“Mr. Zhao, I heard that you were looking for me?”

“There’s a matter that I want to complain about.” Zhao Bocheng picked up the teapot to pour himself tea, and also poured Jing Yang a cup.

“Complaint?” Jing Yang sat down across from him. “Please say.”

“Besides the grand opening day, these times when I came to eat, the dishes seem to not have been made by you.”

In his heart Jing Yang was somewhat surprised, he was actually able to taste the difference. It would be impossible for Jing Yang to be the same as the other chefs, constantly staying in the kitchen to cook for the customers. But every dish that was included on the menu was personally checked by him, before in the areas that Guo uncle and Wang uncle weren’t able to perfect, he also took a lot of effort to personally guide them to perfect the recipe. The flavor of those dishes, even though they didn’t achieve 100% the flavor that he could personally make out, but they could still show out 70 to 80%.

“I have a lot of matters to attend to, so I’m unable to always be in the kitchen cooking. The food that my restaurant’s other chefs make, Mr. Zhao isn’t satisfied?”

“Really not satisfied, I helped you say so many good words, you still use other chefs’ food to get rid of me, how could I be satisfied?” Zhao Bocheng looked at him . In the several times he came before, he had always come with friends, so even if he could tell that the dishes were not made by him, he also didn’t mention it.

“Whichever dishes Mr. Zhao wants to eat today, I will go to make personally, we can consider this as an apology.” These Zhao family people were all so overbearing, Jing Yang still didn’t want to offend him for the time being.

Jing Yang personally went to the kitchen to make the dishes that Zhao Bocheng had ordered.

After the dishes were served, Zhao Bocheng only tasted one mouthful, then satisfyingly nodded. “Exactly this flavor, you also sit down to eat together, I have something to give you.”

Something? Jing Yang sat down like he said to see what thing he would give him.

Zhao Bocheng took out a quite refined invitation card to give Jing Yang. “This competition invitation letter is for you.”

Jing Yang took the invitation and opened it to take a look, it was an invitation for the China Cup Culinary Competition (CCCC). This is the China country’s top culinary competition, its fairness is also extremely high, it’s basically impossible for dirty tricks to exist. The judges were all people from many circles who had extremely high standards for food. Moreover, there’s also a segment with public evaluations, the entire competition process would conducted as a live broadcast to the entire country.

He had planned on participating in this competition, because he knew that Zheng Junming would definitely attend. Zhang lao is one of the competition’s judges, so he had originally planned on asking Zhang lao to help him write a recommendation letter. But he didn’t think that Zhao Bocheng would directly send him an invitation letter for the competition.

“An invitation letter this sort of small thing, how could I trouble Mr. Zhao to personally send it over?” Jing Yang knew that this competition was always sponsored by the Zhao family corporation, but this Zhao family chairman personally sent the invitation letter. Just thinking about it, it didn’t seem very suitable ah?

“For this time’s competition, I am one of the main judges, I recommended for you to participate in the youth competition, and then conveniently helped you bring over the invitation letter.” Zhao Bocheng looked at Jing Yang’s eyes, it seemed like he had directly looked into his heart. “You should curry favor with me well, this would be quite advantageous to your result on the competition.”

“Isn’t this competition known as the entire country’s fairest competition? How could it be that it would still need me to curry favor in order to have a good competition result?” Jing Yang looked back at him, he felt like that pair of eyes seemed very familiar.

“The competition is fair, but I don’t have to be, in any case I am also not some good person, however…” Zhao Bocheng smiled. “I am more willing to be partial towards you.”

Based on what Jing Yang knew, Zhao Bocheng should be a particularly coldly arrogant and unsmiling person, showing an icy face to everyone. When he saw him for the first time at Zhang lao’s home, he also indeed thought this way. Yet ever since he saw him today, whenever he (ZBC) spoke, he would always have a smiling expression. Could it be that the information that he got was mistaken?

From then on Zhao Bocheng came to Lu De Ji more frequently, most of the time he always came by himself, and whenever he came by himself, he would always have to eat food personally made by Jing Yang, and would also have Jing Yang sit down to accompany him to eat.

As the number of times Jing Yang saw him increased, he also increasingly felt an familiar feeling towards him. This type of feeling made him very perplexed. Logically, before he came to this world, he definitely had never seen Zhao Bocheng before, moreover Lu Jingyu’s original owner had never even spoken a word with him. Where this type of familiar feeling came from in the end, even he himself started to be curious about.

And what Jing Yang didn’t know was that this type of feeling was actually not experienced by only him. Zhao Bocheng had recalled, earlier he had probably also seen Lu Jingyu before, but his impression of him was extremely vague. At Zhang lao’s home could be considered their first formal meeting, when he first looked at him, he experienced some kind of feeling.

When they were eating breakfast together, Zhao Bocheng couldn’t resist secretly looking him over. He found that his appearance and temperament were all very in line with his preferences, it was a type that let him feel very comfortable looking at him. Especially that pair of eyes, he really liked them, extremely liked them, and whenever he saw him again afterwards, he would always have a kind of urge to kiss his eyes.

Before Zhao Bocheng ascertained his own intentions, besides requesting Jing Yang to personally make him food and accompanying him to eat with him every time he went to Lu De Ji, he didn’t make any other moves. He only had a feeling of wanting to see him every day that grew increasingly intense.

The China Cup Culinary Competition was held once every two years and was split into the youth group, middle-aged group, and elderly group. Every group had a highest award, and then there was an overall champion.

