The Game of Life

By the time they finished eating the dumplings, it was already past 3 PM, and Jiang Feng had mostly forgotten the notes he’d taken last night, the “100 Must-Win Strategies for a First Date” that Wang Hao had passed on to him, after downing a bowl of dumplings.

What a joke, the Jiang Family men had always relied on their natural talent when it came to dating, never needing any sort of love manuals or external help.

Hey, what did Wang Hao say they should do after lunch yesterday evening?

Jiang Feng’s first date encountered an unprecedented crisis.

Worse than the crappy movie they watched this morning.

Jiang Feng kept his composure as he continued to wash dishes and clear the table, while the inner computer in his brain rapidly searched through all the strategies he had planned last night.

Aquarium?

Shopping mall?

Coffee?

Claw machine?

In the end, Jiang Feng followed his heart and chose the aquarium, mainly because he wanted to go.

He had never successfully visited an aquarium his whole life, and today was the day to break this curse!

After putting the washed dishes back into the cabinet, Jiang Feng shook the water off his hands, and turned to Wu Minqi, who was busy messaging someone, “It’s only 3 o’clock now, how about we go to the aquarium? There’s a seal show at 5 PM, we can just make it.”

“Sure,” Wu Minqi put away her phone and said with a smile.

The aquarium was just opposite the east entrance of the mall, freshly built last year, and it could be considered the largest one in Alan City, far superior to that old one in Zet City which Jiang Feng had always longed to visit as a kid.

Anyone who had ever watched a domestic idol drama knew what an aquarium looked like, as it was a sacred dating spot for the male and female leads in those dramas — confessions, meals, encounters, love at first sight, and the villain’s machinations could all take place here. Directors and naive sweet leading ladies could use a variety of beautiful shots to show the audience just how beautiful, deep blue, and mysterious an aquarium could be.

And expensive.

Since it was the weekend, and the weather was bright and springlike, it was the perfect time for kids to ask to go out and play, for couples to date, and for the aquarium to fleece visitors.

Jiang Feng, who had never been out playing before, had brought a bag of miscellaneous items just in case, but forgot to bring something as critical as his student ID which offered half-price admission.

Yet there were still quite a few people visiting the aquarium in the afternoon. After queuing for a few minutes, Jiang Feng successfully bought two tickets. Wu Minqi had been waiting for him at the entrance, holding a cup of milk tea.

“For you, caramel macchiato, 70% sugar, room temperature.” Wu Minqi handed the milk tea to Jiang Feng.

Jiang Feng took the milk tea, took a sip, and the sweet caramel macchiato traveled through his mouth, down his esophagus, and into his stomach, sweetening his heart all the way.

The two held hands and walked inside together.

Most of the sea fish and tropical fish inside the aquarium tanks were unfamiliar to Jiang Feng; he generally only recognized fish that could end up on the dining table. There was no need to recognize those doomed never to appear on the Jiang Family’s table.

The inside of the aquarium mostly consisted of long corridors with dim lighting, lit predominantly with cool blue lights. Couples could be found everywhere, huddled in corners cooing at each other, paying no heed to the fish, the girl usually holding a cup of milk tea, eyes sparkling with laughter.

Jiang Feng glanced at the milk tea in his hand.

An incredibly ugly octopus was sprawled against the glass tank, its suction-cupped tentacles facing Jiang Feng.

What a great octopus, it would taste amazing in takoyaki.

“It stopped right in front of you, it must really like you,” Wu Minqi said with a laugh.

“Someone already liked me first, so it has to line up behind,” Jiang Feng said. “What about dinner? Should we eat here or go out? I read in the reviews that the restaurant in this aquarium is quite interesting.”

“Either is fine,” Wu Minqi said with a smile.

The two quietly observed the big octopus in front of them, Jiang Feng’s mind filled with different ways to cook takoyaki.

“Oh, the fish in the aquarium look so pitiful, all locked up here and unable to go home,” a girl from a young couple nearby lamented in a whiny tone.

Jiang Feng: …

“Hey, what’s this, a loach?” Wu Minqi pointed to the bottom of the tank.

Jiang Feng was instantly drawn to it and looked closely; indeed, it was a loach.

“They must be for feeding the other fish,” Jiang Feng guessed, as the recipe for fried loach in his head suddenly turned into deep-fried small loach. “Once these finger-length loaches are purged of mud and de-slimed, just pop them into the oil to fry; the taste is incredible.”

“A little bigger and you could make loach hotpot,” Wu Minqi agreed.

“And there’s sauteed loach; as long as they’re not too big it’s fine, stewing them in sauce isn’t bad either,” Jiang Feng began pondering too different ways to cook loach. “I remember my dad once made loach stewed with tofu that was really tasty.”

