Because he was assigned to the kitchen, Song-dae had to face the older bro known here as the Demon King. Dong-hoon asked him a bit about what he needed to know regarding the first in, first out rule, also known as FIFO, and what it meant. Song-dae smoothly answered that this definition meant organizing items in order of their expiration dates, which was also the very first job he would be doing today.
Dong-hoon was pretty pleased with the new recruit little bro, so he instantly left to go hang out, leaving Song-dae all by himself.
While the guy was still struggling, not knowing how to organize things, a panel loading user information suddenly popped up right before his eyes. Song-dae's initial basic skills included beginner-level ingredient organization and beginner-level chef's sharp eyes.
With these two skills, the first mission was also assigned. Use the warehouse organization skill. The reward is one hundred experience points.
Song-dae didn't know that outside, right at that moment, the inspection team had started coming over for a surprise check on the kitchen to see whether it met food safety and hygiene standards. Looking around the kitchen, this inspector wrote down a ton of errors in his notebook, from utensils being in the wrong place to unwashed towels that could easily breed bacteria.
Lieutenant Ye-jin found out the inspector had stopped by, so she hurriedly ran down to the kitchen. Dong-hoon told her that the new recruit little bro was in the storage room right now, too. Afraid that if the inspector went down there they would all be dead meat, she brought her aggressive, bossy attitude straight down to the storage room.
The inspector intended to scold the new recruit little bro, but unexpectedly, before the words even left his mouth, he had to swallow them right back down.
All the food and spice boxes were organized perfectly and neatly. The bags of rice were arranged evenly, following the standard of keeping them a handspan away from the wall to prevent moisture. The inspector irritably turned to the lieutenant.
"Did you people know I was coming in advance so you could prepare?"
The lieutenant answered awkwardly. "I was only informed you were here a few minutes ago."
The inspector turned and complained that they shouldn't leave a newbie all alone down here. If something happened to the warehouse, what then?
Truly, if someone wants to find an excuse to scold you, they will find it.
After that incident, the mission complete notification rang out in front of Song-dae. Through that mission he got enough experience points to level up to level two. It has to be mentioned that before everybody arrived at that warehouse, countless memories had merged into his body the moment he received the skill.
With the sharp eyes of a chef, Song-dae was able to appraise the items in the warehouse. As long as it was cooking gear, everything had detailed information floating right on top of it. Thanks to that exact skill, Song-dae had saved his teammates from a clear loss.
Because he leveled up to level two, golden lights immediately covered Song-dae, making him twist and turn until the lieutenant thought he was still high on drugs.
Because of what had just happened, and since he was new to the army and not used to it yet, Song-dae was called up to the lieutenant's room to talk. While he was being carefully instructed about the rules in the military zone, a notification panel popped up, letting him know he had unlocked a new dish. Because he wasn't paying attention to the lieutenant's words, she called out to him and asked if he had been possessed by a ghost.
Was it because he was hallucinating from too much gaming, like the report said?
Song-dae mumbled, not knowing how to reply, and just said he was praying. The lieutenant finally breathed a sigh of relief and told him that previously there had been a few people who also said they saw weird things. That was pretty similar to Song-dae right now, so he asked whether stuff like that happened often.
The lieutenant only knew that occasionally there were a few people like that.
That night, Song-dae went into the shower with the Demon King bro. Seeing how skinny this new recruit kid looked, Dong-hoon thought the kid was nothing but skin and bones.
"You've got to be like me. Join the army and hit the gym for a solid, healthy body."
Song-dae just nodded for the sake of it, then ignored the older guy as he kept rambling on and on.
Just as they got outside, Dong-hoon remembered a friend of his once saying that Song-dae had severe depression and a gaming addiction. The higher-ups putting him in the kitchen with you was for a reason. So he got curious and turned back to see what Song-dae was doing. Right at that moment, the kid was messing around with the system panel again.
Looking at Song-dae, it seemed like this little bro's mind wasn't stable. So Dong-hoon immediately ran away before he saw something unclean that would ruin his eyes.
That night, the ever so infamous Demon King bro was playing on his phone alone at bedtime. Song-dae, annoyed by the system sounds, subconsciously said one sentence.
"Turn off the phone and let me sleep."
Dong-hoon was so scared he lost his mind. He went straight to sleep and turned off his phone right away, terrified like that.
Song-dae was currently a kitchen staff member as well. So bright and early in the morning he was woken by Dong-hoon to go cook breakfast for the whole military zone. As soon as he got to the kitchen, right before his eyes was still that beef and seaweed soup, waiting for him to try cooking it. However, Dong-hoon forced him to grab toothpaste and a brush and go scrub the kitchen instead, just to prevent being checked by the inspector like yesterday and getting totally busted.
As for Dong-hoon, he cooked the beef and seaweed soup exactly as it appeared on the menu. The sad part was that this guy had lost sleep, and he poured a whole half bottle of soy sauce in, making the broth even blacker than a witch's soup pot.
By the time everyone woke up and walked into the dining hall and looked at that bowl of soup, blacker than the future of kids taking the college entrance exams, not a single guy dared to touch his chopsticks. Even the sausages were fried pitch black.
A scene of the entire military zone having to fight against the Kitchen Demon King alone was immediately built up in everyone's minds. On the battlefield of the culinary arts, Dong-hoon, the Kitchen Demon King, stood there shooting endless burnt sausages like bullets at the passionate young boys. Countless brothers, poisoned instead of shot, lost their lives under Dong-hoon's cooking ladle. No matter how hard they fought back, they were all drowned in a sea of beef and seaweed soup even blacker than the Taedong River.
Someone got dissatisfied, stood up and complained.
"Can you even cook, or do you want to slaughter the whole military zone? I'm not asking for anything out of line. Is cooking good food really that hard for you?"