Chapter 4: Slimming Ayran

  Hours passed, and morning arrived.

  Jin Kai, as usual, opened his shop and eagerly began waiting for customers. While sipping a hot cup of tea, he muttered to himself, “Money, money, money…”

  It was as if he needed to make money and was preoccupied with this nonsense—

  AHHH!!!

  (Enough! I’m quitting! Enough! I can’t work under these conditions!)

  AHH!!

  Okay, okay! Lower your hand, I didn’t say anything!

  …

  An hour passed swiftly.

  The door creaked open.

  The person entering was none other than Lin Feng.

  Upon seeing Jin Kai, Lin Feng involuntarily blushed with a bit of embarrassment and lowered his head. The shameful incident of the previous day still lingered in his mind. But how could he possibly resist the exquisite taste of the bagel and tea?

  With his entrance, Jin Kai’s eyes lit up.

  Lin Feng hardened his face like steel, raised his head, and greeted Jin Kai, “Good morning, Boss Jin,” and then, with slight embarrassment, turned to Picockyo and Zamazingo and added, “Good morning, Great Master Picockyo. Good morning, Great Master Zamazingo.”

  (‘Greeting a puppet and a rooster is truly shameful…’)

  He smiled bitterly to himself.

  Jin Kai immediately put on a friendly smile, quickly gestured to an empty table and chair, and invited Lin Feng:

  “Welcome, dear customer. What would you like to order? Today, I recommend you try the bagel and ayran combination.”

  Jin Kai’s act of treating yesterday’s incident as if it had never occurred brought tears to Lin Feng’s eyes.

  (“Boss Jin truly has a heart as vast as the heavens. He acts as if nothing happened, just to spare my embarrassment!”)

  Seeing his eyes fill up, Jin Kai rolled his eyes in his mind.

  (“Fuck, you scared me! What the hell was that?!”)

  The Shopping Mall System, upon noticing Jin Kai roll his eyes in his inner voice, cursed in fear—but soon realized to whom it was cursing. It quickly shut its mouth. Then, just like in the movies, it pretended as if nothing had happened, looked up, and started whistling to change the subject. It even kicked the ground with its foot, sending up dust.

  (“The weather is so lovely today…”)

  Jin Kai appeared to completely ignore its nonsense. Meanwhile, Lin Feng was still internally praising Jin Kai with adoring eyes, while Jin Kai awaited his order.

  Jin Kai’s eyebrows and lips twitched at this absurd situation. The smile on his face faded by half, and he asked once more:

  “What would you like to order?”

  His tone seemed to long for this nonsense to be over as soon as possible.

  Lin Feng suddenly remembered where he was and, so as not to anger this secret expert, quickly replied:

  “Yes, yes. I would like one bagel and one ayran.”

  Jin Kai’s smile once again took on a gentle and friendly demeanor. He retrieved a crystal-clear plate from beneath the counter and placed it on the counter. Then he opened the glass cabinet, took out a golden, exquisite bagel, and placed it on the plate.

  But... was that enough?

  Of course not. A bagel wouldn’t be just plain.

  Therefore, he took a cold-as-ice ayran from the cabinet and poured it into the plate’s special ayran compartment.

  This compartment was specially designed. After all, if hot and cold were side by side, they would try to balance each other out—the bagel would absorb the heat, the ayran would warm up, and it would be an utter disaster. But thanks to this special compartment, the bagel retained its warmth, and the ayran its chill.

  This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

  Jin Kai examined the plate he had prepared and nodded in satisfaction, yet something was still missing. He took a small salt packet from a special compartment of the cabinet and placed it next to the ayran. Finally, he picked up the plate, set it on the table in front of Lin Feng, and with a smile said, “Enjoy your meal.”

  Lin Feng was excited by Jin Kai’s courteous behavior. Receiving well wishes from a secret expert was truly an honor. So he sincerely replied,

  “Thank you—”

  but upon seeing the open palm awaiting payment, Jin Kai involuntarily swallowed his final word, and his excited expression turned bizarre.

  Immediately, memories of yesterday’s events came to mind. Consequently, he quickly pulled out his money pouch and asked,

  “How much do I owe?”

  Jin Kai’s smile grew even wider as he replied,

  “6 Qi Stones.”

  Lin Feng murmured in a bit of pain, “6 Qi Stones…” but without wasting any time, he took 6 Qi Stones and extended them to Jin Kai.

  Jin Kai received the money with great delight, and once again his expression turned nonchalant. He quickly went behind the counter and began eagerly awaiting customers.

  Although Lin Feng had seen this behavior before, he was still perplexed and thought, “To understand secret experts, one must also be a secret expert…”

  Despite his sorrow over spending 6 Qi Stones, his face quickly assumed an excited expression. After all, he would once again get to enjoy the exquisite bagel! And for the first time in his life, he would try the ‘ayran’ beverage of which he had only been aware.

