A few hours earlier.
Inside a small warehouse at the Firearms Factory that had been temporarily converted into a workshop.
Simple wooden partitions divided the space into two sections. One was purely a work area, where Lorne drew up designs and built firearms by hand.
The other served as a rudimentary living area, piled with basic necessities, a few changes of clothing, and even a small gas stove and a set of basic cookware.
After all, he sometimes conducted business in his office, so leaving all these personal belongings there would have been inappropriate.
What had surprised and delighted Lorne beyond measure today was finding rice at the market. God only knew how excited he had been when he saw those familiar white grains.
Apparently, Backlund did have rice. He simply hadn't made a point of looking for it before.
Ever since transmigrating, he had eaten bread every day, to the point that he was practically sick of it. The bricklike texture of black bread went without saying, but even the fairly tasty oatmeal bread became unbearably tiresome after too much of it.
Although the rice in this world seemed to be a different variety from what he had known before transmigrating, with slightly longer grains, at least it was rice!
The only blemish on this otherwise perfect occasion was a minor mishap while cooking it, which had left the rice at the bottom of the pot slightly burnt.
"Sigh, there aren't any rice cookers in this era yet. Cooking rice on a gas stove is quite a hassle."
Looking at the pale yellow crust at the bottom of the pot, Lorne felt a pang of regret, but quickly comforted himself.
"Oh well, even burnt rice is still rice-"
"Besides, this little gas stove is pretty convenient."
He turned to