Bakers Dozen

As the first of the party sets foot on the bridge, you feel the supports give. You manage to step back just as the bridge plummets into the gorge. An ominous wind howls through the gorge, a sound that is swiftly drowned out by the booming voice behind you.

"I've been waiting for you, warriors!"

You whirl round, coming face to face with a bronzed, rugged wild man, dressed in naught but a tiger skin, with a large rolled tarp on his back.

"You don't recognize me, but I've searched many a day for you. Do you remember the chef of the iron ladle?" the burly man asks. He pulls a large iron ladle, twice the size of a greatsword, from his tarp. "He was my master."

The bronzed man unfurls the tarp, revealing a full iron-cast cooking set complete with lit coal stove. "Show me the power that felled my master!" he bellows. "I challenge you to a cook-off!"

----

You find extra drinks waiting for you when you reach the bar. Behind them sits an elderly gnome, who only manages to see over the table thanks to a large velvet pillow. He twirls his peppered gray handlebar moustache and mumbles to himself.

"Hm, hm, hm. So you are the ones that defeated the chef of the iron ladle, and his uncultured apprentice." He chuckles, a gravelly sounds more akin to a pepper grinder than laughter. "I'm not surprised. They were weak. That man and his apprentice believed that good dishes were pure, untainted. They did not understand the overwhelming power that spice contained. Those uncultured palates could never handle true flavor."

The gnome takes a deep breath and blows, and pepper flows over the table, obscuring it, blinding your eyes. When the pepper settles, a large golden cookpot sits in the center of the table, surrounded by all manner of shakers, grinders, baggies and beakers. The gnome leaps to the top of the cookpot and shouts to you.

"I, the Sultan of Spice, shall not fall so easily! I shall show you the true power that spice contains! The power to dominate, to subjugate a dish! Prepare to be overwhelmed by the power of spicery!"

---

You wake to find yourselves not in the inn room you rented last night, but rather inside a hanging cage, high above the ground. A deep chill permeates the thin air, and a quick glance tells you you've somehow been transported to the nearby mountains while you slept. Under you sits a thin rock disk, balanced perfectly on the mountain top. In the center of that disk an old man sits cross legged, fingers pinching the air like it were fine spice, beard hanging down over the disk and off the mountain top. The old man grunts and turns to you.

"So you are awake. Word reached me that you defeated both the Chef of the Iron Ladle and the Sultan of Spice, so I had you brought here. I fear that you may have been..tainted..by their beliefs." The rock disc begins to spin slightly from the force of the man's words. "You see.. they both thought they knew true power. The simple essentials that make or break a dish. They thought their way was the true way," the old man sighs, "but I know better."

The old man stands, whirling round, his beard rapping around the cage with the force of his spin. "The true essence of a dish," the old man shouts as he tears your cage apart, sending you all falling onto the spinning stone disk, "is balance!" He leaps back as the disk tilts, landing perfectly on the edge and standing on his toes, balancing out your weight with his own. In his hands are a perfectly arranged, perfectly symmetrical dish of sushi and rice.

"Yes," he laughs! "Perfect proportions are the secret! And perfect proportions shall be your downfall!" He pulls out several stone dishes, perfectly balanced on his head and fingertips. "I challenge you to a cook-off!"

---

You all stand in the campsite of the old man who has guided you through the blizzard. Strangely enough, the area of the campsite is completely devoid of snow, despite the howling storm around you, the warmth of the campfire radiates from many feet away.

The old man sits at a black pot atop the fire, stirring at the soup the bubbles within, and as you approach, the smell hits you. Dozens of ingredients, vegetables, meats, spices, even fruits! They are all so clear, so much that you can almost see each ingredient sitting in the pot. Your mind if brought back by the warm laughter of the elderly man

"You can see it, can't you? Thats good, it means you are the right ones" He says softly, "The chefs of this land...they have become twisted in their ways, they believe they have mastered cooking, that they have subjugated the world of food. Ha!" He laughs, slapping his knee, "Those fools have forgotten! Those brats have forgotten the purity of food!"

