The Erguotou Bond over Grilled Cold Noodles and the Hidden Mage at the Ring-Toss Stall
At 7:30, white steam rose from the food market on the back street.
Sing Sing walked up to the food stall and took a look.
"Boss, three servings of grilled cold noodles, two starch sausages per serving, double the eggs, and plenty of garlic chili sauce."
The stall owner responded and quickly picked up a shovel to turn the contents over.
The dough softens as it heats up, and the golden egg mixture spreads along the edge of the spatula.
Illyana moved closer to the stall and examined it carefully.
"Stephen, this thin slice of carbohydrate clearly doesn't have any magical fluctuations, so why can it withstand the blows of an iron shovel after being sprinkled with a little liquid?"
"And... that deep red paint actually smells so good it can stimulate saliva production."
Li Qianhuan nudged her arm with her elbow.
"This is called Northeast China snack. It's made with fragrant vinegar and white sugar, and it's much more fragrant than your Thaddeus Ross rye bread!"
The vendor's shovel flew up and down.
With a few quick snips, the cold noodles, coated with chopped onions, were cut into small pieces, placed in a paper bowl, and handed over.
"Here you go, three servings of grilled cold noodles. Be careful, they're hot!"
Sing Sing took the paper bowls and handed them to the two girls.
Just as I was about to find an empty seat, I saw two familiar-looking foreign young men sitting diagonally across from me.
The man on the left, wearing a dark gray stand-up collar uniform issued by the 749 Bureau, was giving orders to the man opposite him in a thick Beijing accent.
"Brother, how many times have I told you!"
"To peel roasted chestnuts, you have to use your thumbnail to pinch along the horizontal lines. If you keep using brute force, the chestnut meat will all rot inside the shell!"
Sitting opposite him, Riptide clumsily peeled chestnuts, not arguing back when his younger brother scolded him, but just chuckling foolishly.
Black smoke billowed from the barbecue grill next to them, carried by the wind toward their table.
Riptide gently turned his index finger halfway around, and a miniature vortex appeared out of thin air, silently lifting the black smoke into the air and dispersing it.
The barbecue vendor, who was fanning himself, paused for a moment, then gave a thumbs-up to the Riptide.
"Wow, buddy, you've got impressive lung capacity! You just blew my smoke away with a single breath. You must train to swim at the Shichahai Sports School, right?"
"Pretty much, my brother deals with thick smoke all the time."
Mange Anton chuckled in response, but out of the corner of his eye, he caught sight of Stephen Chow carrying a plate of grilled cold noodles.
"Deputy Director Zhou? What brings you here?"
Okay, okay, wherever Lao Zhou goes, people call him Director Zhou or Director Zhou.
That kid Anton had to add the word "deputy" to it!
Riptide noticed the three of them and warmly invited them to sit down.
"Brother Zhou, it's been so long! I'm planning to bring Anton to visit you after the New Year!"
"So A Le said you were away on a business trip again, and these two are our new colleagues?"
Riptide has been incredibly busy these days.
They're always on their feet, so it's not easy to find a moment to grab a late-night snack and chat with their boyfriend.
After participating in the previous ball game, I didn't even watch the performance and went straight back to the team for fieldwork.
Li Qianhuan, who was sitting next to him, didn't have a friendly look towards Riptide.
Even though the two had fought side by side before.
"Hmph, don't think that joining China will erase everything you did before! If Piotr hadn't stopped me, I would have beaten you up already!"
The Riptide gave a helpless smile.
His past was indeed dishonorable, following Wan Ci...
No!
During the time they followed the evil Mutants Rick Lehnsherr in committing atrocities, the X-Men members were also severely harmed by him.
People naturally feel a little guilty after they turn over a new leaf, and even Riptide are no exception.
Li Qianhuan knew this too, so she just muttered a few words and left it at that.
Sing Sing then changed the subject. "Riptide, how's the progress on your promise to form National Special Meteorological Rapid Response Brigade?"
"Sigh, it's a long story. I just got back from a business trip. It's not easy running around looking for good prospects."
"Besides this, I also need to keep an eye on the situation in our jurisdiction."
