"This is..."
(_-)
"The seasoning you guys were talking about?"
∑(△｀)?!
After first reaching out to pinch a little, Annie's gaze quickly moved away from the rusty oil drum filled to the brim with tiny white crystals resembling salt, and she looked at the two smug green-skinned Orcs before her.
"These things... are salt?"
(_)
Though they did smell like salt, Annie still felt that something was off. As for what exactly was wrong, she could not tell for the moment, because she could not be bothered to analyze it.
(...)
(;￢￢)
"It is salt!"
"But it's not ordinary salt!"
At that moment, the green-skinned player Azure Corridor started showing off again.
"Actually, it's mineral salt!"
"It's a byproduct of us green-skins mining. We secretly collected a few barrels and brought them back."
As he spoke, he pinched a small amount of the white crystals from the barrel, placed them on the tip of his tongue for a taste, then smacked his lips and made an oddly flamboyant expression.
"Its main component is still sodium chloride, but it also contains plenty of other minerals—calcium, magnesium, potassium, iron, zinc, sulfur, iron, nitrates, nitrites, and so on."
"We took it to the camp before, but the quartermaster offered a very low buyback price. Eventually, nobody bothered collecting it anymore, so it was easy for us to get this much from the mines!"
"If we mix it into the paste and knead it evenly, it can make our mud cakes saltier and greatly improve the taste."
Only then did Annie understand. She unconsciously rubbed her fingers together again before frowning.
"But mineral salt is highly toxic, right?"
-
(゜-゜)
Unexpectedly, that green-skin—Azure Corridor—merely nodded cheerfully. He had no intention of denying it or hiding the matter.
"That's right, it really is highly toxic!"