Chapter 49：A Happy Written Examination

"Thank you, thank you." Zhang Wen Wu clasped his hands together to bid them farewell. After the cops left the room, he spoke to the worker from the health office, "Do you want to visit the hospital for a medical check-up?"

The worker was really confused, he thought, "What is going on? I have been assaulted, but no one cares about me? They not only ignored me, but the cops also left as well?" With a heart full of grievances, he wanted to call his family. But at this moment, when he heard Zhang Wen Wu speaking, the worker became enraged, and he said, "Check! I would definitely go for the check up! I want to sue that son of a bitch."

Zhang Wen Wu looked outside. He saw that the health inspection vehicle was still around. He shook his head and thought, "What kind of shitty bureau chief is he? His underling has been assaulted, but yet, he is hiding in his car and pretending to be blind." He said to Dan Xue Feng, "Section Chief Dan, what do you think about his injuries?"

Dan Xue Feng had a sullen expression on his face. In his head, he was contemplating on how he could take revenge and relieve his hatred. After he heard Zhang Wen Wu speaking, he suddenly recalled about the issue with the health office. He thought, "I have really lost all my face today." He propped the worker up, and he said, "Go to the hospital first. We can discuss other issues in the future."

The five fatties wanted to have a meal. On the contrary, they ended up with a lot of trouble, but they also could not do anything about it. When they got in the car, Zhang Wen Wu said to Dan Xue Feng, "Investigate the three names: Bai Lu; He San Qing; and Gao Yuan."

Dan Xue Feng was rather pleased. "Sure. We are uncovering their background already?" He made the call to investigate.

Bai Lu was unconcerned over their investigations. After the police and the fatties left, he looked at the broken pieces of glass and sighed. He San Qing acted all high and mighty, and he said, "Look, you cannot live without me. I have only just left, and someone came to cause trouble for you again." Then he said to Le Miao Miao, "You did well this time around."

Le Miao Miao was rather pleased.

Bai Lu asked him, "The last time when the glass shattered, where did you make the replacement?"

He San Qing pointed at the entrance of the street, and he said, "Turn right at the corner, and there is a building for construction materials... Right, I will make the journey for you."

From those bunch of guys that came in the sports cars, there was a little fatty that walked out. "Brother San, what do you want to do?" 

"Wait for me," He San Qing said, and he drove away in his car.

Those customers that were queueing up came over to ask Bai Lu, "Will the restaurant be open at night?"

"Open," Bai Lu said.

They went back to inform the rest, and they started queueing up again happily.

Not long after, He San Qing came back, and he said, "The workers will be here soon. I am going off now."

"Where are you going?" Bai Lu asked.

"There is the last day of car exhibition today. Right when I picked my next female target, you called me out of nowhere. Tonight, I have plans already, do you want to come along? There are booze and women, it's a very happy place."

No wonder there was a massive line of sports cars. They must have been fooling around at the car exhibition.

Bai Lu rejected, and he said, "I am resisting corrosion by avoiding moisture."

"Hurry up and go to hell." He San Qing signaled the rest of the guys to get in their vehicles, and they drove away boomingly.

Not long after, the workers arrived. After tipping an extra sum, the workers guaranteed that they would finish the job by today.

Zhang Sha Sha took the whisk broom and started sweeping up the broken glasses. Bai Lu hurried over and snatched it away. "I will do it."

After finishing all the tasks, the restaurant started dinner service as usual. After the meal, Le Miao Miao invited Bai Lu to go out and have fun. However, Bai Lu refused to go, and he brought Sha Sha back home.

The next day was the 8th of October. The sun was shining brightly.

After breakfast, Bai Lu sent Sha Sha to school. Before he left, he said to Ding Ding, "For lunch today, you have to settle it on your own. I don't think I can make it back."

"How far away are you sending Sha Sha? Why are you not coming back? Ding Ding was about to go upstairs to her own apartment.

"I have something on," Bai Lu said, and he went downstairs.

Ding Ding chased him down, and she said, "What is more important than my meal?"

Bai Lu was a little helpless. "Your cheek is getting thicker."

"Cut the bullshit. Quickly tell me what you are doing."

"I joined the Top Chef Contest last month. Today, there will be the preliminary rounds."