Zheng Junming had already received the youth champion twice, this let him collect quite a few fans, only this overall champion was always taken by the elderly group’s chefs. , this phrase has some logic, at least those people had cooked for several decades more, this disparity couldn’t be made up that easily.

“Bo brother, wait for me, I’ll go with you.” Qian Xiang followed Zhao Bocheng onto the car, he knew that today Zhao Bocheng would go to the culinary competition live broadcast as a judge, so he especially came to the Zhao home to wait to go together with him. “Bo brother, I want to discuss a matter with you.”

“There’s nothing to discuss.” Zhao Bocheng said coldly.

“At least first listen to what matter I want to say ba, really, this matter for you has no difficulty.” Qian Xiang didn’t receive Zhao Bocheng’s response and independently continued, “You see you last time helped Lu Jingyu speak, let me have no face in front of Junming. I am very good friends with him, you are also my cousin, how could you go help that fellow who’s always going against him ne. This time Junming is attending the competition, can you favor him a bit?”

“Why should I favor him? How does whether or not you are friends with him have any relationship with me? Also, you think that there’s only me as a judge? If he has no ability, he should just not attend the competition.”

“You can’t say that, the Zhao family sponsored this competition for so many years already, and you’re also the Zhao family corporation’s successor. If you favor Junming, those stubborn old fellows at least would give you face. We’re cousins at least, you just give me this face ba.”

“Give you face?” Zhao Bocheng turned his head and incisively stared at him. “You think that the number of times that you relied on my reputation to is still too little? I will warn you for the last time, if you still dare to rely on my name to do something, I will break your leg! If you don’t believe me then just try it and see.”

Qian Xiang was suppressed by Zhao Bocheng’s imposing manner to the point of not being able to lift his head, he even more didn’t dare to go look at his face again. From small to big, he never really even feared his parents, only feared this cousin of his, if he really got angry and gave him a lesson, that would definitely not be light. But who let the reputation of this cousin of his be so useful, no matter where he went other people would always give him some face, not only because he was the Qian family young master, but even more so because he was also Zhao Bocheng’s cousin.

Qian Xiang was very good friends with Zheng Junming because Zheng Junming’s food was very good, his appearance was also not bad, personality was also good. He felt that they were naturally supposed to be good friends, speaking more deeply then they are intimate friends. That bastard Lu Jingyu was always finding trouble for Zheng Junming, he (QX) already couldn’t bear to see him for a long time, sooner or later there would be a day when he would tidy him up.

Qian Xiang had also let Zheng Junming make food for Zhao Bocheng, but when Zhao Bocheng had only eaten two mouthfuls he already put down his chopsticks and left without saying anything. This let him and Zheng Junming both have no face. Qian Xiang could only comfort Zheng Junming by saying that his cousin had a golden tongue, extremely hard to please, it was not that his food wasn’t good enough, but that his cousin’s standards couldn’t be satisfied by ordinary people.

But what he didn’t expect was that on the day of the grand opening of Lu De Ji, Zhao Bocheng not only went, but also gave Lu Jingyu a very high evaluation, this let Zheng Junming’s heart feel even more uncomfortable.

Qian Xiang had promised Zheng Junming that in this time’s competition he would definitely let his cousin favor him. Even though Zheng Junming said he was very confident in his own cooking and didn’t need anyone to favor him, he would definitely not lose to Lu Jingyu, but Qian Xiang still felt like he should help him do something.

Jing Yang was closing his eyes resting in his lounge. The competition was divided into semifinals, finals, and the championship, split into three days. As for what dish to make, it would only be known when the competition started.

The lounge door was suddenly opened, Jing Yang opened his eyes to see that it was Zhao Bocheng. In this place, it would only be this person who could casually go anywhere without anyone daring to block him.

Jing Yang had accompanied him to eat so many times, the two people could be considered as acquaintances. He also found that Zhao Bocheng was not as difficult as he had thought. Based on the fact that Zhao Bocheng had been one of the people who had indirectly caused Lu Jingyu’s death, Jing Yang should quite dislike him, yet he actually couldn’t bring himself to dislike him, instead he had a kind of feeling of increasingly wanting to be close to him. But for Zhao Bocheng this kind of person, if he could become friends with him, it would be best to not become enemies with him.

“Nervous?” Zhao Bocheng sat down beside him.

“Not nervous, just a little tired.” Jing Yang stretched his neck a bit, recently he had too much to do, he couldn’t even rest well.

Zhao Bocheng raised his hand to help him massage his neck, Jing Yang stiffened for a second, but didn’t prevent him or hide away. His pressing was pretty comfortable, he simply closed his eyes to enjoy it.

This was the first time that the two of them had this kind of direct skin contact, yet these two people who always never liked having others touch them, seemed to not dislike this kind of contact.

This was also Zhao Bocheng’s first time doing this sort of action servicing other people, Lu Jingyu’s skin felt very good. Looking at his fair neck, he actually felt his mind ripple somewhat, and moreover started becoming unsatisfied with only having this kind of simple contact.

———

[1] – 似笑非笑, idiom, ML being passive aggressive here

[2] – 莫名其妙, idiom, also means baffling

[3] – 似曾相識, seemingly familiar/already acquainted

[4] – 姜還是老的辣, idiom, the older the wiser

[5] – 胡作非為, idiom, also to commit outrages