>>36610
>Restaurant Chain: Loveride
Flagship Location: Dragonia Empire’s “Cloud District”
The Cloud District is a high-elevation monster residential neighborhood. It’s only a stone’s throw from the Valley of Bonds and the Corps HQ, and it’s a popular sightseeing spot for getting a great view of Dragonwing Street. Most of the monsters living up here are wyverns like me and Litia. Of course, there are a lot of new homes getting built around here for new couples, you’ll see somebody’s husband heading to town on a wyvern’s— or, y’know, his wife’s— back basically every morning.
Well, what do you think? Seriously, it’s not every day that you can be in a place with this good of views, and in such a convenient spot that you can go shopping or get to the Dragoon Corps right away if you go by wyvern-back! A-and, if- if- if- if y-you’re thinking about somewhere to live after you get married, I, I most definitely recommend this neighborhood, b-but… w-well, y’know, I mean, just, give it a thought, I don’t care! Since we’re here in the Cloud District though, you might as well check out my house— I mean, the place my mom and dad run.
It’s called “Loveride”— it’s actually a chain here in Dragonia with a few other locations. Ehe, did you know my mom’s a pretty famous wyvern around here? She was the previous captain of the Dragoon Corps; they even called her “the Great Wing”, if you can believe that. When she went to another country on a diplomatic mission with the Corps, she met a guy working as a cook— my dad, y’know— and after a red-hot romance that transcended species barriers, they got married.
When my mom came back to Dragonia with dad, she stepped down from the Corps and started up Loveride with him, the first restaurant offering food that caters to dragon and human couples. Thanks to everyone in the Dragoon Corps coming here ever since it opened, the sight of dragoons and their mounts happily eating together spread throughout the Empire, and the restaurant became a hit in no time at all. Of course, my parents make everything with love, so anything you pick off the menu is gonna be your trump card for deepening your relationship with a dragon. Y’know, ever since I was little, I was helping out here while my mom and dad went on and on about their sappy love stories, and I was always watching the couples eat. They seemed so… intimate.
Huh? Did you seriously just imply that I wasn't "just" watching?... W-well, excuuuse me! This is a place for couples, so it’s only natural, isn’t it?! Look, the details don’t matter— right now, just be honored that you get to eat with me for your first visit! Besides, once we’ve had a proper meal… I’ll have to introduce you to mom and dad ♥
~DTB Newbie Guide Syltia~
>Couple’s Fruit Mixed Juice
Available at: Every “Loveride” location
(Available in-store and to-go)
The thing I recommend before anything else to those young and kinda awkward dragon couples who visit the store is this special juice made from “couple’s fruit”. It’s Loveride’s best seller, and it’s even been featured in “Slow Life” as the “fruit juice that makes love bear fruit”1.
It’s made using a sorbet of the separated red and blue parts of a couple’s fruit before they ripen fully and become one— the two fruits represent the human and the dragon drinking the juice. When the juice is served, more of those separated fruits are floating in a fruit infusion made with “scaleflowers”, which look like dragon scales and have mana with a sort of acceleration property, so the fruits actually continue to ripen in the water.
With how close their faces are from those intertwined straws, the couple can enjoy the sweetness and sourness of each fruit, marveling together at how the flavors bloom into something new and incredibly refreshing. Eventually, while they’re so into that evolving flavor profile, that whole fruit that’s been ripening in the sherbet will fully dissolve into the juice, and they’ll fully be taken over by a couple’s fruit’s… special properties. Basically, they’ll start off all shy, just enjoying the juice, but by the end they’ll really wanna enjoy each other’s bodies. Okay, well, to be blunt, that whole “flavor transformation” shtick is kind of just a fun bonus, but… y’know ♥
Actually, when we recommend this drink, really proud dragons tend to get really fussy about sharing the same drink with someone else, so we’ve cooked up the whole flavor-change “excuse” for them. At first they get all red, drinking through the straw like they’re giving in, but at some point the couple will start to switch off straws, and she’ll start tasting the guy’s saliva that’s still on his straw and drinking the juice in earnest.
