Chapter 183: The Deceitful Beast (Part 3) (For

After Gong Liang returned home, Gong Mu didn't say anything, just went to notify the neighbors to tell them Gong Liang was back and they didn't need to look for him anymore, then used the stove to heat the rice in the lunchbox to let Gong Liang eat quickly.

In the lunchbox were quail eggs braised in meat and cornmeal buns. The buns looked wrinkled and misshapen, and one could tell at a glance they were made of pure coarse grains. The quail eggs braised in meat were the portion Gong Liang had scooped out when he heated the dish in the afternoon; Gong's father and mother hadn't touched a bite.

Gong Liang didn't say much throughout the meal. After finishing, he washed the lunchbox clean, washed up simply, and returned to his room to rest.

When Gong Liang got up the next day, Gong Mu was already not at home. A boiled corn was placed on the table, and the door to Gong's father and mother's room was tightly closed. Gong Liang glanced inside, saw his father was still sleeping with his eyes closed, so he didn't speak and went to work.

Gong Liang didn't have a god's-eye view and couldn't see clearly, but Qin Huai had been wandering around the house. He saw Gong Mu getting up before dawn to decoct medicine, clean, organize clothes to be washed, and do needlework, not resting for a moment, fearing that if she did less, someone else would have to do more.

A quarter of an hour before Gong Liang woke up, Gong Mu took the needlework she was doing and went out to mend clothes, probably having calculated the time to avoid being seen by Gong Liang.

The clothes Gong Mu had to mend were of many styles and very mixed. Those clothes were likely not from their own family; they were jobs she had taken from outside.

As for Gong's father, he wasn't sleeping either; he had long since woken up.

Most of the time he lay on the bed with his eyes open, dazed. Occasionally, he would try to move to see how paralyzed he actually was, and then stare blankly at the ceiling with lifeless eyes.

Gong Liang walked to work, gnawing on the corn as he walked.

Although the sales section had an office, the office was rarely full. Qin Huai counted; there were 11 positions in the office. Theoretically, the sales section should have at least 11 people, but only 4 arrived in the morning.

Section Chief Chen, Gong Liang, Liu Hai, and a middle-aged man Qin Huai hadn't seen before. The middle-aged man who had told Liu Hai to say less yesterday didn't come today, probably out running business.

Running business outside was hard work, and sitting in the office wasn't idle either. Gong Liang was assigned the task of collecting information. It was called collecting information, but it was actually reading newspapers, writing letters, and making phone calls.

He read newspapers from all over the country, looking for factories that might have the intention to order silk. For those with a certain probability of success, he would call directly; for those with slim chances, he would write letters. These three tasks couldn't be done simultaneously. In the morning, Gong Liang was mainly responsible for reading newspapers and recording information.

Qin Huai watched from the side and deeply realized that Gong Liang was indeed a natural-born salesman.

Gong Liang not only had a slick tongue and thick skin, and was good at pestering and climbing the pole, but he was also very good at collecting, identifying, and extracting information. Many contents in the newspapers were clearly advertisements, such as handicrafts and toys, but he recorded them all, labeling the types that could be promoted.

Even news reporting that the pearls from a certain pearl farm were well-received at last year's trade fair and successfully created foreign exchange, he recorded, labeling that they might need silk packaging.

With this ability and patience, Qin Huai fully believed that Gong Liang losing the Modu order at the beginning of the year was not a problem of ability, but purely a problem of mentality.

No wonder Section Chief Chen trusted Gong Liang, a young man who had just become a regular employee, so much, letting him come forward as the main force when negotiating big orders.

After the morning work ended, Gong Liang didn't go to the cafeteria to eat, but ran to find Section Chief Chen to ask for leave. He explained the reason directly, didn't make up a story, just said Master Jing asked him to go to the state-run restaurant in the afternoon.

Section Chief Chen agreed without even thinking, didn't make Gong Liang write a leave note, and told Gong Liang that if things ended early at the state-run restaurant, he didn't need to come to the unit and could go straight home.

Gong Liang went to the cafeteria to have a meal before setting off for the state-run restaurant.

The cafeteria food at the silk weaving factory was very perfunctory: coarse grain steamed buns, minced meat braised cabbage, and clear-stir-fried white radish. Except for seeing some grease in the minced meat braised cabbage, the clear-stir-fried white radish looked no different from boiled water.

