’t the only potential threat, though. The western seas were… probably fine. They quite happily traded with the continent. For the moment, the Windswept Sea to the south was subdued. Whether for a decade or several generations, John did not know. It was unlikely they would muster up any forces of note too quickly, given how they had crushed the closest and most powerful groups. If they rose once more, it would really be a new group taking advantage of their names. But there could be some beyond them.
There was also the Sovereign Primacy. Perhaps they weren’t significantly stronger than the last war, in which case John himself could vastly influence any sort of future conflict. But maybe they had an Exalted Soul Phase cultivator somewhere.
The biggest threat, though, was the continent itself. Specifically, if people as a whole decided the alliance wasn’t worth it. At the moment enough people believed for it to work, combining their power into a single whole. But they could falter. It took constant upkeep. John felt like he never had a chance to relax. He had to get back to managing such things soon.
He paused to think as the closest thing he’d gotten to a vacation lately was hosting the Empress of the empire they had been at war with. Cultivators didn’t really do vacations. No, that might not be true. They went on training journeys all the time, and they weren’t focused one hundred percent of the time.
John could afford to take a little bit of time off. Just not too much. He was worried he would fall behind some unknown enemy. He was afraid, a little bit. And yet, he knew that cultivating for that reason wasn’t optimal. He assumed Aldara knew, but he should have said it. Cultivating because it felt wonderful to discover new insights and grow, merely for the act itself, was probably the best things got. Surely she knew. But he still should have reinforced the thought.
Maybe he could send a letter. It would likely be a big affair any time he did, so he would have to make it worthwhile. Pages of flowery words that she could spread to her people. Political discourse, ideas for trade deals that were really better off being managed by others- not those at the top of the system- and finally a few things he actually wanted to say.
It came to John’s mind that he already missed Aldara, and that he didn’t know if he should. Some of her was Matayal, certainly. However, even if one didn’t consider being born into a new life it was possible for someone to be the same person, and yet not. Personalities shifted over time and people fell apart, especially because of trauma. And there were probably more reasons to not get overly involved than there were to seek something out. But he couldn’t help but draw parallels to the past, with her living far away. This time, it was hopefully for the best. They had empires to run.
Except John wasn’t an emperor, yet. Maybe he shouldn’t be. Yet there were also some whose opinions he trusted that thought otherwise. The official state of things could greatly affect the future of a group, even if he didn’t do anything different except change what he called their group. John wasn’t sure if he had quite the necessary level of control… but clearly Aldara’s control of her own empire hadn’t been absolute. He might not be far off.
He didn’t want to be an Emperor. He wished he could just trust others to run things, but unfortunately those he would trust seemed to prefer him in this position. John could exhaust himself thinking in circles about that, so he would stop.
Ultimately what he learned was that he should eat burgers more often. Yes, that sounded correct.
