A century of magical theory, of bending the world’s mana to my will, and the scholars of the Ivory Tower would weep if they saw what I was using it for today.

  Tenderizing.

  I stood in the brush of the Whispering Woods, one hundred and twenty years old, staring down a three-ton Ember-Tusk Boar. It pawed the dirt, steam hissing from its snout, heating the damp forest air. For decades, my parents had drilled the arcane arts into my skull. You are an Archmage, Adamas, they would say. Act like one. So, I did. I raised my right hand.

  The boar charged, a mountain of muscle and fiery bristles. I didn’t cast a Grand Aegis or summon a meteor. I didn't need to level the forest. I just needed the ribs intact.

  I focused on the spatial axes, feeling the weight and momentum of the beast. With a flick of my wrist, I cast Sever. It wasn’t a flashy spell. It was a surgical manipulation of space, tight and economical. A thin, invisible line intersected the boar’s neck. The beast's momentum carried it forward, but its life ended instantly. No scorched meat. No bruised flanks. Just a clean cut.

  I exhaled, feeling the familiar hum of mana bleed out of my core. "Perfect."

  With a wave of my hand, the massive carcass floated into the air, trailing behind me as I walked back to the clearing.

  Waiting for me was my life's actual work. Suspended twenty feet off the ground was The Hungry Griffon, a three-story tavern built of reinforced ironwood and brass. Four massive wyverns—Crimson, Azure, Jade, and Onyx—rested on the grass, their thick, leathery wings folded. Thick mythril chains tethered their harnesses to the reinforced hull of the restaurant.

  As I approached, Azure let out a low rumble, eyeing the floating boar.

  "Not for you," I said, dropping the carcass near the loading ramp. "You four get the scraps. I need the prime cuts for tonight's service."

  I walked up the ramp and into the kitchen. The air inside was thick with the scent of roasted garlic and crushed star-thyme.

  "Master!" Yuno nearly dropped a cast-iron skillet as I walked in. The boy was fourteen, all elbows and nervous energy, but he had a palate that rivaled kings. "Is that an Ember-Tusk? I’ve only read about them!"

  "It is," I said, rolling up my sleeves and washing my hands at the basin. "We need to break it down quickly. The meat runs hot; if we don't bleed out the fire-glands, the whole flank will taste like ash."

  Across the kitchen, a spark flared, followed by a frustrated growl. Myria, her golden feline ears flattened against her head, was glaring at the main stove. The beastfolk girl had her hands outstretched, desperately trying to summon a stable flame.

  "It’s flickering again," she muttered, her tail lashing the air. "I'm pushing the mana through my center, but it keeps dispersing."

  I walked over, drying my hands. I didn't pity her past as a slave, because pity didn't make you a better mage. Discipline did. "You're treating the mana like a weapon, Myria. You're trying to force it to explode." I tapped the center of her back. "Stop fighting it. Cooking isn't about destroying the ingredients; it's about guiding them. Coax the mana. Let it breathe."

  She closed her eyes, took a slow breath, and adjusted her stance. A steady, blue flame roared to life under the grate.

  "Better," I noted. "Hold that temperature. Yuno, get the mythril cleaver. We have a boar to prep."

  Once the kitchen was prepped and the broth was simmering, I walked up to the helm at the front of the restaurant. I grabbed the master reins, channeling a pulse of mana through the mythril chains. The wyverns roared in unison, a sound that shook the floorboards.

  "Up," I commanded.

  The massive beasts launched into the air. The physical force of it was incredible. The hull groaned, and the world tilted for a brief second before the wyverns found their rhythm. The chains went taut, pulling the ironwood structure up through the forest canopy and into the open sky.

  I leaned against the railing, feeling the wind whip through my beard. Far below, the world was a patchwork of green forests and blue rivers. In the kitchen behind me, I could hear the rhythmic chopping of Yuno's knife and the steady hum of Myria's magical fire.

  No scholars. No ancient prophecies. Just the open sky, a perfect cut of meat, and a dining room to open by sundown.

  Breaking down a magical beast is less about butchery and more about defusing a bomb.

