Selena’s restaurant smelled like roasted meat and warm bread and something spiced that Kalina couldn’t identify but immediately wanted more of.

The tall green-haired elf from earlier the one who had kissed Eren’s mouth in broad daylight while pressing her entire body against him like she owned him set two plates on the table without being asked. She said something soft in Elvish and touched Eren’s shoulder for exactly two seconds longer than a normal waitress would.

Maybe that was for her to see who owned that man but Kalina was annoyed for their natural beauty and charm. It was like they were forest fairies..

Kalina watched this happen from across the table and felt her left eyebrow twitch.

It was jealousy. She knew exactly what it was because she’d spent five years pretending it wasn’t but now anymore.

Damn it..

The food was some kind of stew with thick dark meat and root vegetables she’d never seen before, served in a clay bowl with a wooden utensil that was somewhere between a spoon and a paddle. There were no forks, napkins or menu here. The elf woman didn’t ask what they wanted because apparently nobody asked what they wanted here. You sat down and Selena decided what you ate.

She picked up the wooden thing and tried the stew.

Oh.

It was incredible. Not just good but genuinely one of the best things she’d ever put in her mouth and she’d eaten at Michelin-starred restaurants in Milan and Rome with her family since she was twelve.

The meat was tender and rich with a depth of flavor that didn’t belong in a wooden bowl served by a barefoot elf in a stone building with no electricity. There was something in the broth that tasted like rosemary crossed with something warm and earthy that she couldn’t place and the vegetables had a sweetness that no Earth produce had.

"Good, right?" Eren was already halfway through his second bowl. He ate like someone who hadn’t seen food in a week which was probably accurate given the kind of afternoon they’d had.

But the thing she didn’t know Eren had now a animalic bloodline involved in his body and the small cat wanted food more than everthing else. Eren saw the situation of Clone’s food crisis but it was actually more insane in his case.

His need for food didn’t tripled like the Clone. It became five times at least!

Kalina raised her eyebrow with the quality of the meat. "What animal is this from?"

"A Yaksha. Big fluffy thing, looks like an overgrown bunny but acts like a cow. Thadrici our rancher raises them on his inner field. The other ranch areas were burned. Sad.." He tore a piece of bread and dipped it in the stew. "Don’t think about it too much."

Kalina noticed that Eren was more concerned about this elf village than he told her before. It was like he was a bit possessive and protective of here. 𝗳𝗿𝐞𝕖𝘄𝗲𝕓𝗻𝚘𝚟𝕖𝐥.𝚌𝕠𝕞

But the food was too good to think about other stuff..

The bread was warm and had a slight sweetness to it that reminded her of Italian focaccia but with a denser chew and a faint honey note that lingered on her tongue.

This came from the bakery run by the young blonde one. The tiny elf with the absurd boobs who had plastered herself against Eren’s arm like a heat-seeking missile an hour ago.

Even her bread is good. I hate her.

Kalina ate everything on her plate and then accepted a second serving when Selena brought it over with a smile that was too knowing for comfort. The elf woman looked at Kalina, then at Eren, then back at Kalina with an expression that said she’d already calculated exactly what had happened at Emily’s house this afternoon.

The green-haired elf said something in Elvish and Eren translated. "She thinks you’re beautiful and wants to know if you eat well on Earth."

"Tell her thank you and yes." Kalina wiped her mouth with the back of her hand because there were no napkins and this whole planet apparently hadn’t invented them. She was sitting in a restaurant in another dimension eating monster cow-bunny stew with a wooden paddle and she’d just wiped her face like a child at a picnic. Her Italian grandmother would faint.

Selena came back one more time with a small cup of something that smelled like tea but with a richer aroma, almost perfume-like. She placed it in front of Kalina with a gentle nod and said something to Eren.

"Pao Tea from a mutated tree in the farm. This one is one of the best one among the other similar ones." he translated. "It’s actually amazing. This stuff alone could sell for hundreds on Earth if we could mass produce it."

Kalina took a sip and her eyes closed involuntarily. The tea was smooth and warm and tasted like someone had distilled luxury into a cup. No bitterness, no sharpness, just a clean rich warmth that spread from her stomach outward.

But the incredible thing about the tea was, it forced her body to have some kind of energy. Like she could do a lot of things even after a full day of walking, sex and work. The tea was magical or at least had some kind of boost effect which made it a divine sell product for Earth!

This could beat the crap of Coffee in the whole world!!

