Chapter 77: The Genius Who Deceives the World and Steals His Name
"Just... just want to scare you away and get some food." The man's cheek was swollen and his words were a little unclear.
He had an alien snake pattern on the side of his neck, so he must be a member of the Spirit Snake Clan.
"Scared?" The shop owner sneered, "Do you think we don't know poisonous snakes?"
Ah Luan hooked up the bodies of the two snakes with the tip of his boot and threw them in front of the two men.
"No... No..." The more anxious the man was, the less clear he could speak. Another person spoke quickly, "The poison glands have been removed. They just look scary, but they are not poisonous."
Not poisonous? The shop owner and Ah Luan looked at each other.
Qi Huan found two venomous snakes that he had chopped off. He cut open the snake heads and tested them with a detector. The test results shown on the screen showed that they were indeed non-venomous.
He was worried, so he tested the other ones next to him one by one. All of them showed no poison. He nodded to the shop owner and A-Luan, "It's true."
"So, you really just want something to eat?" After hearing that there was no poison, the owner slowed down his tone. A Luan reached out and grabbed the collars of the two men, letting them use the force to stand up and sit on the ground.
These two people should be potential people. They can slightly feel the fluctuation of mental power, but it is extremely weak.
"Really." The two nodded eagerly. "Our leader went to the base a few days ago to exchange animal cores for nutrients and medicines, and he never came back. The second-in-command went to look for him, but couldn't find him. We only heard that Base No. 3 was completely destroyed by the beast tide. The few nutrients left in the enclosure have been drunk up, and there haven't been any hunting teams passing by recently. Everyone has been hungry for several days and is almost dying. The two of us are on patrol today, and we happened to see you cooking, so..."
"That sounds nice, but if you really want to eat, why don't you just exchange it for something?" Diwu Yuan glared at the two of them. To scare people away and steal something, to put it bluntly, they have bad intentions.
"We... we have nothing to exchange." The two men lowered their heads awkwardly. "The few animal cores that we have saved in the enclosure that can be exchanged for other things have all been taken away by the leader. We usually exchange things with hunting teams by providing them with accommodation in exchange for nutrients or other things. You don't seem to need accommodation..."
As they spoke, their voices grew softer and softer, and their heads drooped lower and lower. The protruding vertebrae cast bony shadows on the backs of their skinny necks, and they looked so fragile that they could be broken with a single hand.
"Then you can just ask us directly!" Diwuyuan said angrily.
The two men exchanged glances silently and lowered their heads even lower. "We were afraid you wouldn't give it to us."
They thought it would be easier to scare the people away and then get some food, but they didn't expect that these four people were basically not afraid of snakes.
If they are afraid that they will not give it to him, then they will snatch it. What kind of absurd logic is this? Diwu Yuan was so angry that he laughed. That is to say, everyone is fine today. If someone is injured, he will never let these people go.
"How many people are left in your base?" The shop owner didn't dwell on the two's motives. Most of those who could stay in the nomadic base were cruel and ruthless. Those who walked on the edge of death had no sense of morality and could do anything cruel and outrageous.
These two people are obviously hiding something. It takes time to remove the venom glands, and it is impossible for the snake to have no traces of them after temporary operation, so the venom glands should have been removed long ago. As for the reason for removing them, the most likely reason is that they often do this "scare" and they should have succeeded many times before.
Even another reason why they removed the venom glands was probably to protect themselves with this excuse after the incident. After all, their targets should mostly be hunting teams, among whom there are many people with superb skills or who carry universal antidotes with them, so the probability of failure is not low.
But this cannot be verified for the time being. We can only say that no matter what, the method chosen by these two people is already relatively mild among those extremely vicious criminals.
The two hesitated for a moment before saying, "There were more than 500 before, some were killed by stone beasts a few days ago, and some died of starvation in the past two days. There are probably about 300 people left."
The shop owner exchanged glances with A-Luan and was about to ask one of them to go back and find someone who could make the decision to come over and talk, when he heard the sound of a flying ship in the air.
When they looked up, they saw the two airships carrying Jiufang Yu and several guards coming back. A man with a bruised face and nose was sitting in the back seat of the guards' airship. He had obviously had a "cordial" exchange with Jiufang Yu and the others.
The three men with bruised faces and noses looked at each other in silence for a moment.
The man was taken onto the starship by the escort team. Qi Huan secretly went over to inquire with Jiufang Yu, only to find out that the living beings scanned by the starship were the vagrants and illegal residents in the enclosure. There were a few people among those people who had some skills. They could not detect the specific form of the living beings at the time because they were set up with an electronic barrier.