Before long, they’ll have their hands on each other’s waists while drinking, and finally they’ll forget all about straws and drink right from each other’s mouths… ahh, I’m so jealous— i-is what I would say if I was jealous, which I’m not! W-well, whatever, anyway! It’s also the perfect pick for monsters who aren’t really used to getting fawned on! It’s a miracle juice that can close the distance between you and your partner just by drinking it!
Hm, all this explaining has made me pretty thirsty— seems like a perfect opportunity to try it out… let’s give it a shot ourselves ♥
~DTB Newbie Guide Syltia~
Translation Notes:
1: The verb 実る used here regarding love both refers to literal fruiting and figurative fruiting, like a plan bearing fruit, so I tried to give it that wordplay feeling with "fruit juice". It's a little clunky, but I tried.
>Pamumu
Available at: Every “Loveride” location
(Available in-store and to-go)
Mmm, that heavenly smell of meat coming from those couples on the street eating that burger-like thing is just unbearable, isn’t it! Really works up the appetite, huh! Are you curious? You totally are, right? Well, that’s the flagship dish from Loveride, the restaurant that my lovely classmate Syltia’s parents run: the pamumu!
Pamumu is a dish made with roasted mamono realm lizard meat, wrapped up in a wheat flour flatbread1 along with salamaranth and “intimacy vegetables”, or as we call them “montatoes”! You can get them almost right after ordering them, so I guess you could say that they’re a kind of fast food like ryuudon, huh? But unlike ryuudon, which is a super hearty meal made to fill you up, pamumu really is just a light meal or snack. The salamaranth tucked in with the meat has even been soaked in alraune nectar, so its notorious “feverwort” effects are mitigated, too. Just like the soft and flaky montatoes, the greens are really just there to add another dimension to the textures and flavors.
But of course, a pamumu is more than a mere quick lunch! Its greatest charm of all is that right after the customer orders it, a wyvern employee cooks the lizard meat with her breath in front of their very eyes! And then, and then, a lizardman carves up that perfectly roasted meat with her incredible swordplay, or rather, her knifework, and slides it into that yummy fresh flatbread! Yes, pamumu is a meal with a show! The freshly-made, piping hot, soft and flaky pamumu is finally complete when it’s finished off with a secret sauce made from deluxe mamono realm herbs that Syltia’s own father invented when he was a cook in another country!
That intense, amazing smell goes all the way up into the very heavens themselves, tickling the nostrils of the surrounding dragons, especially the high-flying wyverns like me… it whets the appetite enough to get us drooling. If a wyvern who’s been made so utterly famished by that amazing smell were to spot a single man in the middle of eating a fresh pamumu… unfortunately, we just can’t control our dragon instincts! She’ll do an incredible nosedive from the skies just to get one bite… or, well, no, to eat the whole thing! Oh, p-please don’t look at me like that!
But don’t worry too much about it; a single wyvern who ate a gentleman’s pamumu will certainly recognize him as a “most charitable master”. No doubt she’ll owe him a debt of gratitude! If that happens, the wyvern will take the man home in order to repay the favor— they say that one good deed deserves another, so she’ll let him take a taste of her, making full use of her body so the man won’t be able to live without his new favorite meal ♥
~DTB Newbie Guide Litia~
Translation Notes:
I just wanna say that I ripped my hair out trying to figure out what "pamumu" is punning on so I could try to make a suitable wordplay on it for English, but I came up with literally nothing. It's... pretty clearly some sort of gyro/donar kebab, but I couldn't find any weird niche Japanese name for those kinds of things anywhere! I might have to ask Will/KC about this one because it's driving me nuts. Anyway, that's why I left it intact from パムム. Also I want to eat this one real bad.