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  Back in the kitchen, the Ember-Tusk Boar took up the entire central prep island. Even dead, the carcass radiated a stifling heat. The air shimmered above its bristled hide.

  "Alright, pay attention," I said, rolling my sleeves past my elbows. I channeled a localized aura of frost around my forearms to keep the ambient heat from blistering my skin.

  "Yuno, what is the core rule of fire-aspected monsters?"

  Yuno hovered at the edge of the island, a leather apron tied tight around his waist. He gripped his mythril-alloy cleaver, his eyes locked on the beast. "The elemental core taints the blood," he recited perfectly.

  "If you pierce the fire-gland before draining the veins, the mana ignites the blood sugar. The meat turns bitter. Tastes like chewing on charcoal."

  "Exactly." I traced a glowing, icy blue line down the boar’s sternum with my index finger. "Myria, keep the hearth at a steady simmer. We need the ironwood coals ready for the ribs, but don't let the flames spike. This meat carries its own heat; we are coaxing it, not cremating it."

  "Got it, Master Adamas," Myria called out from the stoves. Her golden ears twitched as she hyper-focused on her mana output, keeping the blue flames under the massive grill perfectly level.

  I placed my hands flat against the boar's rigid flanks. Decades ago, I would have used this same technique to analyze the mana pathways of a rampaging chimera before ripping its heart out. Now, I pushed my senses into the meat, feeling for the dense, thrumming knot of the fire-gland nestled near the beast's diaphragm.

  "Here," I pointed. "Yuno, make the cut. Shallow and clean. Let the mythril do the work—it naturally absorbs ambient mana."

  The boy stepped up, swallowing hard. He set the blade against the frosty line I had drawn. With a swift, practiced motion, he pulled the cleaver down.

  Steam hissed from the incision, smelling of burnt pine and raw power. The boar’s muscle fibers twitched reflexively, but Yuno held firm. He dug his fingers into the split hide and pulled back, exposing the glowing, fist-sized fire-gland. It pulsed like a dying star.

  "Quickly," I commanded.

  I cast Aetheric Vacuum, a spell usually reserved for suffocating flame elementals. A localized pocket of zero-air formed around the gland. Yuno slipped his blade beneath the glowing organ and severed the connecting arteries. Without oxygen, the residual fire mana in the blood couldn't ignite.

  With a pair of iron tongs, I lifted the gland clear and dropped it into a lead-lined lockbox under the counter. The heavy lid slammed shut, cutting off the intense heat.

  The entire kitchen seemed to drop ten degrees.

  "Good cut," I told Yuno, tossing him a clean rag. The boy beamed, wiping the sweat from his forehead. "Now, separate the ribs and the loins. We’ll grind the shoulders for sausage later. Myria, is that grill ready?"

  "Ready!" she shouted over her shoulder. "Aura is stabilized. Coals are glowing."

  I grabbed the first rack of ribs—easily fifty pounds of prime, marbled meat—and hauled it over to the grill. As soon as the flesh hit the ironwood grates, it didn't just sizzle; it sang. The residual fire mana within the meat reacted violently with the heat of the coals, attempting to fight back.

  This was the secret of monster cooking. You didn't just cook the meat; you conquered it.

  I pressed my palms flat against the stone counter next to the grill, casting Mana Bind. Invisible chains of pure arcane force slammed down over the ribs, locking the ambient energy in place. The fat began to render, dripping down onto the coals and sending up plumes of smoke rich with the scent of caramelized sugar, toasted spices, and raw, untamed wilderness.

  The Ivory Tower Archmages spent their lives locked in dusty libraries, arguing over the theoretical limits of mana compression. Idiots, all of them. True magic was right here. True magic was perfectly rendering a cut of Ember-Tusk belly without burning the crust.

  Suddenly, the floorboards vibrated beneath our boots. Outside, Azure let out a sharp, trumpeting roar that rattled the copper pots hanging above the island.

  "We’re slowing down," Myria noted, stepping away from the stove to peer out the porthole window. Her tail swished with sudden excitement. "Master, I can see the walls! We're here."

