In mid-July, the weather was exceptionally hot, humid, and stuffy. Rong Se was rather delicate in this regard, tolerating neither heat nor cold. When he lived alone previously, he relied on floor heating in the winter and air conditioning in the summer, stepping outside only when absolutely necessary. Now, however, he had to wake up on time to attend court and listen to those officials engage in verbal sparring, leaving him utterly exhausted. For the past two days, he hadn’t even wanted to visit Fusheng Restaurant.
Beneath the grape trellis in the small courtyard, a rattan chair and a low table had been set up. A plate of cherries rested on the table, resting on a bed of crushed ice. Rong Se reclined in the rattan chair, motionless, closing his eyes to enjoy the leisure.
He wore only a single layer of thin, plain-colored silk undergarment, his long hair gathered up with a wooden hairpin, exposing his slender, jade-white neck. Several wisps of short hair hung down his temples, displaying a thoroughly unkempt look.
Liang Shenyu had continually delayed mentioning his return to Qiangzhou, and Rong Se maintained his forbearance as well, keeping the imperial court relatively stable for the time being.
Yet Rong Se did not dare lower his guard for even a second.
After all, Duke Huan’s estate had followed the original plot by submitting several impeachment memorials, resulting in nothing more than being relentlessly chewed out by the officials in Rong Se’s faction for days on end.
Rong Se knew whose handiwork was behind the scenes, and having heard that Rong Jing had summoned Liang Shenyu into the palace for long private talks on multiple occasions, he understood this was the prelude to the little white flower attempting to use past sentiment and infatuation to sway Liang Shenyu.
To give him something to be annoyed about, Rong Se brought up during several morning court sessions that the emperor was no longer young and ought to select a consort. The resulting uproar over the past few days was more than enough to keep Rong Jing thoroughly agitated.
Did he have his eyes on Liang Shenyu? As an elder, Rong Se naturally had to fulfill some elder-ly duties.
Such as breaking up a mandarin duck couple, or launching a relentless campaign of urging marriage.
As long as the other party was miserable, Rong Se felt quite pleased inside.
“Master!” Yun Chu hurried over, calling out from outside the grape trellis, “Something has happened with Lan Ying.”
Rong Se’s languor vanished in an instant. He sat up abruptly and asked, “What is wrong?”
It was no wonder he made a fuss; ever since arriving in this place, Rong Se had never truly set his mind at ease. He was merely an ordinary person blending into the crowd, and every single moment here felt like walking on the edge of a blade, constantly filled with anxiety and dread.
Yun Chu said, “It is Song He, the cook who used to work at Fusheng Restaurant. Today, he brought along a recipe book and publicly claimed that all the dishes at Fusheng Restaurant were recorded in his ancestral recipe book.”
Rong Se fell silent for a moment. His memory capacity wasn’t that massive, but he vaguely remembered this person.
“Life is actually quite short,” Rong Se suddenly remarked.
Uncomprehending, Yun Chu asked, “What?”
Rong Se picked up a cherry, plucked off its stem, and said through gritted teeth, “Since this bastard wants to take a shortcut, I will grant his wish!”
He had spent so much grueling effort memorizing those recipes, yet this guy claimed plagiarism just like that, treating the Great Jin as if it had a plagiarism-checking database!
Yun Chu froze. The corners of his mouth twitched, wanting to laugh but not daring to.
Why get this furious over it?
Inside Fusheng Restaurant, the dining hall was packed with patrons, all watching the excitement.
The young girl in a blue dress wore a gentle hair bun adorned with soft floral pins, but her expression was fiercely sharp. Her cold gaze locked onto the middle-aged man kneeling and making a scene, making her grind her teeth in resentment.
If they weren’t in full view of the public, she would have snapped this bastard’s neck right then and there!
“Taking something without asking is called being a thief.” A young nobleman with the air of a scholar walked down from the second floor. It was none other than Yan Shuning. With a mild tone, he said, “Since you took someone else’s property, you naturally ought to return it in its original state.”
Having recently received a personal summons from the emperor and hooked up with the Cao family faction, he was hosting the Cao family’s young master today. Not having forgotten the humiliation dealt by Fusheng that day, he chimed in to stir up trouble.
