Tanimaki Enters a Bread-Baking Contest (Part 6)

From somewhere in the crowd came a voice saying, “See? Women just aren’t cut out for this.”

They said that because Tanimaki was in Coco’s body.

“I ain’t no woman, meow!”

Tanimaki blurted out, and Mayutan immediately clapped a paw over his mouth. If anyone discovered that they had switched bodies, they would be disqualified.

The person most frustrated by those words was Coco.

“I’ll make them acknowledge the bread I baked—no matter what!”

Coco made a firm vow to herself.

Her bread finished baking as well. She carefully removed it from the oven, her hands trembling slightly with nerves as she gripped the baker’s peel.

The loaf was a brilliant golden brown, with an aroma that made the heart leap. Its plump silhouette looked so light and fluffy that it might float into the air like a cloud at any moment. She had created a loaf that seemed capable of tantalizing people’s taste buds before they had even taken a bite.

One after another, the other contestants who saw it announced that they were withdrawing. They must have decided they had no chance of winning. In the end, only twelve contestants remained.

The competition concluded, and the judging began. At last, it was time to announce the winner.

“The winner is Tanimaki!”

Cheers and startled murmurs erupted throughout the venue.

The true winner was not Tanimaki, but Coco in his body. For a moment, Tanimaki mistakenly thought that his own name had been called and gave a triumphant fist pump.

Coco stood at the center of the stage, and a microphone was held out to her as the winner. But then she made an announcement no one had expected.

“I switched bodies with someone through magic. I’m actually a woman.”

The crowd began to murmur. No one seemed to understand why she would go out of her way to reveal it.

“You would have won if you had kept quiet. Why did you confess?”

The host asked Coco with a bewildered expression.

“I have my professional pride as a baker—and my pride as a woman.”

With that, Coco stepped down from the stage.

Naturally, she was disqualified.

Meanwhile, Tanimaki got completely drunk while drowning his sorrows and had to be carried back to the bakery on Mayutan’s back.