“Loach stewed with tofu? I’ve never had that. When I was a kid, I only had red date loach soup that my aunt made. You blanch the loaches to death with boiling water, add red dates, white peony, Angelica sinensis, goji berries, Chinese yam, and red glutinous rice wine, and it’s done in half an hour. Next week I could make this dish for you,” Wu Minqi suggested.

“Handling loaches is too much trouble, waiting for them to spit out the sand and lose their fishiness takes a long time.”

“It’s not a hassle,” Wu Minqi said.

“Hey, isn’t the sea lion performance about to start? Let’s head over now, or we won’t get good seats if we’re too late,” Jiang Feng suggested naturally, taking Wu Minqi’s hand.

“Sure.”

The two of them walked away hand in hand.

The young couple standing beside them questioned their life choices.

The whiny girlfriend watched their retreating figures and swallowed hard, then suggested to her boyfriend, “How about we have loach for dinner tonight?” “Sounds good, let’s have loach hotpot!”

“Not loach hotpot, we’ve definitely got to have deep-fried small loach!”

After watching the sea lion performance, the two continued their visit to the aquarium, focusing on critiquing the tunas, pomfrets, eels, codfish, and hairtails, though it was unclear why hairtail ended up there; perhaps just to make up the numbers, since it’s also a sea fish. Undeniably, the visit to the aquarium was a great success.

Jiang Feng declared that the Jiang Family members were naturally talented when it came to dating!

Dinner was at a restaurant inside the aquarium, a themed restaurant where the cuisine was mainly fish. Having just seen them, now to eat them, offered the ultimate pleasure of both seeing and eating simultaneously.

Quite coincidentally, Jiang Feng noticed that the couple at the next table was the same ‘Ying Ying Ying’ lovebirds.

They had arrived earlier than Jiang Feng and Wu Minqi and were already being served. On the table was a plate of deep-fried loaches, which looked to be well- cooked with excellent fire control.

Leaving the ordering entirely to Wu Minqi, she chose a portion of deep-fried loaches, braised cod, and takoyaki.

“Have you thought about your dish for the final round?” Wu Minqi asked.

“Not yet.” The thought gave Jiang Feng a bit of a headache. It was easier to come up with something based on ingredients, but he was at a loss for what to make based on the theme of ‘original intention’.

“Gu Li will definitely make golden-thread shumai. That dish is also part of the Manchu Han Imperial Feast. I once ate the one personally made by Master Tan when he was alive. If he really can recreate Master Tan’s taste, then in the final round, you might…” Wu Minqi’s face showed difficulty, as she didn’t want to dampen Jiang Feng’s spirits.

“With his skills, I won’t feel wronged losing to him,” Jiang Feng said nonchalantly, admitting he wouldn’t have made it to the finals without the confidence boost from Wu Minqi’s pre-competition confession. “I’ll decide on the dish in the next couple of days. I still need to think about what to make. By the way, what are you planning to cook?”

“Ants Climbing a Tree.” As soon as she finished speaking, the server brought the deep-fried loaches to their table.

The freshly cooked deep-fried loaches were steaming, crispy on both sides, and only sprinkled with a hint of salt to enhance the natural flavor of the loaches.

They were crispy and delicious; the bones were fried to a crisp, allowing one to swallow a small loach in two or three bites.

The quality of the ingredients was so good that simple salt seasoning brought out their freshness, making it hard to stop eating one after another.

“I didn’t expect their loaches to be so fresh,” Jiang Feng remarked. “Why did you think of making Ants Climbing a Tree? It seems you don’t usually make this dish.”

“I don’t usually make it, mainly because it’s my dad’s specialty, and I rarely cook it in our Healthy Stir-fry Restaurant, so I’m not in the habit of making it.” Wu Minqi picked up a loach and examined it, “The salt is a bit heavy-handed.” “But the theme of the competition is original intention, right? This is the first dish my dad taught me, and also the only one. Cooking lessons for the younger members of our family were usually my grandfather’s responsibility. When I heard the theme, my first thought was this dish,” Wu Minqi explained.

Jiang Feng nodded thoughtfully.

Actually, when he heard the theme ‘original intention’, his first thought was of the preserved egg and pork congee he’d made during the summer holidays.

Looking back, that pot wasn’t particularly impressive; he made the congee following recipes and videos from the internet. Yet, it was the first dish he’d seriously attempted in the kitchen since his third year in junior high, earnestly researching and cooking it.

In a way, that truly was his original intention.

Back then, he simply wanted to make a decent-tasting preserved egg and pork congee, so Chen Xiuxiu would have a few more sips, not only to accomplish a task but also to stop her from using suicidal dieting methods to lose weight.

