The Game of Life

Translator: 549690339

The father of Zhang Xi managed to become the head chef at the Imperial Meal Room, naturally possessing some impressive family skills.

The signature dish of the Imperial Meal Tavern is called “Spring Dawn and White Snow,” which is actually a stewed dish. The main ingredients are shredded tofu, green vegetables, and minced fish meat. The green vegetables are the essence of the whole dish, which must be cooked by being doused spoonful by spoonful with broth. The whole vegetable looks like a piece of jade in the plate, tender and dripping with freshness, soaked thoroughly inside and out with the broth’s juice, an extremely labor-intensive process.

Xu Cheng was willing to visit the Imperial Meal Tavern every day just for this “Spring Dawn and White Snow.”

For ordinary diners, without some connections, even if they could afford the expensive price of this dish, it was very hard to wait for Chef Zhang himself to cook this dish.

If another chef were to make it, even if the ingredients and methods were the same, the taste would be worlds apart. The technique of pouring broth over the greens was unique to Chef Zhang: a secret recipe, never shared with others.

There were only eight pieces of green vegetables in one “Spring Dawn and White Snow,” and with 17 people around the large round table, there was not enough to go around.

In fact, Jiang Zaidi wanted to order two servings of “Spring Dawn and White Snow,” but even if he wanted to order, the Imperial Meal Tavern wouldn¹1 sell it. There’s an explicit rule that each table is limited to one serving of “Spring Dawn and White Snow,” even if provincial leaders came…

They would decide what to do when provincial leaders actually came.

As the junior who took charge of the situation, Jiang Zaidi was given the important task of dividing the green vegetables.

“Come, come, Mr. Wu, Mrs. Wu, this ‘Spring Dawn and White Snow’ is the signature dish of the Imperial Meal Tavern, and it’s personally made by their head chef. You should try it,” Jiang Zaidi warmly urged.

As guests arrive, two pieces go away, and six remain.

“Grandpa, Granduncle Weiming, you are the elders, please eat first.”

The two most important things in the world are the grand elders, and with two more pieces gone, only four remain.

“Here, little bro, Minqi, you’ve worked hard in the competition, you should have some too.”

After two more pieces were taken, only two remained.

The remaining 11 people stared collectively at the last two pieces of green vegetable.

Jiang Zaidi silently took out a small knife.

Just kidding, who is he, he’s De! How could he possibly fail at something like this?

Everyone was happy with the meal.

In the middle of the meal, Mrs. Jiang made a video call, still in the boastful state she had been in earlier with her friends and the senior women’s group, full of vitality and even speaking louder than usual, praising Jiang Feng once again with the compliments she had heard from her uncle and then praising Jiang Feng from beginning to end with the same words.

At the end of the video call, Da Hua made a brief appearance. In the darkness of the pigsty, Jiang Feng could faintly make out that it really was much thinner than before, barely recognizable as a pig.

How haggard!

Everyone sadly lamented how Da Hua had become so thin, and when they remembered that because of Jiang Feng’s illness, Da Hua had to be kept alive and not slaughtered, they felt even more regretful, and even the pork dishes they were eating lost their flavor.

What a great pig Da Hua was, and now it couldn’t be slaughtered for food.

Jiang Jiankang sadly gnawed on his sauce elbow.

After the meal, everyone went their separate ways.

When Jiang Feng returned to his dorm, he was just about to check the rewards from the game and see how the quality of the knife was, wondering if it was indeed a legendary dark iron knife capable of cutting iron like mud and severing hair blown upon it, when he received a WeChat message from Wu Minqi.

She asked him to check the Chess Club’s QQ.group—Jiang Feng was the kind of person who could go ten days or half a month without glancing at QQ.once.

In the QQgroup, the members of the Chess Club were discussing the details of a gathering the following day.

Since the Chess Club was no longer in danger of being disbanded like in the past, everyone’s relationships had somewhat cooled. Jiang Feng, as the club president, didn’t really recognize all the faces anymore. Tomorrow’s gathering was partly to celebrate the current president and outstanding members’ second and fourth-place finishes at the Good Taste culinary competition, and another reason was to announce the handover of the club president while everyone was together.

