This Is Terrible Cooking, But It Tastes Good

After perishing alongside the Zombie Emperor, Bai Mang transmigrated to another world with a spirit spring.

This new world was rife with unknown pollutants that could infect every living thing.

The food and water were polluted, too. When consumed, they gave off an unbearable stench that even purification masters couldn't remove.

People had endured food like this for decades.

That is, until Bai Mang arrived.

--

One day, a small restaurant quietly opened beneath an old apartment building, offering purified food.

The restaurant was simply furnished and a little dated, but clean and tidy. Its ingredients were so rare they were practically unheard of, and the two selling points, "purification master" and "ingredients with a pollution level of zero," were enough to bring people flocking to its door.

Yet whenever customers who had eaten there mentioned it, they all wore complicated expressions.

If anyone asked, they would answer:

"Well... you'll understand after you try it. Good luck."

--

Everyone said the little owner’s ingredients had given them hope,

but the little owner's cooking had also plunged them into a new kind of despair.

--

The System that helped Bai Mang be reborn gave her a mission: collect "Hope Points."

But the mission's requirements were quite strange. She had to "first make people despair, then give them hope."

Most importantly, "both emotions must be caused by the Host."

Bai Mang: Sounds like she has to become that "behind-the-scenes Big Boss who gets defeated by the protagonist right before destroying the world."

The Big Boss makes things difficult for the protagonists to spur their growth, then ultimately becomes despair itself, gets defeated by them, and spreads the light of hope across the continent.

And the endings for all Big Bosses are obviously never good.

Bai Mang, who wasn't ready to die yet, decided to put the mission aside for now and focus on running her little restaurant.

...But for some reason, all she did was cook, and her Hope Points kept piling up.

More and more people were reaching enlightenment and awakening as purification masters after eating her food.

Bai Mang: Confused.

Maybe it's thanks to the spirit spring, she thought.

The customers, firmly: No, it's a million percent thanks to you!

Theme: Hope spreads like wildfire