Chapter 120: Rescue Center for Boss Yuan
“No need. I don’t have any interest in that,” Yuan Zhou took the bowl of the broth and walked towards the Maltese while listening on the phone. When he heard the preferential conditions offered by Boss Guan, he still didn’t show any manner of being swayed.
Boss Guan changed into another sitting position and didn’t give up. He then continued saying, “maybe Master Yuan should listen to me for a while longer.”
“Ok, tell me,” Yuan Zhou answered as concisely as usual. Meanwhile, he looked at the Maltese that seemed to have never moved from its position.
He crouched down and poured the broth out of the bowl before turning around to go back to his restaurant.
“Seriously, I’m sincerely inviting you, Master Yuan. This small restaurant is definitely unworthy of your talents,” Boss Guan first complimented Yuan Zhou.
When he found that Yuan Zhou didn’t have any reaction, Boss Guan then continued to say, “I will be investing here to build large buildings especially for food, with my newly constructed 5-star hotel being the center of them all.”
“I would like to invite you to be a shareholder of the new hotel just with your culinary skills and give you 8% worth of free shares. Are you satisfied with these conditions?”
Boss Guan smiled confidently. The construction of a 5-star hotel required at least hundreds of millions RMB and the 8% share for Yuan Zhou was equivalent to dozens of million RMB. This generous move was simply extraordinary and remarkable.
Seen from the other point of view, it showed that Yuan Zhou’s culinary skills were pretty convincing.
However, there wasn’t any answer from the other end of the phone for quite a while.
Yuan Zhou vaguely knew the difficulty of constructing a 5-star hotel and the costs of hundreds of million RMB. The 8% shares were like gifting him money. Furthermore, it was a huge amount and, moreover, dividends could be obtained each year in future.
With a sound of “Peng”, Yuan Zhou closed the back door. He then became greatly tempted by the shares. However, thinking that he had to share his culinary skills, Yuan Zhou calmed down from the feeling of excitement.
“Share my culinary skills! A head chef who can cook only three dishes? A head chef who can cook less than 10 dishes?” having consecutively asked himself several times, Yuan Zhou eventually got rid of the temptation of the small devil, the money.
“Thanks for your appreciation but I refuse. I’m sorry.” the moment Yuan Zhou uttered that, he suddenly sat down in his special chair and began to count his fingers while placing the phone between his shoulder and head
He was carefully calculating the huge amount of money that he had missed. When he came to the amount of profit sharing each year, Yuan Zhou found his fingers were not enough. Having stared at his own toes for quite a little while, Yuan Zhou finally restrained the desire to take off his shoes since he was in the kitchen now.
Missing one hundred of million RMB could no longer describe Yuan Zhou’s current feelings. This was a matter of hundreds of million RMB. Then, Yuan Zhou started to regret saying those words so quickly.
“What? You won’t even consider the proposal at all?” Boss Guan had thought that he would get a reserved answer like ‘Let me consider it for a while.’ Who could know that Yuan Zhou would refuse him so bluntly and straightforwardly?
“Good night,” Yuan Zhou didn’t actually answer Boss Guan concerning the considering issue. After all, if he reconsidered, he was likely to change his answer; therefore, Yuan Zhou hung off decisively and firmly.
“How interesting!” When he initially started this business, Boss Guan had personally gone everywhere to recruit good chefs. Not having done this work for a long time, he unexpectedly encountered failure, which nevertheless made Boss Guan feel more challenging.
He made another call and said after getting through, “You make some arrangements. The next few days, I want to go to the restaurant where I was eating tonight.”
A vaguely affirmative answer came from the other end. With a smile, Boss Guan put down the phone and started to deal with some documents.
With a sound of “Hu”, Yuan Zhou took a deep breath and then went upstairs to clean himself, preparing to sleep.
Then, he began to toss and turn restlessly in the bed. It was his first fitful sleep since he got the system. When the alarm clock rang, Yuan Zhou was still a little muddled. The bad dream at night was too scary.
In the dream, all his money suddenly grew feet and ran away. He then anxiously ran after them but still failed. Even running after the money for a whole night, he still had empty pockets.
This dream was awfully frightening.
“Pa Pa”, Yuan Zhou patted on his forehead and became a little more clear-headed. After the helplessness shown on his face slightly vanished, he resumed his usual solemn and spirited manner.
Of course, grinning for quite a little while in the mirror, Yuan Zhou would never admit that his smiling face did not look as good as his solemn face.
