Chapter 12: A Weird Rule
Translator: Xiong Guoqi Editor: DesTheSloth
Sun Ming was making a call using Bluetooth while driving. The street was quite crowded during noontime. While watching the traffic carefully, he also had to give directions to his friends. He was very good at doing multiple things simultaneously.
“Monkey, you turn left in the front. I will be waiting for you two guys at the door of the restaurant.” Seeing that he was nearly there, he drove the car onto the narrow street with great care after giving his final directions to his friends.
“Sun, let me tell you. If the food is not to my satisfaction, after coming so far, you’d better call me a grandpa. Otherwise, you just wait and see.” The man on the other side of the phone was grumpy due to the heavy traffic. He could only hope that the restaurant Sun Ming found served really scrumptious food.
“Take it easy. You hurry up here with Ali.” He parked the car and found Yuan Zhou waiting for him. As he waved his hand to Yuan Zhou, he hung up the telephone.
His friends Monkey and Ali were meanwhile trying to find the way into the street. They looked at each other..
Both of them knew Sun Ming through a gourmet QQ group. Members in the group would recommended fine food nearby and often gathered together to party, they started to know, and later, got familiar with one another. Sun Ming was found of these two people. Fine delicacy definitely ought to be shared with good friends. As for making them suffer, Sun Ming would never admit it. After all, the Egg Fried Rice was indeed super delicious, except the fact there was also a horrible rule accompanying it.
“You really think there is such delicious Egg Fried Rice?” Monkey asked first. With a nickname like Monkey, he indeed seemed similar to one. Besides being skinny, his arms were especially long. With a good face and a short hair, he looked fairly spirited.
“Maybe.” Ali answered absentmindedly with a drowsy look.
Monkey looked at the drowsy Ali, “You didn’t sleep last night again, did you? Besides, did you still have a cold?”
“I am almost recovered. Concentrate on driving. We are nearly there.” Ali took a look at the road in the front and reminded Monkey. Smoothing the hair with his fingers, he crouched in the passenger seat.
“Save your breath. I know. Don’t sleep anymore. We’ll be there right away.” Monkey made a gentle turn into the street and looked around for Sun Ming’s car.
“There it is.” He drove ahead and parked next to Sun Ming’s car. Both cars were extremely near, yet his vehicle didn’t graze Sun Ming’s car at all. Judging by that, he was a driving expert.
“Let’s go. My friends are here. Now it’s your turn to shine and serve us something delicious.” Just as Sun Ming was about to greet Yuan Zhou, he saw Monkey parking his car. Thus he left that sentence behind and then went up to Monkey’s car.
“Don’t worry. I’m going to prepare now.” Yuan Zhou wasn’t going to greet the two friends of Sun Ming. He knew neither of them.
Yuan Zhou wasn’t an enthusiastic person. He spoke little, unless absolutely necessary and had gotten used to the loneliness. He would rather listen to the music quietly than talk with others. When he was upset, he liked counting money, which would always make him feel better.
His dream was to be able to count money until his hands cramped up and sleeping enough. However, reality was harsh.
“Ok.”
“Monkey, Ali, this way please.” Sun Ming stepped forward and greeted them.
“Sun, you said you discovered a good place but it's fairly crowded outside with so much traffic, yet there are so few people here.” Waiting until Ali got off the car, Monkey shut the door and said.
“Of course. Only at quiet and clean places can we enjoy our delicacy.” Saying that, Sun Ming turned around and pointed to Yuan Zhou’s restaurant, “This is the restaurant owned by my brother which I mentioned to you.”
Monkey and Ali raised their heads and looked at the restaurant in front of them. It looked really inconspicuous. It was a tiny eatery, the only difference was that this one looked fairly clean. Clean as it was, it didn’t even have a shop sign.
“Your brother didn’t even hang a shop sign?” No wonder Monkey felt weird. Although he was as skinny as his name revealed, he was nevertheless a senior foodie. He had left footprints in many nameless eateries. Before he came, Sun Ming had mentioned to him that this was a new restaurant operated by his good friend.