The new president would be Liu Zixuan, a well-liked and outgoing fellow who got along well with the newer members and was widely accepted as the successor.

The Chess Club was no longer like before, where due to a shortage of members, seniors wouldn’t leave the club for fear of it being disbanded. Next semester Jiang Feng would be a senior, so according to convention, he should hand over the presidency and prepare to leave the club this semester.

Ji Yue would soon go from being the former president to two terms removed.

He Jiahui was now interning at a comic magazine and working overtime until she was out of her mind, Zhao Lin had successfully stayed at the law firm to accumulate experience under her seniors and became so busy her hair was falling out, and Chen Mengxing chose to return to Beiping to tackle harder challenges.

But it wasn’t too hard for him; his family owned property in the inner city due to being relocated residents.

The old members of the Chess Club, except for Liu Zixuan, were all about to leave.

Tomorrow night would be the farewell dinner.

Looking at the chat history in the QQ.group, Jiang Feng suddenly felt a bit lost.

Then Jiang Feng received a bank transfer notification.

Counting the zeros, Jiang Feng felt a bit relieved.

In this cold world, only money still held some warmth.

It was getting late, Wang Hao had already sent a voice message wishing Zhenzhen good night and had gone to bed to continue playing on his phone with the lights off. In the darkness, Jiang Feng quietly opened his attribute panel.

Looking at the kitchen knife in his item slot, Jiang Feng really wanted to take it out and hold it in his hand to feel what this game – awarded knife was really like.

But it was late, the lights were off, and moonlight streamed through the window onto the bed. A roommate holding a kitchen knife in bed, with its tip glinting coldly, was a scary sight indeed.

Considering that Wang Hao had not yet fallen asleep, Jiang Feng decided against it.

He closed the attribute panel, lay down, turned over, and went to sleep.

The Good Taste culinary competition was over, and the newbie village instance had been officially cleared. Now, his journey lay among the stars.

Daydreams filled the day, and at night, dreams came. Jiang Feng even dreamed of Chef Wang.

Do you want my recipes? I left them all in…

Cough cough.

Early the next morning, Jiang Feng arrived at the Healthy Stir-fry Restaurant and saw the banner that Mrs. Wang Xiulian had put up.

“To celebrate my son Jiang Feng’s second-place victory in the Good Taste Culinary Competition, all specified dishes at our restaurant are 50% off.”

Jiang Feng:…

Before the lunch service began, Professor Li meandered into the Healthy Stir- fry Restaurant.

He was there to see Jiang Feng.

” I’ve asked a friend in Beiping to pull some strings. The renovation cost for Taifeng Building can be negotiated down to 13 million,” Professor Li got straight to the point.

“13 million?” Jiang Feng was shocked. Previously, Jiang Zaidi had also used his connections to negotiate with Chengju Decoration Company, but they refused to budge from 20 million. Professor Li had managed to reduce it by 7 million with just one discussion.

“Leave the renovation to me. Are the blueprints all set and good to go? I heard that you specifically had a designer draft them. Can you trust this designer?” Professor Li said, “If you can’t provide the full amount right away, you can start with a 6 million down payment and slowly pay the rest. If it’s really too difficult, I can front the money for you. It’s not a small sum, and it is indeed challenging to come with that quickly.”

Jiang Jiankang started to calculate how much money each family needed to gather the moment he heard the price of 13 million. His mental abacus was clicking away fervently, and so was Wang Xiulian’s.

“No need, no need, Professor Li. How could we let you front such money? We’ll figure it out and come up with it ourselves,” Jiang Jiankang said repeatedly.

“I’m not very familiar with design, but my cousin looked at the blueprints and said there were no issues. The blueprints are upstairs; if you’re not assured, I can bring them down for you to see,” Jiang Feng said, now lying through his teeth as he rushed upstairs to retrieve the Renovation Blueprint from his attribute panel.

A minute later, Jiang Feng came back down with a thick stack of Renovation Blueprints and placed them before Professor Li.

Professor Li knew a bit about the field and after a cursory glance, asked, “Which designer drafted these?”

“I’m not too sure myself, Mr. Han recommended them,” Jiang Feng shifted the responsibility to Han Guishan, as many knew he had spent a long time cooking at Han Guishan’s home last semester.

