Lu Liu was not a close friend of Master Paotu.
He usually wouldn't eat monster ingredients. With no shortage of normal food in Tianyuan Territory, why would any respectable person study such bizarre ingredients?
But after witnessing Master Paotu's meticulous and pleasing ingredient processing procedure, Lu Liu had to admit that the man before him was quite skilled.
Even if he couldn't understand or hear it.
"The vast majority of monsters are born from filth, and most parts of their bodies are inedible. Only a few parts can be transformed into real ingredients after going through the correct, appropriate, and special processing,"
"And what if the ingredient processing is improper? At best, it leads to contamination and mutation, at worst, it results in death."
Although Master Paotu advocated for the way of monster delicacies, he never ignored the associated risks.
But it was precisely because of the accompanying risks that the essence of the ingredients was exceptionally delicious.
Master Paotu took out a kitchen knife as tall as a person, his knife danced and glittered, and he began to dismember the Giant Scorpion in front of him that was as big as an armored car.
"This Toxic Iron-armored Scorpion looks terrifying, and it truly is, as the fierce poison inside its body could easily bring down a Four-order leader. Hence, the processing of such ingredients must be handled with extreme care..."
"Generally speaking, from three tons of scorpion pincers, you could only extract less than three pounds of the real essence."
Master Paotu had barely finished speaking when he caught sight of a blue-haired girl who had appeared by his side at some point.
The blue-haired girl was a bit chubby, looking harmless to humans and animals alike. However, she was holding a scorpion leg that had been sliced off. The girl brought the scorpion leg to her mouth, opened her small mouth which seemed not too large, and with a crunch, bit into the scorpion leg greater than a Horse-cutting knife, leaving a crescent-shaped bite mark.
These teeth were simply sharper than rare weapons...
"This... this is the leg of a Toxic Iron-armored Scorpion!"
Master Paotu had been in the business for decades and had never encountered such a severe accident.
Swallowing a Toxic Iron-armored Scorpion alive could result in instant death! Even legendary beings would likely suffer from vomiting and diarrhea, looking wan and listless.
Duo Lai's complexion was rosy.
In the blink of an eye, Duo Lai had crunched through a large scorpion leg.
Duo Lai wiped her mouth, "This kind of snack never gets old, no matter how many times you eat it."
Master Paotu looked at the Giant Scorpion in front of him and began to ponder.
The little giant assistant who had taken a bite of the raw scorpion leg at his side, his face turned purplish, his whole body stiffened and trembled twice, and then he collapsed to the ground with a thud.
"This is our territory's foodie, Duo Lai," Lu Liu introduced.
Master Paotu's understanding and experience of Monster Cooking were far beyond what Duo Lai could compare to.
What Duo Lai excelled in was merely the knack for cooking; her treatment of ingredients was very simple. Of course, many high-end ingredients only need simple preparation. To Duo Lai, issues such as toxin removal and purification from filth were unimportant, as she could absorb anything in one gulp.
For Master Paotu, Duo Lai's recognition of various monster ingredients—their shapes, tastes, nutritional values, evaluations—were astonishingly impressive.
Master Paotu was passionate about developing a variety of new monster ingredients.
However, this was not an easy process.
Monsters often mutated, and determining which part of their body had the potential for development and what kind of process was needed to eliminate impurities... Master Paotu had to spend a long time researching and experimenting.
The scales on his face, the stains on his hands, and the specks of blood-red in his eyes were all the traumas of contamination accumulated during the process of discovering new ingredients.
This was unavoidable.
Even so, to date, Master Paotu had only developed over three hundred monster recipes. Through Duo Lai's descriptions, he even found that there were parts of monsters he had originally thought to be worthless that still had the potential to be processed into high-end ingredients.
"My vision is still too narrow!"
He looked at Duo Lai, "Master Duo Lai, if your lord would not mind, we would like to offer our services."
「Hint: You have recruited special Territory Members "Monster Chef·Paotu", "Big Stomach", "Xiao Qiang", ... .」
Paotu was a high-ranking Four-order Level 3 expert with a quality of Excellence Two-star level.
Even in the Tianyuan Territory, Paotu's combat power could rank among the top... the top hundred.
Paotu had several special skill entries.
「Master-level Culinary Skills (Light Blue), Monster Chef (Deep Blue), Advanced Hunting (Green), Outdoor Survival (Green), ...」
Paotu obviously possessed normal culinary skills, and they were quite high.
However, the culinary skills of the mundane world could only cook delicious dishes and didn't have the effect of transforming the mundane into the extraordinary, therefore the rating is not too high.
And Monster Chef, roughly, is like the professions of Pharmacist, Forging Master, Enchanter, Alchemist, involving supernatural elements.
Paotu is the Spirit Chef of the culinary world, only specialized in Monster Cooking, and he is particularly skilled and insightful in this field.
Mu Yuan could understand.
He was not averse to monster ingredients either.
He was from Xuan Country. People from Xuan Country Baiyun State even claim that anything can be food.
He had also tasted some monster delicacies before, of course, mostly Earth Rock Dragon, Fierce Flame Flying Dragon, Crazy Lightning Double-headed Bull, those that looked drool-worthy.
These 'ingredient-class monsters' had also made it onto Tai Xuan's list of edible monsters early on.
Their juices were succulent, a vast majority of their body parts were edible, and they were not difficult to process. Mu Yuan's earlier feast of Earth Rock Dragon was based on the methods from the Tai Xuan cookbook. Otherwise, he wouldn't dare eat just anything…well, maybe he would.