"Spit it out. What happened?" Yan Yifei stood with his arms crossed, motioning with his eyes for the two to explain.
Gao Haiyang recounted the incident in excruciating detail, adding plenty of embellishments. Afterward, he started crying and wailing again, begging Yan Yifei to seek justice for him.
"Give me two skewers so I can try them. Is this food really so good that it almost made you two fight and burst into tears!?" Ling Fei demanded in a crisp voice, reaching out toward Gao Haiyang to snatch them away.
Gao Haiyang desperately hugged the temperature-controlled box with both arms, shaking his head violently as he shrieked, "Impossible! You’re not even getting half a skewer!! Over my dead body!"
Yan Yifei looked at Gao Haiyang, completely speechless. "As your Captain, I need to know what exactly makes you so obsessed with these skewers. What if it’s some addictive spice? Hurry up and bring them out for testing!"
"I already tested them! There are no addictive spices. Eating them occasionally won’t cause any issues. Even if there was a problem, it would just be a minor one that a single bottle of Recovery Potion could fix! You don’t need to worry, Captain."
However, since Yan Yifei was the Captain after all, Gao Haiyang grimaced in pain as he reluctantly pulled out five lamb skewers.
He thought, "This is my limit! I absolutely cannot give up any more. Besides, I’m kind of curious to see the Captain’s exquisite face on the verge of tears. He’d definitely look even more pitiful and moving! Hehe."
The moment the roasted lamb skewers were brought out, a rich aroma instantly permeated the entire living room. Three of the four people in the room stared at the skewers and gulped.
The remaining person, Yan Yifei, maintained a calm facade as he tugged the skewers from Gao Haiyang’s tight grip. Deep down, however, he was anything but calm. He stared at the roasted meat, which seemed to be screaming, "Eat me! Come eat me quickly! I’m delicious!"
Taking a reserved bite, he chewed slowly, his eyes growing a bit red. Seeing the other three watching him with eager, longing gazes, he took another bite. His expression remained composed and elegant, but the uncontrollable tears rolling down his face betrayed his true feelings. He thought, "This is even better than what our family’s head chef makes! It’s just a bit too spicy."
In just a few bites, he demolished all five lamb skewers. He calmly wiped his tears away, then elegantly dabbed at the corners of his mouth. Ignoring the aggrieved, hesitant expressions of the other three, he spoke lightly.
"The taste is decent, but that was too little to really get a good sense of the flavor. Take them all out. We’ll send a few skewers to the chef to study, and we’ll split the rest. Once the chef figures it out, you can eat as much as you want." After speaking, he wiped away a few lingering tears and gave Gao Haiyang a pointed look. He thought, "HISS... it’s really so spicy!"
Gao Haiyang clutched the temperature-controlled box tightly with both hands, eyeing Yan Yifei with deep suspicion. His face screamed his disbelief: *Don’t even think about coming after my skewers!*
Seeing that the Captain had given the word, Lu Ziyu and Ling Fei immediately lunged forward to snatch the box.
Gao Haiyang, with his garbage physical stamina, ultimately failed to protect his temperature-controlled box. He ended up sprawled on the floor with disheveled hair, looking like a broken ragdoll. Watching helplessly as his precious roasted meat skewers were carried further and further away, he couldn’t help but burst into sorrowful tears!
Yan Yifei looked at Gao Haiyang’s dramatic posturing. He wondered if this guy had enrolled in the wrong school; he really should have gone to the acting department of a comprehensive university. Just look at how realistic his performance was—even as his Captain, Yan Yifei was struggling to control the urge to beat him up.
***
The moment Gan Lan woke up the next morning, she went straight to the mirror. The 1,000 Credit Points Nutrition Potion certainly lived up to its reputation! Her complexion had already taken on a rosy hue. She examined her reflection closely and thought, "Hmm... I think I’ve grown half a centimeter taller. Excellent! I’ll work hard to earn more money and keep buying these to drink. I definitely won’t drag down the school’s average height!"
After finishing her classes, Gan Lan arrived at the Food Street. Her stall from yesterday had already been rented by someone else. She felt a twinge of regret; she really should have renewed the lease for that spot for a whole month. But regretting it now was useless, so she could only find a new location.
