Volume 3 Hello, Eri Chapter 218 Sakura and the Little Monsters (Part 2)
"These are for you!" The ramen chef pushed up two plates, each with a stack of dried tofu and a boiled egg on it. The accompanying drinks could be oolong tea or sake.
"Thank you, boss!" Lu Mingfei's mouth was full of food, and even her thanks were unclear, but she still tried to nod and give a thumbs up.
"What's there to thank me for?" The ramen chef took off his headscarf and sat on a high stool to rest. "It's a blessing for people like us to meet diners who know what we are doing! Seeing you guys laughing so happily while eating the food I made makes me very satisfied! A little side dish doesn't cost much."
"The boss must have been a very good person when he was young, right?" Lu Mingfei tried hard to swallow everything in her mouth before saying, "So even when he's old, he still likes young people like this!"
"If I were a good person, there would be no bad guys in this world." The ramen chef smiled helplessly, "Little girl, you and those men around you are not the same kind of people, right?"
Lu Mingfei was stunned. She was indeed not the same kind of person as them. No matter whether it was Caesar, Chu Zihang or Yuan Zhisheng, they were all typical second-generation rich male protagonists. There were very few people like her who could struggle all the way to where they are today in Kassel, which was full of elites.
"Boss, how did you know that?" Lu Mingfei was very curious.
"Isn't that what gangsters are like? Young men always have pretty girls around them. I knew you were gangsters from what you said the other day." The ramen chef said something old-fashioned, as if he wanted to advise Lu Mingfei, "Girls your age just think gangsters are cool and hang out with them. You're vain! In my opinion, it's better not to get involved with them."
Lu Mingfei understood that the ramen master understood Chinese but could not understand every word. They talked a lot while eating noodles with Yuan Zhisheng that day. The ramen master heard that Yuan Zhisheng was a gangster and said some life philosophy. He also thought that Caesar and Chu Zihang were gangsters, so he imagined a Japanese love story.
"It's not what you think, boss!" Lu Mingfei wanted to distance herself from the matter and give some explanation, but she didn't know where to start.
"Still can't let it go? Never mind. This is not something you will listen to if I say it. It is indeed hard to understand if you have not experienced it. Just don't regret it in the future." The ramen chef waved his hand, indicating that he didn't want to bring up this topic anymore.
Lu Mingfei really didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Sometimes people are always willing to believe what they believe, and even other people's explanations seem like prevarications. Let the boss think that she is someone like Lu Mingfei. Anyway, she is now mixed with the Sheqi Eight Clan, and is no different from the underworld.
Eiry didn't pay attention to what the people around her were saying. She just silently took small bites of her own braised egg. Although Lu Mingfei had taught her the bold way to eat ramen, when eating other things, she was still the princess, and she seemed to be so elegant that she could bite into patterns on the braised egg.
"You can actually eat this way!" Seeing this, Lu Mingfei picked up her own braised egg and dried tofu and threw them into the soup bowl, which would give them the rich flavor of the soup. Many famous restaurants in China have this way of eating, such as Shaanxi's mutton soup steamed buns and Huainan's beef soup.
But in Japan, especially when eating ramen, the Japanese basically don't eat it this way. Their side dishes are often dumplings, tempura, or edamame pork chops, which are actually not very suitable for soaking in soup. Lu Mingfei doesn't care about this. She just wants to teach the young lady in front of her how to cook common people's food, and promote Chinese charm even on Japanese territory.
After the teaching just now, Eri seemed to have regarded Lu Mingfei as her master in the field of culinary arts. She immediately followed Lu Mingfei's method and added the half-eaten boiled egg and dried tofu into the soup. Although the ramen chef saw it, he did not say anything saying that it was blasphemy. In his opinion, delicious food is best enjoyed by the customers themselves. As long as the customer thinks it tastes better in a different way, it is fine even if he eats the noodles upside down.
Eri picked up the thoroughly seasoned tofu and took a small bite, her eyes slightly widening in surprise. At Sheqibajia, her meals basically consisted of traditional Japanese food and Western food at luxury restaurants when she went out, and she had basically no contact with Chinese food or anything else.
"Wow! It's completely changed the flavor!" Eiry wrote in a small notebook for Lu Mingfei to see.
Lu Mingfei felt very proud. Eiry was so easy to handle. Anyone would appreciate the praise from a beautiful girl.
People are always surprised by the levels they have never been exposed to. No matter how you look at Eri, she looks like a pure young lady who has little contact with the outside world. She is as simple as a blank sheet of paper. Although she doesn't have many expressions, sometimes you can understand what she is thinking just by looking at her, it's all written on her face.