Speaking of accomplishing tasks, one couldn’t avoid mentioning this game that often had bugs.

Yesterday, Jiang Feng had been giddy from the sudden confession, his mind full of exclamations: “Holy shit, I’m in love,” “Holy shit, I have a girlfriend,” and “Holy shit, I’m no longer single,” completely overlooking the most fundamental bug in the game.

Despite facing Wu Minqi head-on and defeating her in a one on one battle, the [Challenge of the Same Trade] mission still hadn’t shown as completed; the progress remained (0/1). Jiang Feng was starting to wonder if the game had taken off with the promised kitchen knife as a reward.

It was just a kitchen knife, was it really worth it?

Just yesterday, Jiang Feng had praised the game as an Angel, but today he felt like filing a complaint against it.

They gave the engagement ring so readily, yet dragged their feet over a simple kitchen knife, preferring to let the game bug out rather than handing it over. Jiang Feng was genuinely beginning to doubt whether this game was more about cooking or about relationship development.

The three dishes were served quickly, and the chef’s skills were pretty decent, the ingredients especially fresh. Jiang Feng even suspected they were fished on the spot from the large glass tank, as the count of edible sea fish seemed a little high.

After dinner, Jiang Feng didn’t call for a ride and instead, the two of them took the subway back to UAL University together.

Taking a cab to the mall in the morning was to show how much he valued her. Taking the subway back in the evening was for the pleasure of holding hands while squeezing through the crowd.

– by Wang Hao

Around eight o’clock at night, the two parted ways at the university’s gate, each heading home to report the day’s dating outcomes to their respective parents.

Wang Xiulian and Jiang Jiankang were restless sitting at the Healthy Stir-fry Restaurant, Jiang Jiankang especially so. He was terrified that Jiang Feng might follow in his embarrassing footsteps during his first date.

“Son!” Seeing Jiang Feng, Jiang Jiankang sprang up, “How was it today? What did you guys do?”

After some thought, Jiang Feng summarized, “Pretty good. After the movie, we visited the vegetable market. Minqi made me Dragon Dumplings, bought me a 70% sugar-warm brown sugar macchiato, we spent the afternoon at the aquarium, the dry-fried loach was a bit too salty, but the octopus in the takoyaki was quite fresh, and the braised cod was cooked just right.”

Mrs. Wang Xiulian smiled and said, “Look how considerate Minqi is, even knowingyou like your brown sugar macchiato with 70% sugar.”

On the other side, Wu Minqi was also summarizing the day to her mother.

“Jiang Feng bought me a warm lemon red tea, took me to the aquarium, the dry-fried loach was a bit too salty but he didn’t seem to notice, the braised cod had a bit too much seasoning, but the fish was quite fresh, must have been freshly killed…”

“Oh my, look how thoughtful Feng is, knowing you like lemon red tea,” Mrs. Wu said with a smiling face.

“Heh.” Wu Hanxue did not want to speak.

“Oh right, Auntie, do you still remember the proportions for that red date loach soup you made?” Wu Minqi asked.

“Are you making it for that stinky boy?” Wu Hanxue’s expression soured even more.

“What stinky boy, go look at your WeChat and don’t talk. I’m chatting with my daughter,” Mrs. Wu gave Wu Hanxue a “friendly” smile, “No worries, Minqi, I’ll ask your aunt for the recipe tomorrow. I’ll also find out where to get the freshest loaches around here. The soup is really good, it’s very nourishing!”

“Sure.” Wu Minqi smiled slightly.

At the Healthy Stir-fry Restaurant, Jiang Feng, helping Ji Yue with the tables and chairs, seemed to remember something and turned to ask Jiang Jiankang, “Dad, can you find some time in the next few days to teach me how to make loach stew with tofu?”

“Loach stew with tofu?” Jiang Jiankang scratched his head, “Sure, why all of a sudden do you want to make that dish?”

“No reason, just suddenly felt like learning.”

The Healthy Stir-fry Restaurant closed up early that day. Jiang Feng and Ji Yue each carried four bags of trash in both hands to the nearby waste station.

“I’m afraid it’s not that you want to learn loach stew with tofu, but a certain someone wants to eat it, right?” Ji Yue said with a smile that read, ‘though I’m single, I understand these things,’ “By the way, how was the movie you watched this morning? I’m planning to see it tomorrow afternoon.”

Jiang Feng immediately recalled the unbearable memory of the morning, how his values had been shattered along with the movie.

“It was excellent, extremely moving, definitely a must-watch, the best of the year!” Jiang Feng said sincerely, “The girl sitting in front of me cried!”

“Ding, gained 66 points in proficiency in Lies.”

Shut up!