The trial production of soy sauce was a huge success. Harano was very pleased, but Ah Man had a stroke of bad luck and ended up contaminated like a little otter, knitting her bean-sprout eyebrows while wrestling with a philosophical question: Am I in a river? Is this a river world? Am I really living in a world that's just one big river?!
But Aki, Yayoi, and the Momoi brothers didn't have her level of curiosity—they weren't the type who needed to get to the bottom of everything—and since they had no idea how long traditional soy sauce brewing was supposed to take, they just accepted this as totally normal, not the least bit surprised. —Maybe that's why the smarter and more knowledgeable you are, the easier it is to go nuts!
After sampling the soy sauce, they all loved it, raving about how delicious it was, and Yayoi even ladled some out to take home, planning to bottle it up and treat everyone to soy sauce over rice for dinner.
