Taming the Beast World with a Frying Pan-Chapter 235: The Chef Has a Cult

Splash.

The wooden serving spoon slipped from Ren’s paralyzed fingers and plunged straight into the bubbling depths of the fifty-gallon cauldron. Drops of hot elk stew splattered against the rim, but Ren didn’t even notice.

She was too busy staring daggers at the massive White Tiger beastman standing next to her, who had just casually invited every predator in this forest area to fight for the right to sleep with her.

Ren immediately grabbed Kael by his thick, muscular bicep. She couldn’t actually move him, but she used her grip to yank herself closer, pulling his head down to her level.

"What in the name of Gordon Ramsay are you doing?!" Ren whisper-yelled, her green eyes wide with absolute panic.

Kael blinked down at her, his golden eyes filled with nothing but pure, unadulterated innocence. He looked like a giant, deadly puppy who genuinely thought he had just brought his owner a very nice stick.

"I am helping you find strong mates," Kael whispered back, his deep voice rumbling with pride. "You need powerful energy to cure the Feral Madness. A combat tournament will weed out the weak ones. I will personally test them all for you."

Ren opened her mouth to argue. She desperately wanted to scream, ’I decide who the strong mates are! Me! I pick them!’ But she snapped her mouth shut, her teeth clicking together. She couldn’t say that. If she said that, the entire cover of her carefully constructed lie would be blown to smithereens.

She had told Kael that the Moon Goddess had given her a divine, sacred mission to gather raw power from the strongest males in the Beast World to cure the sickness. If it was truly a divine mission, then finding the strongest mates through Beast World combat was the most logical, practical method.

If she suddenly started rejecting the undisputed champions just because she ’didn’t vibe with them,’ she would instantly expose that she was picking husbands based on her own mortal, shallow preferences. The "Moon Goddess" facade would collapse faster than a bad soufflé.

She was trapped in her own brilliant lie.

Before Ren could figure out a way to mentally dig herself out of this polyamorous gladiator pit, the elder tiger beastman banged his wooden walking stick against the dirt.

"Lies!" the elder shouted, challenging Kael’s grand declaration. "It is a farce! You expect us to believe that the Great Moon Goddess chose this frail, hairless little female? You expect us to believe she has the divine ability to cure Feral Madness?! Blasphemy!"

Kael bristled instantly. He stepped out of Ren’s frantic grip, his posture shifting from a proud mate to a lethal protector.

"If she is not chosen, then tell me, old tiger," Kael snarled, his voice dropping to a dangerous, guttural frequency. "How do you think I was able to recover from going feral?! Not once, but twice?!"

The entire clearing went dead silent.

"It was Ren’s food that saved my life!" Kael roared, gesturing to the bubbling cauldron. "Her cooking pulled my mind back from the shadows! It is the cure!"

The rogue strays, who had already received their wooden bowls, froze.

They stared at the dark, glossy broth, the perfectly cubed potatoes, and the tender chunks of elk meat. They didn’t doubt Kael’s words for a second. The moment the food had touched their lips, they knew it was something they had never, ever tasted before. It was warm, it was incredibly delicious, and the explosion of spices felt magical. It was completely unordinary. 𝗳𝚛𝗲𝕖𝚠𝚎𝚋𝗻𝗼𝕧𝗲𝐥.𝚌𝚘𝐦

If a female could create something this beautiful out of mud, fire, and dead animals, she must indeed be very, very special.

These rogue beastmen and pregnant females had long given up on life. They had been surviving on scraps, shivering in the cold, feeling utterly fated to die of starvation or eventually succumb to the horrific Feral Madness. They had felt that the Moon Goddess had completely given up on the world, leaving them to rot.

But looking at Ren—standing by the fire in her beautiful gray fur dress, glowing in the morning light—a collective epiphany washed over them.

She was sent by the Goddess! It dawned on them that they were currently holding the literal, physical cure to Feral Madness in their wooden bowls.

"The cure!" a frail ape beastman gasped.

They didn’t hesitate. They practically buried their faces in the bowls, eating heartily and shoveling the stew into their mouths with reckless abandon.

"Ah! Ahh! Hootootoot!"

A chorus of pained, muffled yelps echoed through the clearing as the scalding hot stew burned the absolute hell out of their tongues, but they didn’t stop. They swallowed the boiling meat and potatoes through tears of joy, desperate to get the cure inside their bodies.

The strays dropped their empty bowls and fell straight to their knees in the dirt. Their hollow eyes widened in awe as their bodies suddenly felt renewed, energized, and deeply, wonderfully warm. The agonizing aches in their joints vanished.

"It is the truth!" a pregnant female stray cried out, bowing her head so low her forehead touched the grass. "She is the Chosen One!"

"Praise the Divine Savior!" another beastman wept, throwing his hands up in adoration and reverence.

Ren took a horrified step back, nearly tripping over a piece of firewood.

"Whoa, hey! Stop!" Ren panicked, waving her hands frantically as she tried to usher the sobbing, praying beastmen off their knees. "Get up! Please, get up! It’s just potatoes and elk, I swear! I don’t want to be worshipped! Please stop bowing!"

It was an absolute disaster. She had just wanted to feed some hungry people and maintain a solid alibi, and now she had accidentally started a culinary cult.

The elder tiger, however, remained entirely unimpressed by the theatrical display of the strays.

"Fools!" the elder grunted, pointing his stick at the kneeling beasts. "It is all a farce! A trick of the mind! You are easily manipulated by a warm belly!"

But behind him, the White Tiger Clan was no longer standing in silent, angry solidarity.

They were murmuring among themselves. Whispers spread like wildfire through the ranks of the white-haired warriors and females. They remembered. They had eaten Ren’s food before, back in the village. And it was undeniably true—their bodies had felt different afterward. Warmer. Lighter. Faster.

The elder heard the muttering of his clan. He looked back, seeing the doubt replacing the anger in their eyes. He looked at the strays, who looked healthier than they had in months.

Finally, his gaze locked onto the giant cast-iron cauldron. His stomach let out a violent, painful rumble that demanded immediate satisfaction.

The elder squared his shoulders and grunted, stepping forward out of the brush and into the light of the clearing.

"I will not be fooled by words or the theatrics of strays," the elder declared, puffing out his chest as he marched toward the fire, using his walking stick to look dignified. "I will check the truth of this so-called divine cure... by trying her food myself!"