Chapter 63

Chapter 63 Very Urgent! Still Can Enter the Haunted House at Sixty...

Xu Ruyi really put a lot of effort into this haunted house. The entire storyline was constantly updated and refreshed.

Some small scenes were often adjusted, and player reactions were carefully monitored through surveillance.

Because of this, Han Qiao gave this place a good review. After all, he wasn’t a food blogger but a haunted house reviewer.

On the path to the “Hell” map, Yang Jingzhou looked at the scenery on both sides and actually felt a bit creeped out.

Chen Ran turned her head to look at him and asked, “Are you scared?”

Yang Jingzhou snorted, “Why should I be afraid of these things? You young people nowadays live too comfortably. When I was young, I even slept in a graveyard. How could I be afraid of this stuff?”

Every sentence from this man made people feel nauseous. If it weren’t for waiting for him to eat the caramelized sweet potatoes, Chen Ran wouldn’t have wanted to say a word to him.

For today, she had specially borrowed Xiao Liu’s filming equipment from the police station. It was small but had very high recording and filming precision, hidden in her bag, very discreet.

“All right, let’s go try and see how this lion’s head really is.”

Yang Jingzhou could also make the clear stewed crab roe lion’s head himself. When Old Xu taught him back then, he was very dedicated.

However, during that egg white multiple-choice question, he chose three egg whites without thinking. Since then, he felt his master was biased against him.

The three-set duck recipe wasn’t taught to him but only to his junior apprentice.

But he didn’t care!

Old Xu himself always muttered about “few confidants, who listens when the string breaks,” yet stubbornly held onto that old mindset, what use was that!

He agreed more with what Chen Yun heard from that old man: no matter how well you make a lion’s head with just one egg white, the common people won’t be able to tell the difference, so what’s the use?

He snorted, “This lousy place, making things so meticulously but only hosting a few people a day. Old Xu’s granddaughter is just as clueless. Is this whole family at odds with money or what?”

Many concepts of Huaiyang cuisine came from Chinese gardens. Old Xu forced him and his junior apprentice to memorize many classical texts, including the famous Ming Dynasty garden master Ji Cheng’s saying “Though made by man, it seems naturally opened by heaven,” which was the origin of the Tiankai Building’s name.

As they walked, Yang Jingzhou talked more and more.

The path to the “Hell” map was a long corridor, with pale lights and withered branches and leaves. A winding shaded path under the sun would be serene, but under these conditions, it was especially terrifying.

The empty corridor had only Chen Ran and Yang Jingzhou. Chen Ran deliberately lightened her steps, almost stepping exactly where Yang Jingzhou’s footsteps fell.

Yang Jingzhou often felt like he was the only one in the corridor, but when he looked back, he would see Chen Ran, who had unknowingly taken off her mask and let down her long hair.

His heart jumped sharply. Forcibly starting a topic, he asked, “Chef Chen, which place did you come from?”

Chen Ran’s voice was soft, but she didn’t continue his topic. Instead, she quietly asked, “Yang Jingzhou, you said you even slept in a graveyard, but do you remember who picked you up from that graveyard?”

Yang Jingzhou suddenly stopped, wildly waving his hands in the air twice: “That old immortal picked me up, so what? I apprenticed under him for so many years. Why didn’t he let his own son learn cooking? Why only the apprentices?”

Chen Ran looked at the agitated Yang Jingzhou and felt it was a bit ridiculous.

“Xu Zhuoxing really didn’t let his own son learn cooking because his son had no talent. When you were cooking, his son did the hardest water station work. When you were practicing, his son was helping you kill eels, and in the end, his thumbs couldn’t straighten.”

“Nonsense! What do you know! That restaurant was his own. What’s wrong if his son just helped out a bit?”

At some unknown moment, the corridor lights changed color—from pale white to eerie red. Only the sound of fallen leaves rustling and Yang Jingzhou’s heavy breathing could be heard.

Under the red light, Chen Ran suddenly smiled.“Actually, you regret not choosing one egg white back then, don’t you?”

