Chapter 243：The Challenge (18)

After the customers left, the shop became rather quiet and empty. Xiu Ling made sure that the customers leave with satisfaction and they promised that they would return, giving high praise to Mrs. Xiu and Auntie Xiao's cooking but after they left, Xiu Ling was feeling rather worried. She expected the hype would continue to run until the end of the week, but it felt like they were running out of steam already.

However, Xiu Ling did not let her anxiety and worry show on her face because she understood that she had her employees looking up to and depending on her, if she showed any sign of a lack in confidence or uncertainty, the morale of her crew would be affected. Xiu Ling would not want that. Therefore, she maintained a smile on her face and kept herself going.

While Xiu Ling was clearing the tables, she heard a large commotion coming from outside the shop. With a frown she lifted her head up and turned to look. Walking towards her restaurant was a large army of professionally-dressed individuals. These people should be a group of employees from the nearby office but with the number of the entire group, Xiu Ling believed a whole company had been mobilized. Xiu Ling was just speculating but she had no idea how right she was.

After she got over her initial shock, Xiu Ling realized there were some familiar faces among the crowd. Some of them she had met when she was still working at Lin Corps at Lin Kang's behest. At the company, not everyone was out to get her and Xiu Ling's friendly demeanor and kind personality did earn her quite a number of friends. Xiu Ling's eyes scanned the large group of individuals and her eyes widened with shock when she saw the man who was in the middle, acting like a general leading the rest of the troops.

"Yi Nian?!" Xiu Ling gasped. The man walked towards Xiu Ling when he saw her and when he was close enough, he greeted her with a nice smile. "Good afternoon, Miss Xiu Ling." The man always acted so politely and referential around Xiu Ling. Then again, that was to be expected since Xiu Ling was technically the Madam Boss.

"Good afternoon, Yi Nian..." Xiu Ling looked at the group of people behind Yi Nian. They gathered at the entrance to the shop, whispering and talking among themselves, while pointing and gasping at the restaurant's decoration and interior design. None of them walked into the restaurant yet, they seemed to be waiting for their leader, which was Yi Nian to make the first step.

Xiu Ling did not even know what to say. Therefore, she asked the question that first popped into her mind, "Yi Nian, what is happening?"

Yi Nian beamed at Xiu Ling and offered an explanation, "Miss Xiu Ling, we're on lunch break." He answered it with such insouciance that Xiu Ling had no choice but to accept it. However, she knew there had to be more to this explanation. It was understandable if Yi Nian came alone for his lunch break but why would he bring almost the entire company with him? Something else was amiss.

Seeing the look on Xiu Ling's face, Yi Nian flashed a knowing smile before leaning in to whisper to her, "Actually this is Boss Lin Kang's idea, he had the whole company come to support you, Miss Xiu Ling."

To be honest, Xiu Ling had expected as much. When she saw Yi Nian leading the team, Xiu Ling had a fairly good guess that her husband was behind it somehow.

Since Elder Lin banned Lin Kang from directly helping Xiu Ling, the man had been coming up with creative ways to bypass that limitation. Ordering his employees to come patronize Xiu Ling's shop, that was something that Xiu Ling did not anticipate.

Xiu Ling was thankful for her husband's support but there was a logistic issue. She whispered back to Yi Nian with a trace of apology in her voice, "But the restaurant will not be big enough to accommodate so many people."

After all, Jia Jia only had that many table. It was impossible for it to fit the entirety of Lin Corps. Xiu Ling's shop was a single-storey building with half of the space taken up by the kitchen but Lin Corps had employees that could fill up a tall skyscraper, the number simply did not add up.

"Miss Xiu Ling, there's no need to worry about that. Boss Lin Kang said that as long as we come to patronize your shop, our lunch break will be extended until we had our fill. Therefore, we do not mind waiting. Please take everything at your own pace, there is no need to rush." Yi Nian explained.

'So that is how Lin Kang managed to 'persuade' his employees to come here,' Xiu Ling thought. Honestly, she assumed her husband would force his employees to support Jia Jia with an iron order, she did not expect him to go for the softer route, to provide them with extra benefit if they came to Jia Jia.

This was Xiu Ling's influence on Lin Kang as well. Xiu Ling might not have realized it but Lin Kang had mellowed out a lot after spending some time with her. Before this, Lin Kang definitely would have gone about things the way that Xiu Ling believed he would. Lin Kang could not care less about how his employees were feeling, if they were not satisfied, they could pack up and leave. There were always someone waiting to take up the spot that they vacated.

However, after taking into account how his employees would fill up Xiu Ling's restaurant with bad mojo if he forced them into motion, Lin Kang decided to adopt some persuasion in his method this time. He was worried that if he forced his employee to go have lunch at Xiu Ling's, they might be in such bad mood that they vent it on Xiu Ling.