CH 59.2

[NOTE: PLEASE READ THE FOLLOWING CONTENTS WITH THE APPROPRIATE MINDSET, REPLACING TERMS WHERE APPROPRIATE TO UNDERSTAND THE INTENDED MEANING OF THE AUTHOR]

(TL: I’ll try my best to make this part as entertaining as possible, hehehehehe)

Murong Jihua’s face is really hot. He thinks, he must be having a fever now.

He gulps, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down with it. Then, he hears his own voice whisper, as quietly as a little insect,

“… Here?”

He Jünle turns around to examine the surroundings. The moonlit boat with its whole array of soft plushies lay beneath him. It definitely doesn’t hurt to sleep on. In fact, it’s a pretty refreshing experience.

He Jünle chuckles as he closes his fingers in, to begin unpeeling the egg, saying,

“I’m fine, but if you want…”

“Wait wait wait!”

Murong Jihua stops his hand to say,

“… We’re making a meal together for the first time, so it’s important we have a good kitchen. The shaoye——Yes, the shaoye will be giving you a ceremony to celebrate first. Wait——”

He Jünle stops, observing with a curious glance how the beet-red man in front of him is looking up suitable kitchens with trembling fingers. The grey fog in his eyes are quite tumultuous for once.

His lips perk up as he says, “as expected of an excellent chef, master Murong.”

“… Right. He——Jünle. Come out,”

Murong Jihua feels like his tongue is going to freeze up. He helps He Jünle up from the moonlit boat with a powerful arm, asking,

“How about this one?”

“Sure,” answers He Jünle without looking, stretching his limbs a little and continuing, “go prepare the ingredients first. I’ll go over to the sink first. I’ll be with you later.”

“Ok… Wait, why are you going to the sink?”

He Jünle gives him an odd look, raising his left brow to ask,

“You don’t wash your vegetables before making your meals?”

“…”

“Got it? Good… Seriously, you look like you don’t know anything. Remember all the ingredients you need to prepare? The cling film, and the vegetable oil. Everything is necessary. If you really don’t understand, go ask your assistant chef Cui. He knows.”

He has all the theory down pat, but this is also He Jünle’s first time washing the vegetables.

In the sink, he has a poker face on, and with one hand holding the recipe, the other hand is washing the vegetable in accordance with the recipe.

He’s a genius.

It is definitely no easy job to remove all the seeds from inside the plump Oriental melon, but it is no difficulty for a genius chef like He Jünle. Just three seconds in his fingers are already scouring in an adept motion.

It’s pretty tiring though.

He Jünle is gasping slightly.

That damned dumbass Murong Jihua. If he just let him be the head chef, he wouldn’t have had to gone through so much trouble.

——Let’s just hope chef Murong doesn’t have a bad habit of mutilating eggplants.

The kitchen is pretty far away. The bedroom air-con is at just the right temperature and the light music is perfect for the mood. He Jünle is walking with naked feet on the three layers of snow-white silken carpet. The breeze is soothing. The weather is relaxing.

——A perfect day for cooking.

When He Jünle steps inside the kitchen, Murong Jihua is currently sitting on a low chair with a box in his arms down at the corner.

His face is so red it might as well have been drenched in blood.

He Jünle really feels like laughing, but he doesn’t.

He asks, “done?”

Murong Jihua replies, “… mm.”

“All the food is prepared? The cling film, the vegetable oil, and…”

Murong Jihua cuts him off, saying, “everything,” then he lifts the big box at him, telling him, “… xiao-Cui sent this.”

Then all is well.

He Jünle’s lips are perking up like crazy. He pinches Murong Jihua’s cheeks, asking, “nervous?”

Murong Jihua “…”

“… Tch. Don’t look down on me. This shaoye is just a bit worried about your body.”

——Then, with a smooth set of motions, he quickly reproduces what he practised countless times while He Jünle was off washing vegetables,

——Wrapping his arm about the young man’s waist, as he pushes He Jünle down onto the cutting board.

Calm down. Calm down.

He can do it. Yes he can.

Murong Jihua closes his eyes, and inhales——deeply——before exhaling again.

What to do now?

His mind is churning mad to dig back up the little cooking walkthrough he just saw from all the images of He Jünle clogging up his mind.

Right, right, he remembers now——

Step one – Remove the shell of the egg

So, with shaky hands, he tries to unbutton He Jünle’s shirt——Removing the shell of the egg, bit by bit, until the clean, ripe egg white is revealed.

So white, it is glistening.

Though he stops soon enough, because it was so tortuous to reveal the ivory whiteness inch by inch. He can only turn his head away. Without looking, his hands are almost drifting off to the void.