There are very few girls like this these days. Girls on the streets of Tokyo even tan themselves and dress like Shibuya, with jackets tied around their waists and earrings bigger than eggs. Eri seemed to have traveled from a world hundreds of years ago. Her hair looked like it had never been taken care of. It was simply supported by her natural beauty. When she sat down, she had a beautiful sheen like a waterfall.
Her family must be quite special, right? Maybe Eri is a famous shrine maiden of some shrine. I wonder if there are groups of men in black looking for her all over the world, Lu Mingfei thought.
The soup pot that the ramen chef never stopped boiling was always bubbling. The two happy female diners devoured the food in no time. Lu Mingfei reached out to wipe the soup from the corner of Eiry's mouth. Eiry turned her head and looked curiously at the stains on Lu Mingfei's raised fingertips. Suddenly, she moved closer to Lu Mingfei's lips and licked them, then stuck out her tongue to show Lu Mingfei that it was the soup that she had wiped off.
Lu Mingfei was stunned for a while and thought to herself, "Girl, although you have an innocent face, your style is very bold!" She didn't know that this was something Eri learned from anime. In those love dramas, there is always this kind of intimate interaction between the male and female protagonists. Eri didn't understand the meaning of this action, but from the shy but beautiful expressions of the male and female protagonists afterwards, she thought it should make people happy, so she did it.
The surging cumulonimbus clouds quietly spread out a torrent of rain under the cover of night. In just a short while, the ground outside the trolley was covered with rain, and the raindrops as big as beans splashed everywhere.
The trolley did have a roof to shelter from the rain, but the stools were still on the ground. The rain hitting their calves brought a chill. Lu Mingfei and Eiry curled up their legs and moved closer to each other. The mist in the shed obscured each other's faces, warming their hearts.
They didn't see that, on the long street not far away, groups of motorcycles and various flashy sports cars formed their own small groups, the roar of the engines was like thunder, and the drivers were all gangsters wearing raincoats and sunglasses, with the lining deliberately opened to reveal vicious tattoos. These people's eyes swept over the faces of every girl in sight, and the water splashed almost splashed on the side of the trolley, but they didn't get off the car to lift the curtain to take a look, because they couldn't see the legs of two girls on the seats here.
The cell phone rang in her pocket. Lu Mingfei took out her phone and found that it was Chu Zihang calling.
"Hello, Brother?" Lu Mingfei answered the phone. Chu Zihang was the kind of person who wouldn't call you for three hundred years unless there was nothing wrong. There was basically no possibility of a long phone call. Moreover, if there was really a small matter, he would rather use the email function of the Night Watchman Forum to contact, because he knew that with Lu Mingfei's level of internet nerdism, as long as she was awake, her computer would definitely be on.
"It's raining hard, where are you?" It was Chu Zihang's voice on the other end of the phone. He was standing in the corridor outside the commercial street with a group of men and women, shoulder to shoulder, taking shelter from the rain. The water was flowing on the steps in front of him, almost covering the soles of his shoes. The difference was that he had two umbrellas in his bag, so he could leave at any time, unlike those stupid couples around him who were yelling about how this could happen, but their faces were filled with happy smiles of being able to stay a little longer.
What? Lu Mingfei blinked her eyes, thinking what was this saying? Senior brother, you suddenly feel in love and want to show your boyfriend power. Are you thinking of coming to give me an umbrella on this rainy day?
"Still playing in the store, what's the matter?" Lu Mingfei remained calm and wanted to continue to find out. She was still not sure what Chu Zihang's intention was in making this call.
"Akihabara?"
"No, it's in Bunkyo-ku."
"When will you be back?"
"I don't know. It's raining harder and harder, and I don't have an umbrella. If it doesn't work, I can just find a hotel or a B&B to stay for a night. Even if I take a taxi back, I'll be soaked." Lu Mingfei glanced at Eri beside her and didn't plan to say it. It sounds like cheating to go to a hotel with a girl he just met on a rainy night and take care of her. But Chu Zihang shouldn't think so. He would only choose to believe Lu Mingfei's lame lies, even if he knew it was false, as long as it was harmless, he would not expose it.
"Okay, remember to take care of yourself." Chu Zihang hung up the phone just like that, because he felt that there was nothing more to say. It was always like this with Lu Mingfei's calls, and he had to end it all.
