The dough is melting. Gooey, like chocolate fondue. But this isn't a fondue pot. It's a tart pan. It was proper pie dough just moments ago. Momose Riko stopped moving and stared at the disaster on the counter. "…Why" The whisper was swallowed by the workshop. On the first floor of a small apartment building in a residential neighborhood of Meguro Ward, Tokyo. The fan of a commercial oven quietly rotates in a six-mat kitchen workshop. Pastry tools line the walls, and there are two refrigerators. Atelier Momo—Riko's shop—is small, but it's her favorite place in the world. It was supposed to be. Until three months ago. Riko took a deep breath and looked at the chocolate again. Without any heat applied, the chocolate in the bowl was gradually darkening. A burnt smell drifted faintly through the air. "[angry]It's burning even though I didn't burn it!!" She screamed. She looked down at her apron. A faded-colored apron wrapped over a white shirt and black slacks, covered in embroidery—a seemingly cute piece of fabric. She'd bought it three months ago. At a secondhand shop called "Cronica" on a back street in Meguro Ward, recommended by an elderly white-haired woman named Kazuki. It cost 2,000 yen. Cheap. Maybe that was the trap. The moment she put on the apron, a gate of light opened on the kitchen floor. A voice came from within. "Welcome to the world of Luca." That was how it all began. Riko sighed once and threw the melted dough into a garbage bag. This was her third failure today. The strawberries she'd bought at the supermarket turned black the moment she touched them. The cake flour hardened on its own while she was measuring it. And the chocolate burned without any heat applied. This was the "Food Binding Curse." With ingredients from the real world, everything she made would always fail. The dough melts. The ingredients rot. They burn. This wasn't a conclusion Riko had reached through trial and error anymore—it was apparently just how the curse worked. Only Luca ingredients could be used. That was the only solution. Riko wiped down the counter and glanced at her planner. Today's schedule was written there. "I already used one today, so I've got two left. And exactly six hours of time." She spoke to herself while running her pen across the page. The portal could be opened three times a day. Each visit lasted a maximum of six hours. And the exit was always fixed at "Fiero Hill" on the Luca side. These were rules that had finally sunk into her body over three months. At first, she'd lost track of time and gotten into trouble. Now she had three timers set on her phone. The kitchen wall clock pointed to 10 a.m. "Alright. Let's go." She touched the embroidery on her apron. A rough, unique texture. Ancient Luca characters were supposedly sewn into it, but Riko couldn't read them. She just had to touch it and focus her will. Light spread from her feet. --- The kitchen floor disappeared. The next moment, her soles felt the soft touch of earth. The smell of grass. Clear air filled her lungs completely. Fiero Hill. Silver grass that reached to her knees swayed in the wind. Completely different from Tokyo's air. Somehow, it was sweet. Not just the smell of grass—the air itself was slightly sweet. She'd been surprised the first time she came, but now she was used to it. An old stone monument stood at the top of the hill. Carved into its surface were the same ancient Luca characters as the embroidery on her apron. She didn't know who built it or when. Riko had been curious about it since the beginning, but hadn't investigated yet. Looking out from the hill, white castle walls shimmered in the distance to the north. Blancheuer, the royal capital. Luca's capital city. A white stone city with a population of about 150,000, with the royal palace Palais d'Or supposedly towering in the center. Riko always thought it was like Mont-Saint-Michel. Though she'd never actually been there. Riko began descending Fiero Hill. Today's destination was north—Miela Forest. --- After about thirty minutes of walking, the forest entrance came into view. Even in daylight, pale golden light flickered through the gaps in the trees. When there was a Miela bee hive, it glowed like this even during the day. When she first saw it, she'd thought "fireflies?" but realized that couldn't be right since it was daytime. A man sitting on a worn wooden bench in front of a small hut near the entrance looked up. It was Jorge, the collection manager. A man in his fifties who spoke very little. He always had a stern expression, but Riko had come to understand he wasn't a bad person. Jorge stood silently when he saw Riko. He disappeared into the hut and returned immediately with a small bottle in his hand. A pale golden liquid sloshed inside it. "Miela honey. One bottle." "[excited]Yes! Thank you!" "Eight leaf." She pulled eight leaf-shaped silver coins from her wallet. One leaf was about 500 yen. So this small bottle cost about 4,000 yen. More expensive than regular honey from a supermarket in Tokyo. But the taste was completely different. Luca ingredients were just on another level of deliciousness. The moment she finished paying and took the bottle, she felt something squishy at her feet. "[surprised]Huh?" A transparent, gelatinous substance was clinging to her shoe. A Fore Slime. A magical beast that lived in Miela Forest—it didn't attack people, but it had a habit of being attracted to sweet things. It seemed to be targeting the honey bottle Riko was holding, oozing up her shoe with a squelching sound. "W-wait, wait, wait!" Jorge pulled a small pouch from his pocket and sprinkled it over the slime. Salt