“…”

He Jünle grabs the man’s hand to ask, “what, baby’s first time ever egg shell removal?”

“…”

“… Just let me do it.”

“No, I’ll do it.”

“… Let me-”

“Me!”

“Me.”

“…”

“…”

He Jünle’s forehead has veins visibly twitching. He closes his eyes, and offers a suggestion with 30% sighing, 30% annoyance, 30% ‘oh hell’ and 10% patience,

“Rock, paper, scissors?”

Twelve seconds later, a brand new, clean white egg is now placed properly in the middle of the cutting board.

Step two: To serve the Oriental melon

“Murong, you…”

“Wait, I’ll be done soon!”

“Say, you should still just…”

“No! This shaoye is just not used to this yet, don-don-don’t move!”

He Jünle really doesn’t understand Murong Jihua’s thought processes.

He has a feeling that, Murong Jihua, who, in the middle of his cooking session, ran off to put on a pair of black sunglasses, is probably about to lash out at his fragile worldview, yet again.

Alright, in Murong Jihua’s terms, it is just that the egg is so shiny that he would definitely go blind if he doesn’t wear any protection.

When he said this, his ears are positively crimson. He looks really like some pure virgin boy.

Murong Jihua didn’t want this either.

Before his cooking, he thought he would be,

Flipping the clouds with one hand, splashing rain with the other. Churning the axle and strumming the strings, forming a romance before a tune. Lightly caressing, slowly patting, before going back to touching. Food is life. Chef Murong would definitely produce the most excellent meal in this entire world.

Yet imagination doesn’t make for reality.

As truth will have it, a CEO who can’t even peel an egg properly is not a good chef.

With his gloved hand, he has retrieved a small puddle of vegetable oil within his cupping hand. And under He Jünle’s firm protest of “too much” he very unwillingly pours some away.

——Then, he rubs them all on the smooth surface of the Oriental melon.

So Murong Jihua watches as He Jünle shows him a fantastically amazing expression.

“What’s wrong this time?”

“… What do you think? Are you trying to cook up a meal with the melon or just merely eating the skin of the mlon?”

“…”

He Jünle is rubbing his temples. The feeling of mental exhaustion and unwillingness really is building now. He says,

“… You pour the oil inside of the Oriental melon.”

“… Oh.”

Anyway, after Murong Jihua experienced the most excruciating and infuriating preparation process, he has finally and successfully poured vegetable oil into the Oriental melon. What a cause for celebration.

Step three: Vegetable oil, bananas and milk; Presentation of a meal

This step, Murong Jihua believes he definitely knows. He knows well. Very well.

He puts the unpeeled banana onto the cutting board, and wraps a cling film about it. Then, he carefully observes He Jünle’s expression, saying,

“… If I’m doing anything wrong, please tell me, alright?”

He Jünle – Poker_face.jpg

“Got it already. Quit dithering around.”

It’s in.

He Jünle’s experience –

(23:04:04) It hurts;

(23:10:10) It hurts a lot;

(23:30:00) It hurts like fucking hell;

He Jünle’s beautiful hand is now instead marred by veins popping everywhere. He is seriously regretting so much – He vastly underestimated how tragic Murong Jihua’s cooking skills would be!

This, fu-fu-fucking damned Big Bang level of cooking!

He should never have bloody negotiated with him. He should have just chopped him unconscious and let nature take his course with him!

Murong Jihua’s experience –

(23:05:01)  … It’s so hot;

(23:06:12) It hurts;

(23:20:05) It hurts a lot;

(23:40:00) It hurts like fucking hell;

Murong Jihua’s hairs are all standing on end as he makes another difficult gulp. While trying to suppress the pain to keep frying the vegetables, he keeps cheering himself on in his mind.

Yes, yes, keep going. Lighter. Try another angle——That’s what the novels all say. All will improve. It’ll get better soon. It’ll become so amazing soon, right? Right?!

He Jünle yells out, “… Murong, Jihua!”

Murong Jihua goes “huh?”

“Are you seriously trying to chop the damned Oriental melon horizontally with your knife?!” (TL: How did the… kuhum… knife… not snap yet?)

He Jünle has had enough.

He raises his long leg, and kicks Murong Jihua right out of the kitchen.

“Confucius say, ‘the honourable man stays away from the kitchen,'”

He Jünle sits up on the cutting board, with hints of red by his eyes. He feels like his body is going to fall apart anytime soon. He says,

“Murong Jihua, I tell you what, there are all sorts of careers in this world, so please, stop trying to cook or you’ll be a fucking embarrassment to the civilised world!”