During the next five days, Boss Guan really didn’t give up and basically came over here whenever he had time. Every time he showed up at the restaurant, he had a meal first and then began to persuade Yuan Zhou to be his head chef. Of course, the conditions he offered were getting better and better. The promised share remained the same, but he could enjoy the privilege of working for less time, only serving the head chef’s menu once per week.
Such decent conditions were basically equal to the preferential treatments of a Michelin 3-star chef. However, Yuan Zhou’s answer followed the same pattern, with decisive refusal.
Yuan Zhou answered as concisely as possible every time and wouldn’t talk much for fear of him changing his mind.
Boss Guan came frequently and talked to Yuan Zhou every time he was here. Therefore, it was inevitable that their talk was heard by others. Then, more and more customers started to know a big boss was trying to recruit Yuan Zhou as his chef and, moreover, offered quite tempting conditions.
Therefore, with Man Man taking the lead, Wu Hai and Wu Zhou organized a gang of people, preparing to figure out some ideas to let Yuan Zhou stay.
In order to communicate conveniently, they even set up a Wechat group, with the simple name of Rescue Center for Boss Yuan.
[I received new information today. The coal boss even let Yuan Zhou cook only one day every week. He’s so disgusting,] Man Man typed the sentence through the phone and sent an irritated expression.
[What the f*ck. Only one day? What shall I do with my three meals?] Wu Hai also became nervous. After all, although Yuan Zhou would rest from time to time at present, he basically opened the restaurant every day. If he really went to that 5-star hotel to work, Wu Hai would starve to death for sure due to his picky stomach.
[The coal boss is wealthy, then so what? Boss Yuan wouldn’t go there, would he? We are all his established customers, right?] Some other people were also dubious about that.
[If it were you, would you go?] Man Man directly choked him.
…….
After a heated discussion, the people in the group finally came to a consensus that everybody should try to test Boss Yuan’s reactions one by one and then shared the information with the group.
The other day, Yuan Zhou bumped into Wu Hai who appeared extraordinarily weird.
“Boss Yuan, I haven’t eaten a lot for a long time but I feel very hungry today. Please serve me an Herbal Tea Egg first, then the Egg Fried Rice Set and lastly a plate of Phoenix-Tail Prawns. Of course, the watermelon juice is also a must. Besides that, give me another bowl of Clear Broth Noodle Soup,” Wu Hai began to order dishes generously.
“Can you finish all of them? You know the consequence of wasting food, don’t you?” Yuan Zhou looked at Wu Hai curiously. Normally, this guy ordered dishes according to his particular appetite. What was the matter that made him suddenly act so foolishly?
Wu Hai had originally intended to indicate he was quite wealthy and thus could afford so many dishes. However, with regard to the effect, it seemed that Yuan Zhou was merely suspecting his intelligence, instead.
Thus Wu Hai declared defeat. At last, Man Man switched on the coquetry mode, which frightened Yuan Zhou so much that he thought Man Man forgot her brain with her when she came out today.
“Man Man, did you feel too hot while baking the bread?” Yuan Zhou was truly unable to endure Man Man who had changed so much today. He then asked her with difficulty.
“No problem. Let me order my dishes,” with her coquetry defeated, Man Man suffered a huge blow when she saw Yuan Zhou’s reaction of wiping his perspiration with the towel.
Not knowing the reason, Wu Zhou selected the mode of flaunting his relationship but unfortunately was directly despised by Yuan Zhou.
“Be careful of your influence. There’s a minor girl here,” Yuan Zhou said that justly and righteously. Only he himself knew the genuine reason for saying so.
After all declared defeat, they could only use the final way, asking him directly.
With Wu Hai, Wu Zhou, Man Man and Zhao Yinigjun taking the lead, they asked Yuan Zhou straightforwardly when there weren’t many people.
“Boss Yuan, what exactly do you think of Boss Guan? Wu Hai asked anxiously.
“A regular customer.” Yuan Zhou had a guess as to what they were up when he saw the few of them frantically looking for him but he was not quite sure.
“Boss Yuan, let’s be frank. Are you getting another job?” Wu Hai got impatient first and directly got to the point.
Yuan Zhou raised his eyebrows and answered, “Why? It is my restaurant.”
“Ehhh… Boss Yuan, are you going to work for Boss Guan?” Man Man got impatient, too.
“When did I say that I would go there?” Yuan Zhou immediately asked back.