With this food, it was no wonder the workers at the silk weaving factory were trying every means to transfer to other factories. One could tell from the food that the factory's efficiency was indeed not very good.

When Gong Liang arrived at the state-run restaurant, the restaurant had just finished business. The waiter was already holding a bowl and eating noodles. It looked like white flour, and the food was not bad.

Seeing Gong Liang come, the round-faced, slightly chubby waiter raised his head, pointed to the way to the kitchen with his eyes, and said with a drawn-out tone as if he didn't want to open his mouth: "Master Jing is waiting for you in the kitchen."

Gong Liang walked into the kitchen, somewhat confused.

Only Jing Lixiang was in the kitchen.

"You're here." Jing Lixiang looked at Gong Liang with a smile, pointing to all the ingredients that could be seen on the countertop, "Is there anything you want to eat?"

The implication was that if he wanted to eat, he could order it. All the dishes today would be paid for and prepared by Master Jing.

Gong Liang was very panicked for a moment.

The first thing he saw was the beautiful pork belly on the cutting board, and then he quickly looked away. He saw chicken, looked away. Duck, looked away. Fish—he didn't look away from this, looked for a while, and saw crabs.

Gong Liang pointed to the crabs.

According to the order in which Gong Liang examined the ingredients, Qin Huai saw the pattern.

He didn't dare look at the expensive ones, always picking the cheap ones.

In this era, crabs, fish, and shrimp were absolutely cheap goods; they were everywhere in the river, and you could catch them if you wanted to eat them. To make these dishes taste good, you had to add seasonings, and seasonings meant spending money. Boiled in plain water, they didn't taste good, and the most critical thing was that there was no oil, so eating them didn't provide the satiety that pork did.

Although it was the season when crabs were fattest, this large basin of crabs crawling everywhere was not necessarily more valuable than that small piece of pork belly on the cutting board.

"Crabs, huh. Crabs at this time of year are indeed good, fat and full of crab roe. Let me think about what can be made with crabs. Cooking them as a dish is a bit too grand, and it's inevitable that people will criticize me for abusing my power for personal gain."

"How about making dim sum? How about crab roe xiaolongbao?" Jing Lixiang asked.

Gong Liang shook his head repeatedly. He knew about crab roe xiaolongbao; it required pork, which was too expensive.

Jing Lixiang also saw Gong Liang's thoughts and smiled helplessly: "Since Xiao Liang doesn't want to eat pork filling today, why not make crab roe shumai? Shrimp filling with crab—although it's a bit troublesome, the ingredients are easy to get and it doesn't cost much money."

Gong Liang nodded, still confused.

Jing Lixiang began to make crab roe shumai.

Qin Huai was very familiar with this dish; he was so familiar with the production process that even if his eyes were covered, he would know what to do next.

Qin Huai's crab roe shumai was taught by Zheng Da, and Zheng Da's crab roe shumai was taught by Jing Lixiang. Therefore, Qin Huai's and Jing Lixiang's crab roe shumai were actually of the same lineage.

Qin Huai was very familiar with every movement of Jing Lixiang, but it was a bit strange.

How to put it, the pastry chef level was too high.

Ignoring physical strength, the level of a pastry chef could theoretically be practiced higher and higher.

Pastry work was not as strictly demanding on strength and technique as savory cooking. Savory chefs' culinary skills would gradually decline after their prime; although their experience would be more seasoned, their bodies would not keep up with their brains. Especially since savory cooking was high-intensity physical labor, they couldn't keep up with the intensity of the kitchen when they got older. Pastry work was relatively much better, which was why there were very few female chefs in savory cooking, but relatively many female chefs in pastry work.

Now, although Jing Lixiang was already over 50 and had a lame leg, his pastry culinary level was still at its peak. Qin Huai could only open his mouth and sigh at the side that it was truly unreachable. When would he be able to practice to such a peak level?

His movements could no longer be described as flowing like clouds and water or done in one go.

Qin Huai felt that Jing Lixiang was probably the second-best chef he had ever seen. The best was Jiang Chengde, whose teaching videos he couldn't quite understand.

Jing Lixiang's was still somewhat understandable.

"You must have thought about it all night after going home last night, right?" Jing Lixiang could still spare the energy to talk to Gong Liang while kneading the dough.

Gong Liang nodded.

"Did you think of anything?"

Gong Liang didn't speak; not speaking meant nothing.

