Chapter 158 The boss is praising your cooking skills.

She quickly stood up, unconsciously fidgeting with her fingers, and lowered her head, not daring to look at the imposing apron-wearing uncle. Like a primary school student caught doing something wrong by the homeroom teacher, she silently moved behind Lao Chen and Xiao Li, trying to minimize her presence.

However, a shadow fell.

Su Xiaonuan felt that the area in front of her had become much brighter. She subconsciously looked up and met a pair of eyes that were as sharp as a hawk's and seemed to be able to pierce through people's hearts.

His gaze, filled with the authority and scrutiny of someone long accustomed to a high position, made Su Xiaonuan swallow hard, her heart trembling.

The apron-wearing uncle sized up Su Xiaonuan, his gaze lingering for a moment on her slightly chubby face, which was filled with "innocence" and "nervousness," before glancing at the two empty bowls of chicken feet on the table, the broth still emitting an enticing aroma.

"Did you make this?" the uncle asked, his voice low but carrying a heavy pressure.

Su Xiaonuan didn't know the other person's exact identity, but her intuition told her that this was definitely the person in charge here, and of a high rank.

She could only nod timidly, trying to make her eyes look clearer and more innocent, her voice as soft as a mosquito's buzz: "It...it was me who did it."

The apron-wearing uncle didn't say anything more. Instead, he reached for a pair of clean chopsticks next to him, picked up the last piece of chicken foot soaking in the broth from Old Chen's bowl, and put it in his mouth.

He chewed slowly, his face expressionless, as if he were savoring some ordinary food.

But Su Xiaonuan keenly noticed that the moment he bit into the chicken foot, his usually tightly pursed lips relaxed almost imperceptibly for a moment, though they quickly returned to normal.

He put down his chopsticks expressionlessly, his face seemingly even colder and harder than before. He turned to look at Old Chen and Little Li, who were standing there as if being punished, and scolded them, "What kind of behavior is this! Fighting over a bite of food, you've forgotten all about discipline?! Get back to your posts right now! I'll let it go this time, but if it happens again, you'll have to write a self-criticism!"

Upon hearing this, Old Chen and Little Li were as if they had received a pardon. Their faces instantly brightened, and they were almost crying with joy. They quickly stood at attention and lowered their voices, "Yes, boss!"

Then, the two of them didn't dare to linger for even a second longer. They practically scurried back to their noodle and wonton stalls, their eyes still lingering on the two empty bowls on the table.

Su Xiaonuan stared wide-eyed at the sudden turn of events, her mind reeling.

Is that... the end of it? No criticism of her, the "culprit"?

The man in the apron turned around again, his gaze returning to Su Xiaonuan, his expression still indifferent, and asked, "Did they pay?"

Su Xiaonuan nodded subconsciously: "I've already paid, uncle."

Upon hearing this, the man in the apron nodded almost imperceptibly.

Then, to Su Xiaonuan's bewildered gaze, he casually reached out and picked up the two empty bowls on the table, each still brimming with tempting broth, his tone as calm as if he were simply saying, "Hmm. Wasting food is bad."

After saying that, he picked up the bowl, turned around, and walked steadily towards a relatively quiet corner next to the night market, which seemed to be a temporary command post, leaving Su Xiaonuan alone in the spot, completely bewildered in the evening breeze.

What... what kind of operation is this?!

As Su Xiaonuan watched the imposing man leave with two empty bowls, she felt a shock to her more than twenty years of life experience.

Just then, the guy from the pancake stall next door quietly appeared again. While clumsily wiping the griddle, he lowered his voice and said to Su Xiaonuan with a mix of sympathy and amusement, "Girl, don't be afraid, it's alright. Our boss is just like that. If he criticizes you, it means he thinks you're not good enough. He's... well, he's indirectly praising your cooking skills! He's probably taking the bowl back... well, to study the soup recipe!"

The young man himself realized how absurd his statement was and couldn't help but laugh. "Go back to your stall, it's alright now."

Su Xiaonuan: "..."

She looked at the pancake vendor's handsome face, which seemed to say "trust me," and then at the direction where the apron-wearing uncle had disappeared. In the end, she could only rub her temples, feeling both amused and exasperated.

Well, she's seen this unique way of "praising" people for the first time.

It seems her spicy and sour boneless chicken feet with lemon are indeed quite potent, even a "big shot" of this caliber couldn't resist them.

She shook her head helplessly, then turned to the kind-hearted but less-than-stellar pancake-making guy and sincerely thanked him: "Thank you, sir."

Temporarily putting this little incident behind her, she refocused her attention on her stall and the target connected to "Crescent Moon." Just as she was about to step back into her cart to continue thinking about how to lure the target in, she paused slightly.

A thought flashed through her mind—these plainclothes colleagues disguised here might be able to provide some useful information, or at least, they wouldn't cause misunderstandings or even interfere with her actions.

She hesitated for a moment, then turned around and called out in a low voice to the pancake vendor who was about to go back to continue his battle with his "nemesis," the batter.

"Um... Big brother, wait a minute." Su Xiaonuan's voice carried just the right amount of hesitation and caution.

The pancake vendor stopped and looked back at her in confusion.

Su Xiaonuan took two steps closer and, in a voice only the two of them could hear, with a hint of trust in her eyes, asked softly, "Big brother, have you... ever heard of an organization called 'Crescent Moon'?"

She paused, as if she had made a great decision, before continuing, "To be honest, the reason I came here to set up a stall was actually on the orders of our boss Lu Zheng, to stake out a criminal target who is involved with this organization."

She cleverly brought up Lu Zheng to increase credibility, since Lu Zheng had a considerable reputation within the public security system.

Upon hearing this, the pancake vendor's face instantly showed obvious surprise. He looked Su Xiaonuan up and down—petite, with a baby face and big, bright eyes. She looked like a college student who hadn't yet graduated, or at most an ordinary stall owner with excellent skills.

He clearly hadn't expected that this seemingly harmless little girl was actually a "colleague" who had come with a mission.

This realization immediately changed the young man's attitude. He went from initially being somewhat sympathetic and amused to becoming much more serious and friendly.

Since we're comrades in the same trench, what's there to hesitate about?

He gave a knowing look, patted Su Xiaonuan's shoulder readily, and lowered his voice, a hint of excitement in it: "Heh! Girl, you're one of us...you should have said so earlier! Crescent Moon? I know a little about it, they mentioned it above, it's a pretty troublesome, toxic organization. So, the target you're looking for is active around here?"