The person they brought back with the airship was the second-in-command of the vagrant base. Jiufang Yu had just made a deal with this person in front of all the people at the vagrant base. During the construction of the new base in the future, if these people are willing to come to the construction area to work, as long as the quality meets the requirements, he can provide nutrients and basic wages per person. This person came to sign the contract with the escort team on behalf of the people below. To show his sincerity, Jiufang Yu will first provide some medicines and nutrients to the vagrant base as a "deposit" today to alleviate their urgent needs.
"It's better to disperse than to block, and there are quite a few children in their enclosure." Jiufang Yu sighed softly, thinking of the skinny figures he had just seen. For their sake, he was willing to give these people another chance. "If these people are allowed to grow outside, it will also be a hidden danger. The new base is short of manpower after the expansion. It is better to take this opportunity to spread the news and recruit and select some suitable people during the construction period, which can also weaken the power of the vagrant base. Find a chance later to expel those who specialize in bad activities from Waste Planet No. 7."
"What if someone has bad intentions?" Thinking of Si Liang's experience in the nomadic base, Qi Huan knew that most of these people were not good people.
Jiufang Yu's eyes turned slightly cold, "Then they will definitely regret not leaving here sooner."
After signing the contract, Honglin, the second-in-command of the nomadic base, was about to take the two people captured by Senior Aluan back home, but was stopped by Qi Huan.
"I will cook these snakes into food. It will be ready in about four hours. You are welcome to bring your family and friends to taste my cooking." Qi Huan pointed at the snakes on the ground. Since Jiufang Yu wanted to "recruit him", he would naturally help to gain more favorability. The cost would be like buying food from him.
The three people who received the invitation were all stunned. After a few seconds of silence, they stammered to confirm with him, "Really? Can we all come over to eat?"
"A bowl will do." Qi Huan nodded. He didn't have that many tableware.
"Thanks!"
"Thanks!!!"
The three people were so excited that they saluted Qi Huan repeatedly, one standing up and another standing down, their movements were uneven, but their expressions were full of surprise.
Jiufang Yu, Diwuyuan and the medical team set out separately to conduct environmental and equipment inspections. Only Qi Huan, the shop owner and A Luan were left on the starship.
Qi Huan began to prepare for today's dinner.
Fried fish cakes, rouge pork jerky, stuffed fried dough sticks, Minister Jiang tofu, Taibai beast meat, Dong'an chicken, assorted mushrooms, stir-fried seasonal vegetables, cured meat clay pot rice, and Taishi Five Snake Soup.
Taishi cuisine originated in the late Qing Dynasty and early Republic of China, and is considered the top Cantonese cuisine in the past century. The reason why it is called Taishi cuisine is that it comes from the residence of Jiang Kongyin, the last Jinshi in the late Qing Dynasty. Jiang Kongyin once entered the Hanlin Academy, and people at that time respectfully called him Jiang Taishi. Jiang Taishi had a very high taste for food and very high requirements for his family chefs, which made the family banquet dishes in Taishi’s mansion highly respected. Those who have tasted it all praised it, causing major restaurants in the city to follow suit and call it Taishi cuisine.
The most famous and classic dish of Taishi cuisine is the Taishi Five Snake Soup.
The characteristic of Cantonese cuisine is that the ingredients are carefully selected and the cooking techniques are exquisite. As the top Cantonese dish, this dish is naturally no less exquisite in terms of ingredients and complicated cooking methods.
The most authentic way of cooking it requires selecting snakes with five different warming and nourishing effects, namely improving eyesight, replenishing qi, detoxifying, clearing the liver, and removing headaches. The snakes must be skinned and boiled until about 80% cooked. The snake meat and bones must then be peeled off, the meat steamed, and the bones used to make soup.
The soup ingredients are more particular. The first soup needs to be simmered with snake bones, Jinhua ham, pork, pig bones, old chicken and other ingredients to extract its freshness. The tail soup is stewed with tangerine peel, sugarcane, red dates, longan, old ginger and bones to extract its sweetness. It is said that the tangerine peel should be more than 50 years old, the longan should use the yellow shell of Shixia, and the dates should be from Hotan, Xinjiang, otherwise the taste will not be right.
The combination of the two soups forms the base soup of Taishi Five Snake Soup.
The steamed snake meat is torn into thin strips by hand, and then added with shredded winter mushrooms, winter bamboo shoots, fungus, Jinhua ham, ginger, tangerine peel, etc. and stewed in the base soup. Finally, it is thickened with a thin layer of water chestnut powder to make this bowl of soup.