This time, Chen Ran didn’t invite Yang Jingzhou to the haunted house just for the caramelized sweet potatoes.

In the past few days, she had “haunted” all the staff in the haunted house, including herself, and concluded that this caramelized sweet potato dish could draw out what people cared about most deep in their hearts while amplifying their emotions exponentially.

But if emotions were already fluctuating violently before eating this sweet potato, the effect would be even better.

She specially contacted friends at Qiaotou Police Station, who helped find a detective skilled in psychological profiling to analyze Yang Jingzhou’s psychology.

Sure enough, the analysis matched reality.

For Yang Jingzhou, the person he cared about most was also the one he hated the most. Xu Laoguai had taken him in as an orphan and raised him, but as soon as there was any slight failure to treat him best, it became an excuse for his hatred.

If he really cared only about money as he claimed, why would he name the restaurant “Tiankai Building”?

Chen Ran remembered the psychological profiler explaining to her, “If you don’t understand his complicated psychology, think about An Lingrong.”

She recalled this and asked again, “Yang Jingzhou, do you regret choosing three egg whites?”

Under the red light, and with Chen Ran deliberately letting down her long hair, Yang Jingzhou felt a sudden stab in his heart.

“Regret? I don’t regret! Even if I chose one egg white, even if I inherited his legacy, what good would it do? With Tiankai Building’s business so big, should I regret it now?!”

As if covering something up, he immediately turned around, back facing Chen Ran, and strode toward the end of the corridor.

What a farce! He wasn’t regretting it!

When the master originally taught the three-set duck and three-course banquet only to the junior apprentice, it was to make that old immortal regret it! To show him that clinging to that old set of ways was useless!

Entering the “Hell” scene, perhaps feeling guilty, Yang Jingzhou immediately saw the oil pot in the scene.

“Heh,” Yang Jingzhou raised his head looking around, searching for cameras in the haunted house. “Waiting for me here? You think I’m scared? Even if you bring that old immortal and that useless one here together, I’m not scared!”

“I have a clear conscience! It’s all you who owe me!”

This oil pot was exactly the same as the one the junior apprentice had once pressed his hand on.

Chen Ran saw a trace of panic in Yang Jingzhou’s expression but forced a tough front. She quietly adjusted the camera she had just turned on to aim at Yang Jingzhou.

“Master Yang, what are you saying? Come solve the puzzles, try the lion’s head.”

Chen Ran handed him a pair of chopsticks and first picked up a piece of caramelized sweet potato and put it in her mouth.

After being in the haunted house for too long, the caramelized sweet potato had lost its strings, but it was still a qualified dessert.

She had eaten it once before, and this time, besides feeling a slight texture, there was no other sensation.

Yang Jingzhou took the chopsticks, breathing heavily, picked up a piece of caramelized sweet potato and put it in his mouth.

The sweet potato was cold, the sugar coating on the outside slightly hard, with a crispy texture. Yang Jingzhou chewed big mouthfuls, his face contorted as if he held a deep hatred for that piece of sweet potato.

Chen Ran stood there, hearing footsteps in the distance. The footsteps were slow and accompanied by the clinking of chains. Like an elderly man, his steps were a bit unsteady.

Yes, the ghost NPC in the “Hell” scene was Xu Laoguai himself.

Chen Ran timed it perfectly. She kept talking to Yang Jingzhou all along—not just to provoke his emotions, but also to make the old man come over in person.

Yang Jingzhou looked up and glanced over.After that incident back then, he immediately became the only surviving Huaiyang cuisine master chef of the era and never went back to see his master or junior apprentice.

This was also the first time he saw Xu Laoguai’s face, twisted and burnt.

The flavor effect of the caramelized sweet potato worked!

“Hahaha, old immortal, do you regret it?”

“You were the one who made me choose, you made me pick the egg whites, and then you told me things like true friends are hard to find and no one understands me. Why didn’t you teach me the three-set duck after I chose three egg whites?!”

“Why did you only teach the junior apprentice?! Why?!”

