There were five tables in front of the magic screens, and each had a ballot box. The staff wearing red vests were counting ballots. They were also checking each and every ballot with crystal b.a.l.l.s. If the crystal ball glowed green, the ballot was valid; if it glowed red, the ballot was invalid."Hey, guys, check out this restaurant!" said a short-haired young member of the staff. "Its dishes are so expensive! Tofu pudding, 200 copper coins; roujiamo, 300; Yangzhou fried rice, 600; braised chicken and rice, 800! This customer ate 1,000 copper coins" worth of food for breakfast. Can you believe that?"
Rood and Arvin were shocked.
"His waitress snuck this ballot in the box, probably," Arvin sneered. "No one would spend 1,000 on breakfast in that remote restaurant. Each person can vote once every day, so maybe he"ll get 10 ballots."
"I thought only large restaurants would hire people to vote," Rood said, angry. "Customers" total expense on each dish is an important factor in the compet.i.tion, and his dishes are all overpriced. More and more customers are questioning the fairness of this event. If you ask me, we should make some changes."
"Keep it down. We shouldn"t talk about things like that," Arvin whispered nervously, looking around. "Although the Catering a.s.sociation is a governmental agency, the member restaurants in the Chamber of Commerce are giving us a lot of money every month. We should stay on their good side."
"I know." Rood sighed. "I"ve been working here for over 20 years. The compet.i.tion was never like this back in the day, and the top-ranking restaurants used to live up to their rankings. But, everything has changed after the Moreton Family took over the chamber. We"re just p.a.w.ns in their games now!"
"I"ve got one from that Mamy Restaurant too. 1,300 copper coins!" another staff member said.
Rood and Arwin were angry as well as surprised.
"Three here. 500 copper coins, 1,000 copper coins, and 1,100 copper coins."
"I got one—200 copper coins."
"I found another two!"
As far as they were concerned, this was not normal—not for a small restaurant.
Even the famous Dukas Restaurant couldn"t do this well at breakfast time.
The staff started discussing.
"Isn"t it the first time this restaurant entered the compet.i.tion? Could it be a dark horse?"
"Judging from these ballots, 800 copper coins" worth of food isn"t enough to make them feel full. That"s the shocking thing here."
"The prices must be wrong."
"But the prices are the same as the registered prices here," a staff member said, pointing at the record in the notebook.
They fell silent, and looked to the lean middle-aged man. "What do we do, Deputy President?" a staff member asked.
"Let"s not jump to conclusions just yet," said Robert. "If those ballots can pa.s.s the test of the crystal ball, they are valid. I"ll go check this restaurant myself. If they play dirty, we"ll ban them from this compet.i.tion forever."
"Deputy President just got transferred here from the castle of Chaos City," Rood said to Arvin. "He wants to make this compet.i.tion thing right, but he"s alone and helpless. He is even willing to come out here and do everything himself. If we"d had more officials like him, the Catering a.s.sociation wouldn"t have ended up like this."
"There is something wrong about that restaurant, and Deputy President will find out what!" Arvin said, clenching his fist.
The staff got back to work.
"In total, there are 320 ballots from that restaurant, Deputy President. Also, the total number comes to 150,400 copper coins!" said an old accountant who had 30 years" experience.
The staff all looked angry and shocked.
They had never known a restaurant in the Aden Square to make this much during breakfast time every day.
Besides, this restaurant wasn"t even famous enough for them to know.
"They are cheating!" a staff member said.
"We should ban it, Deputy President. You don"t need to go there to check it," said another person.
Robert also looked astonished. "No. Give me the files on this restaurant." Judging by its morning sales alone, it will easily make it into top 100. If it could do this well at lunch and dinner, it would probably enter the top 50.
The old accountant handed the files to Robert. "We have confirmation that this restaurant has been open for less than a month."
Robert read the files, which were not very detailed, and then frowned. If I can"t ensure the fairness of the compet.i.tion, the Catering a.s.sociation will lose its credibility.
…
Mag was worrying about his ranking, and the fact that sweet tofu pudding people and savory tofu pudding people were giving one star to their undesirable flavor was not helping.
"I"m home, Father! I learned a new spell today!" Amy said. She sounded very excited.