He lifts the ladle from the pot, the dazzling soup slowly pouring into a bowl in his other hand, "Food has a depth that rivals the oceans, it has a breadth of complexity that spans whole continents, not even the sky can surpass food in it's sheer volume of variety. Food is life, thus cooking is the art of guiding life." He lays out bowls of soup for each of you as he smiles, "Touch, taste, sight, smell, even hearing, cooking is the only art that encompasses all the senses, you know." He says with a small smirk as he rises from his stump seat, "I am but a simple old man, but all of you are the kind of people I need, to teach those fools in their kitchens the error of their ways. Eat, and I will teach you all the truth of cooking."

---

As you wander through the cavern system, glowing salt crystals guiding you every step of the way, blinding sunlight greets you as you enter another of the many canyons of the mountain range. This time it is different, however.

There's a thin stone walkway from the cavern entrance you crawl from, and to either side of the walkway is a near bottomless lake of sizzling, spitting, steaming, golden-brown oil. Gritting teeth from the sharp sparks of pain caused by the popping oil, you immediately get into a single-file line, and trek down the thin stone pathway.

Within moments, after a set of hazardous stepping stones, you find a large 'kitchen,' the entire thing hewn out of a large island of red stone. What's even stranger is the giant, buxom woman that stands waiting for you, cleaver in one hand and a massive, long-handled basket in the other.

"So that doddering fool, the Master of Proportionate Plating, was finally beaten huh? That makes three of the Master Chefs beaten. I suppose you're here," and here she whips around the menacing fryer's basket to point at your party, "to find the Fry-Cook Mistress?"

With that she suddenly tosses the basket high up, the tool landing in a harness on her back. She spins quickly to slap two more deep-frying baskets up, their contents flying overhead to land on towel-covered plates CLEAR on the other side of the island.

"The Chef emphasized labor. The Sultan emphasized the flavor. The Master focused on proportions. All that is good, but the thing is..." She monologues before spinning the knife in her hand, pointing it challengingly - like a duelist's rapier - at you, "is that without timing, you ruin everything! Bring your skills and senses to bear, for Lady Mathilda, the Fry-Cook Mistress, challenges you!"

---

ou stroll through the golden fields of wheat in the sun-touched plain, brushing past the soft plants. The sky is blue, the birds are chirping, there is a light breeze cooling you off in the mid-day sun. A perfect scene of summer.

You soon pick up a scent on the breeze. The scent of cooking. As you head towards the source, the smell becomes all the more appetizing. Eventually, you come across a small orchard with plump red apples hanging from the trees.

In the middle of the orchard, you see a middle aged man in an apron lounging on a lawn chair near a oak table, drinking a cold glass full of what looks to be apple cider. Around him are a few grills and smokers.

"Howdy younguns. Names George. Some call me the master of the barbecue. Welcome to my orchard. Hope ya'll will stay for lunch." He gets up and slightly opens a smoker, letting out a plume of smoke and the smell of meat. "Hmm, this one here looks just right. Been cooking this baby since around the same time yesterday and hoo-wee, is she tender."

He carefully lifts out the meat with his tongs and places it to cool. Around the meat is a thin glaze and some sliced apples. "So I heard that some fellers have been going around challenging the other chefs to cook outs. That's all fine and dandy, but they always seem to be in such a rush. The best things take time. Patience is a virtue, ya know. With patience comes the most tender meat that you will ever have."

He takes a small knife and drops it down onto the meat. The knife passes cleanly through the meat almost as if there was nothing there. "Perfect, now take a seat and relax, no need to rush our little cook-off here."

---

As you all navigate yourselves through the thick brush, the flora seems to grow thicker and more tangling as you move. With a few more steps you all finally break through a wall of leaves to discover the tree line covered in small huts, linked by bridges and ropes.

At the base of the trees are several rows of wooden racks, with fillets of meats left out to dry. You all notice the trees form a perfect ring around a massive stone fireplace, atop it was a massive iron skillet, loaded to the brim with what appeared to be wild herbs, vegetables, and various types of meats. The smell rising from it is an intoxicating mixture of the wild, raw and pure.

