Lance looked at the time, it was already six in the morning. He finished with his videos and then uploaded them. He sat back in his chair, dead tired. Now that he was no longer preoccupied with a task the wave of exhaustion hit him, it was time to go to sleep. Lance got up and went to brush his teeth.

  While brushing his teeth he heard a loud clanging and the shatter of glass coming from downstairs. He paused and listened before yelling out down the stairs with a mouth dripping toothpaste. "Herlllooo??" He then quickly spat out and rinsed his mouth and ran downstairs. In the kitchen his mom was sweeping up a cup of coffee that seemed to be the cause of the sounds.

  Lance's mom looked up at him, clearly still half awake and upset. " Sorry did I wake you?"

  " Oh uhm no, I was just brushing my teeth, are you okay? You need help?"

  " No, I got it. I just grabbed the cup and it was too hot, so I set it down quickly and well.. I need to wake up more. You look tired as well, want a cup?"

  Lance knew that if he told his mom he had stayed up he would be in for a bit of trouble. He also had some homework he had to turn in this evening that would require a few hours of work. He played it off as if the day had just begun. " Yeah I'll take a cup. Here give me that." He said as he took the broom and dustpan and swept up the cup's pieces. Coffee was also splattered all over the floor so he quickly grabbed a roll of paper towels and lay them down. He began to take over cleaning up the mess and grabbed the mop. His mother made them some cups of coffee and sat at the table. After cleaning it up Lance sat down with his mom who was just scrolling through her phone.

  " Thanks hun. Also why are you up so early on Sunday? You're not usually up this early, you feel okay?" She thanked him.

  Lance chuckled. He obviously looked like he should go to bed but he continued to feign ignorance. " No I'm good, I don't know, I just woke up and was wide awake. I am tired but I'll get over it." A second after speaking his stomach growled loudly and he remembered a few days prior. " Hey Mom, can you make something to eat? If I don't eat something with this coffee I will end up on the toilet. I can help."

  She looked at Lance and chuckled. " Oh yeah help me how? What do you want? Are you still cooking dinner tonight? I bought you the taco stuff you wanted. You better help with the dishes."

  " Yeah I'll still cook tonight, and for breakfast, I don't know, let's keep it simple. Something that a dishwasher could cook. "

  " A dishwasher? What do you mean?"

  " You know, like if a dishwasher at a restaurant had to cook something. I think it's just something easy."

  " Ohh so something anyone that isn't good at cooking could make.” Lance choked on his sip of coffee and she continued ” Well I sure hope you're not meaning to say you cook like a dishwasher, cause if that's the case I'm cooking dinner."

  Lance dropped his smile and looked at her dejectedly. Inwardly he complained " Even she's a critic! I need to get better." He put on a simple smile and responded. " Yes, something who sucks at cooking can cook. Ever made anything with tongue, ears, or eyes and stuff? "

  His mom eyed him questionably. " What? I think you need to back up a bit. Why? You know what never mind, let's just start with the basics. For breakfast, why don't we just make egg salad sandwiches. Get a pot, add some water and put it on the stove."

  Lance hopped up and got right to it. After a few minutes the water began to boil and his mom went to the fridge. She pulled out a bunch of ingredients and then placed half a dozen eggs in the water to boil. " Okay these eggs should be just about ready in no more than 10 minutes, you could even soft boil them by taking them out around 7." Lance nodded and she continued. " Okay so while that is being cooked we have prep time for our other ingredients. First, wash your hands and use a clean knife to cut the pickles, celery, and chives. Mince the pickle into a relish." She basically did the work half way for him and showed him as she described the steps. " Thinly slice the celery and chives. Add that to a large mixing bowl. Grab yourself some mayo and mustard, if you don't want to use those you can use just the juice from the pickle jar and soft boil the eggs. And put an appropriate amount in the bowl."

  Lance stopped her there. " Wait, hold on, what's an appropriate amount you're not measuring anything."

  " First rule of cooking, measure with your heart. Unless you're baking. If you're baking, get good at baking, then measure with your heart. If I made eggs the same way every time eventually all eggs would taste the same. I would get bored or disgusted. Remembering the exact amount of things only matters when cooking conservatively. When you cook from your soul for people you care for, break the rules, taste is more important than calories. Okay so now that I have most of my stuff in the bowl I'm going to grab seasonings. Pepper, dill, onion powder, and a little bit of salt. I like to add a little spice with some paprika. And perfect. Now the bowl is kind of a sloppy mess, but now we get the eggs." She then took the eggs off the heat, after which they waited just a couple more minutes. "Rinsing them in the sink under cold water helps cool the eggs, which helps you peel them, you could add stuff to the boil to make this easier like a small amount of baking soda, but we didn't want to complicate this. After we are done with these you get a fork, and mash each of them in the bowl as you mix." After letting them cool down she peeled them. She began mashing everything together in the mixing bowl.