powder. The slime shrank with a puff and plopped to the ground. Even though the danger level was low, she was startled every time. "Be careful when carrying honey." "[laughing]You say the same thing every time." Jorge didn't answer and returned to his bench. Riko secured the bottle firmly in her backpack and started walking back the way she came. She checked the timer on her phone. Four and a half hours left. Plenty of time. --- She returned through the portal at Fiero Hill around 1 p.m. Atelier Momo's kitchen was as quiet as ever. Riko set down her backpack and placed the Miela honey bottle on the counter. The pale golden liquid swayed gently in the light. Now then. Time to make something. She put butter and sugar in a bowl. The sugar was also from Luca. Not as expensive as Aero Sugar, but Luca-made ingredients worked properly. As she whisked, a fluffy white cream formed. Next came eggs, almond powder, cake flour. All Luca ingredients. Finally, she added a spoonful of Miela honey, and the bowl glowed softly gold. The texture of the dough was already different. Completely unlike the gooey mess she got with supermarket ingredients. When she poked it with her finger, it bounced back with a soft elasticity. The smell was wonderful too. Sweet, gentle, and somehow—happy. She poured it into the mold and into the oven. She set the timer for fifteen minutes and sat down. Outside the window, a cat walked slowly down the residential street. A calico. When it made eye contact with Riko, it looked away disinterested and continued on. The timer beeped. When she opened the oven, a golden aroma poured out. The Miela honey financiers had risen beautifully. The surface gleamed with a glossy shine. These are definitely delicious. She could tell just by looking. After letting them cool, she took a bite. "…No way." The words came out involuntarily. Sweet. But not heavy. The richness of butter spread softly across her tongue, and then it was already gone. Only the gentle sweetness of honey remained on the aftertaste. She'd heard that sweetness triples when heated, and it was absolutely true. She'd never eaten anything like this in Tokyo. Riko took another bite. And smiled. The curse was the worst, but the ingredients were truly the best. This complicated feeling hadn't changed in three months. That's when the apron glowed. "[surprised]Huh?" She looked down. The embroidery was pulsing with a faint light. Gold and white light moved as if alive. In three months of wearing it, this had never happened once. Riko instinctively stepped back. Characters were appearing on the apron's surface. Ancient Luca characters. The same squiggly lines as on the stone monument were floating up from within the embroidery. She pulled out her phone and aimed the translation app's camera at it. "No matching language found." "[serious]Yeah, figured." She tried a web search too. "Ancient characters Luca how to read." Of course nothing came up. Riko was the only person in the world who knew about Luca. Why was it glowing now after three months of wearing it? That creeping unease made the financier taste slightly bitter. --- The next day, Riko spent the whole time staring at her apron in the workshop. She copied the Luca characters into a notebook and analyzed their shapes. She drank coffee and compared each character one by one. Every time she noticed something—"oh, that looks like a cat" or "this resembles the hiragana り"—her mood lifted a little. It was actually kind of fun. Around 3 p.m., something occurred to her. Some of the characters seemed convertible to sounds close to Japanese. Or rather, "seemed like they could be read that way, kind of." She traced them with her finger and arranged the fragmented sounds. Mi, ko, u, o, u, ni, to, do… ke, yo. "[serious]Deliver to the king?" She continued reading the next line. Sa, mo, na, ku… ba… ko, ko, ni… ei, en, ni. Riko's hand stopped. "Wait, trapped here eternally?" Her voice rose. She read it again. And again. It still read the same way. Deliver to the king by the end of thirty days, or else be trapped here eternally. Riko leaned back in her chair and stared at the ceiling. Thirty days. The curse didn't activate three months ago. If a thirty-day countdown had been running this whole time… Riko pulled out her planner and checked the calendar. She had marked the day she bought the apron. Thirty days from that date. She calculated. She looked at today's date. She calculated again. "[surprised]Only twenty-one days left?!" She stood up involuntarily. "So I've already lost nine days?! Wait, hold on!!" She shouted even though no one was there. The coffee cup rattled. The calico cat passed by the window. Outside, the weather was peacefully clear. Riko took a deep breath. Okay. Stay calm. Panicking won't change anything. First, organize the information. The curse's condition was "deliver pastry to the King of Luca within thirty days." Failure meant being trapped in Luca forever. Twenty-one days left. And "the King of Luca" meant the person beyond those white castle walls, right? In the royal palace Palais d'Or in the capital Blancheuer. She'd never been there. She had no idea how to meet him. Riko opened her planner and picked up her pen. She wrote "21 days left." Below that, she wrote "Find a way to deliver to the king." She set down the pen and picked up one of the remaining financiers from the counter. She took a bite. Still delicious. All she had to do was deliver this deliciousness to the king within twenty-one days. That was all. Just that. (How am I supposed to do this, really?) She kept smiling. But deep down, something was quietly beginning to panic.