Putting on her mask and gloves, she quickly and skillfully began grilling. As she grilled, she called out to attract customers, and the domineering aroma of roasted lamb began to drift through the street.
"Junior, so this is where you set up your stall today! I saw someone else selling grilled meat at your spot from yesterday. There was a huge crowd gathered around, and the vendor was wearing a mask, so I assumed it was you and got in line. It wasn’t until I reached the front that I realized it wasn’t you—after all, she’s much taller than you. Since I had already waited, I bought a skewer. It tasted just like the stuff we usually get in the cafeteria—a bit bland. It wasn’t rich and endlessly flavorful like the ones you grill!"
After speaking, the customer took a deep, greedy sniff of the fragrant aroma wafting from the grill.
"Right, I went and bought some too. I got five skewers. They smelled nice enough, but the taste was definitely lacking. Still, I was just glad it didn’t taste weird!"
"I went there too, but your barbecue is way better!! Junior, grill me ten skewers! Make them mildly spicy!"
The returning customers from yesterday chattered away, eagerly gossiping with Gan Lan.
Gan Lan had anticipated being imitated once her business took off, but she never expected it to happen this fast. Furthermore, they were exploiting the tiny bit of reputation she had worked so hard to build yesterday to sell their own meat. This left her feeling a little uncomfortable.
Although her original intention was to spread Earth’s culinary civilization throughout this futuristic era, it wasn’t supposed to happen like this!
She decided to push the thought aside. She would focus on the present, secure a stable livelihood for her future, and then worry about the rest. However, Gan Lan still planned to reduce her lamb skewer inventory by a thousand tomorrow and introduce something new. After all, when it came to barbecue, anything could be grilled!
Gan Lan took out the price board she had prepared yesterday and wrote down a few things, including the health risks of eating too much barbecue:
*Roasted Lamb Skewers: 10 Credit Points / skewer*
*Bonus: Buy 10 or more skewers and receive complimentary green vegetables!*
*The vegetable leaves can be wrapped around the lamb, or eaten after finishing the meat. Feel free to unlock even more ways to eat them on your own!*
*Tomorrow’s Menu: To Be Determined...*
*Friendly Reminder: Barbecue can easily cause excess internal heat. It is not recommended to overeat, or it should be paired with green vegetables!*
She placed the large sign next to the charcoal grill. As for whether the customers bought a lot or a little, that was no longer her concern!
Next, she set out the lettuce. Anyone buying ten or more skewers would get two massive lettuce leaves. Ingredients in this futuristic world had basically all evolved; a single lettuce leaf was about the size of a normal lotus leaf. She thought, "I am truly a remarkably honest and generous seller. I deserve a thumbs-up!"
"Junior, Junior! How do we eat these vegetable leaves? Do we just eat them raw like this!?" a customer asked, holding up two giant lettuce leaves and staring at Gan Lan with wide eyes.
Gan Lan’s hands didn’t stop moving as she continued to grill. Hearing this, she looked up in amusement and replied, "You can try wrapping the lamb in the leaves, or you can eat a few leaves after finishing the meat to cut through the grease. The sign lists the eating methods and a friendly reminder." She pointed to the board standing next to the charcoal grill.
After reading the sign, the slender senior student gave Gan Lan a thumbs-up.
Following the scent, yesterday’s regulars quickly tracked Gan Lan down. They chattered excitedly, saying they had finally found the barbecue junior they had been thinking about all night. They explained how they had been fooled by the imposter’s barbecue while searching for her, and after eating it, they weren’t feeling great and desperately needed Gan Lan’s barbecue to wash the taste out of their mouths!
Some regulars also suggested that Gan Lan create an account on the school’s forum. That way, she could post her stall’s time and location before setting up, making it easier for them to find her.
Gan Lan’s heart stirred as she listened. Why hadn’t she thought of that earlier? She had been trapped by the mindset of her past life and hadn’t managed to adapt. She decided she would go register for a forum account as soon as she packed up her stall.
Gan Lan gave the senior who made the suggestion two extra lamb skewers and thanked her sincerely, promising that once her account was registered, she would write the account name on her sign.