Chapter 16 [Second Update]

"Chapter 16: The Second Watch"

Xiaofa took a call and came back: "The chief director, a senior student, said she has to attend the senior graduation defense with her advisor today, so she probably can't make it. She told us to start the audition first, then send her the video after we finish. She'll edit it and post it on the campus forum, and we'll let the public vote to decide the final promotional actor."

Shen Gali: Whatever, just shoot it quickly. I need to go crash after this.

"Since our filming approach uses the promotional actor's perspective to lead the audience through the campus, the audition process involves each candidate walking from the school gate to the pavilion here. We'll mainly assess your posture and on-screen presence."

Shen Gali sized up the distance from the school gate to the pavilion—about a hundred meters.

Too long... Suddenly, that thousand yuan didn't seem so appealing.

But the shortest distance between two points is a straight line. To save effort, a lazy person's eyes can act like a measuring tape. He mentally plotted several shortest straight lines within this distance, marking exact landmarks for each connection point. He'd walk along those landmarks—maybe it wouldn't even be a hundred meters.

Still, after one round, Shen Gali was exhausted. He quickly found a spot to sit and rest, trying to blend in with the potted plants by the roadside.

He realized his limit was only fifty meters.

Xiaofa sidled up to him with a smile: "A moment ago, the light was too strong in one shot, and it blocked your face. How about we walk it again?"

"Not happening." Shen Gali said honestly. He glanced at Shen Lanqing, who was still auditioning, worried he might get pestered again. He stood up, "If there's nothing else, I'll go ahead. I'm not feeling well—I think I'm having a heart attack."

Xiaofa: ...?

Sick this, sick that—is this guy even normal?

But Nan Feiyao hadn't arrived yet, and he hadn't set up the perfect moment for the hero to rescue the damsel in distress. That cash was going to be hard to earn.

Xiaofa's eyes darted around like a flounder's, and his clever little brain quickly came up with an idea.

A hero saving a beauty in front of a dozen people? How about doing it in front of the entire school? Much more satisfying.

So he put on a big smile: "Shen, then you go ahead. When the audition results come out, I'll give you a call. Oh, by the way, your contact information—"

Before he could finish, Shen Gali had already drifted to the school gate.

He pulled out his phone and saw that Idiot No.22 had called him over a dozen times.

No need to ask who Idiot No.22 was. Just thinking about his face, the nagging like a chanting monk echoed in his ears.

Sure enough, as soon as he got home, Uncle Li stood with his hands on his hips, looking like a woman ready for a verbal brawl: "Mr. Shen, where have you been? You didn't answer your phone. Master said you're not to go more than two kilometers away from home."

Shen Gali didn't even have the strength to speak. He went straight upstairs and flopped onto the bed.

Good dreams always get interrupted—it seemed like a strange rule. No sooner had he closed his eyes than Uncle Li knocked on the door: "Mr. Shen, it's 3 PM. Master will be home in three hours. Please prepare dinner as soon as possible."

Shen Gali: Who is Mr. Shen? From today on, I'll take my mother's surname—Lin.

But wait. Dinner? Dinner expenses?

Expenses? Money?

Shen Gali slowly sat up, opened the door, and before Uncle Li could scold him, he took the initiative and said: "I'll go buy the ingredients tonight."

Uncle Li was utterly shocked: Has Shen Gali really changed? Maybe the master's regular fasting days are working. The Queen Mother saw the master's sincerity and, in a dream, reformed this unreliable Shen Gali!

And as an elder, he knew that young people should be encouraged. Since Shen Gali wanted to learn, he should give him this chance.

Without overthinking it, Uncle Li handed Shen Gali the money and told him what ingredients to buy and where to get them.

To make it easy to remember, Shen Gali linked the keywords of the three ingredient names into "Duck, Empty, Mouth."

Before leaving, he inexplicably asked: "Is this money considered joint marital property?"

"Theoretically, yes."

With that answer, Shen Gali took the money and left.

Volunteering to buy groceries, he regretted it the moment he stepped out the door.

Looking at the tree-lined path leading to the main road, Shen Gali felt muscle aches all over, his teeth hurt, and his head ached.

By the time he dragged his battered body to the market, his illness had fully set in.

So many people, the stalls packed tightly together, the air thick with the salty smell of seafood. Every factor felt like poison, forced down his throat by a giant hand.

"Local mantis shrimp on sale! On sale! Handsome guy! Buy some mantis shrimp!" a vendor enthusiastically called out to Shen Gali.

