Riches and Bitches: I have a gate to an isekai and leveling-up system!

"I cannot overstate the importance of food in the current, early stage."

Leading the princess towards a smaller, secondary storage field, I eagerly started with the explanations.

As per the terms of peace, she was to oversee the takeover of the war captives and ensure they were treated fairly. And the food scheme was just the right way for me to convey to her the very spirit of our thinking.

"This is the food that we will feed everyone in the first few days," I soon introduced after bringing the princess over to one of the crates and prying its cover open with a crowbar I found lying around.

The crate's insides were filled to the brim with neatly stacked rows upon rows of columns of small cans. Each of the metal containers was roughly the size of a man's fist and contained a portion of a meal.

By combining various types of cans, one could easily construct all sorts of breakfasts, lunches, or dinners, with the number of cans determining the size and variety of the meal.

Or, in other words, the absolute bottom of the tier when it came to what soldiers would like to survive on.

"Those have a bland taste and can be weird to get used to at first. Their saving grace is how we can keep them stored for several years with no worry about spoiling. This is the very bottom tier of food that we want to feed everyone at first. But surprisingly," I allowed myself a small smile befitting a cunning bard telling a compelling story to amuse the crowd of the inn.

"Those are actually quite expensive, because of how extremely convenient they are. But those," I pointed my hand towards the next crate, "are what we will feed those who work hard."

Picking up a selection of cans from the first crate, I threw my haul into a simple, plastic bag and moved to open the next crate. From there, I pulled out a variety of proper military rations, each set wrapped in a tactical band-aid.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

"Each of those packets can feed a hard-working man for a day. All you need is to add water and smash the heater pack to let it boil to have a warm meal along with an assortment of snacks, drinks, and useful trinkets."

In order to aid my presentation, I used the sharp edge of the crowbar to cut through the tightly wrapped net of the tactical band-air, opening the packet and separating a huge number of small packages before spreading them all over the crate's wooden lid.

"Lastly, once we get some time to organize it, we plan to set up a network of mobile kitchens. While we will use those two types of supply for quite some time, I can't wait to see their faces when they will all be served a proper, warm meal a day."

Staring off into the distance, an imaginary picture of how the camp would look like in the future overlayed with my actual vision.

The long rows of grave-like ditches and actually quite a few of already constructed tent sheds turned into comfortable barracks… or rather, a worker's dormitory split between private quarters, common living areas, backyards for garden-farming and then access to the rest of the city.

The several piles of crates in the designated stockpile areas became massive warehouses, housing far more cargo than what one could store directly on the ground even in their wildest dreams.

The beaten paths became solid, wide roads. The empty parts of the plains turned into massive factories, profiteering off the transit through my gates…

For a second, I saw a city planner's greatest dream crawling all over the virgin lands of this world, consuming nature like some sort of shadowy monster and churning out unimaginable amounts of wealth into the pockets of everyone even most remotely involved in the trade…

And then, all of this vision suddenly reverted, condensed into a single point, a single square-to-be where exhausted and hungry imperials would gather up to get their well-earned, warm meal and then some sort of leisure to let them regain the strength for the rest of the day.

'It all starts with building up people's motivation,' I thought, fully aware that I was looking at the future from beneath precariously pink glasses.

However, the colonization of new, rich lands was the one type of instant get-rich scheme for entire countries and nations that allowed the creation of the level of wealth necessary to bring forth utopia.

'With that in mind, would it be wrong to carve out a small heaven for me and Fay, right at where the two worlds converge?' I thought, staring off into the distance, strangely enraptured by this beautiful vision.

"Hello? Are you awake?"

Only now Etaria's voice reached my brain, leading me to stumble a bit and lean heavier over the edge of the wooden crate.

"Sorry, I was lost in my thoughts," I excused myself while shaking my head to clear my focus. "Oh right, what's the point of me showing all of them if I won't let you get a taste?"

Putting up a huge smile on my face, I pinched at the edge of one of the preserved cans before tearing the thin, metal lid off.

"Look," I cautiously guided Etaria's attention as I used the tip of my knife to get a chunk of the meat paste and stuffed it into my mouth.

'Urgh…'

My face slightly twitched when faced with the extremely bland taste. It hardly felt like meat, and more like a paste infused with chemicals that were supposed to make it taste like real meat.

Still, the hint of a taste was there. And with just this tiny chunk, I could feel my body regaining a bit of energy.