However, the dish is not finished yet. Three more dishes of ingredients need to be prepared: one dish of freshly fried fermented bean curd crisps, one dish of finely shredded lemon leaves with the veins torn off, and one dish of white chrysanthemum petals. The most exquisite chrysanthemum petals are the 'Crane Dancing in the Clouds' specially grown in the Taishi Mansion. They are thick, tender, crisp, smooth, and sweet and fragrant.
When tasting, add these three ingredients to enhance the flavor. The aroma of lemon and chrysanthemum blooms in the steaming soup, adding the finishing touch to the taste.
What Qi Huan wants to do now is to follow this method as much as possible. There are some things that he definitely cannot do, such as the two pots of soup that need to be boiled for a whole day, the ingredients from designated places of origin, and especially the last dish of white chrysanthemum petals, which are nowhere to be found. He can only use the old method to find substitutes.
Hearing that he had to skin nearly a hundred snakes and tear them into shreds by hand, the young master enthusiastically offered to help him. Before leaving, he spent five minutes writing a small instruction, temporarily handing over the control of the group of mini bears to Butler Bear. When Qi Huan needed it, he only had to issue instructions to Butler Bear, and the Bear Special Forces would help skin and tear the snakes.
It must be said that with the help of these mini bears, Qi Huan's work was indeed much easier. However, every time he saw the ferocious and brutal looks of those bears when skinning people, Qi Huan couldn't help but wonder if the young master deliberately added some personal emotions when designing the movements.
Qi Huan was cooking soup by the stove. Jiujiu ran over excitedly as usual and wanted to throw her hair into the pot, but Qi Huan gently held her away.
The little white ball blinked its big light blue eyes and looked at him in confusion.
"Jiujiu, be good. You don't need it for now. I'll tell you where to add it later." Qi Huan touched its head and explained gently.
The soup base will be used in the snake soup, and everyone in the nomadic base will eat it. The members there are all kinds of people, and there is no guarantee that there will be any strange people. It is better to be safe than sorry. He remembered Jiufang Yu's reminder in the morning, and out of self-protection, safety comes first, so he will only provide those people with the ordinary version of the soup.
The little white ball scratched his hair and nodded, not quite understanding what was going on.
Qi Huan was busy preparing dinner while Senior A Luan was lying on the hammock with his eyes closed to rest. The bored shop owner poked Qi Qi and spit out another piece of gold. He glanced at Jiujiu's long white hair and started tinkering with it again.
As the sun was setting, Jiufang Yu and others returned one after another. Various dishes were served one by one. A large group of ragged and skinny people also gathered around timidly.
Perhaps the sense of intimidation left by Jiufang Yu and the guards was too strong, they did not dare to get too close and stopped ten meters away from the long table.
Qi Huan took a quick look and saw about a dozen children, a dozen old men with gray hair and haggard looks, and the rest were young and middle-aged people. Of course, their specific ages were uncertain. After all, the alliance was composed of many different races, with different lifespans and conditions.
Some of them held bowls in their hands, while others used water cups, wine glasses, or even empty tubes of nutrient supplements to make up the numbers. Obviously, "bowls" were not a must-have item in the home here.
Seeing Qi Huan looking at him, Honglin, who was standing at the front, clasped his hands nervously and forced a smile.
Qi Huan gave him a bright smile in return, called on a few guards for help, and together with Butler Xiong, moved several giant thermos buckets filled with soup in front of him.
"Here is the stewed snake soup," Qi Huan patted the lid of the soup bowl and handed the long-handled soup spoons in his hand to Hong Lin, "There will be a few more buckets of noodle soup later, please share them with everyone."
In addition to the snake soup, he also cooked a large pot of noodle dumpling soup. The physical condition of these people was too poor, even worse than those of the original inhabitants of the base, and their gastrointestinal function must be relatively weak. Qi Huan thought about it and only smooth semi-liquid foods such as soup and dumpling soup were easier for their stomachs to adapt.
Honglin carefully opened the lid of the pot, and the hot steam mixed with fragrance wafted towards her.
Honglin felt that he could no longer remember how long it had been since he last tasted food. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath greedily, and served himself half a bowl.
The wisps of white mist with fragrance gradually dispersed, and the people behind him opened their eyes wide, especially the children, whose eyes were shining. Since they were old enough to understand, they couldn't even eat much nutrition, let alone other food. This steaming smell suddenly aroused the most primitive desire for food in their souls, and they immediately became restless.
Then Honglin didn't have any intention of distributing the soup to them. She just picked up the bowl by herself, blew on the soup twice without caring about how hot it was, and took a big gulp impatiently.