But while she was thinking about the tea, Selena, the tall and sexy restaurant owner french-kissed Eren with no shame. She looked so happy and blessed with her angelic face.

She may be an incredible cook and a good elf but I still hate her for kissing "my" boyfriend.

They left the restaurant after Eren had what amounted to four full servings plus bread plus two cups of tea with a cup of wine.

She didn’t accept the wine in this strange place but would try another day.

Maybe if there are no other vixens around..

The village was quieter now with the sky fully dark and the Koen vines on the houses providing most of the light. A few elves were still out, walking between buildings or sitting on porches smoking those leaf cigarettes, but the energy had shifted from lazy afternoon to calm evening.

"You said the system accepted me." Kalina walked next to him on the stone path and her heels clicked against it with every step. She was wearing five hundred dollar heels to a different planet because she didn’t know she’d be visiting a different planet when she got dressed this morning. "But I can’t see anything. No blue screens, no stats, nothing."

"That’s because you need to touch the Totem first." Eren pointed toward the center of the village where a small tree stood in a clearing surrounded by open ground. It looked unimpressive from this distance, barely taller than a two-story house with thin branches spreading out like an umbrella. "It’s the village’s connection point to the Evon System. Think of it like... a router for magic."

A router for magic... Wait!

This man used to struggle with basic Excel formulas. I knew he was smart but acting dumb on purpose!!

"But why could you even come here in the first place?" She’d been saving this question since they walked through the portal at the café. The stew and the tea had settled her nerves enough that her brain was finally working at full speed again. "You said the door was in your apartment bathroom originally. How does a random door in an İstanbul apartment connect to a planet in another universe?"

Eren scratched the back of his neck. "Honestly? I still don’t fully know. The system gave me a skill called Door Master after I discovered the original passage. But the original door was already there when used it but my deceased grandpa also used it when he was in his thirties. But his story was full of chaos and pain. He probably didn’t find this village like I did. Emily is really my lucky charm..."

Kalina didn’t like the sound of his voice about another woman and tried to change the flow. "So someone or something else created it in that house a long time ago?"

"Or it was always there and somehow connected to a door or something. I don’t know." Eren shrugged like this wasn’t the most important question in the history of both planets.

He said. "What I do know is that once I got the skill, I could open portals on my own. That’s what I used today to bring you here."

"And the stats." She looked at his arms and his jaw and the way his body moved now with a fluid coordination that the Eren she used to know never had. The old Eren walked like someone who spent too many hours at a desk. This one moved like a noble born prince. "The physical changes were really good in her aesthetic perception.

But Eren also added like he’d already thought and tested about this a hundred times. "The system doesn’t work on Earth. It only kicks in when you’re physically in Evon and interacting with the environment. Killing things, touching the Totem, just being here."

That made a terrifying amount of sense. The system wasn’t broadcasting to Earth when there was no active connection between them. Evon as he called its name, was from this side. It was a local or maybe universal thing but you had to be present to receive it.

"So everyone on Earth is walking around with potential superpowers and they just don’t know because they’ve never stepped through a magic door."

"It’s the same for everyone and everything. There could be other similar areas, planets of universes elsewhere so it’s not the potential that important. Just coming here is the only important part."

"And Rosa? She went through the same process?" Kalina remembered how much she hated that annoying pest!

"Rosa, yeah. She killed her first slime about two months ago. She’s still low level comparing to me but the system accepted her the same way as the elves." He paused for a second. "Actually, the interesting thing is that the system doesn’t care about your species. Elves, humans, kobolds, even wolves. If you’re alive and you interact with the system, it registers you. I have two wolves that are in the system and they can talk to me telepathically through a skill. You saw them before the dinner."

Oh now she remembered them. How weird it was to forget talking giant wolves when you see naked elves and giant drakes in the sky.

Maybe she was losing her ability to be surprised in this place.

And maybe human brain could only absorb so many impossible things per hour and she was already well past her limit.

They passed the well in the center of the village, a few more stone houses with their glowing vine-covered walls and a training area where wooden dummies stood in a row covered in deep slash marks from sword practice.

The distant hammering she’d heard earlier had stopped and the village felt still in a way that Istanbul never did. No car engines, no construction noise, no airplanes overhead. Just insects and wind and the warm living glow of Koen vines crawling up every wall.

A young elf woman walking past them looked at Kalina’s heels and her earth clothes with naked curiosity, whispered something to the older elf beside her and both of them giggled.

Great. I’m the weird one here...in a village of people who think clothes are optional.