Volume 1, Chapter 49: The Food is Too Delicious

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“What boar?”

Guo Dong frowned as he looked at the few men, each gripping a shovel and looking ready for a fight.

“A wild boar. Didn’t one just show up here?”

“How did you know?”

Even now, Guo Dong still had no idea what was going on.

“You’ve been livestreaming for ages. How else would I know?”

Only then did Guo Dong realize what he meant. He glanced at the phone lying not far away, then immediately hurried over and ended the livestream.

The viewers in the stream were stunned.

Was this some kind of scam?

He had not said a word or even given them any warning. He had simply shut off the livestream.

“My buddy just sent a few dollars’ worth of gifts. And now it’s all gone?”

“A few dollars? I sent over a hundred!”

“I knew it. This streamer doesn’t understand anything. He has no idea how many people are watching him.”

“He’s just streaming for fun. Did you really think he was doing it for money?”

…

The livestream descended into chaos.

Of course, some viewers thought it was all a marketing ploy—a way of exploiting the audience’s curiosity to attract attention and generate traffic.

Guo Dong knew nothing about any of that.

He did not even know how many people had been watching his stream.

Feeling the phone burning hot in his hand, he was heartbroken.

It was a phone worth more than ten thousand yuan, yet it had overheated after only being used for a while.

He decided that the problem was not with the phone, but with how hard he had pushed it.

He secretly vowed never to do that again. If he streamed in the future, he would set a schedule—perhaps half an hour at a time.

“Why did you shut off the livestream?”

By the time Li Tianhu reacted, Guo Dong had already slipped his phone into his pocket.

“What if the phone breaks?”

Hearing this, Li Tianhu looked utterly exasperated.

“What the hell do you know? Once your livestream gains some popularity, you could earn back the price of that phone in a single day. That lousy thing of yours isn’t worth much anyway.”

“It’s worth more than yours!”

Li Tianhu fell silent.

“Jelly, you’re going to be famous, you know that? If you hadn’t ended the stream just now, the number of viewers would have kept rising. You have no idea how fast your followers were increasing!”

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“Forget it. There’s no point explaining it to you. You wouldn’t understand!”

Bang!

Li Tianhu hurled the shovel in his hand onto the ground.

“How did I never think of this before? With so many wild beasts around here, if we’d started livestreaming earlier, we would’ve been famous by now. Instead, we’re struggling just to stay afloat.”

Listening to Li Tianhu complain, Guo Dong asked, “Are you saying there were a lot of people in my livestream?”

“Several hundred. For your first stream, that’s already excellent. As long as you keep at it, you’ll be a huge hit before long!”

Li Tianhu was exaggerating a little. He was merely boasting in front of Guo Dong and venting his frustration so he would feel better.

But while complaining, he suddenly thought of a promising way forward.

He reached for his own phone, only to realize that it was gone.

Then he remembered that he had run off too quickly. His phone was still over by the fishpond.

Furious, he grabbed his shovel and ran back.

The others had no idea what was happening. They shook their heads and followed him back to the fishpond.

After watching them leave, Guo Dong took out his own phone again and opened his account.

When he first posted a video, he had only one follower—Meng Xiaohan.

Now he had more than five hundred.

The speed of that growth startled even him.

Still, he did not resume livestreaming. Instead, he began bringing down the Spirit Rain.

Compared with making money through livestreaming, he trusted himself more.

With his family’s heirloom gourd, he believed there would be plenty of opportunities to make money in the future. There was no need to concern himself with this little matter.

…

Inside a private dining room on the second floor of the Peaceful Hotel, five men and women sat around a large table.

Dozens of dishes covered the table, making an extraordinarily lavish spread.

Expensive red wine and white liquor were both present, and two beautiful waitresses stood nearby, ready to refill everyone’s glasses.

“Chairman Wang, try this. I came here specially to sample it yesterday, and it was absolutely delicious!”

A middle-aged man pointed toward a plate of baby bok choy and began enthusiastically recommending it.

Recommending baby bok choy to one’s superior at a banquet was certainly a first.

“We were originally planning to go to the Tianpeng Hotel. You may not know this, but the Tianpeng Hotel is the biggest star-rated hotel in Hongwu County. Yesterday, I decided to give this place a try, and after eating here, I couldn’t bring myself to eat anything else when I got home.”

He praised the baby bok choy as though nothing in heaven or earth could compare, making him sound rather over the top.

But Chairman Wang, whose hair was already streaked with gray, picked up a piece and tasted it.

Hmm?

After only one bite, a remarkable expression appeared on Chairman Wang’s face.

“Well? Isn’t it delicious?”

Chairman Wang did not answer. Instead, he reached for the grass carp beside him.

He took a small bite, and his eyes immediately narrowed.

“Chairman Wang, the baby bok choy and spinach are delicious!”

Chairman Wang shook his head and turned toward the waitress standing nearby.

“Young lady, bring me another serving of this fish and this cabbage, prepared the same way. I’ll pack them up and take them home later.”

The waitress suddenly looked troubled.

“Sir, these two dishes have to be reserved in advance.”

At that, the middle-aged man who had been fawning over Chairman Wang could no longer sit still.

“Young lady, business requires flexibility. Back when I was at the Tianpeng—”

Chairman Wang raised a hand and interrupted him before he could finish.

“That’s enough. Rules cannot be broken. Our own company is the same. Otherwise, what would be the point of having rules?”

The middle-aged man paused, then hurriedly said, “You’re absolutely right, Chairman Wang!”

“These two dishes are quite good. Go ahead and eat whatever you like. I’ll pack up the rest and take it with me.”

The moment he said that, none of the others dared touch anything.

No matter how curious they were, they would never dare take a bite of those two dishes.

They did not touch them, and Chairman Wang did not touch them either.

“Chairman Wang, if you like them, we can make another reservation and have fresh ones prepared…”

“No. My daughter has been suffering from a loss of appetite lately and can’t eat anything. She hasn’t had a bite in a whole day. Perhaps taking these home might help.”

As he spoke, he sampled several other dishes.

He tried one. The flavor was pure and wonderfully delicious.

Then another. It was equally delectable—truly one of a kind.

For a moment, Chairman Wang sat there, unsure which dish to try first.

“What’s wrong, Chairman Wang? Is something off about the flavor?”

The middle-aged man grew nervous as well, afraid that his arrangements had offended his superior.

“No. They taste too good. I was just…”

Before he could finish, the middle-aged man understood. His heart leaped with joy, and he quickly leaned over to whisper a few words to the woman sitting beside him.

She was startled for a moment, then made an excuse and left.

Chairman Wang gazed at the table laden with food and sighed with emotion.

“Young lady, do all these dishes require reservations?”

The beautiful waitress blushed and replied, “Sir, the ingredients for your table today were personally selected by our Chairman Liu, so these dishes…”

“All right, I understand. Go and bring me your dining hall manager.”