The smooth and hot soup is mixed with plump and delicate snake meat, tender and crisp bamboo shoots and mushrooms. It tastes extremely delicious. After sliding down the throat, there is even a light and sweet aftertaste lingering in the mouth.
His throat trembled, and he couldn't believe that the soup he tasted was so delicious.
The others were all eagerly watching his Adam's apple trembling up and down, feeling nervous and expectant.
What's going on? Seeing that Honglin only served himself a bowl and didn't share anything with others, Qi Huan was about to go over to ask about the situation, but Jiufang Yu grabbed his wrist.
Qi Huan: ???
"He is testing poison." Jiufang Yu explained softly.
Qi Huan: ...
"He didn't dare to trust us completely, and he didn't have any test equipment, so he could only use the most primitive method."
"Shouldn't we usually find a subordinate to test it?" Qi Huan turned his head and whispered. He remembered that in the Qing Dynasty palace dramas, there were eunuchs who helped the emperor test poisons. Honglin was at least the second in command among this group of people. Even if he suspected something, there was no need to risk his life, right?
"If it is a delicacy, he will eat it first. If it is poison, he will carry it first. As the leader, this is his responsibility and his right." Jiufang Yu glanced at someone's cheek close to him, and a faint smile appeared in his eyes.
"How about I lend them the detector?" Qi Huan looked at the group of people and said "tsk". How long will they have to wait?
"They still don't believe in the things you borrowed. Never mind. Let's just eat our own food." Jiufang Yu pulled him to the long table.
"Huanhuan, something bad has happened, come quickly and take a look at this." Diwuyuan called out anxiously.
Qi Huan hadn't come to the table yet, so the owner and the others naturally wouldn't start eating in advance. Some poured wine, some chatted, and Diwuyuan casually opened his personal terminal and checked the latest news on the Internet. After scrolling down a few posts, he saw a push notification related to the keywords of the Baifu platform, [A genius who deceives the world and steals his reputation].
He originally thought that it was some jealous black fan who was scolding him again. After all, Bai Fu was from the Fifth Family. When it came to the genius of the Fifth Family, who else but him?
However, after clicking on it, the person being scolded was actually the host of Renjian Restaurant, the third best chef in the world.
This person had obviously watched the replay of Qi Huan's live broadcast. He started with the first dish, Nine-tail Pastry, and dug up all kinds of details in the video. He said that most of the dishes he put on the shelves were prepared in advance, and he just pretended to make them again in front of the camera. In fact, he had no idea what the food he actually made tasted like.
Then he posted several interview records, saying that he had consulted five three-star chefs, two four-star chefs, and some senior gourmets. They all said that the taste of the original flavors was definitely not something that a novice chef who had not yet obtained a chef's certificate could make. Then he raised a meaningful question, who made these dishes? Is there another genius behind the genius chef?
Then, this person talked about how the third best chef in the world deliberately made his life on the waste planet very miserable. He arranged various unimaginable accidents several times, and was disconnected every time. He deliberately created topics to attract attention, and then raised questions in an intriguing way. There were accidents every time, and they were never the same. Do you believe this dramatic coincidence?
Finally, this person emphasized that the anchor was obviously very good-looking, but he deliberately kept people in suspense and acted mysterious by using a virtual image during the live broadcast. Then he pretended to "accidentally" appear in the live broadcast of the banquet that made him famous, to create a contrast. In this way, he deliberately created an image of a genius chef with superb cooking skills, handsome looks, and miserable living environment. Finally, he became an overnight sensation with the live broadcast showing his face, and became the most watched anchor in the food live broadcast industry.
However, this is clearly a carefully planned scam to insult everyone's IQ. He is a liar who deceives the world and steals his reputation.
This post was quickly forwarded and spread on the Internet, and its popularity continued to rise.
Qi Huan ran over without knowing why, and Jiufang Yu followed him. Diwu Yuan glanced at Jiufang Yu standing behind him, curled his lips, and enlarged the first post to show them.
The two of them quickly scanned the content of the post. It was a hodgepodge of things, but it sounded convincing and very inflammatory. It was a natural move to throw dirty water on someone.
Some people even followed suit and posted related posts such as "Ten Questions to a Genius Chef", "High-profile show, low-key money-making", "Should a fake genius be banned", etc., with a mixture of people following suit to scold him and asking him to come out and explain. The topic fermented rapidly and directly occupied the top three on the real-time list.
Disaster strikes from the sky, when did he ever say he was a genius? Qi Huan smiled bitterly and shook his head, never expecting that he would experience an inexplicable cyberbullying in this era.
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