Mr. Zhou Doesn’t Want to Work Hard Anymore!

Chapter 24

 

As the recording of the show continued, they went to the snack street and started aimlessly looking for clues.

 

        “It seems like you have to eat to obtain the clues.” Zhuang Jingle reminded them weakly.

 

        “Then eat ba! ” Zhou Chenxi had long been eager to get into action or start on a task. The cost of this eating snack street while strolling was all covered by the program team. The ‘Golden Daddy1‘ is too generous, Zhou Chenxi’s mouth was watering.

 

        The Golden Daddy asked from the sidelines: “Where should we start?”

 

        Zhuang Jingle said : “Let’s eat something low-calorie! I’m afraid of gaining weight.”

 

        “No, no, no,” Zhou Chenxi said, wagging one of his fingers as if he was taking things very seriously. “The two great pleasures of life, junk food and junk drink.2 How can you appreciate Newton’s good intentions in discovering gravity if you don’t get fat once in this world?”

 

        Zhuang Jingle : “….”

 

        He was smeared with Zhou Chenxi’s sudden poisonous chicken soup3and vaguely felt his worldview shake.

 

        Luckily, Lu Ji had long since gotten used to it and said: “Let’s start at the street corner then!”

 

He really looked like he was going to eat from the street corner to the end of the street, Zhuang Jingle swallowed hard.

 

All right, let the carbohydrates and calories drown him ba!

       

The three of them divided the work and cooperated with one another, each person bought different items to strive for and maximize the benefits. Zhou Chenxi was blowing on the piping hot bowl of stinky tofu in his hand.

[臭豆腐 chòu dòu fu : stinky tofu / strong-smelling preserved beancurd]

He heard the stinky tofu’s stall owner ask him: “Are you a carp?”

 

     This is a code word (password)! 

        

Zhou Chenxi’s eyes lit up and he quickly said, “Yes, yes, yes!”

 

        The stall owner gave him a silk brocade bag.

 

锦囊

 

        The three of them gathered around and unwrapped the brocade bag.

 

        “A coupon?” Zhou Chenxi stared at the light as a feather of slip paper in his hand,”What does it mean?”

 

        That was just a slip of white paper with the words “Discount Coupon” written on it.

 

        “It should be a prop for the next mission, it’s useless to study it now,” Lu Ji said, “First let’s see if there are any other clues!”

 

        “Yes, that’s right,” Zhuang Jingle agreed, “Let’s get a few more pouches first!”

 

        Thereupon the three of them were caught in the snack street and crammed in by the crowd.

 

        The originally tidy clothes of Lu Ji were already wrinkled. He always stood on the outside of the crowded area, secretly protecting Zhou Chenxi, fearing that something might happen to him.

 

        Zhou Chenxi was a very big-hearted person.He wanted to try everything he saw that looked delicious but he only had one mouth to feed. In no time, he couldn’t hold more in his hands.

 

        ‘Time is strict, the mission is important’,by this, they all walked while eating without caring much about their image. Zhou Chenxi looked around, intending to find a place to sit down and finish eating what he was holding but he heard Lu Ji say, “Give it to me!”

 

He took a stick of tanghulu and a cotton candy from Zhou Chenxi’s hand.

 

[Táng hú lu (糖葫芦) :sugar-coated Chinese hawthorn or other fruit on a stick]

[棉花糖 : a cotton candy / marshmallow / candy floss]

        

        The brightly colored dessert did not match with Lu Ji’s own image, but he held it completely without any burden.

 

        Once Zhou Chenxi’s hands were empty, he finally had the energy to eat what he had bought. In three or two bites, he finished what he was holding.

 

        After one round, the three of them collected a total of two brocade bags. The amount was too small. This made them spring up the unbidden kind of emotion of being defeated. 

 

        But they couldn’t waste the food too. As soon as the time was almost up, they sat down at a small table on the side of the street for the tourists to rest and ate the rest of the food.

 

        Zhou Chenxi’s belly is bulging, he swallowed the last fish ball and sighed,”I’m really full….”

 

        He burped after saying that.

 

        Zhou Chenxi was really fighting strong today. Both of the brocade bags were the result of his ‘eating’. Zhuang Jingle looked at his thin arms and pointed chin with envy, “How do you do it? How do you manage to eat so freely and not gain weight?”

 

        Zhou Chenxi patted his own stomach and boasted shamelessly, “Receptive as an echoing canyon, all rivers run into the sea, therefore wide hearts embrace all.”

 

[虚怀若谷，海纳百川，有容乃大 (consist of three idioms) which mean :’Modest and open-minded, use different means to obtain the same result, greatness lies in the capacity’]

 

        Zhuang Jingle: “….” It was just that his understanding of the Chinese language wasn’t deep enough.

 

        Lu Ji couldn’t help laughing and put the bowl of fried potatoes in his hand on the table.