As you all approach the fire place closer, a roar of some beast echoes the tree lines, and a figure comes hurtling down from the tree tops on a rope. He lands with a loud thud, skidding a bit, before coming to a halt. The dark skinned man standing before you all towers above the whole group, like a mountain of muscle with long, scraggly wild hair. The most striking thing however is the limp body of a massive bear hung over his shoulder.

"Ah, looks like the forest gods have brought me a most wonderful gift." He says, letting the bear corpse roll off his shoulder and onto the ground, "I have heard of you all, the Iron Ladle, the Spicy shrimp, that old coot of Plating, and now even that oil soaked bitch, you've made quite the names for yourselves in these lands." He says, walking over to the skittle, reaching in with his bare hand to lift out a steaming potato, he takes a large bite from it. "Hmn, well you know what all those spineless mice lacked? They lacked what true cooking it about..." He swallows the second half of the potato in one go "...and that is the raw power of nature! Everything comes from the wild, and to truly master cooking, you must immerse yourself in it!" He snatches the bear up with a big grin, "I am Sargus, the Wild God, and you will now face me!"

---

Your quest underway, your group travels through a dark canyon, the path ahead lighted by odd fixtures and flowery decorations. The decorations become more wild and fantastical the farther you go, until you arrive at a marvelous kitchen built into the stone of the canyon itself. The walls are covered in splashes of random colors, arranged in heiroglyphs around a strange ribbon-covered thing in a central circle. The pots, pans, and cabinets vary wildly in color and shape, as do the tables.

From the central circle, the ribbons move and rotate, and you see a figure rise from the flighty mass!

"Hmm, what delectable treats have stumbled into my lair today?" a voice says, giggling. The figure is strangely androgynous, wearing a skin-tight suit obscured by multicolored ribbons. The person's hair, too, is arranged in wild shapes and dyed in every color.

"To be here you must have bested the other chefs, hmm? The Iron Ladle, that cute little spicy man, that horrible woman with her deep fryers...all lacking in imagination."

The figure daintily steps down from its pedestal, and the colors on the wall shift and gyrate.

"Were you impressed by their quaint displays? Spice, stout flavor, soups? Pah!" it lets out a tittering laugh. "They don't know cooking like I do! They treat it like a game, where I see it as an art!"

"The only thing that matters in cooking is presentation!"

The figure raises its hands and the walls sing with color, light, and sound.

"Allow me, Jarvo the Bold, to illustrate!"

---

The scorching heat of the desert beats down on your party as you trudge through the sands. Off in the distance you see what looks like an oasis perched alongside two massive leaning rocks. As you all approach it, the sands begin to change color slowly, until the yellow grains are now a bright white. Investigating it reveals it is sugar!

A high pitched laugh pierces your ears as you walk across the sugary sands. Lounging in the middle of the oasis' is a woman with short, wild red hair, dressed in a swimsuit that almost resembles an apron.

She stands up on the doughnut themed floaty, "Well, I was wondering who would stumble on my little slice of paradise, and it seems to be the little bugs who have been causing some troubles lately." She says with another shrill laugh, "Was it fun? Battling all those ignorant mules with their foul dishes of spices and oils and boring things!"

She leaps from her floaty, lifting into the air as if she had legs of springs, and landing on the ground, "Well, allow me to treat you to a much nicer battle." She says, slamming her hand against one of the massive leaning stones, a portion of the rock popping open to reveal it to be an immense oven, "You see, the true beauty of cooking is not in some spice, some oil or some grill, it is in the amount!" She says with a confident smile, "That is why the oven and baking are the ultimate in cooking, as with a single tray you can produce dozens of treats, with a single oven you could feed a kingdom in a day!" She produces a large whisk from seemingly no where and leans it over her shoulder, "Now come, you little bugs, I, Drasorra the Sweet Empress, shall drown you in an army of delights!"

---

You arrive at the docks. The ocean winds carry the salty mists from the crashing waves. Ships and fishermen all line the old boardwalk. At the end of the dock is the ship where the next chef resides.

As you come closer, you gaze at the magnificence of the sea-worthy vessel. Grand, strong, and salty. Black flags with a skull and crossed pans flow in the wind. Soon enough, a gangplank is lowered for you to enter the ship.