“Do you think he’s some kind of good person? Do you think he can endure this loneliness? I just found someone to give him two cigarettes, and he got addicted to drugs. Do you think he can endure this kind of loneliness?!”

“In this world, only money matters. What cooking skills, what endless roads to nowhere… You’re already in the top ten of the Tian List, what do you have now?! Do any diners who ate your three-course banquet remember you?!”

“Do you think this was decades ago? Do you think you can choose an apprentice just like you?”

The sound of chains grew closer as Xu Laoguai took a few steps forward.

Half of his face was twisted and fierce like a demon, but Chen Ran, who had learned cooking from him, knew that when Xu Laoguai looked at her and had Xu Ruyi rub her fingers, his eyes were compassionate like a Bodhisattva’s.

He walked closer and closer, and the female ghost from afar had somehow wandered over.

The female ghost’s crying, the distorted wind, the clinking of chains, plus the rustling sound of falling leaves rolling—

Chen Ran quietly pressed the Bluetooth speaker in her pocket.

The sound she recorded was simple—just the sound of the oil pot.

When the oil heats up, there is sound.

Not just the sound of hot oil, but the buzzing vibration of the iron pot, the explosion sound the moment food is dropped into the oil…

When this sound played, Yang Jingzhou, who had just been loudly arguing, suddenly went crazy!

“I’ll give it back to you! I’ll give it back!”

He grabbed the oil pot next to him and forcefully poured it over himself!

Of course, the pot wasn’t filled with hot oil, not even oil, but some cold water.

The icy cold touch hit him the instant it poured on him. Yang Jingzhou looked at Xu Laoguai striding over, seemingly trying to grab the pot too, and suddenly laughed.

Yang Jingzhou had gone mad.

Soaked with cold water, shivering and curled up in the late October temperature, the only thing he kept muttering was: “One egg white, two egg whites, three egg whites…”

Xu Laoguai stood aside, watching him silently.

The female ghost Song Yuhan had already been scared to the side calling 120, and Chen Ran quietly sent the video of Yang Jingzhou admitting he framed someone to get addicted to drugs to Xiao Liu.

She walked over to stand beside Xu Laoguai: “Grandpa Xu, do you pity him?”

Xu Laoguai slowly said, “I only pity my second junior apprentice.”

Chen Ran breathed a sigh of relief. She reached out to help Xu Laoguai unlock the chains on his body and helped him sit properly in a nearby chair.

“Don’t worry, there’s surveillance; he went crazy on his own.”Xu Laoguai turned to look at Chen Ran: "They say back then the Chen family cooking god cooked with a single thought reaching the divine, a single anger reaching the ghost—turns out it’s true."

Chen Ran definitely couldn’t admit to that!

“It’s just that the haunted house atmosphere was too realistic…”

After such a big incident, the haunted house naturally couldn’t continue operating today. However, the cooking man still happily ate the clear-braised lion’s head, and Xu Ruyi refunded this group of tourists.

Although the video couldn’t be used as direct evidence, it became a starting point for the police to successfully pry open the mouth of the original poisoner.

The crime of instigating poisoning usually results in a prison sentence under three years. But Yang Jingzhou had gone completely insane and would spend the rest of his life in a psychiatric hospital.

Under the hint from Director Gao at Qiaotou Road, the police also conducted a thorough investigation at Tiankailou.

At first, they were worried Tiankailou might be using addictive substances in their dishes, but after testing, it turned out the restaurant was using a large amount of gentamicin in their food!

To save and cut costs, many ingredients at Tiankailou were not fresh. To prevent incidents, they “thoughtfully” gave customers “diarrhea prevention” in advance.

After such an event, Tiankailou naturally couldn’t continue to operate.

Xu Ruyi’s haunted house was implicated and investigated for a few days, and had to temporarily close.

However, she wasn’t upset about being implicated at all.

“If I had known that bastard was such a coward, I would have invited him on the haunted house’s opening day!”

All morning long, Xu Ruyi excitedly repeated this sentence more than ten times.

Suddenly startled by her shout, Chen Ran used the wrong amount of strength and broke the slender pigeon bone, the broken end piercing out of the pigeon skin.