 

        That was Zhou Chenxi’s leftover, he couldn’t hold it in his hand just now and with Lu Ji’s help, he easily shoved that bowl of potato into Lu Ji’s hand. After that, he ate so much food that he completely forgot about this bowl of potatoes.

 

        Now when he saw Lu Ji holding it out, Zhou Chenxi paused for a moment and hurriedly said, “Oops, there’s still one bowl.”

 

        Zhou Chenxi burped again, took a deep breath and said, “Wait, let me chew over it for a while.”

 

        Not waiting for him to finish brewing, Lu Ji picked up a new pair of chopsticks and began to eat the half bowl of potatoes Zhou Chenxi had left.

 

        “That’s what I ate, hey……” Zhou Chenxi spoke in a low voice. 

 

        “Don’t force yourself if you can’t eat anymore,” Lu Ji said, “or you’ll easily get a stomachache.”

 

        But that’s not the point….like this, it’s not good, right?

 

        Zhou Chenxi’s face reddened again as he watched impatiently as Lu Ji finished that half bowl of potatoes.

 

        Zhuang Jingle who was beside them has long been eyeless, hating himself for being unable to shrink, decrease and disappear from that place. 

 

        After sitting and resting for a while longer, Shao Yunyi and Ren Qian happened to come from afar. As the number one currently popular actress, Shao Yunyi still had an idol burden, so she ate in small bites and didn’t dare to buy more. She had to take care of her image, so the heavy burden of carrying the pouch fell on Ren Qian’s shoulders.

 

        The two parties met and greeted each other in a fake manner.

 

        “How many clues did you guys get?” Ren Qian spoke first.

 

        Zhou Chenxi was very on guard; he did not take his words, nor did Zhuang Jingle, and only Lu Ji asked him in return, “What about you guys?”

 

        “Not a single one,” Ren Qian sighed, “There are so few clues.”

 

        Lu Ji smiled blandly, “So do we.”

 

        Then black eyes looked towards his pockets.

 

        In Ren Qian’s large sportswear pocket, a corner of the brocade bag was exposed.

 

Ren Qian coughed dryly and quickly stuffed the brocade bag back in,pretending that nothing had happened: “Come on, let’s go over there and take a look!” He said to Shao Yunyi.

 

        Shao Yunyi quickly nodded her head and the two of them left together at lightning speed.

    

        As soon as they walked away, the remaining three immediately whispered and discussed.

 

        “Qian Ge should only have one in his pocket, right?” Zhuang Jingle speculated, “Luckily we didn’t expose it.”

 

[Qian Ge : Brother Qian aka Ren Qian]

 

       “No,” Zhou Chenxi pushed the non-existent glasses on the bridge of his nose, “He probably has deduced from our reaction when we see the brocade bag that we already have the brocade bag so he should have been able to guess that we at least have one clue as well.”

 

        Zhou Chenxi vaguely felt the BGM of Sherlock Holmes, the great detective, slowly sounding behind him, “Maybe The Film Emperor Ren is trying to use this trick to test us on purpose.”

   

“Awesome!” Zhuang Jingle applauded,”Oh yeah, why didn’t I think of that?”

 

        “…. It shouldn’t have,” Lu Ji coughed dryly, “he should have just dropped it by accident.”

 

“How do you know?” Zhuang Jingle and Zhou Chenxi looked towards him together.

 

        Lu Ji said, “The grass jelly vendor’s stand is just diagonally opposite us. I heard him when he just bought the grass jelly, holding a brocade bag and said, ‘It’s so difficult, after eating so much, finally we got one’, then they came towards us, so they should only have one brocade bag at the moment.”

 

        Zhou Chenxi and Zhuang Jingle stood in deep admiration.

 

        “His reasoning is as fierce as a tiger, however look again at the game’s result of 2,5,” Zhou Chenxi took off his non-existent glasses, “still Lu Zong has eyes to see and ears to hear!”4

 

 

Zhuang Jingle let out a laugh.

 

        After that, he stared at them and discovered that Lu Ji turned his head to look towards Zhou Chenxi, a gentle smile flashing in his eyes.

 

        Here we go again! Here we go again!

 

        That kind of feeling where he wishes to be disappeared from this place!

 

        Zhuang Jingle looked at them and

sadly thought to himself,‘Who am I? Where am I? Why is the top of my head shining?’

 

 

1

[Similar to Sugar Daddy, but slightly not that degorative in use or could be used broadly]

2

[The original words for ‘junk drink’ is this : 肥宅快乐水 which literally mean: “drink that makes fat otakus happy”.] Lol! 

3

[Poisonous Chicken soup is the term for ‘demotivational quotes’ or anti-motivational quotes’/ anti-inspirational quotes, cynical motivational quotes, mock inspirational quotes. ]

4

[眼观六路, 耳听八方 ( 眼觀六路, 耳聽八方 ) yǎn guān liù lù ěr tīng bā fāng : lit. The eyes watch six roads and the ears listen in all directions /same with this idiom too ;the eyes observe all sides and the ears listen in all directions: it means to be observant and alert (idiom)]