  I wiped my hands on a towel and walked to the window. Below us, nestled between a sweeping river and a massive valley, was the merchant city of Oakhaven. Its stone walls and bustling markets looked like a scattered handful of coins from this height.

  "Alright, you two," I said, untying my apron. "Prep is done. Let's find a place to park this tavern. We open in two hours."

  Guiding the wyverns down wasn't about strength; it was about intent. I fed my mana through the mythril chains, sending a pulse of calm down to the beasts. Oakhaven’s southern plateau was the only stretch of land outside the city walls flat enough to hold The Hungry Griffon.

  "Brace!" I shouted over the wind.

  Inside the kitchen, pots clanged as Yuno and Myria secured the stations. The four wyverns backpedaled in the air, their massive wings kicking up a localized hurricane of dust and loose grass. With a heavy, satisfying thud that vibrated through my boots, the three-story tavern touched down. The wyverns collapsed onto the grass, panting, their job done for the day.

  "Flawless landing, Master!" Yuno called out, already untying the heavy ironwood shutters to let the afternoon sun into the dining room.

  "Get the tables wiped down," I ordered, stepping away from the helm and casting a quick Cleanse over my own robes. "Myria, activate the perimeter wards. I don't want any local wildlife spooking Crimson while he's napping."

  "On it!" Myria darted out the back door, her golden tail flicking as she channeled her mana into the brass runestones embedded around the tavern's base.

  The dining room of The Hungry Griffon wasn't a damp, ale-soaked tavern. I had spent a century in the Ivory Tower surrounded by pristine marble, and I refused to serve my food in a sty. The tables were polished mahogany, the lanterns burned with ever-glowing soft-light crystals, and the air smelled strictly of roasted garlic, seared meat, and star-thyme.

  I walked behind the heavy oak bar, grabbed a chalk stick, and wrote the day's special on the blackboard:

  Ember-Tusk Boar Ribs - Smoked over Ironwood - 5 Silver.

  A ridiculous undercharge for a Class-4 Magical Beast, but I wasn't doing this for the gold.

  I didn't have to wait long. Barely ten minutes after Yuno flipped the "Open" sign, the heavy double doors creaked open.

  In walked a man wearing dented steel armor, a heavy broadsword strapped to his back, and the weary, cynical scowl of a Silver-rank adventurer who hadn't eaten a decent meal in weeks. He took one look at the pristine tables, then at Yuno, who was furiously polishing a fork, and finally at me.

  "A flying tavern," the adventurer grunted, walking up to the bar. "Saw you drop out of the sky.

  Figured you were either a lunatic or a noble with too much coin."

  "I can be both," I said smoothly, leaning against the counter. "What can I get you?"

  He squinted at the blackboard. "Ember-Tusk? You're claiming you have fresh Ember-Tusk? That's a death-zone monster. You expect me to believe an old man and two kids hunted one today?"

  "I expect you to eat," I said, not losing my smile. "Yuno. Plate one."

  Less than a minute later, Yuno scurried out of the kitchen. He placed a thick ceramic plate on the bar. Resting on a bed of roasted root vegetables was a massive, half-pound rib. The meat was a deep, mahogany red, glistening with rendered fat. A faint, residual heat still radiated from the bone, warming the air around it. The crust was completely perfect.

  The adventurer stared at it. His mouth practically watered before he even picked up the fork. He cut a piece—the meat fell away from the bone with zero resistance—and took a bite.

  His eyes went wide. The ambient fire mana trapped within the meat hadn't been destroyed; it had been tamed. It sent a rush of pure, revitalizing warmth straight down to his core, flushing the exhaustion from his face in an instant.

  "By the Gods," he whispered, staring at the bone like it was a holy relic. "This... this is..."

  "Five silver," I reminded him gently.

  He slammed a gold piece on the counter, his eyes manic. "Bring me the rest of the rack. Now."

  I looked over at Yuno and Myria, who were beaming with pride near the kitchen door. I smiled, feeling the familiar hum of the tavern coming alive.

  A century of magic. All of it led to this.

  "Order up," I called out.