The Monster Tavern

They say there is a tavern in the city beneath the sea called Bai's Tavern. Eat there once and grow stronger; eat there twice and all your illnesses will vanish. If anyone manages to eat there three times, they might even live forever. But no one knows where the tavern is. Only those destined to find it can enter.

Xia Hanchun, the only human and the head chef at Bai's Tavern, says that when a customer eats once, half her life is shaved off; when they eat twice, she gives up and doesn't want to work anymore; and if a customer eats three times, well, no customer has ever eaten three times.

Except for the owner, Bai Meng, who eats there every day! She just has to have meat every now and then.

Luckily, the owner is different from the customers. Xia Hanchun has to prepare the customers' ingredients, but Bai Meng brings her own.

Today, Bai Meng wants charcoal-grilled Taotie hoof.

She says, "Good thing I got there early, or this claw would have eaten itself."

Theme: Hard work brings honor, even to monsters.