"Yeah -- which is one way that Koushiro's useful. He's got a practically effortless understanding of how this place works," Yamato says, a little wryly. "Get him somewhere like the Factory, the Temple, or the teleporting Sphinx, and he can even manipulate those rules for his own ends."

In the vending machine, one of the GRAPE?! drinks drops down. The liquid inside is a lurid, cut-price-soft-drink-for-kids purple, fizzing slightly. It's odourless, but definitely ice cold.

A taste will determine that it does not taste like grape, or really any fruit on Earth.

It mostly tastes like beef.