365 Days of Starshipping (Part 1)

Professional Chef

5/4/19

"Shining praises from everyone, good job," Edo said, meeting Judai near the back entrance of the building they were in, "The client in particular was happy with it, so thanks for that."

"Thanks, and no problem," Judai replied, giving him a tired, but satisfied smile, "Looks like all those years of travelling gave me at least a little bit of useful knowledge."

Edo snorted at that, saying, "There you go, being all humble and stuff again. If it weren't for the fact that I know you, I'd say you underestimated yourself."

"Humble, huh?" Judai mused, thinking about how Yusei kept insisting that he was much better than he gave himself credit for. Edo wasn't actually too far off the mark in saying he underestimated himself sometimes, but that tended to be for the bigger, super-important things, not things like cooking and baking.

No one but Yusei would get to know that though, and he was perfectly fine with it staying that way.

"Actually, I did have a question, maybe you can answer it," Judai continued, frowning slightly at having remembered the point Yusei tried to drive home a week before-hand while Carly was over, "Would I be considered a... professional chef or something?"

By the gods, even just asking it was hard. Why was it so hard for him to think of himself as that? It wasn't like he thought it was a bad thing at all, and it actually made him kind-of happy to think about, so then why was it so hard for him to try and accept as reality?

"Recognition for something other than dueling," Yubel answered, soothing him quietly in the back of his mind before he could start worrying too much, "It's not a bad thing, just different. You have to grow into the role to get comfortable with it."

"...Reminds me of when I first became king," Haou stated in agreement.

"Ah, good example - you were a prince and a swordsman for years before you became a king. I remember it being difficult for you to adjust at first to suddenly having to control an entire realm and not always being able to be on the battlefield."

"The feeling was similar."

Well, it made Judai feel a bit better about being so off-kilter at the idea - it was, at least, a normal thing to feel and have happen to you, and that was always an important distinction to create.

"I suppose you would, at this point," Edo blinked, surprised at the question but still answering it relatively quickly, "You may not have an official education for it, but you're more qualified to be one than a lot of the other 'professionals' I've worked with, so yes, I would definitely consider you to be one."

"Well, I guess Yusei wins this one then," Judai sighed, though he had a smile on his face regardless, "He brought it up recently and I guess I just wanted another person to confirm it."

"I see," Edo replied with a grin, folding his arms and leaning on the wall across from him, "Speaking of, Manjoume wants you to text him when you can about the favor you wanted."

"Did he figure something out?" Judai asked, perking up at the reminder of what he'd asked them to do. It'd barely been two or three weeks since the tournament, he wasn't expecting him to already have results.

"Apparently. He's a lucky bastard if he has, I've still come up with nothing on my end," Edo muttered in response, competitive annoyance lacing his voice.

Judai couldn't help but chuckle at that, "I'll be surprised as well if he has, I've never actually tried having someone do this before and I was expecting something more like months, not weeks."

"Well, months or weeks, it's definitely worth it if it works in the end."

It was more than worth it if it worked, Judai thought to himself, nodding in agreement.

For now though, as excited as he was by this, he was seriously itching to just get home and back to Yusei. Gods know if he actually set the alarms again this time to take breaks since it was actual work he was focusing on, and Judai had been low-key worried about him since he realized this. As much as he absolutely adored that part of Yusei for being determined and hard-working, he sometimes wished he'd tone back on it just ever-so-slightly...

Ah well, that's why Judai was there to pull him out of it.