The kitchen fell into its nightly quiet just after the evening meal was served to the upper levels of the palace. Most of the senior servants had retired to their quarters, leaving only a skeleton crew to clean the cooking areas and prepare ingredients for the next morning.
Chun Hua volunteered to stay late, claiming she wanted to finish cleaning her vegetable preparation station properly. Master Ding barely glanced at her as he left—after all, what trouble could the weakest servant in the kitchen possibly cause?
If only he knew. She waited until the last footsteps faded down the corridor, then slipped away from the main kitchen toward the storage rooms. Xiao Bai appeared from the shadows, his white fur almost glowing in the dim light from the oil lamps.
"Ready?" he asked, though his voice was now only audible to her.
Chun Hua nodded, touching the jade bracelet. The familiar warmth spread through her wrist as the shimmering doorway materialised in the empty storage room. She stepped through into the impossible space, breathing in the comforting scents of her world's ingredients.
Tonight, she had a plan. From the shelves, she selected items carefully: a small amount of the refined sea salt, some dried shiitake mushrooms, and a precious vial of sesame oil that was purer than anything this time period could produce. She also took several potatoes—humble vegetables that existed in this world but were rarely used in palace cuisine.
"Potatoes?" Xiao Bai observed as she filled a small cloth bag. "Interesting choice for your first real cooking experiment."
"They're underestimated," Chun Hua replied, running her fingers over the smooth skins. "In my world, potatoes fed nations. Here, they're considered peasant food, barely worth notice. Perfect for practising without drawing attention."
Back in the main kitchen, she set up at a small side station near one of the dying cooking fires. The coals still held enough heat for her purposes, and the location was far enough from the main areas that she could work undisturbed.
She began by washing the potatoes carefully, then cutting them into precise, uniform pieces. Even with the primitive knife, her technique was flawless—each cut exactly the same size to ensure even cooking.
As she worked, memories of Li Xuan began to surface more clearly. The girl had grown up in a small village before coming to the palace under mysterious circumstances. She'd been malnourished, often surviving on scraps and thin soup. The idea of a perfectly prepared potato dish would have seemed like impossible luxury to her.
Chun Hua seasoned the potato pieces with just a touch of the refined salt and a hint of the precious sesame oil. She wrapped them in clean cloth and nestled the bundle among the glowing coals, banking them carefully to create an even, gentle heat.
While they cooked, she prepared a simple broth using kitchen scraps and a few of the dried mushrooms. The umami-rich flavour would have been impossible to achieve with the ingredients normally available to servants, but she used so little that the enhancement would be subtle.
"You're crying," Xiao Bai observed gently.
Chun Hua touched her cheek, surprised to find it wet. She hadn't realised tears were falling as she cooked.
"I miss it," she said quietly. "The precision, the control, the way ingredients respond when you understand them completely. In my other life, I took all of this for granted."
"And now?"
She looked around the primitive kitchen, with its rough wooden surfaces and crude iron tools. "Now I understand how precious it is. Every perfect cut, every balanced flavour, every moment when everything comes together exactly right—it's a small miracle."
The potatoes finished cooking while she spoke. She unwrapped them carefully, steam rising from the perfectly tender flesh. The aroma was simple but extraordinarily pure—earth and warmth and the subtle enhancement of her modern seasonings.
She took a small bite and closed her eyes, savouring the clean, perfect flavour. It was the first truly satisfying food she'd eaten since arriving in this world.
"Better?" Xiao Bai asked.
"Much." She portioned the remaining potatoes into small bowls, adding a bit of the mushroom broth to each. "These are for the night watch servants. They'll be hungry, and they won't ask too many questions about where improved food came from."
"Clever. Building loyalty from the bottom up."
As if summoned by their conversation, footsteps echoed from the main corridor. Three servants appeared—members of the night cleaning crew who would work until dawn preparing for the next day's meals.
"Li Xuan?" One of them, a tired-looking girl named Shu Mei, peered at her in surprise. "What are you doing here so late?"
"I couldn't sleep," Chun Hua replied, which was essentially true. "So I thought I'd prepare something for you. You work so hard, and the kitchen scraps they leave for the night shift are barely enough to keep anyone going."
She offered the bowls, watching as their expressions shifted from suspicion to wonder at the rich aroma.
"Where did you get potatoes this good?" asked another servant, already taking a tentative bite. His eyes widened at the flavour.
"The storage room. They were going to spoil anyway, so I thought..." Chun Hua let her voice trail off, allowing them to draw their own conclusions.
The three servants ate in reverent silence, savouring every bite. For people accustomed to thin gruel and stale bread, the perfectly cooked potatoes with their subtle enhancements must have tasted like food from the gods.
"Li Xuan," Shu Mei said finally, "I don't know what you did to these, but... thank you. I haven't tasted anything this good since I left my village."
"It's nothing special," Chun Hua deflected. "Just took a little more care than usual."
But she could see the seeds of something valuable being planted. Word would spread among the lowest-ranking servants that Li Xuan had skills beyond what anyone expected. More importantly, she was generous with those skills, sharing with people who had never experienced kindness from their superiors.
After the night shift servants went back to their duties, Chun Hua cleaned her cooking area meticulously, leaving no evidence of her late-night cooking session except for the lingering aroma of perfectly prepared food.
As she finally made her way back to her sleeping alcove, Xiao Bai trotted alongside her.
"A good beginning," he said approvingly. "Small kindnesses create large loyalties."
"I learnt that in my previous life, though I didn't always practise it. Success made me arrogant." She paused outside her door, looking back toward the kitchen. "Here, I'm starting to understand what really matters."
"Oh?"
"Feeding people well isn't just about technique or expensive ingredients. It's about care. About taking time to make something nourishing and delicious, even when—especially when—the people you're feeding have little hope of ever tasting anything better."
"And that makes you sad?"
Chun Hua considered the question as she prepared for sleep. "Not sad, exactly. Determined. In my other world, I cooked for people who already had everything. Here, I can cook for people who have nothing. Maybe that's why I was brought here."
She settled onto her thin mattress, the jade bracelet warm against her wrist. Through the small window, she could see a sliver of star-filled sky—the same stars she'd seen in her previous life, though now they seemed to shine with different meaning.
Tomorrow, she would continue the careful work of establishing herself. She would cook simple, humble foods with extraordinary care. She would share her skills gradually, building trust and loyalty among the forgotten people at the bottom of the palace hierarchy.
And eventually, when the time was right, she would find a way to bring her gifts to the attention of those who mattered most.
But tonight, she was content knowing that three tired servants had gone to sleep with full bellies and the unexpected kindness of a perfectly prepared meal warming their hearts.
It wasn't fame or fortune or recognition, but it was something deeper. Something that satisfied a hunger she hadn't even known she carried.
"Thank you," she whispered to whatever force had brought her here, her fingers tracing the carved patterns on the jade bracelet.
For the first time since arriving in this world, Chun Hua fell asleep with a smile on her face.