"Last month, our jurisdiction responded to 14 fire calls, improving smoke extraction efficiency in high-rise building fires by 80%, and the entire team achieved zero casualties!"
"Hey! Don't make this sound like a report from the bureau."
Anton chuckled; he was very relaxed when he wasn't at his post.
At this moment, he took out a roll of neatly bound sketch paper from his pocket and handed it to Sing Sing.
"Director, these are some drawings I made over the past two days. Could you please take a look and give me your opinion?"
Sing Sing, with a bamboo skewer in his mouth, unfolded a piece of drawing paper, on which he meticulously and vividly depicted a lively scene of a hot pot feast in the cafeteria with charcoal pencils.
In the painting, Sing Sing is slicing a fat beef in mid-air with Pig Butchering Knife.
Below, a group of Awakened were scrambling for the prize.
In the corner, there's a drawing of Deadpool hugging a stool and weeping bitterly.
"Wow, your sketching skills have improved! You even drew those two teardrops on Wade's face with such depth."
"Hehe, if it weren't for you saving my brother and me in New York, Director, how could I be painting in peace right now?"
"My brother and I have already discussed it. Once he's done with his work, the two of us will treat you to Quanjude on Qianmen Street!"
"Eating roast duck is too expensive. Just come to the cafeteria later and let me show off my skills. But bring your own ingredients, and save the money you save to find a wife."
Sing Sing rolled up the painting and stuffed it into the Dimension Box. He then turned to ask Illyana to take some of their grilled skewers and chestnuts while they were still hot.
But then he discovered that the Russian girl beside him had vanished.
Look in the direction Li Qianhuan is pointing.
Illyana was standing five meters away in front of the ring toss stall, staring intently at the highest point of the stall.
There stood a large white goose plush toy, about half the height of a person, with a flat, orange-yellow beak and a large red ribbon tied around its neck.
The stall owner shouted to the onlookers.
"Don't miss out! Fifteen laps for ten yuan, fifty laps for thirty yuan."
"Take whatever you catch, and if you catch the big white goose on top, take it home and use it as a pillow!"
Illyana reached into her pocket, pulled out thirty yuan in change, and handed it to the stall owner, stammering:
"Give me fifty rings, and I'll take that white poultry with me."
"Alright, young lady, you have good taste!"
"Come on, throw it from outside the white line, but your toes can't go over the line!"
The stall owner handed me a large plastic ring with a smile.
Illyana was focused, holding the plastic ring in her left hand and picking one up with her right hand before tossing it away.
Did not win.
A hint of confusion flashed in Illyana's eyes as she raised her hand and flung out more than a dozen plastic rings in quick succession.
Without exception, all the plastic rings either flew off or slid off the track.
The stall owner sat on a small stool, watching the excitement with a cheerful smile.
The girl's previously calm expression turned somber, and magical power surged around her.
"That cunning old man from the East! He actually set up a high-level force field deflection barrier on an ordinary toy!"
"Hey, hey, grandma, please calm down! This old man is a self-employed business owner, not some kind of black magician!"
Sing Sing reacted quickly, pressing down on the back of her hand and forcibly pushing the energy back into her body.
Hey!
That's why she absolutely has to pay attention in class!
They're quick to fight to the death over the slightest disagreement. If we really let her out like that, who knows what kind of trouble she'll cause!
The stall owner blinked twice with his presbyopia, looking at Sing Sing and the aggressive foreign girl.
"Young man, why is your foreign sister getting so worked up? Playing games is about accepting the consequences of your bets."
"It's alright, sir. My sister just arrived from Moscow and is jet-lagged; she has low blood sugar."
Sing Sing gave a forced smile, took two plastic rings from Illyana's hand, and flicked them.
How did Instructor Hu teach you in class during the day?
"When encountering complex spatial resistance and material rebound, you can't just rely on brute force; you have to utilize the knowledge in your mind!"
"Look closely, this plastic ring weighs only fifteen grams, and the goose's neck is tilted at a seventy-five-degree angle."
"And then Riptide's that level 3 southeasterly breeze that kid Jiliu created on the left..."
"You lower the angle of incidence of the parabola by twelve degrees, using the rotation of the plastic ring upon landing to lock its center of gravity."
Remember, the more you read, the less you'll suffer.