Rising from the Slum City of Reincarnation in Another World ~ Gathering, Hunting, and Living a Slow Life by Eating

Chapter 70 Café Elfir

On weekday mornings, I go to school.

So it’s already afternoon.

“I want to try running a café.”

“Ed, a café, meow?”

“A café, meow?”

With a little thought, I decided to give running a café a try.

I also graduated from wearing brown clothes and bought neat clothes at the Adventurers’ Guild.

What I serve is the herbal tea that we used to make ourselves.

Both mint tea and barley tea can be purchased, but brewing them yourself is especially troublesome if you live in the slums.

“So, it’s a café. A specialty shop that serves tea, offering only the essentials but with incredibly low prices.”

“I see, Ed, that’s amazing.”

Minya doesn’t quite understand, but she’s saying “Ed, that’s amazing.” Well, it’s fine.

I decided to establish the Melun Clinic as a branch café. People living in the slums can enjoy tea at Melun’s shop.

And since serving only tea would be a bit lonely, I’ll also offer cookies. Cookies have a good shelf life, so it’s okay to carry them over to the next day.

Oh, right. At this moment, I nervously placed an order for sugar and pepper at the Adventurers’ Guild’s shop.

“Um, um, sugar and pepper… please.”

“Yes, of course, we have them. In large bags, right? That’ll be two gold coins in total, is that alright?”

“Yes.”

I’m nervous too. Weapons and such might be more expensive, but sugar and pepper are considered luxury items. Buying them is like a dream for me, so the tension is real.

There are small bags available, but the unit price is higher because they are individually portioned. If you understand that you’ll be using a larger quantity, it becomes even more expensive.

There are bags worth one silver coin and bags worth one gold coin.

Even if you buy ten bags worth of silver coins, the capacity is still less than that of a single bag worth a gold coin.

Anyway, I bought the sugar like this.

I’m making simple cookies with a modest amount of sugar, made from flour and water. I’m baking them on a magical stove with a frying pan.

I also bought thinly sliced almonds and added them. I prepared some without almonds as well. They’re made to be crispy and thin. If you accidentally make them too thick, they’ll turn out like chewy, portable rations.

They’re really delicious when eaten with jam. However, jam is expensive, so it would require an additional charge.

For now, I had a few jars of cherry and strawberry jam in stock, so I decided to make them available as a paid option.

As for tea, we have mint tea and barley tea, but here’s where our specialty comes in. Not only do we have hot tea, but we also have pre-made tea that has been chilled with ice magic.

I learned about the concept of chilling drinks in this world at an inn. I’ll never forget the cold lemon water I had back then.

So, with my personal judgment, I decided to include lemon water in the lineup as well. I sourced lemons from the morning market in the city. Since I’m not familiar with the market prices, they might be more expensive than the average. This is an area that needs improvement.

Normally, drinks are chilled in underground storage, but we use ice magic. Then we pour the ice into cups and serve it.

“Wow, it’s cold. The ice is amazing!”

Minya is always curious and adorable.

Although it’s ice magic, Melun-san can use it just fine. Amazing.

Lania can also use it normally. In fact, I think she used it before with offensive magic. Amazing.

And I learned ice magic through sheer determination. Apparently, I had some aptitude for it. Amazing. Self-praise. Oops.

The branch is managed by Melun-san, and as for the main shop…

We decided to open up our living room to the general customers.

Since we lived in a small house, having just the kitchen and dining area was sufficient, and we had an underutilized living room. That’s how the idea of a café came about.

Even though it cost us a gold coin, we purchased about four sets of wooden chairs and tables.

Then, through the connection of the elven sister at the Adventurers’ Guild, we had a makeshift wooden sign made.

“Café ‘Elfir'”

‘Elfir’ is a word that means ‘elves are descendants of Raffalier-sama’ in the ancient language, passed down as one of the inherited words. Melun-san and Gid-san were a bit hesitant, but I insisted on it. Not because it shouldn’t be used, but apparently because it’s embarrassing.

Having a café with an elven theme sounds cool, right?

The main shop is closed until early afternoon on weekdays. As a secret menu item at the main shop, you can enjoy a lunch of boiled beans. It’s made with Ilk beans, taro, and spinach, seasoned with Sansho pepper.

I and Gid-san will come back from school, so we can enjoy the service of cute girls. Oh, you can even request me personally. There might be some kind-hearted people who do so occasionally. If you want a handsome, blond elf, Gid-san is the one to go to.

We close in the evening. We have plans to have a slightly later dinner than before. We take weekends off since we want to gather ingredients or go to the forest.

On the day before the grand opening, it was a Sunday, so we went to the forest and collected tomatoes to make my special tomato soup. It’s bread and dried meat day, so of course, we also said our prayers.

Grand opening day. Typically, it’s set on a Monday.

When the afternoon opening time comes, we flip the sign from ‘Closed’ to ‘Open’.

“Café ‘Elfir,’ Now Open for Business!”

Clap, clap, clap.

There’s Mikurashia-san, the elf sister from the Adventurers’ Guild. And there’s Dridon-san from the usual sundries store. It seems his wife is taking care of the shop today. And coincidentally, there’s Knight Beast-san, who just happened to return.

We have the leader of the kids, Harris, who’s also our herb supplier. And there’s Mary, who seems to be Harris’s girlfriend.

Next, we have our neighbors from the slums, Rudolf-san and Quest-san.

Ah, it’s good to see the familiar face of Aunt Patricia, the dog beastwoman. Our herb business started with her.

And there’s Helen, Lania’s mother, our current neighbor. She caused quite a commotion with the jam incident.

There are also people I don’t know and locals from the neighborhood.

Despite being in the residential area’s depths, the seats quickly filled up with people involved on the first day.

Our prices are the lowest. Our sense of pricing is based on the slums and Dridon’s sundries store, so it’s much cheaper than the prices in the castle.

With that sense, we set the prices low, and of course, they are cheap.

The profit may be small, but if we sell ten times as much, it’s good enough, ten times over.

Herbs are obtained directly at a bargain, so they’re incredibly cheap. We can freely draw water from the well. There are no fees for using the well.

They say ice is incredibly expensive if you rely on a supplier, but when I produce it with my own magic, it’s practically free.

And so, we managed to get through the first day of operation. The sales were okay, but more than that, I was surprisingly satisfied with the opportunity to interact with various people.