What's this shit?

"We get used to it." Simple as that. Why the hell couldn't he just put on some clothes and get used to it himself? "By the time we're your age we've had decades of wearing clothes without issue. Being naked is normally weird for humans, and before you demand to know why we can't all be naked, we're stuck to the ground. We have to deal with rocks and varying temperatures, and clothes are one of the ways we keep from freezing." He was starting to get a better idea of the kind of questions Ulrich was going to ask, although he couldn't quite tell how many of them were genuine questions, and how many of them were Ulrich poking at his human mannerisms.

"And it would be considered odd for a human to walk around the house completely naked, especially in front of someone who is more or less a stranger." Because he was, more or less, a stranger. He had 'met' Ulrich years before, but that didn't count. They hadn't even said two words to each other at the time.

He could hardly just call for a pizza for Ulrich's first meal on land, and while he'd prefer to have an actual chef feeding him, he'd just have to do. He tried to ignore just how naked Ulrich was, stepped into the kitchen and pulling open the fridge.

He was almost disappointed to find it was well stocked. So much for an excuse to flee the house and come back with food. He let out a little sigh, forced to improvise. He wasn't much of a chef, but he could at least cook the basics.

"Sit down or... I don't know. I'm going to need like... an hour? Maybe that." He didn't want to just microwave stuff, which meant he was getting Nicolas's old throwback: Chicken in red wine sauce. Paprika, minced garlic, olive oil, brown sugar... and of course, red wine.

Humans couldn't be expected to just eat raw food, but he hadn't given much thought to how Ulrich would react to eating cooked food. It was bad for animals in some cases,but at the same time, Ulrich wasn't an animal - he'd squished himself down into human form. For all Nicolas knew, he wasn't even capable of eating things raw anymore.

Having someone watching him make food was a weird experience. He'd always cooked solo before, and he kept glancing up at Ulrich (Who was still fucking naked) as he set about preparing. "You should keep back, because hot oil will burn your skin like nothing else." He muttered, grabbing the skillet and starting to heat the oil. From there, it wasn't very hard - cook the garlic, put the chicken in, ten minutes each side until it wasn't pink and the juices were coming out clear.

Once the cooking itself was done, he carefully drained the oil, sprinkling the chicken with paprika an the brown sugar, and then pouring the red wine around the chicken. He slid the cover over the skillet and then stepped back, flipping the stove to simmer.

He'd done it a thousand times, to say the least.

"You've got like, fifteen minutes until it's done." All he had to do was baste the chicken with the sauce while it cooked every few minutes. "Can you even eat raw fish in that form? Humans aren't supposed to eat raw meat." Not very much, anyway. Too many parasites or other issues.

"For the record, allergies are because we have overactive immune systems." If you had allergies, it meant your immune system was too good, and you were going to have a better chance against all those lovely foodborne parasites. "Has it occurred to you that part of it has to do with being on land? There's only so many fish in the sea, but we've got rats and birds and bugs and bacteria." And god knows what else he was leaving out. He didn't really know how viruses travelled underwater, but he'd take a solid guess they travelled less effectively than they did on land.

"You have less variety in your diet, so your body is more prepared to deal with specific parasites." Where as humans had a massive amount of variety, and it varied pretty wildly even between different groups of humans. "For the record, we do eat some food raw, we just have to be careful about it." Mostly for reasons having to do with fecal matter. Ugh, that was an unpleasant thought with food cooking - no, better not to think about how Ulrich went to the bathroom in the ocean.

The only really challenging part about cooking, Nicolas found, was cutting. Cutting could be... difficult. He'd gotten damn good at it over time, but it still challenged him, and he still didn't like doing it in front of people. Not that he had much of an option. He was going to have to eat in front of Ulrich, or else starve.

He cut a small slice in the side of the breast, checking it's color before deciding it was done. Taking it off the stove was easy stuff, and he carefully served a breast each onto a plate, setting it down in front of Ulrich before abruptly realizing his mistake.

"Do you... even know how to use cutlery?" Because if he didn't, that was going to be another thing he'd have to teach him... and it'd be a huge pain in the ass. Coordination was definitely Ulrich's number one challenge at that moment.