  He looked at the ayran with great excitement. The mysterious beverage served by Jin Kai was a great privilege for him. He immediately began to examine the ayran with utmost care, but his smile quickly vanished!

  (“Fuck!”) he cursed inwardly upon seeing the salt in the packet.

  Quickly, he recalled the cube sugar incident from yesterday and smacked his forehead.

  But this time, he would not make the same mistake.

  (“Ha. This time I won’t fall into the same trap.”) he thought proudly, and then addressed Jin Kai,

  “Boss Jin—”

  Seeing him call out, Jin Kai became a bit excited and immediately interrupted him:

  “Do you want another bottle of ayran?”

  Lin Feng’s proud expression suddenly froze:

  (“Fuck, it feels as if I’ve lived through this moment before…”)

  He forced a smile and began,

  “No, I—”

  but Jin Kai’s smile faded slightly and interrupted him once again:

  “Do you want the bagel?”

  Sweat began to bead on Lin Feng’s forehead.

  “No—”

  Yet with every letter of “no” that he pronounced, he noticed Jin Kai’s expression fading more and more, and before Jin Kai could interrupt him again, he quickly shouted,

  “I WANT TEA!”

  Jin Kai did not want to give him the opportunity to say,

  “WHAT?! Then why the fuck are you bothering me?!”

  (“Fuck, I almost made the same mistake again!”) he thought, and then looked at Jin Kai with great pride. He was eager to see Jin Kai once again look at him in a friendly manner. An ant could sacrifice its entire colony for a chance to speak with a dragon.

  But life was bitter.

  He saw Jin Kai, as if to say “Who do you think you are?” with his eyebrows raised arrogantly, one corner of his lips curled upward in a gangster manner, and his mouth slightly open in a scornful expression, looking at him.

  (“Why is he looking at me like that?”) Before he could finish his thought, that famous shout reached his ears:

  “WHAT?!? Does this place look like a charity to you?!”

  Lin Feng, astonished, tried to understand what Jin Kai meant and began to think with his mind operating at 100000000% capacity. Every second, trillions of thoughts collided within his mind, causing him to lose weight rapidly. At that moment, he absolutely needed the Wisdom Gu to find the correct answer. But unfortunately, the Wisdom Gu belonged to someone else. Even worse for Lin Feng, for reasons you cannot comprehend at this moment, the owner of the Wisdom Gu was under attack by higher dimensions…

  Due to the countless swirling thoughts in his mind, Lin Feng continued to lose a few kilograms every second and dropped to 60 kilograms within moments.

  (“Fuck, I just gave all my money! But how did he know that? Does he have a money detector?!”) he thought, struggling with admiration, embarrassment, and a bit of fear.

  He quickly scratched his beard, trying to hide his embarrassment, and coughed:

  “?h?. ?h?…”

  His mind was working so rapidly that Jin Kai could almost see smoke emanating from Lin Feng’s head. His head was about to burst into flames!

  When Jin Kai saw that Lin Feng had weakened further—from 60 kilograms down to 40 kilograms—he rolled his eyes.

  “Forget it. Stop thinking and just enjoy your meal, or you'll turn into a skeleton,” he said, turning behind the bagel stand to await the next customer.

  Seeing that Jin Kai was brushing the matter aside, Lin Feng suddenly stopped thinking. His mind had worked so intensely that it felt as if its circuits had burned out. The entire world had transformed into an ant-infested tube television screen. Everything seemed blurry, meaningless, and muffled. As his eyes stared blankly ahead, only a meaningless hum echoed in his head. His intelligence had dropped to that of a three-year-old child. His lips were parted, and he stared unblinkingly.

  Jin Kai noticed this strange state but didn’t care.

  Grull!

  The rumble rising from Lin Feng’s stomach filled the entire shop. In seconds, it had turned into a black hole that could lose dozens of kilograms and seemed ready to swallow the entire universe. His eyes fixed on the bagel on the table. The aroma of the bagel was irresistibly alluring to him. Without hesitation, he grabbed the bagel, stuffed it into his mouth in one bite, chewed it all at once, and swallowed it. Then his eyes shifted to the ayran bottle. He grabbed the bottle and, without a moment’s thought, attempted to take a bite.

  “Ahh!”

  he let out a pained cry.

  Jin Kai snorted at this strange action and snapped his finger. In an instant, Lin Feng’s mind returned to normal. As soon as his normal intelligence reasserted itself, he realized what he had just done. His face turned red, and then, inexplicably, he burst into a mad grin, laughing “Hehühehehe…” as he opened the bottle’s cap, dumped the salt into it, and downed the ayran in one gulp. Then he quickly bolted out of the shop.

  It hadn’t even been a day before another shame was added to Lin Feng’s list...