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Chapter 2: First Mission
Lacking the time to check what mission he’d received or anything else, Yuan Zhou excitedly stood up and paced around the room twice before he realized how silly he was being. He then sat down and kept pressing the power button of the phone, to the point that the phone became sluggish.
Countless thoughts flickered through his mind but they could be roughly summed up in one line, “Culinary God System? At this rate, I can reach the peak of my life with this.”
One had to know that this small shop was originally the result of decades hard labour from his parents, but it hadn’t even been two years before they’d gotten into a traffic accident while stocking up on goods. He was in the third year of university that year, and had suddenly become an orphan after losing both his parents at that time. His state of mind crumbled, he couldn’t care about his studies at all and could only defer his studies, barely graduating a year later.
In this flourishing city, he simply couldn’t find a decent job with such a school record. In the end, he could only help out in the kitchen of a large restaurant. He’d started off wanting to really grasp the culinary skills and inherit his father’s dream, but it turned out that even stir-frying dishes required talent.
He was still the same after two years of study. It just so happened that someone took a liking to this shabby storefront. The despair in his heart was one reason, wanting to cast away the shadow of his parents’ deaths was another, so Yuan Zhou decided to resign from his job and go somewhere else to start a new life.
Thinking that this system could give him opportunities and hope, Yuan Zhou opened the first mission with an indescribable feeling.
[Mission] Own a shop that belongs to you.
(Mission Prompt: As a future Culinary God, how can you not even have your own store, Youngster, go strive a little.)
“What sort of prompt is this? What is it prompting? Is the system mocking me?” Yuan Zhou had opened the mission in excitement but one he saw the words in parentheses, he couldn’t help uttering.
“My own shop? Looks like the heaven’s will.” Seeing the mission, Yuan Zhou felt a little sorrow.
Or perhaps this was the hope of his parents, who didn’t want him to leave.
All of his scattered thoughts congealed into determination, Yuan Zhuo finally picked up the phone from the table, used the swipe-to-call interface and looked for Li Li in the directory. He paused a moment before calling.
It rung three times before the other side answered:
“Hello, this is Li Li,” a soft and gentle female voice came from the opposite side.
“This…… Hello, I am Yuan Zhou, the boss of the shop at 14 Peach Creek Road.”
Yuan Zhou had also only seen the female client who was coming to lease the shop once before, her five features were delicate and pretty, her long hair was tied in a bun with not a single strand out of place, and she wore a fitting suit. Honestly speaking, that woman who wanted to lease the place didn’t even look inside and didn’t even bargain, yet he himself wanted to back out, which was a little embarrassing.
But before Yuan Zhou managed to finish speaking, he heard the person on the other side of the line say, “Oh, it’s you, this is about the contract isn’t it. Give me a moment, I’m a little busy right now, you can talk to my brother, the store will be handled by my brother in the future.”
Without giving Yuan Zhou the chance to speak, the voice on the line changed to one that had a rough and haughty tone belonging to a man, “Tomorrow afternoon at 1pm, we’ll sign the contract at your store.”
“I’m sorry, the reason I’m calling today is because I can’t lease the shop out to you anymore.” Being rebuked like this, Yuan Zhou was pretty unhappy, but thinking of his purpose for calling, he didn’t beat around the bush and said everything straightforwardly.
“What is the meaning of this? You want to increase the lease price?” The man on the line sounded a little dissatisfied, he didn’t take Yuan Zhou’s words of not wanting to lease the shop as the truth.
After all, he knew about this store, the poster for leasing had already been there for two years, yet it was never leased. One of the reasons was that this street was never considered a gourmet street, it was merely a street for miscellaneous goods, anything can be found here, but they weren’t of high quality, most of the stuff was for average households.
The location was also average. There were a couple of office buildings behind it, and there were white collar workers that could easily go to the store, but right below the office buildings there was a gourmet street. Nowadays, office workers are lazy and aren’t willing to walk a longer distance, so this street’s business was honestly nothing great.
This was the state of affairs, the ones who wanted to lease the place weren’t silly, the reason why they wanted to lease the place without bargaining was because they had inside info.