She sighed: “Ruyi jie… if you keep this up, our staff meals will only be pigeon every day.”

Chen Ran learned various basics of Huaiyang cuisine from Xu Laoguai. She had roughly mastered clear broth skills, and the next step was bone removal skills.

For learning bone removal, the best was the recipe for the three-layered duck.

Three-layered duck, as the name implies, is a dish with three types of poultry nested inside each other. The outermost is a domestic duck, inside it is a wild duck, and inside the wild duck is a pigeon.

The domestic duck is plump and tender, the wild duck fragrant and crispy, and the pigeon delicate and tender—each bite more delicious, flavors unfolding endlessly. A genuine three-layered duck offers seven different tastes inside and out.

The most basic skill for this dish is bone removal.

All the domestic duck, wild duck, and pigeon in this dish have their bones removed! Moreover, to keep the dish intact, with flavors merging but not mixing, the bone removal can only start with a small incision below the neck…

To reach this level, the staff meals these days no longer had lion’s head meatballs. Only various kinds of duck.

Xu Laoguai’s teaching method was still scientific—first, chop up a duck to understand the location of every bone and fascia, then start real bone removal practice.

After so many days, after removing bones from countless domestic and wild ducks, Chen Ran finally began challenging the most difficult pigeon!

The ingredients for the three-layered duck were very particular—only male domestic ducks could be used, wild ducks had to be mallards, and the innermost pigeon had to be the year’s young pigeon.

The year’s young pigeons were especially tender but also particularly small, with very fine bones.

“Ouch! Your hand isn’t hurt, right?”

Xu Ruyi awkwardly apologized first, then quickly went over to check Chen Ran’s condition.

Seeing it was only the pigeon bone that caused trouble, she breathed a sigh of relief: “Sorry, I got too excited! I won’t say anything more—I’ll help you properly from now on!”This was after all just the haunted house’s kitchen, with no assistants or cleaners. To let Chen Ran focus on practicing bone removal, Xu Ruyi was grabbed by Xu Laoguai to help kill and pluck pigeons.

“No problem, no problem, I’m just eager to learn it quickly.”

“Take it slow, no rush. Back then my second senior uncle took half a year to learn this dish. Now I’m skilled, I’ll kill a few more pigeons for you to practice on, take your time!”

Xu Ruyi said a few words but didn’t hear Chen Ran reply. Turning around, she saw Chen Ran had picked up another pigeon and started again.

First, she made a small incision about an inch long under the young pigeon’s neck, then slid her hand in, using her thumb to slowly push between bone and skin to separate them, and then carefully pulled the bones out.

Though bone removal is considered a type of knife skill, the actual steps requiring a knife were only a few.

Only when encountering fascia that couldn’t be pushed apart by fingers did she need to use the knife to cut it.

The entire bone removal technique carried a bit of the spirit of Butcher Ding dissecting an ox. After removing bones from several pigeons, Chen Ran already had a clear mental map of every bone in the pigeon’s body.

After a few days, she had disassembled over a hundred pigeons of various sizes. She had a feeling this time she could completely dismantle a pigeon intact!

Xu Laoguai didn’t know when he came close. Xu Ruyi turned back and saw her grandfather arrive; she raised a finger in front of her mouth to signal him to be quiet.

Chen Ran’s expression was extremely serious, one hand steady on the pigeon’s back while the other was mostly buried inside the bird.

The long pigeon neck had already been hollowed out. Her hand moved skillfully under the pigeon’s skin. Suddenly, Chen Ran’s eyes closed.

She didn’t need to see with her eyes; she could feel with her hands!

The pigeons slaughtered and quartered these days had made her so familiar with their bones and fascia that even with eyes closed she clearly knew their structure.

And when her eyes were closed, her sense of touch became even more sensitive.

The thumb pushing motion used for bone removal on ducks became a flexible flicking motion on the pigeon.

In Xu Laoguai’s eyes, Chen Ran’s fingers moved astonishingly nimbly. With a gentle flick, a slender, snowy-white pigeon bone was teased out from the small incision.