"Sometimes the process of making a decision is difficult, but when you make up your mind to start doing the thing you think is difficult, it's often not that difficult." Jing Lixiang said, "Just like when Shengli cut his hand for the first time, since then he has always been very careful, fearing he would cut his hand again."

"But in reality, people won't fail every time after one failure. When learning to cook, you won't cut your hand many times after cutting it once."

"People will gain lessons when they fail, and they will correct them. Correction is to avoid repeating the same mistakes."

"If you don't even have the courage to try, you won't even have the chance to know if you have corrected yourself."

Gong Liang stood quietly on the side, not speaking.

Jing Lixiang chuckled: "Think your Master Jing is talking about big principles again, talking empty words, right?"

"No." Gong Liang denied hurriedly, "I just... just... it's useless to think about these things now. There is no quota for the trade fair, and I don't even have the chance to try."

"Opportunities are always there."

"I still remember how your parents told me with great excitement last year how your first order was negotiated."

"The silk weaving factory had no orders, so you went to the newspaper to find factories with intentions, calling them one by one. Section Chief Chen felt that you made too many calls and the phone bill was too expensive, so you wrote letters and waited for replies."

"Others went to Jin Ling on business trips, going back and forth only to the places originally planned to visit. You did your homework in advance, visiting a few more factories than others. Even if the security guard didn't let you in and you were shut out, you squatted at the door for the purchasing leader."

"Wasn't your first order squatted out like that?"

Gong Liang didn't expect Jing Lixiang to remember this, and remember it so clearly.

"Your Section Chief Chen is old-fashioned, but he is not bad, and he cherishes talent. Otherwise, he wouldn't have cultivated you as a backbone before you became a regular employee, and wouldn't have let a newcomer like you take on the heavy responsibility of negotiating orders in Modu."

"Giving up after one failure is not the Gong Liang I watched grow up."

"I remember when you were a child, when I made dim sum during the New Year, you were greedy and wanted to beg for food. Once didn't work, you tried twice. The pretty words in your mouth never stopped. If one trick didn't work, you changed to another. You are not the type of character to give up after being hit by a stick."

Gong Liang was a bit embarrassed by Jing Lixiang's words, lowering his head with a slightly red face: "Master Jing, those are all things from when I was a child."

"When you were in junior high school, didn't you also trick Shengli and Zheng Da..."

"Master Jing!" Gong Liang had already begun to beg.

Jing Lixiang smiled and stopped exposing Gong Liang's bottom line, quietly making the crab roe shumai.

Once the crab roe shumai was really made, it didn't take long. Soon, the crab roe shumai was put into the steamer.

"I want to say, Xiao Liang, I have watched you grow up all these years, Master Jing. You are not the type of person who will resign yourself to fate if the quota for the trade fair is not given."

"At first, Section Chief Chen wouldn't let you make phone calls, but you wrote letters. Now I believe you can do it too."

"It's just that you are still hesitating in your heart, hesitating whether to do this thing."

"But I have one thing I want to tell you: opportunities are fleeting. Not every time will there be such a good opportunity placed in front of you waiting for you to grasp it."

Gong Liang remained silent.

Jing Lixiang stopped talking, waiting for the crab roe shumai to be steamed and out of the pot.

Seven or eight minutes later, the crab roe shumai was out of the pot.

After blowing it cool slightly, Gong Liang picked up a crab roe shumai, wrapped it in one bite, and chewed.

Gong Liang's eyes widened. He didn't say a word, but it was as if he had said everything.

While Gong Liang was chewing frantically, Jing Lixiang stood on the side and asked with a smile: "What do you want to eat tomorrow?"

Gong Liang:!

Gong Liang swallowed hurriedly, refusing repeatedly: "Master Jing, no need, I tomorrow..."

Jing Lixiang didn't give him a chance to refuse: "Don't be polite with me, order whatever you want to eat. People must face their own desires and their own hearts. You must first determine what you want to have the motivation to make choices and work hard."

"I am not someone who only talks empty words, Master Jing."

Gong Liang thought for a while and said embarrassedly: "Master Jing, I want to eat meat buns."

Jing Lixiang laughed out loud: "I knew it. You kid, your eyes haven't moved away from the pork belly since you entered the kitchen. Fine, I'll make you meat buns tomorrow!"

"Special meat buns, San Ding Bao."

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 184 =====