"Damn it. It is only a bunch of shitty chefs competing with their culinary skills, and they even created the preliminary rounds? Don't tell me that there is a repechage as well?" Ding Ding said with condescension. 

Bai Lu sternly said, "I do not know."

"Hurry up and compete. Oh yes, bring this sign along with you."

"What kind of sign?"

Ding Ding said, "Wait here." She rushed upstairs, and then she came down again. Then, she threw a little wooden sign over to him.

Bai Lu grabbed it and looked. On the front, there were two words: Truce Sign. And on the back, there were also two words: Closed Today. Both sides meant that he would not be working.

"Where did you get this?"

"Picked it up." Ding Ding went upstairs.

Bai Lu and Sha Sha first went back to the restaurant to hang up the sign. Then he sent Sha Sha to school. At the school gates, Bai Lu was a little worried. "Do you have enough money? This afternoon, you can just buy something to eat outside the school. There's no need to go back home."

She said, "Are you treating me like a kid?"

Bai Lu smiled, and he waved his hands to bid her farewell. Then he rushed off to the competition venue.

The venue of the competition was at a higher vocational school, and it was incredibly far away. He first had to change trains on the subway, and journey all the way outside of the 5th Ring. Then he had to travel for another two stations, before finally arriving at the school.

A banner was hung on the entrance to the school: Warm celebrations for the Beijing Top Chef contest. Bai Lu stood underneath the banner and pondered for a long time. He thought, "It sounds a little bit incoherent. What is there to celebrate for the contest?" After thinking about it, he felt that there was nothing wrong with the slogan. It celebrated both the opening and the conclusion of the contest; The person that wrote this slogan had exceptional talent.

While he was looking clumsily, there were sporadic movements from the people on the road. A young man with thin eyebrows walked to his side. He looked and looked before slamming his shoulder. "You are here," he said.

Bai Lu turned around. He had met this guy before at the labor office. When he went there to apply for the chef permit, he also enrolled in this Top Chef Contest. He remembered that this young man kept bugging him. 

"My name is Zhang Cheng Long. What was your name again?" the skinny-browed man said.

"I know that you are Zhang Cheng Long. You told me the last time already. My name is Bai Lu."

"I was afraid that you have forgotten about it. How were your preparations?"

"I did not really prepare at all."

"That makes sense. You have just taken the chef's grading examination. Even if you have prepared, it doesn't make much of a difference anyway. In this contest, the culinary skills are being compared, so you are definitely at a disadvantage. Oh yes, have you obtained the chef permit? That permit was quite easily obtained, there should be no problems for you right?" Zhang Cheng Long kept nagging on and on.

Bai Lu did not answer. He changed the topic and said, "Shall we go inside?"

"Of course, if we do not go inside, then the $1k+ would be spent for naught."

The two of them walked inside. Along the way, they bumped into many different chefs. When they finally reached the faculty of the culinary arts, which was the competition venue, there were even more chefs in this place. Like the saying: "Never see, never know." Once he saw the scene, he was startled. He thought, "How could there be so many senseless chefs in the Northern City?" Some people came as a group, and also people who came alone. There were even some who came here just so that they could post on Weibo. 

Bai Lu sighed with sorrow, and he thought, "Technology is really everywhere."

What was even more depressing to him was the fact that there were so many retarded chefs that were willing to spend more than $1k to participate in this madness.

He went to the registration counter to record his attendance, and he was assigned a test venue. Before noon, there was a written examination. In the afternoon, there was a knife skills test. That was the competition plan for the preliminary rounds.

Zhang Cheng Long and Bai Lu reported together at the same time, so they were assigned to the same test venue with neighboring seats. Zhang Cheng Long giggled and said, "You are much younger, so your memory should be better. Please take good care of me later."

Bai Lu was speechless. "I have only obtained the chef permit. Yet, you expect me to take good care of you?"

"It is exactly because you have just obtained the chef permit, so your memory must be still fresh. There's no doubt that you are better than me so I would have to depend on you in the written examination."

While they were speaking, the people around them eavesdropped on them. Two muscular chefs smiled wryly at the two of them, and said, "You have just graduated from the vocational high school without the chef permit, and now you are participating in the Top Chef contest? How much did you drink before you made this decision?"

Bai Lu pouted his mouth, and he thought, "I have been despised again. Why is it that the people nowadays love to despise others so much?"