As his voice trailed off, a man dressed in black and wearing a mask entered from the front doors, accompanied by a faint scoff: “Whose things were taken, and what were they? Spell it out clearly for me right here today.”
This outfit was Rong Se’s signature attire, black clothing that hid dirt well. Hearing the news, he had rushed over immediately, but he hadn’t expected to run into an arch-rival like Yan Shuning.
When the Yan father and son were in the private pavilion of Fusheng Restaurant that day, he had glanced over and happened to recognize him.
Looking closer, there was yet another person standing on the staircase.
Rong Se narrowed his eyes.
It was Cao Lun’s son, the younger male lead archetype from the original novel, Cao Haoyun.
Fortunately, his attire today differed from usual. Judging by the look in Cao Haoyun’s eyes, he clearly hadn’t recognized him, Rong Se thought to himself.
Frowning, Yan Shuning was about to ask about his identity when Lan Ying raised her voice and declared, “Master? Why have you come? This is just a trivial matter; this subordinate can handle it.”
Rong Se walked up to her, gently ruffled the top of the young girl’s head, she was half a head shorter than him, and smiled. “I know, but I can’t just let a group of grown men bully a single girl like you. Besides, I’d also like to know how Chef Song, who worked at Fusheng Restaurant for half a month, never showed up for duty, and never even set foot in the kitchen, found the audacity to claim my dishes were stolen from his ancestral recipe book?”
Rong Se didn’t lower his voice. Taking advantage of the large crowd, he lowered his gaze toward the kneeling Song He on the floor and said loudly, “Since everyone is here, you must have brought the evidence. Bring it out for everyone to take a look and see what ancestral recipe book my Fusheng Restaurant allegedly stole.”
A flash of panic crossed Song He’s eyes as he clutched the recipe book tightly against his chest and guarded it fiercely. “This is my family’s heirloom treasure! You think you can just look at it whenever you want?”
Rong Se scoffed. “Then how did your family’s heirloom treasure end up on Fusheng Restaurant’s menu?”
Song He retorted, “Who knows what despicable methods you used to copy my family’s ancestral recipes!”
“Very well, let me ask you this then,” Rong Se said coldly. “You worked at Fusheng Restaurant for quite some time. Why didn’t you ever cook any of the dishes from the recipe?”
Song He spoke with absolute righteousness: “This is an heirloom! An ancestral recipe! Do you have any idea how precious this recipe book is? How could it be shown around casually?”
“Oh,” Rong Se mocked. “So your family’s recipe book isn’t meant for cooking, it’s meant for you to offer three sticks of incense to every day?”
Bursts of laughter erupted from the crowd. Song He’s face alternated between green and red as he raised his volume and yelled, “That’s my business! What does it have to do with you? This recipe book belongs to my Song family. You stealing my recipes makes you shameless scoundrels! This recipe book is the only one of its kind in the world and is priceless! Since you stole the recipes, you must pay compensation today!”
“Precisely so.” Having harbored a bias against Fusheng from the start, Yan Shuning grew aggressive as well. “Since the recipes belong to them, they can choose to cook them if they wish, or not cook them if they don’t. By what right did you steal someone else’s recipes to amass wealth?”
Lan Ying put one hand on her hip, pointed at Yan Shuning, and scolded, “For someone who looks like a scholar, you’ve clearly stuffed all your sage teachings straight into a dog’s belly! Open your eyes and look properly: a cook who doesn’t even know how to make Fusheng Restaurant’s signature dishes holds a recipe book that he refuses to show anyone, and claims we stole his ancestral recipes based on that? With zero evidence, if I claimed you were actually my grandmother’s biological son, would you admit to that too?”
Yan Shuning’s face turned beet red with frustration. “Vulgarian woman!”
Lan Ying snorted with a laugh. “Still better than someone who can’t tell right from wrong.”
Rong Se chuckled inwardly. Lan Ying was always like this; whenever trouble arose, she would invariably step forward first, as if she could shoulder all the wind and rain entirely on her own.
“Alright, leave the rest to me.”
Rong Se patted Lan Ying’s shoulder, pulled a recipe notebook out from his front robes, and stood composed and unhurried.
“Recipes, is it? Who doesn’t have one?”