What this food lacked in taste, it surely got back when it came to its nutritional value.

It was a super-food designed for the hardened veterans fighting in places where supplies were an actual issue!

"Here, wanna try it?" I passed over the opened can to the princess, genuinely curious whether she would take it or not.

"Your face…" Etaria muttered, giving the can a look of hesitation before glancing up into my eyes. "It wasn't exactly… inviting."

'Oh right,' only now it struck me.

I couldn't help but feel repulsed by this canned food before I had some hints of what it might be made from. And this thought instantly made my body reject its taste. But for Etaria…

'Wait, I wonder if they lack spices,' I thought, suddenly recalling one of the minor aspects of life that had an influence one could overestimate over the course of history.

Still not sure, Etaria hesitatingly pulled out her knife, alerting several of the soldiers that passed by while doing so.

Thankfully, no one bothered to try to make an arrest when she dug her blade into the meat paste and then brought it to her mouth to carefully snack on it.

"This is…" a small whisper escaped Etaria's lips as they trembled a bit, right as the princess pulled back from the knife and looked at the remaining piece of the minced and then boiled meat.

The princess's golden eyes moved up as she threw me a slightly startled look.

"This is surprisingly good…"

'Oh my!'

It wasn't Etaria's words that made me twitch.

It was the spark in her eyes, the first genuine spark of a positive emotion that I saw actually manifest in this otherwise either perfectly cold and stoic or extremely emotional princess.

"How about some…" Actually amused by the reaction, I looked over to the rest of the cans that I brought over from the other crate. "Fruits? Dark… I mean, sour chocolate? Condensed milk… No, scratch that, I don't think those will be any good."

There was absolutely no sense or reason for me to discard the condensed milk tins. In fact, they were the only ones that caught my attention when I picked up a few of them before.

The only reason why I yapped like that, was to intrigue the princess.

And from the look on her face, I completed that task with full marks!

"What's condensed milk? Why do you think it's not good?"

Maybe it was curiosity, or maybe it was a woman's natural sense of craving for sweets?

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"Actually, this is kind of a child's snack back where I'm from…" I suggested in a reluctant voice while averting my eyes and smiling at my thoughts.

'If so, what kind of company would ever pack it for soldier's rations? Oh,' I suddenly reflected on myself, 'maybe this world still didn't do away with child soldiers…'

With my thoughts suddenly darkening, I waved my hand as if to imply I was giving up and opened up the can with the sweet, condensed milk. A thick and perfectly white paste so viscus, one could easily pick it up with a flat part of a knife's blade.

I low-key knew what to expect, but when Etaria brought the treat to her mouth and gave it a whiff…

Her eyes opened up.

The sense of stillness that marked her expression ever since I first met her has melted down, as her full attention moved down, along her eyes, to the white, thick liquid on her knife.

With a focus on a general deciding where to set up the great battle to end the whole war, the princess opened her full, red lips before slowly, slowly pushing the knife's tip into her mouth…

'Whoops,' I courtly looked away, giving the princess some time to get herself familiar with the sweet taste of the treat…

"Hiyup!"

A strange, high-pitched sound followed, forcing my eyes back to Etaria's face.

Her cheeks were fully blushed, her eyes opened as wide as her eye-sockets allowed. And her jaw, perfectly still, mesmerized by the thick, sweet taste spreading in her mouth.

'I can't wait until she tries it boiled and caramelized,' I thought, no longer able to stop a small grin from taking over my face.

"You just wait until you try the normal rations," I added with a cheeky smile as I moved on to unpack the tastier food option while searching for the small packets with sweet treats contained within the set.

Still… a sense of distant guilt echoed in my soul, as a reflection over me amusing myself with expressions made me a girl other than Fay. And while I was sure this reflection alone was enough of a self-restraint I needed…

In the end, this wasn't me flirting with the golden princess.

It was me entertaining a royal of an empire I was trying to cooperate with, charming her with cheap treats while proving just how well I was going to take care of the men she was leaving in my care.

"You really should try this one," I passed the princess over a small bar of chocolate while already working to prepare the warm part of the ration. "And this is the warm meal we will feed those who will work hard," I shook the heating-up, plastic package while Etaria sank her perfectly white teeth into the brown chunk of a relatively high-quality chocolate.

'Note for myself,' I thought, unwrapping the perfectly warm meal for the princess right as she hurriedly and ungracefully devoured the candy bar. 'Apologize properly to Fay later.'