The other chef smiled, and said, "Perhaps, he has too much money, and he doesn't know where else to spend it?"

Bai Lu was a little dumbfounded, he thought, "In this shitty contest, the winner would only get $2k, so I can't believe that there would still be so many melodramatic plots. Those writers of romance novels should be here to immerse themselves in this wonderful experience. It is definitely like a movie script that came to live."

The two of them kept quiet, so the two muscular chefs were embarrassed to continue mocking them. They displayed an attitude of bad luck, like they were in sorrow for their misfortune and in anger for their inaction, as they shook their head and leave.

"How depressing. If I had not experienced so much trouble for the past few days, I would have struck them down with my destructive temper." Bai Lu cursed silently, as he waited for the bell to sound so that he could enter the test venue.

This wait lasted for more than half an hour. In this period, the two muscular chefs have created much publicity, so many other chefs were aware of the presence of these two ignorant students that came here for the contest. The people that were looking at them were mostly filled with pity.

Zhang Cheng Long was even more depressed than Bai Lu. He muttered, "If I had known, I would have brought the chef permit along today."

Bai Lu laughed, and he said, "To prove that you are not a junior chef that just passed the exam? Lunatic, it would look even more silly if you carried the chef permit around."

It was not an easy feat for them to survive until the bell sounded. When they entered the test venue, they had to wait around for another 20mins, before the examination began.

The questions were simple. There was one invigilator for each room, who was not very strict, so there were many chefs that cheated.

Bai Lu did not cheat. It only required general knowledge, like the origin of the cuisine, and so forth. He answered the questions freely. Then he inclined the test paper, so that Zhang Cheng Long, who was sitting behind him, could copy his answers.

The room was dead silent. All the chefs were surviving through this marvelous moment, with beads of perspiration on their face while they bustled. Suddenly, there was a piercing sound that emanated from the corner, as the guy said, "What the hell. Are you writing Chinese words or Arabic letters? How do you expect me to copy like this?"

The silence in the room instantly morphed into boundless joy, as everyone tried their best to hold their laughter in, but ultimately failed. Bai Lu secretly awarded a thumbs up in his heart. "This guy is a real talent."

At the same time, Zhang Cheng Long poked him from behind. "Why did you choose 'A' for all of your answers to the MCQ? Were you guessing randomly?"

Bai Lu said softly, " 'A' is the right answer."

"Yea, right. What kind of idiot would set the same answer for all the questions? I will copy from someone else instead, and pass you the correct answers later." Zhang Cheng Long initiated contact with the guy behind him.

Bai Lu was speechless. He already felt strange when he was answering the questions. He thought, "The guy who set the questions must be a sadist. All of the 20 questions from the MCQ were entirely the same. It was a blatant move to test people."

The same question sprung up everywhere else. Many of the unlucky fools could not believe that 'A' would be the correct answer for the entire test, so they changed to the erroneous answers of 'B, C, D.' After they modified their answers, they felt relieved and they were convinced that there would be no issues with this written examination.

Going back to the test venue for Bai Lu's written examination, as more than half of the time has passed, there were weak sounds that were slowly appearing. "Behind, turn to the back."

The people in front turned around and said, "Behind my ass, are you done?"

"Hurry up. There's only the last question left at the back page."

"What? There are questions at the back?" The chefs in front turned the script around, and they cursed softly. "Damn it. Who was the one that set the paper? This person is wicked; He hid another question at the back. You there, let me copy your script."

Bai Lu was shocked. He thought, "There's another question at the back?" He flipped it over and took a look. It was a supplementary question. If he answered it correctly, he would be awarded 10 marks. If he answered it wrong, there would be no deduction of marks.

"How depressing. If that guy who cheated were not meticulous enough, I would have missed this question as well." He hurriedly tackled the question with zeal.

The invigilator on the stage thoroughly enjoyed himself. He climbed onto the speaking platform and started scanning his eyes around to find his next target for his entertainment. 

After some time, the examination was officially over.

Zhang Cheng Long wanted to treat Bai Lu to a meal. He wanted to thank him for his grace of letting him copy the answers.

Since they needed to eat, it did not really matter who was the one treating. The most important thing was that there were more than a thousand chefs that mobilized together at the same time. They swarmed into the various restaurants outside of the school. This meal was one of the most pleasurable activity for them.