Once you climb onto the deck, you see a man dressed in a well-tailored pirate suit. He has an eyepatch and a greed beard filled with years of sea salt. Around him are hot skillets and barrels of various fish.

"Arr ye mateys, so ye have finally arrived to the Luissiane. I am Captain Jacobs. Captain. Grand fisherman. Chef. I heard how ye have beaten the rest of those landlubbers who call themselves chefs. HAH! They have no real experience."

He lifts up a fish and a fine knife, and filets it within seconds before dropping it on the skillet. "The briny deeps have many a delicacy. The ocean's bounty is great and nutritious. Can you handle the strength of the tides, ye landlubbers?"

---

As you walk through the seedy-looking city, looking for the next chef, you end up getting lost in a series of alleyways. The grime and dirtiness makes you question what a chef would even be doing here.

Eventually you manage to escape the labyrinth and come across a run-down shack with a small garden in front. A thin, ratty-looking man comes out from behind the shack and waves at you to come inside.

After a moment of hesitation, you decide on entering. The shack itself isn't too bad, although it looks to have seen better days. There are small holes in the ceiling and the pineapple wallpaper in peeling in spots. Surely a great chef can't live here.

The ratty looking man comes back out with a series of dishes. Why, they look like the most common of foods. They look absolutely cheap compared to what you have dealt with. The man smiles at you and says "Hello chums, I am Gerry the Resourceful Streethound. I know that this doesn't look like what the other grand chefs would come up with, but give it a try."

As you take a bite of what looks to be sauce covered, packaged ramen noodles, you are surprised with the flavor of what would otherwise be a bland, unappetizing dish. "You see, the others all have their ingredients and materials ready. The moment you take that away, they become nothing. I, however, learned how to make something from nothing in this city. I had to learn to improvise. Eventually, I managed to create great meals from the most common of ingredients. Now, are you ready to put both your creativity and skill to the test?"

---

Your travels have brought you once again into the depths of the earth on the hunt for culinary combat. Unlike your encounter with the Fry-Cook Mistress, the farther you all go into the caves, the chillier it becomes, however not to a degree that it becomes unbearable.

Rounding the corner, you are greeted with what appears to be mood lighting, lanterns hang from the ceiling, with a dim light that illuminates what looks almost like a bar carved out of the stone of the cave. At the far wall stands a tall, slender, mature looking man, with a long, curling black mustache, wearing a crisp white vest over his black clothing. Behind him, the stone walls are covered in bottles of spirits.

He looks up from his work, a small martini glass sitting on the stone counter, "Oh, well hello there, I was not expecting to see you all for quite some time, but early arrivals are always welcome." He says gently as he pours a clear blue alcohol into a shaker with one hand while cutting a lime with the other, shaking the drink up with a single hand, "With all those battles you have been through, it must be hard to keep track of the true meaning of cooking." He says calmly as he pours the mixture into the glass while balancing a slice of lime right in the center of the liquid, it floats perfectly upright in the murky, ocean blue alcohol.

He picks the glass up, tipping it to his lips, the lime slice never once falling over, "Those masters you fought, they are all brilliant and skilled. But they have all ignored the importance of dining. Food and drink. It was always that delicate balance. However, the truth is, food has, and will always be, second to the drink." He says, taking on a serious tone. "No meal is complete without a drink, and no drink surpasses alcohols. Even if a meal is garbage on a plate, with a fine choice of wine or spirits, it becomes heaven! I am Salvador, the Ace of Alcohols, and I shall show you the true power of drinks!"

---


Lightning flashes in the sky high above the mountaintop fortress.

The rain hits massive, perfectly maintained statues, and pours down on stones that have been exactingly carved into identical sizes with the utmost precision. Were you to close you eyes in the center of the courtyard and turn around, you doubt you would be able to tell the difference, save that the stairs leading up and down would be on opposite sides.

Another flash of lightning and peal of thunder, and on the balcony in front of you, a figure appears. A tall, muscular man man wearing a military uniform and an overcoat stands in front of the banister, above a hanging red banner showing a stylized knife and fork on top of a white plate. Behind him, a row of men in similar uniforms stand ramrod straight. The man begins to speak, gesturing animatedly, his voice carrying throughout the yard.

