Chapter 96

"Also, I received a message from the Inspector. He said he had long heard of the Spring Festival and had moved up the agenda, intending to arrive in Yanjiang Prefecture during the Spring Festival. You must be mentally prepared and not show any weakness in front of the Inspector."

Previously, the Inspector had said he would come to Yanjiang Prefecture after the Spring Festival ended.

"Yes."

When Lu Yang left the branch, he met deacons like Wang He and Bai Zifang walking toward him.

Wang He and the others nodded slightly to greet him. This newly promoted deacon, Lu Yang, was a favorite in front of Branch Leader Chu, so they couldn't afford to offend him.

Wang He and the others had worked in the branch for decades and knew a few things. They guessed that Branch Leader Chu had directly appointed the three of them because they had received high evaluations during the sect entry test, especially Lu Yang, who might have had the highest evaluation of the three.

Wang He whispered: "The Branch Leader has always been someone who doesn't do anything without profit. It's very likely he knew Lu Yang would rise to prominence and wanted to build a good relationship while Lu Yang was still getting started, to facilitate his own promotion later."

They knew that what the Branch Leader wanted most was to be promoted and become a branch leader in a more economically developed area, so he attached particular importance to the arrival of this Inspector.

"Maybe calling us here this time also has something to do with the Inspector."

"But having said that, the Branch Leader is still missing a condition for promotion, right? Has he reached the Nascent Soul stage?"

Promotion within the sect didn't just look at faith in the Decayed Immortal; it also emphasized cultivation base.

"Who knows? Maybe he reached it long ago and just didn't tell us. He never explains what he does to us, and we don't know the purpose of him doing these things either."

Branch Leader Chu's style was also the style of the entire demonic sect, filled with distrust. Branch Leader Chu appeared to trust Lu Yang, but in reality, he did not; Branch Leader Chu had never disclosed any information related to himself to Lu Yang.

Lu Yang knew very little about Branch Leader Chu.

The Spring Festival arrived as scheduled, and the barbecue restaurant's customer traffic reached its peak. Many out-of-town merchants had already discovered the business opportunities of the barbecue restaurant and proposed to Lu Yang that they open branches, with Lu Yang providing the recipe and them providing the capital.

Without exception, they were all blasted out by Lu Yang with a dark face.

There were also cultivators who wanted to eat without paying, but upon seeing the three banners hanging on the wall, they swallowed this unrealistic idea and honestly paid the money.

With the help of the automatic barbecue array, the two vengeful ghosts had more time to skewer meat. In this way, even if there were more customers than usual, the barbecue restaurant could still operate.

"Let's go to the barbecue restaurant again... Yes, that's the one. My aunt told me that this barbecue restaurant is especially delicious. If you come to Yanjiang Prefecture, you must eat there once!"

"Look, this shop is even having an event now. If you spend money at this shop, you can receive a voucher, and you get a 10% discount at the tofu shop on Front Street."

"If you spend one tael of silver, you can participate in the Lucky Wheel once. The number of times can be accumulated, there is no cap, and prizes are limited, first come, first served."

"Let's go, let's go try it."

The two reached a consensus and lined up at the end of the queue, not knowing how long they would have to wait before they could eat.

At the entrance of the barbecue restaurant, Meng Jingzhou was busy with the Lucky Wheel, enjoying himself immensely.

Written on the big wheel were the words "Try Again," "Third Prize," "Second Prize," "First Prize," and "Grand Prize."

"Congratulations to this customer for winning the second prize, a 40% discount on this meal! Let us congratulate him!" Meng Jingzhou clapped his hands, looking even happier than the person who won the prize.

"First prize, the first prize has appeared! This customer's meal is completely free!"

"Grand prize, someone actually won the grand prize!"

The customer didn't expect to win the grand prize and asked happily: "What is the grand prize?"

Meng Jingzhou held the customer's hand and said enthusiastically: "Congratulations to you! You have won an opportunity to experience being a shop assistant! Others pay to experience the joy of labor as a shop assistant here. You are very lucky; you don't have to pay money to experience the feeling of becoming a shop assistant here!"

"Considering that the backyard is smoky and the environment is extremely poor, our professional staff will bring the skewers to the entrance of the backyard, so you won't have to go to the backyard!" Meng Jingzhou had an expression that said, we consider things thoughtfully, no need to praise us.

Customer: "..."Can you change it to the first prize for me?"

"No."

The customer refused the reward of the grand prize.

As of now, Meng Jingzhou hadn't managed to trick anyone into enjoying the grand prize treatment, but he enjoyed the process of tricking people.

Inside the barbecue restaurant, Lu Yang carried a tray and shuttled back and forth in the shop. His steps were light, his movements agile, his lower body was extremely stable, the tray did not tilt, the skewers did not sway, and he did not bump into customers; it could be said that he moved without touching a single leaf.

After more than a month of life as a shop assistant, his footwork level had improved significantly.

"Squad Leader Ma, Registrar Chi, how is the food?" Lu Yang greeted the two customers with a smile. These two were officials in the prefecture and often came here to eat skewers and drink.

"It's as delicious as ever. Little Shopkeeper Lu, if you ask me, your craftsmanship is wasted opening here. You should go to a larger prefecture to open a shop; it's guaranteed to earn more than now!"

"Go on, don't talk nonsense. Haven't you heard that Little Shopkeeper Lu doesn't even open branches? It's obvious that he opened the shop as a hobby and didn't intend to make money."

Lu Yang could only smile apologetically: "I hope you two have a good time during the Spring Festival."

The two were clearly drunk, their cheeks flushed. Squad Leader Ma cursed: "Speaking of the Spring Festival, I get angry. Originally, the Spring Festival holiday was seven days, a long holiday. I don't know whose stupid idea it was to shorten the Spring Festival holiday to three days!"

"What can you do in three days? And they call it a 'mini-long holiday.' Listen to that term, does it make sense? Adding a 'mini' before 'long holiday'—is it a long holiday or not!"

"I wish the person who came up with this term a 'mini-long life'!"

Registrar Chi quickly covered Squad Leader Ma's mouth: "You can't say things like that. You came late, so it's normal that you don't know. This was an idea thought up by Prefect Li!"

Squad Leader Ma gave a cold snort: "So it was him. Not much ability, but plenty of ideas!"

Registrar Chi was better informed: "Keep your voice down. You can't speak ill of Prefect Li now. I heard that Prefect Li has found a way and has caught three vicious demonic cultivators in the prefecture again. It's a great achievement, and he's about to be promoted. Chief Constable Fang Qingyun is going to take his place!"

Squad Leader Ma curled his lips, showing disdain for Prefect Li. Anyway, Prefect Li wouldn't care about a small person like him: "A few days ago, a colleague complained to me, saying that Prefect Li gave chaotic orders, making the government office runners work overtime in the middle of the night, requiring them to insert small flags all night long, and the positions couldn't be off by even a bit. He even acted as a supervisor himself, putting on a show. He's in the Golden Core stage and doesn't need to sleep, but others need to sleep. Many government office runners fell asleep while working!"

Lu Yang poured wine for the two: "I'll go get busy with other things first."

"Go ahead, go ahead, Little Shopkeeper Lu, don't worry about us."

On the night of the first day of the Spring Festival, the four people and two ghosts were exhausted.

Before going to sleep, Seeing Man Gu remembered: "It seems ghosts don't need to sleep. Should we arrange work for them at night too?"

(End of chapter)