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  Lance just stood there. He didn't understand how offering to help cook turned into a lecture about making a sandwich. He enjoyed it, but he hadn't realized his mother would take control over everything and just have him watch. Seeing Lance crossing his arms and in thought she handed him the fork. " Here, mash and mix it up." He began while she grabbed the loaf of bread and a plate, then she made them a couple sandwiches.

  They sat down and ate. Lance was happy, the sandwich and the lesson were easy to grasp and the simple rules she told him made him begin to understand a bit more about why his grading for food was so poor. The small things created a better outcome. After eating the sandwich Lance thanked his mom and went upstairs. With his new caffeine boost he quickly got to work on his homework.

  He finished his homework around mid-day and leaned far back into his chair with a deep stretch and yawned. It was finally time to sleep. Just as his eyes began to drift close he heard a notification come from his computer that he hadn't heard before. It startled him just enough to rouse his attention. Looking at his monitor a new app popped up.

  It was a launcher for his Specter 3 Console. In the launcher he noticed that it came equipped with a messenger tab as well as a console browser for the console store and other apps. The notification came from the messenger tab. Courage and Valora both sent friend requests. Courage had also sent a message.

  " Yo Lance! Dude that new video you put out was awesome thanks so much for including me! I was thinking we should get together and go over some ideas I had for future video's! Also the ladies and I chatted and we are going to wait for you to get here. There's some stuff you ought to know but soon after this we are going to get some new clothes made, so you know, you don't get targeted by folks you play with. Anyways best of luck see you in two days! "

  " Huh.. Well I can't say I'm against that idea. Maybe it's best if I take off the bat leather... I lose two whole defense, but maybe I can make it up somehow. The problem is I don't have spare pants.. And I'm keeping my boots. Oh Shoot! The damn sac on my head people are gonna think I'm a weirdo or something.. Jeez this messenger app is kind of neat though this just came out ? Did it automatically install?"

  " No, It has been here since your initial launch of the Specter software. Hello Lance." The helmet on the desk began to light up a gentle amber glow as it spoke, the speakers in the helmet were amplified due to the helmet's emptiness. For a quick moment Lance was startled but then Lance realized it was Spex. For a second he was concerned. ”Oh my.. she's been listening to me?”

  " Wait so I can access the console from a screen, I obviously can't play but I can use all the other apps. Can I access anything from Wish Legacy?"

  " You can access the items list stored within your 'Tavern' tab. It also seems your mailbox is accessible. Otherwise it is only the marketplace, which can also be accessed through the Specter Store."

  Lance began to click through the apps menus and quickly found a listed inventory of his items. It was so small it made him chuckle. But the overall cleanliness of it compared to its value to him made him happy.

  Inventory List

  7 Pairs of Goblin Ears

  6 Goblin Tongue's

  3 Cave Bat Talons

  8 Dull Exp Gems

  2 Sticks

  1 Goblin Sharpening Stone

  1 Large (Slime Prince) Mana Geode

  Excluding Lance's character gear and what he didn't want to get rid of. (Valora's mace) Lance felt quite happy. He even still had one unopened Praise Tier Gacha in his mailbox. He could certainly find decent trade or even use his gems to purchase things on the marketplace. His first thought. A Pan.

  Lance began to look through the list of items in the shame tier and to his surprise there weren't any good choices. It seemed pans in particular held a higher price than most basic Shame tier items because people began to use them because of Lance's online personality The Dungeon Chef. Others began to wield them in belief that they held some specific benefits.

  " Great, I inflated the price of the only item I can use with skill." He wanted to slap himself but then realized it was just out of his control. He then browsed the Praise tier items and the only thing he could find that was still categorized as a pan was a large wok.

  " Ork's Wok"

  Praise Tier

  +1 Damage

  +4 Defense

  Description: A dark steel wok forged by the heavy blows of an orc smith, the crude thickness of the pan was tempered to hold heat.

  Value: 3 Dull Experience gems.

  " Shit that's expensive. But it actually does damage. This is perfect. I'm gonna buy this right now!" Lance clicked purchase and got the notification for the transfer of items. " That was potentially an entire level of experience to trade right? I should save the rest of my gems and farm tomorrow. I wonder if I can do the dungeon solo..." Lance hopped off before he found anything else that would make him want to spend his gems. He quickly lied down, it was already the afternoon and he had stayed awake far past his initial sleep schedule.