Sunlight poured into the kitchen, shining on Chen Ran’s agile arms. Her shoulders and elbows were frighteningly steady; only her fingers moved nimbly inside the pigeon.

She even wore the sandbag wristband custom-made earlier.

Xu Laoguai sighed, recalling what Yang Jingzhou asked before going mad: “How could anyone really endure such loneliness!”

There really was someone, just a pity it wasn’t his apprentice.

Xu Ruyi’s phone had long been on silent but now vibrated violently. Afraid of disturbing Chen Ran, she dashed out to take the call.

Only Xu Laoguai remained standing there silently, barely breathing, his gaze fixed firmly on Chen Ran’s fingers.

The entire pigeon bone was dismantled like that!

Only then did Chen Ran look down at the pigeon in her hand, now a limp small bundle, and looked up at Xu Laoguai.

“Grandpa Xu, I did it!”

Xu Laoguai nodded without saying much; only his hands trembling slightly behind the counter showed how excited he was.

“Do two more to solidify the feel.”

“Yes!”

Chen Ran’s voice was always so full of energy. She immediately grabbed another pigeon and skillfully made a small incision under its neck.Xu Laoguai silently nodded.

Modest in victory, this little girl will definitely achieve great things in the future. The legacy of Chef Chen might truly be revived in Chen Ran.

He slowly walked out of the kitchen and saw his granddaughter’s excited face.

“What’s up?”

“They just informed me—the haunted house can reopen!”

Xu Ruyi’s excitement wasn’t just because the haunted house could reopen, but also because calls inquiring about the haunted house had not stopped these days.

Although the police had sealed off the details of the case, rumors that Yang Jingzhou went mad here had spread.

Countless calls came asking about it.

Xu Ruyi always responsibly explained, “It’s not like that, it wasn’t us scaring him, he had his own demons… The doctor also explained he had some degree of psychological illness…”

But no one believed Xu Ruyi!

A haunted house that could drive people crazy was, in the minds of these haunted house fans, a must-visit sacred place in their lives.

Everyone kept agreeing with “uh-huh” while urging her to reopen the haunted house quickly. Some even gave suggestions: “Only admitting eight people a day is too few. If it doesn’t work, you could sell tickets separately for each scene!”

Xu Ruyi was a bit helpless, but she had explained as best as she could—no one believing her wasn’t her fault.

There were simply too many inquiries. Xu Ruyi compressed the story and scenes as much as possible, finally settling on three sessions a day, barely satisfying the fans’ demands.

However, it wasn’t only the hardcore haunted house fans who were watching this place; many food lovers had also heard of the haunted house’s “Lion’s Head” meatball legend.

Who wouldn’t want to try the novel experience of eating top-quality Lion’s Head meatballs and Wensi tofu inside a haunted house?

Unfortunately, this haunted house not only admitted few people but even hung a “temporarily closed” sign.

Meanwhile, Zhao Zhijie in the old foodies group, well-informed through classmates in the police, learned the details of the haunted house case.

He shared the backstory of the Xu Laoguai family’s grudges in Huainan cuisine, making everyone sigh deeply.

“Ah, it’s such a pity about Xu Laoguai. Is his second apprentice really not going to cook anymore?”

“That Yang Jingzhou is really hateful! I just hope that second apprentice comes out soon…”

Zhao Zhijie teased the group for a long time, then finally announced with satisfaction, “Guess whose name I saw in the police files?”

The group impatiently sent four red envelopes before Zhao Zhijie finally revealed, “The one making Lion’s Head meatballs in the haunted house is Chen Ran!”

The old foodies group erupted!

“Before, she shocked me by going to KTV and then hosting a big banquet. Didn’t expect she could shock me even more, huh? Cooking in a haunted house—how did she even think of that?”

“Seriously, I haven’t experienced eating in a haunted house before!”

“I’m so anxious! Can someone tell me, what’s the usual age limit for haunted houses? Can sixty-year-olds still get in?”

The group was silent for a moment…

Sixty years old—seems it’s really not easy to go to a haunted house then?