Other eateries didn’t have names because they ran their business at home thus it was not convenient to hang a shop sign, or they had lost their shop sign. Never had he seen a restaurant that was newly opened but didn’t have a shop sign.
“You ask too much. Come on in and eat.” Following their eyes, Sun Ming also just noticed Yuan Zhou’s restaurant didn’t even have a shop sign. Nevertheless, it was inappropriate for him to admit that he also didn’t know. Having said that, he led the two friends into the restaurant.
When he found Ali’s listless manner on the way, he asked and only then knew he was sick. He vowed solemnly, “Don’t worry. Even if you don’t have the appetite now, you will want to eat when you smell the fragrance.”
“Really? It’s really so awesome?” Hearing that, Ali got a little interest in the food despite his sickly body.
“Peng Peng”
Sun Ming thumped his chest and said, “Yes, it’s true.”
“Everybody please wait a little while. The Egg Fried Rice will be ready in no time.” Yuan Zhou turned around and said to the three people who had just sat down.
The spirited Monkey answered first, “No problem. You go ahead. We’ll have a look around.”
Afterwards, he turned around and looked about the restaurant. There was no rare furnishings or decorations here. The room was small while the chairs were few. It was the price list that was really strange. Even an eatery specialized in one serving wouldn’t actually just sell one food.
After all, wherever there was demand, there was market. Small eateries had to do business as per the demands of their guest. So Monkey asked directly, “Do you really serve Egg Fried Rice only?”
Having cooked three servings of Egg Fried Rice, Yuan Zhou carried them outside one by one and answered, “Yes, I do, temporarily.”
“Temporarily? How long before you are going to sell other dishes?” Monkey guessed it was just another kind of marketing method. First he publicized that he only served Egg Fried Rice, then when enough people were attracted into the restaurant, he would take out the already prepared menu. It was fairly common.
However, his usually accurate guesses were incorrect this time. Yuan Zhou replied, “After one week, I will add a serving of Egg Fried Rice package. Afterwards, it depends on my mood.”
“Hummmmm”, the word “It depends on my mood” really surprised Monkey. He didn’t know what to say next. But when he found Yuan Zhou didn’t want to talk about this matter, he stopped asking.
“Hurry up and eat. I will eat your serving after mine if you don’t come now.” Seeing the Egg Fried Rice had already appeared on the table, Sun Ming said in a hurry. He was quite serious when he said he would eat Monkey’s serving.
“Ok, I’m coming.”
“Please enjoy your meal.” Yuan Zhou stretched his hand and made a gesture of “Please”, with dignified manner of a chef.
“Where is the soup?” It was Ali who said this time.
He asked Yuan Zhou when he saw there was nothing more on the table but the Egg Fried Rice.
“Sorry, I don’t provide the soup, nor any side dishes.” Yuan Zhou knew these people were the friends of his friend, but the system was the boss.
The system was a stickler about the rules. Hence the Master Chef Restaurant couldn’t provide any dishes that were not approved by the system. Yuan Zhou wasn’t able to cook in the Master Chef Restaurant with ingredients not provided by the system. He attributed all that to his lower level.
“Fine.” Ali took a look at Sun Ming and again at Yuan Zhou, with a helpless manner.
“Ali, Monkey, look at the Egg Fried Rice in front of you. Although it doesn’t have any add ones, this food absolutely deserves that price.” As the two people were brought here by him, Sun Ming had to explain a little bit before he could pig out on his Egg Fried Rice on the table.
“Ok, ok. But your friend’s restaurant is fairly weird. I just don’t know if the Egg Fried Rice can be as good as you say it is.” Seeing that Ali’s normal request to have a bowl of soup was directly refused, Monkey suddenly became a little discontented.
The price list on the wall told them clearly that each plate of Egg Fried Rice was 188 RMB. Since recommendations were always paid separately using the AA method, Monkey had a suspicion that Sun Ming was guilty of luring guests to his brother’s restaurant. After all, these kinds of matters did occur before.