He looked up at the night sky. The colorful neon lights were still shining, and even the falling raindrops were lit up by them. The heavy rain that came quietly only drove away the cosplay girls soliciting customers on the street, but it could not extinguish the enthusiasm of the customers. Every store was filled with people inside and outside, and the joy of feasting and revelry would not stop. The spring rain in Tokyo came and went quickly. The night was long, and everyone had plenty of time to wait for the rain to stop. Anyway, there was another person to accompany them.
Heavy rain was falling. Chu Zihang tightly held the bag in his hand, opened his umbrella and walked on the lonely road home.
He did not tell Lu Mingfei on the phone that he was in Akihabara. He really came here in the afternoon as Caesar suggested, carrying the limited . He remembered that Doraemon liked to eat this, and pineapple buns were the favorite of Shakugan no Shana, the first generation tsundere cute girl, whom Lu Mingfei mentioned by chance.
According to his memory of Lu Mingfei's preferences, he walked through almost every store that Lu Mingfei might visit, from figurine shops to game card dealers, from video game halls to maid cafes. He even went to the arcade where Lu Mingfei played today, and the cafe where he and Yuan Zhinv had stayed together. However, when he arrived, Lu Mingfei had already walked several blocks away, so he did not meet her.
He strictly followed Caesar's instructions and learned to buy things that Lu Mingfei might like. He even searched online to see if doing so would really make his girlfriend happy. The enthusiastic answers from netizens were all yes.
He was looking forward to meeting her in a store. He would never say hello, but would stand silently behind her while she was admiring the figurines, until she found something she liked and came to her senses to check out. Then she bumped into him and covered her forehead with her hands, trying to apologize, and looked up to see who was standing there.
Ideas are always so beautiful, but the reality is always more cruel than you think. Chu Zihang had prepared everything, but he never expected that he really couldn't find Lu Mingfei. After a phone call, he found out that she was not there at all and didn't even need an umbrella.
Caesar once told him that if a man can't even find out where the girl he likes is going, then he should not practice on the road of love. Chu Zihang thought that Caesar must have done the same thing as Nuonuo. When the blond confident man finally saw Nuonuo, he would definitely hug Nuonuo from behind.
He couldn't help but start to doubt whether such a fake love was really a mistake. He had no idea about Lu Mingfei's preferences, but Lu Mingfei knew him very well. Such a relationship was fundamentally unfair, and it was unilaterally unfair to Lu Mingfei.
Maybe I am not qualified to be in a relationship with anyone... Maybe I have never been ready to be a real boyfriend... Maybe the promise I made because I didn't want to see her lonely expression was a beautiful mistake that should not have happened from the beginning.
On the way home, Chu Zihang had a blank expression on his face, as solemn as a judge in court, and raindrops fell along the brim of his black umbrella. He passed by a figurine shop and saw the loyal dog Hachi model in the window.
That is a dog that is well-known in Japan. Hachi's owner gets off work at Shibuya Station every day. Every time Hachi hears the train beep at 5pm, he rushes out of the house to greet his owner in front of the station. No one taught him to do that, but in his daily life, he caught the habit of his owner coming home after the train beep.
Later, when Hachi's master died, Hachi would still appear in front of Shibuya Station every day, and his master would never appear from that gate again. Hachi didn't know what his family had told him about the meaning of death to his master, and he would still go to the station every day after hearing the train beep at five o'clock, regardless of rain or wind, spring or autumn, summer or winter.
Chu Zihang still remembers the ending of the story. He and his mother watched That winter, Xiao Ba lay in the snow pile in front of the station and slowly closed his eyes. This time, it was finally reunited with its owner. The owner once again walked out of the platform of Shibuya Station, opened his arms and let Xiao Ba jump into his arms, patting his head with a smile.
For a dog, that may be the happiest moment in its life, finally paying off the years of waiting.
Yuan Zhisheng once said that he was like George, the Pinta Island tortoise, whose dream was to bite through the wire fence and play in the mud in his own puddle. Chu Zihang felt that he was like Xiaoba, an Akita dog. Akita dogs have poor obedience, but once they recognize someone as their master, they will never leave him or her and will not obey the orders of a second master. Perhaps this is the reason why Xiaoba went to the station as usual. He knew that his master was gone, but he still subconsciously looked forward to his return.
Just like now, he knew that Lu Mingfei was no longer in Akihabara, but he couldn't stop the delusion of hoping to see her making faces in front of a window when he turned back.
Chu Zihang silently took out a pineapple bun from the bag and took a bite. He didn't like sweets very much, but this time, he wanted to know what flavor she liked.
