CH 19.1

Chapter 19.1 - About Food is the God of the People 1 Part 1

Yang Mo remembered that the first time someone asked him out – he was with Han Shi Yu.

After the incident where the two of them joined forces to exact revenge, Yang Mo wasn’t sure why, but Han Shi Yu managed to leave their previous clashes behind and buzzed around him every now and then, calling him ‘senior’ or ‘ge ge’ beside him. He wouldn’t stop until he was beaten up either.

Lu You Qi had been living abroad before that so he dearly missed the cuisines from his motherland, having the ambition of tasting all the off-campus food he could find.

However, takeaways were only left on the first floor of the dorm while he lived on the fourth floor. It was painful climbing up and down to collect it, especially in the summer. His appetite would have faded away after he worked up a rain of sweat.

Whenever the food delivery guy sent him a friendly message alert, he struggled and tumbled in the deep water and scorching fire. It was thanks to Yang Mo who came to his rescue each time.

His lunches were always brought up by Yang Mo for him and he did it cleanly without much hassle. Sent a message, went downstairs, walked back up; everything was settled in five minutes. The comfortable cold air from the air conditioning did not stop him at all from leaving the room.

Until recently, that junior who shouted at their building, started buying an extra takeaway meal for Yang Mo while he was on the way. This directly led to Lu You Qi’s free errand running service being cut off. Yet, he was too embarrassed to ask Yang Mo’s friend to bring any for him as well, so he returned to the sad life of climbing floors every day.

Lu You Qi thought about it. Coming from the west campus, making a detour to the most remote and quiet area, where Sea Stone Apartment was – this ‘on the way’ was truly quite a rugged road.

Yang Mo tried dissuading him but he wouldn’t listen. In the end, all he could do was naturally accept the takeaways that were sent directly to his doorstep and stopped ordering his own.

On this day, Yang Mo went to Cheng Shao to ask some questions and did not return at noon.

Han Shi Yu knocked on the door, put the takeaway on the table and politely said to Lu You Qi who was on his bed. “Senior, when senior Yang Mo is back, help me ask if he’s free this Sunday.”

“Oh, okay…” Lu You Qi looked up from his phone and wondered, “Hey, why don’t you ask him yourself?”

Han Shi Yu: “I don’t have his contact information.”

Lu You Qi: “Ask him for it.”

Han Shi Yu: “…I don’t dare to.”

Lu You Qi: “……”

Lu You Qi found it hilarious, assumed he was only trying to apologize to Yang Mo but was scared off by his roommate’s fierce and intimidating image, so he could only carefully thread his way to curry favour.

He thought this little junior was quite cute, so out of the goodness of his heart, he gave him Yang Mo’s contact information.

In order to show his gratitude, Han Shi Yu promised on the spot to bring him food in the future.

Yang Mo was in Cheng Shao’s office. It seemed like something went wrong with the school’s official website so he brought along a group of teachers and students to fix it.

Although programming wasn’t Shou Cheng University’s strongest suit but even if it was seen as phoenix tail, it was still beyond the reach of ten thousand ordinary birds.

Yang Mo watched them work from the sidelines, his eyebrows furrowed seriously, asking a few questions now and then.

A student from this major next to him explained to him one by one. The conversation between them were brief, like there was some kind of telepathy connection. The other person brought up a point precisely and Yang Mo immediately understood it.

This kind of commonality and mutual understanding helped Yang Mo feel really comfortable in his thought processes, so he couldn’t help but pay extra attention to this guy.

He received a notification from his phone just then. It was from Lu You Qi. Yang Mo walked out with light steps and opened the chat interface.

A photo was sent along with other messages and it was of his table and the takeaway placed on top of it.

Lu You Qi sent a voice message: “When are you coming back.”

Yang Mo replied: “Soon.”

Lu You Qi: “That junior of yours asked me to ask you if you’re free on Sunday.”

The moment he heard ‘junior’, Yang Mo felt his head ached. He frowned and said, “Tell him I’m not free.”

He put his phone away and was about to go greet Cheng Shao in the room. Right then, he saw the guy who had been answering his questions walked out and they bumped into each other.

That guy: “Hello.”

Yang Mo hummed back in acknowledgement.

There was a moment of silence.

Yang Mo: “Are you going to eat?”

That guy: “Wanna go together?”

Yang Mo: “Sure.”

For no reason at all, the two of them went the same way.

The fourth restaurant in the west campus was the most delicious but also most expensive one in the university. The decoration on its third floor was not inferior to the restaurants outside as well, therefore many student couples often came here to eat.

For no reason yet again, the two went to the third floor of the fourth restaurant.

