The Game Of Life

But the kitchen was Jiang Jiankang"s territory. He was the king in the kitchen. The knives, the woks, the cutting board, the gas, all of those were his loyal servants. There was no way Jiang Feng could take over it.

A whole morning had pa.s.sed, Jiang Feng finally found a chance to cook up a bowl of seaweed soup. He was lucky that Jiang Jiankang was too busy and handed the task to him.

The restaurant closed around 10 at night. Just like always, Jiang Jiankang and w.a.n.g Xiulian stayed to clean the kitchen and chased Jiang Feng back home.

Jiang Feng took two sticks of cuc.u.mbers with him before he left.

Jiang Feng wasn"t happy with what the system called his cuc.u.mber salad. He has been making that exact dish for Chen Xiuxiu ever since they were young. He thought that after practicing that dish for more than 10 years, it would at least have a rating of perfect or one-of-kind.

The amount of cuc.u.mber that Chen Xiuxiu had eaten would"ve been enough to wipe out a whole garden of cuc.u.mbers.

Jiang Feng returned to his home and stared at the two cuc.u.mbers in the kitchen.

One was thick and long, the other was thin and short. Scratches could be seen on the skins, a result of w.a.n.g Xiulian excess scrubbing.

Cuc.u.mber salad… How should I break them? (1)

Jiang Feng had smashed a lot of cuc.u.mbers in his life, none of them managed to survive his skill.

Should I do it like how those martial artists do in novels? I"ll use my ki to check the structures of the cuc.u.mber first. Then I"ll get my treasured knife and smashed it with the back of it…

Jiang Feng stopped thinking right there. It was pure fiction, and he could not continue the story any further.

He then raised his cleaver and smashed the cuc.u.mbers.

There wasn"t any aroma that seeped out from the cuc.u.mbers, nor lights flashed when he broke them.

He poured over some vinegar and a few drops of chili oil over the plated vegetables. In just a few seconds, two plates of cuc.u.mber salad were done.

The vinegar was made by Jiang Jiankang, and the chili oil was made by Jiang Feng.

[A plain and ordinary Cuc.u.mber Salad]

[A plate of Cuc.u.mber Salad with excess vinegar]

"…"

Jiang Feng had no idea why he could still see the pop-ups in his home, but he wasn"t pleased with what they said.

10 minutes later, Jiang Feng took the plate with too much vinegar to his neighbor.

Five minutes before that, w.a.n.g Xiulian returned and saw Jiang Feng making the dishes. He got scolded by her because making such a dish at night was a waste of food. He was instructed to finish one plate and give the other to Chen Xiuxiu.

"Xiuxiu loves this, right? She would even lick the plate clean when she was younger."

w.a.n.g Xiulian shouted as Jiang Feng left. Jiang Feng was worried that with how loud his mother was, Chen Xiuxiu would"ve heard what she said.

When Chen Xiuxiu opened the door and saw Jiang Feng with a plate of Cuc.u.mber Salad, she was stunned.

"Want some?" Jiang Feng asked, which was something he used to ask Chen Xiuxiu quite often.

"Yes," Chen Xiuxiu nodded without thinking.

Chen Duxiu wasn"t at home, which was normal. As long as Jiang Feng could remember, Chen Duxiu was always sent abroad to work every two or three days.

Jiang Feng placed the plate on the dining table. A bowl of plain cold congee could be seen under the dish cover with no side dishes.

The congee did not look appealing. It seemed like there were some burnt bits too.

"You haven"t had dinner yet?" Jiang Feng asked.

"I"m not hungry," Chen Xiuxiu replied.

Looking at how Chen Xiuxiu was starving herself, Jiang Feng did not say anything and went into the kitchen.

Compared to the kitchen in his home, which was almost as good as a kitchen in a restaurant, Chen Xiuxiu"s kitchen was far simpler. There were two knives on the rack, a cracked chopping board, a wok, a bottle of oil, and a small jar of salt. There weren"t any other spices in the kitchen he could use.

"Are you going to cook?" Chen Xiuxiu smiled and did not stop Jiang Feng. "There"s nothing here except for a bag of rice and some powdered meals."

Jiang Feng opened the fridge. It was as Chen Xiuxiu has said, there wasn"t anything in it except for a few cans of beer.

"Oh, and my dad"s beers," Chen Xiuxiu added. "I can just warm that congee and eat it if I"m hungry."

If the words that Chen Xiuxiu had said were heard by the chefs in the restaurants she"d always visited when she was younger, their jaws would drop to the floor.

When Chen Xiuxiu was younger, Jiang Jiankang fed her until she would only eat good food. Hearing her saying that she would rather eat a bowl of burnt congee was never heard.

"Fine. I"ll just make a decent congee for you then," Jiang Feng sighed and stared at the sack of rice.

After that, Chen Xiuxiu sat down and watched Jiang Feng cook quietly.

Jiang Feng and his family hated congee. Even if they were to eat some, they would never go for a bowl of plain congee. It would be something that was filled with seafood or meats. A bowl of unflavored congee would never appear on his dining table.

The critical part of cooking congee was the ratio of water and rice. The control over the fire was important too.

Of course, Jiang Feng had not mastered a skill and could not do that.

He could only whip up a pot of very plain, but not burnt, congee.

"It"s been a long time since we last met, right?" Chen Xiuxiu suddenly asked.

"Yup. Around a year I would say. You rarely show your face around here after you went to college," Jiang Feng nodded after thinking.

"Were you able to recognize me this afternoon? I used to be… well… fat, like a meatloaf," Chen Xiuxiu said as she looked at her arm.

"You weren"t that fat before," Jiang Feng said as he stirred the congee. "At least to my parents standard."

To Jiang Feng"s parents, anyone less than 100 kilograms wasn"t fat, just large.

"You"re right," Chen Xiuxiu laughed. "You guys were the only ones who thought I"m not fat."

"Weren"t you the one who said that dieting could harm your body?" Jiang Feng asked.

He remembered that Chen Xiuxiu would come to his family restaurant every day after school.

"I know that eating this much will make me fat," Chen Xiuxiu would say every time. "But this is how much I can eat. If I go on a diet, it could harm my body!"

"I know," Chen Xiuxiu laughed wryly. "I tried losing weight by exercising, but asking an 85-kilo girl to run a lap is just too much. Going on a diet and throwing up after meals is way easier."

Chen Xiuxiu paused and continued, "Now, I don"t need to wear custom made clothes because of my size. People have also stopped staring and making jokes at me because of it too. I don"t even need to use emetic anymore (2). Just the sight of oil and meat are enough to make me puke."

Jiang Feng did not say anything about it. His family was filled with people that were obese, but people would never joke about them because they were strong too. A slap from them would knock a person out.

Soon, the congee was done.

[A bowl of decent congee]

It was the best rating that Jiang Feng had gotten so far for the dishes he made.

When the bowl was placed in front of Chen Xiuxiu, she frowned.

She didn"t want to eat anything. She believed that she would even be fine if she never had to eat for the rest of her life.

But there was no way she could reject the bowl of congee that Jiang Feng has specially made for her.

She picked her chopsticks up and grabbed a piece of the cuc.u.mber.

Crunch

"Ding! Gained 10 experience points."

"This is good!" Chen Xiuxiu praised.

"?" Jiang Feng was confused.

If he remembered correctly, the plate of Cuc.u.mber Salad that Chen Xiuxiu was eating had extra vinegar in it.

(1) The cuc.u.mber salad is a Chinese dish that"s made by flattening pieces of cuc.u.mber by smashing them with the side of a knife.

(2) Emetic is a type of medicine that induces vomiting.