"So you have defeated the others? That worthless fry cook who refuses to use anything other than the second-rate equipment she had when she first started cooking? The filthy street urchin who intentionally uses the worst ingredients he can get his hands on? All the garbage they espouse is nothing without the necessary tools to cook a dish. Tools are everything in cooking, and the finer the tool, the finer the meal it makes. Even the proper utensils can improve the taste of a meal! This is the true way of cooking, and only through the replacement of inferior tools can one gain the ability to improve as a chef."

He makes a motion, and two of his men begin carrying down a large canopy and some poles. Behind him, the rest have begun transporting a huge variety of top-quality cooking devices with military efficiency. Rather than take one of the two stairways leading down from his position, he leaps off the thirty-foot balcony, effortlessly clearing the railing.

His landing cracks the stones below him, but he seems completely unfazed by his fall. He straightens and looks at you. His men snap to attention as he begins to speak.

"One's implements matter above all...." he says as he throws off his coat, the lightning revealing that he has implanted thin, heavily jointed mechanical arms to himself, each ending in a different type of cooking utensil, each crafted out of adamantium.

"And I have made myself the ultimate! I am capable of creating a feast out of things normal beings could not hope to prepare properly! I am the Master of the Perfected Kitchen!" He flourishes his various knives, swiping with far greater strength and speed than a humanoid could ever hope to achieve. "Now let us cook!"

---

Silence permeates the stone pyramid. Every surface is covered with a thick layer of dust. Closer inspection reveals it to be flour, but in that inspection one of you steps on a panel that sinks deep into the floor. The base of the pyramid rumbles, and you feel the earth shift as the entire pyramid rises up out of the sand, expanding outward from its base. The top spreads open like a flower, puffing up as the central sarcophagus erupts to reveal a towering skeletal figure in a cast-iron chef hat.

The wraithlike figure speaks, a deep droning that stirs the very earth with its depths. "I am The Baker," he says, his hollow eyes staring beyond the party, off into the distance. "I was the first. Long did I knead the dough that is this battered earth. Under my whim, the oceans sprang into being, gifting the earth with a buttery glaze. It was I that sparked the sun, and set it to bake. For a long time, all was quiet. But with heat came life, and new civilization spread across my surface, turning it a deep golden brown. And now.. it is almost time."

The skeletal chef turns to the sky, reaching up, up towards the sun and twisting, tracing an arc of silvery light in the air, grasping at some hidden aspect of reality you cannot see. You feel a deadly chill settle around you as the sun itself dims. "Much has changed in my absence," he drones. "Your culture has grown strong on my surface, but make no mistake. You are but toppings. I am the crust!" He spreads his emaciated arms wide. "Now I rise!" layers of golden flaky pastry flare wide behind him forming wings, and he soars overhead, silhoetted against the sun. "Show me you are worthy of being on top," he commands, "or I shall reduce this world to dust! I shall return it to the flour from which it was borne and start anew! I, The Baker, challenge you!"

---

The master chefs defeated and shamed, you embark to claim the fruits of your labor. The title of True Maester.

There is one final test you must complete before your journey is completed. One final dish to make.

Because to become a True Maester... You must defeat the previous one..

"Greetings. I've been watching your rise with great intrest." The Maester says, rising from his dinner table. He's dressed in a tweed blazer, and a striped shirt. His glasses are scratched and smeared, as if grease had splattered on them, but was forgotten.

You recognise him, but cannot place the memory. "Ah yes," he says, straightening his bow tie "you most likely remember me from the old competitions for the Master Chefs. I was there, in the background. I was subtle, not loud and brash like you. I spent a decade learning their techniques, and the ways to most handily defeat them."

"And being the True Maester? Not what its cracked up to be. I expected to be the ruler of a culinary empire, spending years perfecting my dishes, but instead, I get a few books, and a few jobs a year from the people rich enough to hire me... I welcome your challenge, though. Its been years since I've had a decent challenger. I wish you the best of luck." As he finishes his speech, he pulls out an industrial sized food mixer, complete with flame decals on the side. "Whenever you're ready, kid." He says, smirking.