"Are you... Zhang Wei?"
Zhang Wei was Jiang Nanzhou's junior high school classmate. His family lived in the next village, and they had played together a lot as kids. He used to come over to Jiang Nanzhou's place all the time. But before finishing junior high, Zhang Wei dropped out and sneaked off to the city to work illegally. In those days, nobody had mobile phones, and they lost touch completely.
"Good eyes. You still recognize me? Not bad at all."
Jiang Nanzhou had recognized him by the scar at the corner of his eye—after all, he was the one who had given it to him. Back when they started junior high, the boys formed rival cliques. At first, Zhang Wei hung out with kids from his own elementary school, and since the two groups didn't get along, they arranged a mass brawl and both got their parents called in.
As a kid, Zhang Wei had been dark and chubby, with single-lidded eyes squeezed into mere slits.
Yet the young man standing before Jiang Nanzhou was around one hundred and seventy-five centimeters tall, with a standard build. Though his skin wasn't fair, he didn't look wretched anymore either.
"If I hadn't looked at the scar by your eye, I really wouldn't have dared to recognize you."
"Come on inside and chat, lunch will be ready soon."
Granny Jiang pulled them into the house and turned to go cook.
"Granny Jiang, then I won't stand on ceremony. I'm freeloading a meal here today—I still remember that after eating at your house when I was a kid, nothing I ate at home tasted like anything."
"Alright! Even if you wanted to leave, I wouldn't let you. Today I'll whip up a few of my signature dishes."
With that, Granny Jiang went into the kitchen, leaving the two of them to talk.
"Nanzhou, I've been back home for several days now, and I was so bored I could barely stay put. If I hadn't stumbled across your video, I wouldn't even have known you were back. I missed you so much that I just came over uninvited."
"Cut the sappy talk. It's already a miracle you remembered me. You didn't stay in touch all these years either. Some classmates passed your WeChat profile to me, but you never accepted my request."
Hearing this, Zhang Wei flashed a bitter smile.
"Forget about you—even my own family couldn't reach me."
Jiang Nanzhou frowned slightly at those words.
"What happened?"
"Manslaughter. Sentenced to six years. I just got out the other day."
Jiang Nanzhou fell silent when he heard that.
Zhang Wei recounted the whole affair to Jiang Nanzhou in detail.
Back when he was in school and terrible at his studies, he had sneaked off to the city at fifteen or sixteen to work illegally in restaurant kitchens. At the time, he only made a little over three hundred yuan a month. After working there a long time, the chef saw that Zhang Wei was a good worker who could endure hardship, so he took him on as an apprentice. He studied there for several years.
In his twenties, relying on the culinary skills he learned from his master, Zhang Wei went to work in the back kitchen of a large hotel. Just a few days after arriving, he started dating a waitress named Xiaomei. One night after work, the two of them went to the night market for a bite to eat and ran into the waitress's ex-boyfriend, who frequently went to their restaurant to harass Xiaomei. This time, the ex and several of his buddies had been drinking; the moment they saw Zhang Wei, they rushed over and started a fight. Zhang Wei lost his head in the heat of the moment, grabbed a beer bottle, and struck the guy. As it turned out, the ex had a regular "glass jaw" and croaked on the spot. Zhang Wei completely lost his mind, remaining in a daze right up until the police hauled him away.
After Xiaomei's family came and took her home, she never showed up again. In the end, Zhang Wei's family paid thirty thousand yuan in compensation, and Zhang Wei was sentenced to six years.
Hearing about Zhang Wei's ordeal, Jiang Nanzhou didn't know what to say.
"Since it's all in the past, just live well from now on. Don't be so impulsive when things happen."
Zhang Wei had already made peace with it; he just felt he owed his family far too much.
"Yeah, it's all in the past. From now on, I'll work hard to make money, treat my mom and dad better, and live a good life."
Jiang Nanzhou fished out his phone.
"What's your number? Let's add each other on WeChat, and I'll pull you into our class group chat."
He was the one who had set up their class group chat in the first place, driven by a little selfish hope—waiting for the day *she* might join. There were only a dozen or so people in it now, and many classmates had lost touch entirely.
*Lone Boat invited A Cook to join the group chat.*
"Zhang Wei, change your nickname in the group so people don't fail to recognize you."
As soon as Zhang Wei finished changing his nickname, he dropped a "Hello everyone" sticker into the chat.
A few lurking classmates popped up almost immediately.
Yu Lili: *Scattering flowers* Another person joined our class group! Zhang Wei, we used to share a desk. Do you remember me?
Zhang Wei: Remember you? Of course I remember Yu Lili, the one who could polish off five big meat buns in a single meal.
Yu Lili: Speechless. Why'd you have to bring up meat buns? Now I'm craving meat buns. Never mind, I'm going out to buy meat buns.
Several other classmates surfaced to make their presence known as well.
Wang Haiming: Zhang Wei, you little punk, no word from you in all these years. Where are you now? Let's all get together for a reunion after the New Year.
Jiang Nanzhou: He's at my place. We'll wait for you guys here—come back for the New Year and let's have a proper drink.
...
While they were chatting away animatedly in the group, Granny Jiang finished cooking the dishes and told them to wash up for dinner.
Only after replying in the chat that they were going to eat did they finally put their phones down.
The dishes Granny Jiang prepared today were lavish, though unfortunately, Grandpa Jiang had gone into town and wouldn't be back until afternoon.
Granny Jiang had made four dishes in total, every single one of them a heavy meat dish. One of Jiang Nanzhou's absolute favorites was drunken pork ribs. The preparation was simple yet yielded a unique flavor: the ribs were first marinated in cooking wine, then simmered in Granny Jiang's special sauce, making them tender, flavorful, and brimming with the aroma of wine.
When Jiang Nanzhou was living in Modu, he had tried making this dish himself, but not once had he succeeded. To his current self, however, the dish really was quite simple.
"Granny Jiang, this is too delicious! It tastes way better than what I make as a cook."
Since childhood, Zhang Wei had possessed a honeyed tongue and knew just how to flatter people, and his smooth talk had Granny Jiang beaming with joy.
That afternoon, Zhang Wei received a call from his mother saying his maternal grandmother had been hospitalized, so he had to rush back home.
After seeing Zhang Wei off, Jiang Nanzhou remembered to call his aunt and tell her family to come back that evening to have dinner at his second uncle's house.
Jiang Nanzhou went home, took a shower, and changed his clothes. Seeing that it was still early, he opened Douyin and checked his direct messages. There were simply too many; he couldn't possibly get through them all.
He simply toggled the setting to disable direct messages.
Jiang Nanzhou glanced at his follower count and discovered he had nearly fifty thousand followers.
It was incredible. Jiang Nanzhou had watched other fishing livestreamers before, many of whom caught huge fish—some prized species could sell for over a million. Even those guys had to post a ton of content just to slowly build up their follower base.
Jiang Nanzhou knew his fifty thousand followers were a mere drop in the bucket compared to those major streamers.
Still, gaining so many followers overnight left him somewhat bewildered, and his prestige points had surged as well.
He could finally unlock the Prestige Shop now. He just hoped this Prestige Shop wouldn't leave him as speechless as the Ocean Prestige Shop had.