“Thank you for eating at our restaurant. We hope that you’ll come again.”

Fu Chen and his staff bowed towards the party of 11 people. The customers smiled, thanked them, and left the restaurant. 

“Grandpa Peng, did you like the restaurant?”

Peng Hua had a large smile on her face as she asked her grandpa a question.

Old Peng replied, “Yes, the food was wonderful.” 

He felt warmth seeing his dear grandchildren looking so happy and satisfied. Suddenly, his metal wristband began to ring and display a name. Old Peng felt slightly annoyed, but he answered the call and heard a feminine voice, “We’ve completed our preparations.” 

He responded, “Our side is also ready. We’ll be arriving at the designated time.”

Old Peng got off the call and saw Du Hong opening his mouth. He immediately said to Du Hong, “I’ll take you with us to observe and be our backup.” 

Du Hong nodded and laughed.

The group reached the private maglev train station. Old Peng and Shi Feng left the group and headed back towards their office after saying their goodbyes. Du Hong and his disciples boarded a train that was heading towards their university. 

------------------

Fu Lian sat on a chair with her fluffy reddish-orange and white tail poking out of the back of the chair. She stared intently at Fu Chen who was practicing his knife skills. His movements were fluid and graceful. He quickly cut a vegetable on the cutting board into similarly shaped pieces that were of even thickness. Fu Lian was amazed and tried to imitate Fu Chen’s movements, but failed to achieve the same smooth movements. Her arm motions felt choppy and she couldn’t control the amount of power she used. 

Realizing her mistakes, Fu Lian practiced the motions while watching Fu Chen’s arms. Over time, her own motions began to be less choppy and more fluid. Fu Chen smiled and continued practicing his knife skills. 

“shck” 

Fu Chen finally stopped cutting vegetables and cleared the kitchen counter. He turned around to face Fu Lian who was still practicing with her arms. 

“You’ve improved with your arm motions, but you still need to practice by actually using a knife. You can try practicing the knife skill while I prepare for lunch service.”

Fu Lian tilted her head. [Don’t I have to work for lunch service today?]

Fu Chen shook his head, “There will be some special guests that are coming today. It’s better for Abyss 1 and 2 to deal with them while you improve your cutting technique since the movements are still fresh in your mind.”

Fu Lian nodded her head and eagerly prepared to practice. 

---------------

“Why do you think that the matriarch is holding a celebration today?”

A man wearing a black suit asked a woman who had a purple shirtwaist dress on. Both of them wore expensive jewelry made out of high quality energy crystals and rare metals. 

The woman nonchalantly said, “I heard that it was because the Hu Clan was visiting again. The last visit was short because of the unfilial brat’s escape.”

After she mentioned the brat, the man bared his slightly pointed teeth and snarled, “How dare she try to run away. She was our hope for increasing our power immensely. If only our son wasn’t so useless. Have we been able to find traces of her?”

Sighing, the woman responded, “The last traces of her that we could find was in an alleyway around two weeks ago and the business owners didn’t report seeing anyone like her enter their establishments. However, we did find footage of someone who led a cloaked figure into a restaurant. Lang Yu and his cousin have been recently visiting that restaurant after they started searching for the brat.”

The wolf man narrowed his eyes, “Let’s pay the restaurant a visit.”

------------

“They have alcohol now!”

Su Zheng and Su Zhang loudly cheered which startled the other unnamed diners that had discovered the restaurant.. They quickly quieted down when they saw the women of their party glaring at them, but still had smiles on their faces. 

“We’ll order the usual and ten cups of the sorghum alcohol.”

Abyss 2 nodded and gave them the same advice Du Hong’s group was given about how to consume the alcohol. 

Several minutes later, their food and alcohol arrived. 

Su Zheng was drooling as he saw the dishes arrive at the table and quickly spooned the red curry into his mouth. Meanwhile, everyone else also began eating, but had better table manners. From time to time, they would take a sip of their alcohol after eating a bite of their food. 

“bang”

A tiny fist had hit the dining table which surprised everyone. It turned out that Zhou Ru had become drunk after two cups of the sorghum alcohol. Her face was slightly red and she began slurring her words, “Do you know how much shit I have to deal with working for Su Zheng? Thaaaat’s ookay though, because I’ll always….”

She suddenly stopped talking and her face became even more red. Su Zhenya began talking, “Let’s finish the rest of the food and leave.”

The other party members agreed with Su Zhang nodding while staring at Xue Huo with an expression of fear. Zhou Ru appeared to be more sober after drinking some water, but her face was still slightly red and she stared at Su Zheng from time to time. Everyone quickly ate their meals and left after paying the bill. 

-----------------

Two people exited an expensive car and entered the Abyss Bar & Restaurant. 

“Welcome to the Abyss Bar & Restaurant.”

The wolf woman wearing a purple shirtwaist dress walked up towards Abyss 1 who was standing behind his podium. She quickly demanded, “We want to talk to the owner of this restaurant right now.”

Abyss 1 responded, “Apologies, but our owner won’t meet anyone until lunch service ends.”

The wolf woman raised her voice, “Tell him that high ranking members of the Lang Clan want to meet him.”

Abyss 1 shook his head, “It doesn’t matter who you are. As long as the owner doesn’t want to, you won’t be able to talk to him during business hours.”

The wolf woman was about to explode, but then the male growled, “We’ll dine at your restaurant for lunch.”

Nodding his head, Abyss 1 led the two people into the dining room.

As they were led towards a table, the woman muttered to the male, “If we find the brat here, let’s raze this building to the ground after we retrieve her.” 

The two sat down and were approached by Abyss 2. They refused the ice water and ordered two bowls of spicy beef curry. As they waited for their food, they looked around the dining room and made expressions of disdain when they saw “lower class” diners within the room.

Abyss 2 came out with their food a few minutes later. Both of them frowned at the sight of the curry. Noticing their expressions, Abyss 2 said, “Please keep in mind that the restaurant doesn’t take kindly to people that waste food that the owner worked hard to make.”

Making slight sounds of annoyance, the two customers took a small spoonful of their food and their eyes widened. They began taking larger bites and quickly devoured their food.

“We’d like to order more of the spicy beef curry.”

Abyss 2 shook his head, “We’re about to finish lunch service in less than a minute. 

Their faces became filled with anger but subsided after hearing Abyss 2 say, “However, you’ll be able to talk to the owner now.”