1: The term used is パン生地, which refers specifically to uncooked dough, and since nothing about frying or baking after the goodies were in there was ever brought up, that just felt insanely weird to me. I took a liberty and just made it "flatbread" to avoid further weirdness.
>Chocohorn
Available at: “Loveride” flagship restaurant
(While supplies last)
This is a sweet known as a chocohorn, a rare item sold at Miss Syltia’s family home.
There’s a bounty of mamono realm crops that one can enjoy in the Dragonian Territories, full of fertile bright green mamono realms, but these chocohorns are made from one that’s particularly rare: “horn cane”. Like you might surmise from the name, horn cane grows from the ground and ripens into a horn-like stalk, and is only found in hilly areas that get plenty of mana and sunshine. Harvested horn cane is known to be used in various medicinal decoctions, but when toasted by the breath of us dragons, it tastes and smells like sweet confectionery.
These chocohorns are made from horn canes prepared in that very same way, coated with a mixture of “slimeshrooms"1 and chocolate. With its dark chocolate coating, this treat has a perfect balance of bitterness and sweetness, and on top of that, it always retains that just-baked crispiness. Due to how scarce horn cane is, chocohorns are only sold within the narrow window when it can be harvested, but the second Loveride announces their availability, everyone, young and old, even Her Majesty the Queen, comes to buy them up. Dragons from all over Dragonia come hunting for this confection in droves, and they form very long lines in front of the restaurant.
While it’s true that dragons are so dead-set on getting their hands on chocohorns due to their irresistible and addictive flavor, there's actually another reason. Horn canes coated with that slimeshroom mixture are so slippery that when we dragons, let alone humans, try to hold them in our claws, they slip right out— inevitably, if you’re trying to eat them, the only way you can do it is by holding them in your mouth.
Of course, trying to eat them that way all by yourself is… a challenge. So i-in other words, you eat chocohorns with— are you going to make me spell it out for you? It’s something you eat with a man you like! The dragon holds it in her mouth and the man eats it, and vice versa! It looks just like a kissing and, a-and, and just watching it makes me cringe! However, the flavor is unmatched, so there’s really no other way around it if you want to try it… here! I can’t believe I begged Miss Syltia to prepare one just so an ungrateful lout like you could… I-I mean, I would never do that. I just… happened to get my hands on this!
Just think of it as candy that has to be eaten this way and quit whining! N-now, take it from my mouth… ♥
~DTB Newbie Guide Leia~
Translation Notes:
1: This is distinct in Japanese from the existing "sticky mushrooms" from WGII. Stylistic consistency with Brolen would make them "slimy mushrooms"... but if I had my druthers, sticky mushrooms would be called "stickycaps".
>Tricoromille (Dragonia Branch)
Location: Dragonia Empire’s “Dragon’s Den Alley”
Ahem. First of all, let me make it abundantly clear that I have not taken you to Dragon’s Den Alley for any nefarious or underhanded reason. All of this, I’ll point out, is solely to take you to Tricoromille as a part of your tour. … I-I mean, yes, this is also my first time going to an establishment like this, but not to worry— I’ve done recon on the matter!
This is the Dragonia branch of Tricoromille, the greatest cafe chain in any mamono realm specializing in prisoner fruits, famous for its “prisoner fruit parfait” that consistently boasts first place in “Mamono Realm Slow Life”’s yearly sweets ranking, now at last establishing locations all across the land. The impetus for Tricoromille opening a location here in Dragonia was a conversation held at a get-together with the mamono realm nation Lescatie some years back. Originally, Dragonia was full of hearty dishes made to build up essence, but there weren’t any shops that could provide lovely sweets like this, nor any real sweets culture. This was a source of worry for Her Majesty Deonora for quite some time.
Hm… now that I think about it, as far as sweets-focused places in Dragonia went, the place that the captain before me, Sylvia, had opened, was probably the only one. At the time of the meeting, the lilim who represented Lescatie, the fourth daughter of Her Majesty the Mamono Lord, Lady Druella, recommended the Tricoromille cafe that had just been opened in Lescatie to Her Majesty Deonora.