Although their proposal to purchase had been rejected, they still wanted to lease it, so that when they purchase it in the future they would be able to rake in huge profits. Yuan Zhou’s situation had already been investigated clearly, he’s just an orphan that doesn’t have any backers.
“No, this is my personal problem, we haven’t signed any kind of contract anyway, and I didn’t take any deposit, let’s just forget about this lease.” Yuan Zhou’s eyebrows creased when he heard the words increase lease price. Am I the kind of person who loves money? But he still explained a little.
“What’s the meaning of this, you already agreed to lease, how can you change your mind? You think your store is in great demand? If that is the case then I’ll increase the amount by a hundred every month.” On the phone, the rough male voice carried anxiousness and discontent, his first reaction was to increase the lease amount.
“It’s really not a matter of price, I just want to work in this place myself, so I’m not leasing it anymore.”
“Hey you!…”
Yuan Zhou hung up the phone before the other person was able to finish. Are you kidding me? I’m the one who made the call, if that kind of useless talk continued it would surpass a minute. Like Yuan Zhou said before, he wasn’t a man who likes money, he was a man who loves money very much. What’s more, first, there was no deposit made, second, they didn’t even sign a contract, so if he says it’s off, then it’s off.
Tut tut tut
Li Li who finished sending the guest out returned to the house. Her high-heeled shoes stepping on the wooden floor issued a clear clacking sound. She saw her brother, Li Di grimacing at his phone.
She said: “What’s wrong with you? Why are you gripping the cell phone with such force?”
“The store isn’t being leased anymore.” Li Di immediately turned tranquil, but his face showed a little disatisfaction.
[TL: This brother and sister have names that sound exactly the same, Li Li, even the intonation is the same, thus I’ll just call the brother Li Di.]
“Oh? Why?” Li Li raised her beautiful eyebrow in surprise.
“That kid wants to open his own shop, nevermind, we’ve already gotten four or five places anyway.” Li Di showed a face of indifference.
“Well, what are you preparing to do next?” Seeing that her brother didn’t seem to care, Li Li didn’t continue to talk about it. She instead changed topics.
……
Here Yuan Zhou completely relaxed his brain with a solemn face while holding the phone and aimlessly poking at it.
“Should I clean it up by myself or clean it up by myself, or perhaps I should clean it up by myself?”
“That’s right, if there’s a mission then there should be a reward. Where’s the reward?” Yuan Zhou said to himself as he searched on the panel in his mind.
[Reward] Divine-class Egg Fried Rice Technique
Isn’t divine-class egg fried rice still egg fried rice? It’s like how the chief of beggars is still a beggar, what use is there?
“System, is this reward really worthy of my mission?”  The moment he saw the reward, Yuan Zhou felt ill all over.
System: The tastiest egg fried rice in the whole world.
“How is it tasty?” Yuan Zhou asked in a deadpan.
This time, there was no explanation, only a solitary line of words: May the host please complete the mission first.
“Alright, an explanation that doesn’t explain a thing.” Yuan Zhou muttered, then once again continued to look at the screen. He had been too excited just now and didn’t have time to examine it in detail.
“Why is culinary talent unknown?”
Yuan Zhou knew that his culinary talent may not be very high, but what the hell was unknown for?
“This system is not equipped with the ability to measure talent, the talent of humans is not at a fixed level either.” As before, there was an explanation.
“If you can’t measure it, why display it?” Yuan Zhou couldn’t understand it.
“This way the symmetry looks better.” There was a suspicious pause before the system produced an explanation, however it gave off an even weirder impression.
To avoid his IQ being affected by the system, Yuan Zhou decided to overlook this issue, continuing to look further down.
“Five Factors of Culinary Skills?”
System Display: Refers to color, smell, taste, appearance, intention.
However, the dazzling word ‘rookie’ also allowed Yuan Zhou to understand his own culinary talent, it made him feel like a failure. But once he thought about having the system with him, he immediately regained confidence.
So now, let’s set off to fulfill the mission.