Yang Mo liked the chef here who was generous with the amount of chilis used. As long as there were spicy dishes, it would always meet his taste.

On the other hand, that guy also liked one of the dishes served here. As long as he came to eat at the canteen, he would usually head to the third floor of the fourth restaurant to eat.

Yang Mo found the similarity between them quite amusing so he chose to simply stay in the canteen to eat together.

“Lin Chu.”

The other party introduced himself first and said, “Yang Mo, right? Mr. Cheng told me about you before.”

Yang Mo nodded.

Lin Chu: “Learning mathematics?”

Yang Mo: “Yes.”

Lin Chu: “Are you not considering changing majors?”

Yang Mo: “It’s only a hobby to me.”

Lin Chu: “You’re really talented though.”

Yang Mo: “Thanks.”

Conversing with him felt really refreshing to Yang Mo. There was no need to guess and analyse or be concerned of his feelings, much like working with a computer. A few codes could express the entire meaning, no need for further elaboration.

Lin Chu: “Mr. Cheng said I’m really similar to you. I think so too.”

The corners of Yang Mo’s mouths curved up and he smiled, “I was just about to say that too.”

Yang Mo wanted to continue saying something else, but he felt a chill on his body suddenly.

When he looked up, he saw that junior who pestered him all day was at a table not far away.

There were two girls sitting across Han Shi Yu, but he was staring miserably and straight at Yang Mo. It felt like a sorrowful, grudgeful gaze. When Yang Mo looked up, their gazes met.

Yang Mo: “?”

Suddenly, his phone rang.

Yang Mo picked it up. When he glanced over, he found Han Shi Yu also putting his phone to his ear.

“Ge, I brought you some food and left it in the dorm.”

Yang Mo took his phone away from his ear and looked at the phone number.

He said again, “Why are you here?”

Han Shi Yu: “Someone asked me out for dinner.”

Yang Mo frowned, “Then why are you calling me for?”

It just so happened that when Han Shi Yu looked up earlier and saw Yang Mo’s smile, his heart felt really tight. Hesitating for a bit without any words to say, he ended up repeating, “…I bought you some spicy wontons. I went to the central square and joined a really long queue to buy it. My friend told me the wontons from there are really good.”

Han Shi Yu: “I put it in a thermos for you so it won’t go cold anytime soon…” He said again, “There are also some skewers I bought from the east campus and they are all spicy-flavoured…it’s all in your dorm…”

Han Shi Yu said in a wronged tone, “While I haven’t eaten yet…”

Yang Mo: “……”

In the garden area of Sea Stone Apartment, there were often little puppies wandering around, whining a few times at the side of the road when they get hungry. Many passing students would end up buying food for them out of sympathy.

Those little things were really soft when they barked. Yang Mo was also one of the students who fell for them each time.

There was an instance, a split second, where he felt like Han Shi Yu’s current pitiful tone was very much like that of a puppy.

And he didn’t know why, but his heart would tighten up a little and each mouthful of food he put in his mouth felt really sinful.

Yang Mo hung up the phone with a ‘beep’.

Staring at the dishes laid out in front of him, he hesitated.

Lin Chu saw the look on his face when he hung up the phone call and asked, “Something wrong?”

Yang Mo let out a sigh and said, “Sorry, I might need to head back now.”

Lin Chu: “It’s alright. We came together only because we were on the way anyway.”

Yang Mo nodded. He then picked up his meal plate – the dishes he had only taken one bite from, with the rice untouched.

He walked over to Han Shi Yu and stood in front of him.

He stared coldly at this person for a long while.

Han Shi Yu looked at him a few times with an innocent look.

The two girls opposite of him with their exercise books and milk tea seemed to have been affected by the cold aura emitted by Yang Mo. They thought he was here for a fight and instinctively shrank a little.

Yang Mo put down the untouched meal in his hand in front of this big dog who had not eaten, pointed at him and said, “If there’s even a grain of rice left, cut off your head, put it in a bag and come see me with it.”

Han Shi Yu blinked a little before smiling, “Okay.”

The girls still couldn’t make any sense out of the situation: “?”

Yang Mo put his phone back into his pocket, went downstairs to walk back to the dorm.

Lin Chu turned his head just in time to see Han Shi Yu’s bright, sunny expression. Lin Chu felt that this person was very familiar, and before he could recall his name, Han Shi Yu smiled widely and shouted at him, “Hello, Lin Ge.”

Lin Chu: “?”

T/N: The title is ‘民以食为天’ which can be translated into ‘Food is the God of the People’ or that hunger breeds discontentment because of how important food is, to them. If the people don’t have enough food, they will likely rebel against the king or ruler. So, food first, anything else second.