Upon Lady Druella’s recommendation, Her Majesty went to Lescatie on her own two wings, and was terribly impressed by not just Tricoromille’s products, but their lovely uniforms made from arachne silk, and the adjoining inn, complete with luxurious beds, that allowed male customers to take unwed employees “to go”1. She immediately approached the founder of Tricoromille and asked her to establish a new location. And just like that, this cafe was opened in this neighborhood, where ever since, both humans and monsters have been visiting every day in search of a sweet moment.
This Dragonia branch has adopted many Tricoromille classics, like gifting a uniform to long-time employees, and the “take-out” system where male customers can bring an unmarried dragon home, but it seems like they’re rather committed to maintaining a “spirit of Dragonia”. Let’s see, let’s see… ah, I see, according to this guidebook, there’s an all-you-can-eat sweets buffet where even a dragon can satisfy themselves, excellent! And hmm, when you’d like to take an employee home… wh– “you can use Castle Dragonia in lieu of an inn”?! Her Majesty Deonora’s castle… even I’ve never stayed there! Apparently that up-and-coming idol group Dragon Heat even goes there for live shows sometimes… dammit, the Dragoon Corps needs way more perks!
Gghh… hey, look at this “dragon-sized parfait”... it’s the perfect amount for us to eat together, don’t you think? Well… everything’s an experience. L-look, I’m not enjoying this or anything, this is just another part of your training!
~Captain of the Dragonia Dragoon Corps Altoiris~
Translation Notes:
I LOVE ALTOIRIS SO MUCH. I need you guys to imagine everything from paragraphs two through four as her sort of badly paraphrasing from a visitor's guide that she's trying to hide from You that she's still reading.
1: Did you guys know that お持ち帰り, or "takeout/food for to-go" also is preexisting Japanese slang for taking someone you met at a bar or club home with you? Yeah, KC didn't make that innuendo up whole-cloth when he made Tricoromille in WGII.
>Dragon-Sized Parfait
Available at: Tricoromille’s Dragonia branch
Prisoner Fruit Parfait (Dragon-Sized)
Only available at the Dragonia branch location: a dragon-sized parfait, ideal for dragon and human couples! This incredibly filling serving is an expression of all of our wishes as employees at Tricoromille to make an ever-so-sweet moment between a lovey-dovey couple last even a second longer! Please enjoy this sumptuous treat, chock-full of mamono realm fruits harvested right here in Dragonia ♥
【Horn Cane】
As part of a collaboration with Loveride, we are able to provide sweet and fragrant horn cane!
【Scaleflower】
Scaleflowers look just like dragon scales, smell as refreshing as mamono herbs, and even accelerate the effects of other magic goodies! They may be petals, but they’re quite edible— they’re as sweet and chewy as a gummy candy ♥
【Intoxication Fruit】 (AKA Mamono Realm Grapes)
The cultivar of mamono realm grape used in this parfait is “Dralot”1, one raised right here in Dragonia. These large, fragrant “dragon jewels” will make you reveal a whole new face with every bite of parfait you take ♥
【Draberry】
It’s the fruit of the scaleflower: draberries! This sweet yet faintly tart fruit will give a “charming breath” effect to any woman who eats it!
【Couple’s Fruit】
A fully-ripened, juicy, and plump couple’s fruit is carefully placed on the tippy-top of every parfait! The way you eat this completely fused, delicious “love elixir” depends on the couple— mash it into a cream for your parfait right away, or save it ‘til the very end for the final treat! Of course, in this cafe, we recommend going halfsies straight from your love’s mouth ♥
Translation Notes:
1: The "t" is silent, of course. I've romanized ドラロー ("doraroo") this way in order to make it a more explicit nod to preexisting cultivars of grape like merlot.