Shen Gali carefully recalled the three words "Duck, Empty, Mouth"—mantis shrimp didn't fit. Not buying.

But when he stepped into the market, his feet suddenly stopped, and he slowly formed a question mark.

"Duck, Empty, Mouth"—what were those things again?

It wasn't that his memory was bad; that vendor yelling had made him forget.

He couldn't call back to ask; otherwise, Uncle Li would definitely strip him of his grocery-buying rights.

Just then, from a stall hanging plump white ducks, came a voice: "Fat ducks! Fat ducks! White and meaty! Little handsome guy, want to buy a duck?"

Shen Gali looked at the ducks that had kicked the bucket. Did "Duck" in "Duck, Empty, Mouth" refer to duck meat? Maybe it did?

But cleaning a duck was too much trouble—gutting it, plucking the leftover feathers. Definitely not duck. That was the last bit of stubborn laziness.

So he slowly turned to the stall next to the ducks: "Boss, I'll buy duck eggs."

The boss beamed: "How many?"

Shen Gali thought for a moment. He wasn't going to eat dinner anyway, so one each for Nan Liujing and Uncle Li. He held up two fingers.

"Two jin (about a kilo)? Coming right up!"

The boss quickly filled a bag with duck eggs, almost half full, when Shen Gali slowly added: "Just two."

...

The boss's hand, pulling eggs out of the bag, trembled slightly.

Carrying two duck eggs, Shen Gali thought further: What did "Empty" refer to?

He vaguely remembered that in the original story, the antagonist had lived abroad for a long time to treat his leg ailment. Maybe he missed those tough days and wanted to eat some local food to reminisce.

Macaroni.

Macaroni was 16 yuan a bag. Shen Gali, thinking about how to save a bit and pad his zero-balance piggy bank, followed the example of an old man nearby bargaining: "Boss, how about a discount? I'll take it for five yuan."

Boss: "Don't make me mad. Haggling down by half is bad enough, but you've gone and chopped off everything from the neck down."

In the end, he talked it down by one yuan, and Shen Gali walked away with the macaroni for fifteen yuan.

One item left: "kou" (mouth). Shen Gali racked his fried brain for a long time but couldn't figure out any food related to "kou." He scanned the market, silently reciting dish names, but found nothing with "kou" in its name.

Just then, the sound of an electric saw came from not far away. He looked over and saw a vendor chopping the head off a freshly killed pig that was still warm, then tossing it onto the stall.

"Pop!" A little bubble in his mind suddenly burst.

He knew what "kou" referred to.

*

Before leaving, Uncle Li had given him five hundred yuan. After returning, his little stash had grown by 455 yuan.

Though he was still 7,999,954 yuan short of buying an "underground CBD," dreams were necessary—who knew, maybe one day they'd come true.

Uncle Li had timed it perfectly, waiting at the doorstep to welcome Shen Gali's triumphant return, having already prepared words of praise in his mind. Then Shen Gali handed him the dinner ingredients.

Uncle Li: ...?!

"Mr. Shen, this is..." He was afraid of wronging the young man, so he quickly asked for clarification.

Shen Gali slumped wearily into the sofa, fingers rubbing his temples: "Dinner ingredients."

He said it so sincerely that Uncle Li wondered if his own eyes were playing tricks on him.

"Mr. Shen, if I'm not mistaken, dinner should be rock sugar pear soup, stir-fried water spinach, and... pan-fried button mushrooms."

Oh.

So "ya kong kou" referred to pear, water spinach, and mushrooms.

Not duck eggs, macaroni, and... pig tongue.

Just now at the market, when Shen Gali watched the vendor slice the pig tongue from the pig's head, he had thought to himself how unusual the villain's preferences were.

"The twenty-fourth of every month is the young master's fasting day—no meat all day. How are you supposed to eat pig tongue? And the young master never eats offal. What are we going to do?" Uncle Li's face was gloomy, as if he might burst into tears at any moment.

Shen Gali got up lazily: "I'll go to the market again."

Since it was a matter of principle for the other party, Shen Gali knew better than to overstep his bounds. He had no choice but to reluctantly chip in a little from his stash as compensation.

"It's too late. It's already five o'clock." Uncle Li's face was grim, as if he were heading to his death. "Put the tongue in the fridge. As for the rest of the ingredients, I'm afraid I'll have to trouble you, Mr. Shen, to cook it yourself."

Shen Gali: "Fine."