Chương 55: Those Hands Have an Instinct for Heat

As the beeps of preheating ovens rose and overlapped, the Beef Wellington showdown entered its final and most crucial stage: the bake. This was the dish's ultimate test. Bake too short and the pastry stayed raw, a sickly pale; bake too long and the beef overcooked, that perfect pink fading to a hopeless gray. A cook had to be the operator of a precision instrument, finding the one perfect balance point between a golden, crisp shell and a medium-rare center.

Most of the contestants went with the safest method: a high-heat blast for fifteen to twenty minutes to color and set the pastry fast, then a drop in temperature to let the heat seep slowly into the heart of the beef. Every one of them gripped a probe thermometer, eyes locked on the oven's glass window, faces as tense as bomb-disposal techs. After his frantic patch-up of the pastry, Jack pinned all his hopes on the heat.

He sank the probe into the center of the beef, set the alarm for 125°F, and planted himself in front of the oven, motionless, even his breathing gone careful. Sarah was more cautious still. She used a thermometer too, but she also logged the time, the temperature, and the changing color of the pastry in her little notebook, trying to control her variables with the most scientific method she could. In the whole kitchen, only one person was the exception. Ethan.

He slid his Beef Wellington—egg-washed, scored with a handsome pattern—into the oven, set the time and temperature, then turned and started cleaning his station. He wiped down the stainless steel, washed his used tools and lined them up neatly, as if whatever was happening inside that oven had nothing to do with him. About fifteen minutes in, just as everyone else was nervously checking their thermometers, Ethan did something no one expected.

He opened the oven—without a thermometer—pulled on a single heat glove, and slid the tray out fast. Then he stripped off the glove and, with the back of his hand, lightly touched the surface of the pastry. It was a contact of less than a second. He closed his eyes, as if reading the temperature and the way the heat was distributed straight through his skin.

"What's he doing?" Owen asked again.

"He's not using a thermometer? How could a hand ever measure it accurately?" Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

"No—he can." It was Chris who spoke, his voice quiet but oddly certain. He was staring hard at Ethan's movements below, his heart picking up speed for no reason he could name. Because what Ethan was doing right now reminded him of someone—himself. During his heat-control training in the system space, he had repeated that exact motion tens of thousands of times. The system had told him: a top-tier cook never relies on tools alone for control of heat.

Their eyes read doneness from color and sheen, their ears tell temperature from the sound of the oil, and their hands—their skin—are the most precise sensors of all. It had taken Chris a staggering volume of training to barely master that near-instinctive feel for heat. He'd assumed it was a unique edge only the system could have given him. But now Ethan—the academy-trained elite who seemed to worship data and procedure—was showing the very same ability.

Chris realized he had underestimated how much Ethan had grown since the potato-peeling hell. The man who'd climbed back out of that pit hadn't just tempered his will; he seemed to have broken through some inner barrier and begun turning technique into instinct. Data Eye, activate. Target: Ethan's Beef Wellington. Run a finished-dish simulation. Chris spent his second use of the day. He needed a quantified result to verify his read.

[Target locked: Beef Wellington (in progress)] [Current state: mid-bake, surface temp 385°F, center temp 105°F] [Beginning simulation...] [Based on the current operator (Ethan Cole)'s precision, heat judgment, and remaining process, the system projects the final result...] [Simulation complete.] [Projected final completion: 91%] [Overall rating: A-] A-! Chris's pupils contracted at the result.

That number, no more and no less, landed exactly on the minimum threshold the hidden quest "The King's Declaration" required. It meant that as long as Ethan made no major error in what remained, Chris's hidden quest would be complete. But for some reason, Chris felt no relief. Instead, a stronger surge of excitement and tension rose in him. He'd bet right. By giving up his tactical advantage, he'd successfully forced out an Ethan at his absolute strongest.

And this Ethan hadn't disappointed him—he'd turned in an answer worthy of the record books. This was the duel he'd wanted. Just then, a stifled sob broke across the kitchen. It was Jessica. In thick gloves, she carried her Beef Wellington out of the oven. From the outside it looked decent enough, the pastry a golden color. But when she set the tray down on her station, everyone saw the problem.

The bottom of the pastry, soaked by the moisture weeping from the duxelles she'd failed to dry out, had gone soft and collapsed—one patch even stuck to the tray, tearing open to reveal the grayish-white ham inside. Structurally, the dish had already failed. Jessica looked at her work, and her eyes went red in an instant. She knew it was all over. But she didn't give up. Jaw clenched, hands shaking, she transferred the Wellington to a plate and began her final plating. It was the last dignity she had as a cook.

The minutes bled away, and one by one the oven chimes sounded. The contestants pulled out their work, and the kitchen filled with the layered aroma of butter, pastry, and roasted meat. Success or failure—it all came down to this. Everyone's fate hung on the single cut about to be made.