Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations
When Yang Shuxin saw the crowd’s reaction, he had imagined how Yuan Zhou’s Nine Dragon Sculpture would look like. He wondered if it would be a version that stuck closely to tradition like his or would if he would be innovative and sculpt the Nine Dragon Fish, a rather famous modern sculpture or even the Nine Lizard that was more popular among the youths. Any of these would not surprise Yang Shuxin as he was confident he could beat any of them.
He saw himself as an open-minded elder. Even the kids of his own family were only expected to fail less, instead of getting good grades like how other families would. Yang Shuxin was confident that not many parents could be as open as him.
Yang Shuxin was already mentally prepared to see anything, but the instant he laid eyes on Yuan Zhou’s work, his pupils shrunk as he was stunned right where he stood.
He was truly stunned as he blurted, “Cloud Dragon? You sculpted Cloud Dragon?”
Yuan Zhou nodded and did not say anything as his work spoke louder than words.
In China, many things were separated between the north and south. The same applied to the ice sculpting field. Cloud Dragon was a representative of the south’s ice sculpting, like what the Horned Dragon was to the north. Although Yang Shuxin was from the north, he still had long admired the reputable Cloud Dragon.
The south had a saying that “The Cloud Dragon resents being paired.” The origin of this saying was the fact that it was extremely hard to sculpt two Cloud Dragons at once. Even sculpting one was extremely hard. But now, there were nine of these Cloud Dragons here.
“Nine Cloud Dragon Lines, one of the two grand ice sculptures of the south. I have finally gotten to see one with my own eyes today,” Yang Shuxin sighed repeatedly. Each of the dragons was amid the clouds. The dragons and clouds had clearly converged perfectly as well. When Yang Shuxin saw this, his confidence of victory vanished.
“Eleven points.”
Yang Shuxin gave Yuan Zhou 11 out of 10 points. In a sense, Yang Shuxin was victorious as well as he had managed to break through the self-imposed fetters on him. But in this competition, he felt like he had still been defeated by Yuan Zhou.
Strictly speaking, Yuan Zhou had performed far better than usual today. If he was told to sculpt the same thing again, the possibility of him failing would be extremely high.
The score Yuan Zhou had given Yang Shuxin’s sculpture was 10 points.
With complicated emotions, Yang Shuxin slowly kept his things away. He planned to carefully transport his ice sculpture away as well. To the side, Old Yan started to surreptitiously make a phone call.
As for Yuan Zhou, he had his head drooped down. For one, he was very exhausted. At the same time, he was inwardly pleased with himself as he had successfully tricked them all with his ice sculpture. There was one aspect of his ice sculpture that Yang Shuxin and the others had not noticed.
From the front, one could see three cloud dragons. From the left, there were two cloud dragons, and from the back, there were two cloud dragons as well. Finally, from the right, there was one cloud dragon. In total, there were only eight dragons. Yang Shuxin, the crowd, and even Old Yan and Old Gu had not noticed this.
Yang Shuxin had missed that because he was in a state of shock after witnessing a Nine Cloud Dragon Lines before him. As for the crowd, there were too many people for them to have a good look from all angles. Some of them were also too far away to even get a proper look.
As for Old Gu and Old Yan, both were too busy plotting their own schemes. And thus, the dragon consisting of a single line hidden amid the sculpture went unnoticed. In truth, apart from being known as Nine Cloud Dragon Lines, this sculpture could also be named The Nine Transformations of One Dragon Amid The Clouds.
Yang Shuxin had only found out about that in the future after an accidental exposure. At that time, he had an extremely complicated feeling.
In any case, that was in the future and was of no importance now. Yang Shuxin had gained a lot from this competition. For example, he realized that he should change his attitude towards his son.
And what would this new attitude be? Yuan Zhou would know more.
With the Queuing Committee keeping order, the large crowd started leaving. After everything settled down, Old Yan approached Yuan Zhou to discuss about something.
In a way, competing against a master was very satisfying. Yuan Zhou personally felt comfortable in both body and mind after the competition. At that night, it drizzled with light rain.
Night arrived.
Although Yuan Zhou was tired, he still needed to open the restaurant for dinner time.
It was extremely troublesome to preserve ice sculptures and Yuan Zhou’s restaurant did not have the facilities to do so.
And thus, earlier today, under Old Yan’s proposal, the Nine Cloud Dragon Lines was temporarily stored at Old Yan’s private museum.
As a renowned collector, Old Yan’s private museum was rather popular among those of that circle as well. The museum would only be opened to a select few people.
Old Yan had personally offered to help store this ice sculpture. In a way, this was an acknowledgment to the value of this Nine Cloud Dragon Lines. Apart from Yang Shuxin’s invitation, one of the other reasons Old Yan had traveled so far from the north was to increase the collection in his private museum.
This was the so-called “scheme” mentioned earlier. As for Old Gu’s scheme, it was not important for now. Old Yan had even offered to store Yang Shuxin’s Nine Dragon Sculpture as well. But as a famous ice sculptor, how would Yang Shuxin not have a place to store ice sculptures? And thus, Old Yan failed to get his sculpture.
As Yuan Zhou had also achieved his own goal with that ice sculpture and had even managed to have it properly stored, he was feeling rather relaxed. And thus, he started preparing the BBQ ingredients.
That’s right. BBQ would be served tonight since it was raining.
Fortunately, the system’s weather forecast was accurate. Yuan Zhou had already put up a notice that there wouldn’t be any liquor served tonight earlier in the morning.
At night, many customers arrived. All of them were here for the BBQ.
That’s right. Yuan Zhou had never sold both BBQ and liquor at the same time. When it rained he would be selling BBQ.
And when he was selling BBQ, he would not sell any liquor. This was the weird part of Yuan Zhou’s restaurant.
The customers were clear about this rule. But things were somewhat different recently. The restaurant had started selling beer, and the price of beer was something more people could afford.
With that, the number of customers drinking at night had increased.
Even Chen Wei was grumbling, “I feel like I have been drinking far less recently.”
But in truth, Chen Wei had actually drunk more. Each people were allowed five mugs of draught beer, but not everyone could finish them. Those who couldn’t finish would usually sell their remaining quota away.
In any case, Yuan Zhou did not prohibit people from sharing their quota with others since he only had that much liquor offered. When it was finished, it would be finished for the night.
Because of that, a small business activity had formed. Those who managed to get a number to drink at night would pay for the maximum quota allowed per person. Then, that person would drink one mug of beer before selling the remaining four mugs.
Of course, since three numbers would be given each day, this did not have too big of an impact. Nobody was intentionally marking up the price of their remaining mugs as well.
And thus, Chen Wei got to drink more instead of less. But since more and more people were fighting for the numbers nowadays, it had gotten harder for him to get one.
“Keep making up stories. Aren’t you the one here every single day pestering people for liquor?” Wu Hai countered without hesitation. “I can’t even be bothered to deal with someone like you.”
“Get lost, Shameless Wu. You dare say that I am pestering people for liquor? How about you pestering people for food?” Chen Wei said, feeling somewhat embarrassed when he was called out.
“That is my human nature,” Wu Hai replied. “There are things that when saw, my hand will go over automatically. I can’t help it.”
“Where’s your sense of shame?” Chen Wei was speechless.
“Now you are inviting criticism to yourself. How many times have I told you? I don’t know shame. I don’t know shame. Why do you keep asking me? Why are you forcing something I don’t need on me?” Wu Hai complained resentfully while rubbing his mustache and frowning.
“Fine, you win,” Chen Wei admitted defeat.