“Mr. Han is really considerate. Since Zaide says there’s no problem, then there must not be any issues. I’ll ask my friends in Beiping to pay extra attention to the materials and construction period as well. Since you guys aren’t there, you can’t tend to many matters. If everything goes smoothly, work can start soon,” Professor Li said, “It just so happens that I’m going to retire due to illness after this semester, so I can witness the reopening of Taifeng Building with my own eyes.”

“Then we really have to trouble you,” Jiang Feng knew that Professor Li must have accumulated a lot of favors for this.

“By the way, Jiankang, when you and your family move there, have you found a place to stay?” Professor Li asked seemingly casually.

“Not yet. My brother and I plan to rent several adjacent apartments in the same neighborhood, just to have a place to live for now,” Jiang Jiankang said.

Though they boasted at the dinner table every day about each buying a house or courtyard in Beiping to live joyfully together, everyone knew the realities of their family’s finances and the housing prices in Beiping.

Boasting was one thing, but they had to be realistic about the actual situation.

“I know a real estate agent; let me handle this matter as well,” Professor Li offered.

“How could we? That’s too much trouble. We already feel bad asking you to deal with the renovation,” Jiang Jiankang tried to decline.

“It’s no bother at all. We are relatives after all, and helping each other out is only natural. Plus, my teaching load is lighter this semester. I’m not busy, so let me take care of it for you. It’ll be less hassle for you all when you move,” Professor Li said with a smile, “My wife is waiting for me to buy her some mung beans. I should be going.”

Having said that, he took his leave.

“We really do have such great relatives,” Jiang Jiankang remarked with feeling.

“We’ve gained some good relatives indeed. Jiankang, remember this when we go to Beiping. We must keep in touch more often. When it’s time for dinner, invite them over. If they don’t want to come, send Feng over to deliver some food,” Wang Xiulian said.

“Exactly, we must invite them over for dinner.” Once up at the Jiang family’s dinner table, everyone becomes one family.

“Why are you still standing there like a fool? Go to the kitchen! Have you finished cutting the vegetables? Is the meat marinated? Are you going to open for business at noon or not? What about the 13 million for the renovation? Do you really have the nerve to askyour brother for a large amount?” Wang Xiulian suddenly snapped.

“Oh, right, Feng. Isn’t there also some sort of Most Popular Award in that competition of yours? I remember that award being quite lucrative,” Wang Xiulian quickly calculated in her head.

Jiang Feng hadn’t looked at the Most Popular Award for a long time, since there was such a big gap between him and Zhang Guanghang’s votes; there was no hope for him.

“Mom, I think that’s pretty unlikely, but let me check it out.” Jiang Feng pulled out his phone to check the voting on the official account.

First place, Zhang Guanghang: 230,000 votes.

Second place, Jiang Feng, 120,000 votes.

Third place, Wu Minqi, 90,000 votes.

Hey, he was actually in second place with 120,000 votes?

Jiang Feng himself didn’t expect to have such high popularity.

At Han Guishan’s home—

“When does the top 4 competition air?” Han Guishan asked, glancing over the report on the cumulative progress of the Good Taste Culinary Competition brought by his department, when he suddenly remembered the variety show.

“Next Sunday,” his assistant replied.

“How are Jiang Feng’s votes?

“He’s already at 120,000 votes. Our digital teams on Weibo, WeChat, and the official account haven’t encountered any issues, and no one has noticed that our people are rigging the votes.”

“Good. After the top 4 competition is broadcast, you take care of it. Make sure to boost Jiang Feng’s vote count to the first place before 9 p.m. on the 30th,” Han Guishan plotted in his mind.

The plan was to approach Jiang Feng for a sponsorship deal after he won the Most Popular Award, show his face to establish rapport, bring Wang Jing along for a visit to Jiang Yuanchao, and maybe have a meal together, share a porridge, reminisce a little, lead into meeting Xu Cheng, have a chat, cook a few dishes.

Brilliant, simply brilliant.

One arrow, three targets—not just two.

Han Guishan was pleased with himself as he looked over the report and the increased revenue for the company this month.

Such an outstanding boss like himself was indeed a rare find nowadays.