[Hypnosis Mic] Cooking Together

Squirrel and Marten

The three of them worked together to put together the rest of the ingredients for dinner, though the final preparations (as well as all of the… skinning) were left to Riou. The tarts came successfully out of the oven with only a twinge of char, and were placed out of the way to cool down to eat for dessert (much to Dice's chagrin). Eventually, only finishing touches were left to do, so Doppo and Dice were ejected from the kitchen to reassemble the table in the main room. Somehow, they managed to work together on it even without Riou in the room to mediate.

So now they all sat together, eating rolls stuffed with ground squirrel and marten with a side of stir-fried mountain vegetables.

“It's a simple game! I can't believe you've never played before,” Dice said, his mouth full.

“In the Navy, we preferred card games to dice.”

Somehow, they'd gotten to talking about Chou-Han, a dice game, as they finished up the meal. It was out of Doppo's wheelhouse, but firmly within Dice's.

Dice was already pulling out his, uh, dice. “Let's play now. We can bet on, um, oh! We can bet with the tarts. We'll split 'em evenly to start.”

“Okay,” Riou ceded. “How does it go?”

“It's real easy! The dealer just shakes the dice in the cup, and we call whether the sum is even or odd.” He got up to retrieve a proper cup, and the tray of a dozen tarts. “Doppo, you deal.”

Doppo had seen it played in movies, so he more or less understood what he had to do. Like Dice had said, it was a simple game. He still wasn't really sure, though. Could he really do it right? What if he made some stupid blunder that just made Dice hate him more? Was he-

“If you're worried about not getting any tarts, don't be. The house gets a cut of each bet, yeah? And I won't even make you take off your shirt.”

He gave him a baffled look.

Dice just laughed. “That's how they do it yakuza-style. Stops the dealer from cheating, you know, with loaded dice up his sleeves or anything. I really don't want to see your scrawny ass shirtless, though, so let's not do that.” Even though Doppo hadn't agreed, Dice was already splitting up the tarts between himself and Riou.

Anxieties absolutely not assuaged but with no apparent way to get out of it, Doppo took the dice and put them in the cup, shaking them before slapping the cup down on the table, dice hidden underneath.

“You can call first, Riou-san,” Dice said.

“Okay. I bet two tarts on even.”

“Then I'm odd! Show us the dice, dealer!”