Under the young lady's guidance, Mo Bai found the way to the Tōtsuki Detached Palace with some trepidation.
In front of the skyscraper, Dōjima Gin was standing there.
"Follow me." Dōjima Gin nodded and walked towards the interior of the Tōtsuki Detached Palace.
"I suddenly have an ominous premonition." Mo Bai felt this scene was inexplicably familiar.
"Yesterday afternoon, you went to a bar with Head Chef Zhang Yu and Chef Sena Hiromi?"
Mo Bai thought of that glass of Oolong Tea evaporating into the air, and his expression turned awkward. "Yes."
"Did anything unusual happen?"
"Oolong Tea... no, nothing at all." Mo Bai still concealed his deed of very disloyally leaving the two chefs to keep watch while he fled.
"Oolong Tea evaporating in the air? It seems you dodged a bullet." Dōjima Gin raised a brow slightly.
"Yeah." Mo Bai really wanted to know how Dōjima Gin knew about the Oolong Tea, but after thinking it over, he suppressed this death-seeking curiosity. "So, did something happen?"
"Just now, the apprentice cleaning the kitchen in the morning came to report that two unidentified figures were found in the hallway outside the kitchen on the sixth floor of the Tōtsuki Detached Palace."
"Later confirmed, they were Head Chef Zhang Yu and Chef Sena Hiromi, who had gone missing after leaving the bar in the evening."
"Pfft!" Mo Bai swore, he really didn't laugh; that was purely air leaking just now.
No, just imagining two men, one old and one young, supporting each other leaving the bar, then running like crazy drunks to the sixth-floor kitchen of the Tōtsuki Detached Palace, and finally falling asleep hugging each other in the kitchen hallway...
"Pu-hahahaha!" I can't hold it back at all!
Mo Bai's laughter triggered a smile from Dōjima Gin, but the corners of the latter's mouth soon dropped.
"But, they didn't pass out from drinking."
"Hahahaha—gah?" Dōjima Gin's sudden braking and drifting turn in the conversation topic left Mo Bai unable to react in time.
"They fainted after being attacked by a blunt object. This is the diagnosis from the medical staff."
Three bright exclamation marks popped up over Mo Bai's head. "Do they play that hard!?"
After the surprise, Mo Bai stroked his chin, thinking that this plot seemed a bit familiar.
Then he remembered that after participating in the Akihabara Summit Battle, two of his own teammates had gone down.
And today, another two who could be called teammates had gone down.
Mo Bai's eyelid twitched. "Do I have some hidden attribute for screwing over teammates?"
Dōjima Gin shrugged and pushed open the guest room door.
Inside the guest room's main hall, Zhang Yu sat on a seat with his legs wide open in a grand stance; his slightly chubby figure was currently emitting a tyrannical aura that made it hard for people to breathe.
Bandages were wrapped around his head, and his face was frosty.
Having practiced martial arts for over forty years since childhood, he was actually blinded by a goose last night—knocked out by someone with a blunt object and dumped in the hallway.
If this grudge isn't avenged, forty-plus years of living would truly be in vain!
Thinking to the point of extreme anger, Zhang Yu slapped his large hand on the table, and the sturdy red sandalwood table instantly caved in with another clear palm print.
The other head chefs from yesterday's assessment stood trembling in the corner. Except for Sena Hiromi, who was lying on the sofa with a dark face, no one dared to sit down.
Seeing Mo Bai and Dōjima Gin enter the room, Zhang Yu nodded as a greeting.
His small, mung-bean-like eyes glared at the group of head chefs.
"Speak! Who ambushed me yesterday?"
"Admit it now, and I won't pursue anything else. Whatever you hit me with yesterday, I'll just use the same to hit you back."
"Fair and just!" Zhang Yu, with his chubby, blessed-looking face, was currently exuding a terrifying aura.
The group of head chefs looked at the dozen or so palm prints on the red sandalwood table, swallowing their saliva in fear and trepidation, indicating they dared not move.
One hit from you is estimated to cost a life per stick!
"Head Chef Zhang Yu, even if you weren't drunk normally, how would we dare to fight you?"
"Besides, you were in a state where you couldn't control your strength after drinking. How would we, with our small frames, dare to attack!" The head chefs wanted to cry but had no tears.
"Was it really not you guys?" Zhang Yu frowned straight away.
"How would we dare!" The head chefs waved their hands and shook their heads one after another, then looked at Zhang Yu with sincere eyes.
"Indeed, it doesn't seem like it." Zhang Yu muttered to himself. It was just snatching a chef for employment; borrowing him would be fine, there was absolutely no need to tear up face.
"Alright, you all leave first." Seeing Zhang Yu calm down, Dōjima Gin waved his hand to let the head chefs leave.
Dōjima Gin knew it wasn't them, but this group of head chefs really needed a good beating.
Oolong Tea... thinking of this name, he felt unwell all over.
The head chefs fled the guest room squeezing against each other as if granted a great amnesty. The enraged Head Chef Zhang Yu always gave them a sense of fear that the slap would be printed on their bodies in the next moment.
But if it wasn't them, who was it?
Could it be that a staff member mistook the two of them for plotting something bad, knocked them out, and then discovered their identities and fled?
Zhang Yu tapped his finger on the red sandalwood table, a look of contemplation on his face.
"Head Chef Zhang Yu, are you okay?" Mo Bai quickly stepped forward; this concern was still necessary.
"How could I be in trouble? It's just a flesh wound. You should be concerned about the one lying over there." Zhang Yu pouted towards Sena Hiromi on the sofa.
Sena Hiromi's face darkened even more. Wasn't he lying down playing dead just to weaken his presence? Why expose him?
"...What happened to him?" Mo Bai asked with obvious disdain, which made Sena Hiromi feel even more heartbroken.
"Hey! I'm a wounded person! What's with the sense of disdain?" Sena Hiromi roared staunchly, then immediately clutched his head and fell back down stiffly.
"...Tsk, who suggested going to the bar?" Mo Bai, who would have likely ended up in the same state as them had he not seen through the Oolong Tea scam, looked impatient.
"..."
"After drinking, who suggested going to the kitchen?" Mo Bai knew with his toes that going to the kitchen after drinking was suggested by this troublemaker.
"..."
"Do you have anything else to say?"
"..." Sena Hiromi shut down.
"Alright. Head Chef Zhang Yu, let's get back to the topic. What's wrong with him?" Mo Bai was like a killer with no emotions.
"Mild concussion. He'll feel terrible for at least two weeks." Zhang Yu wore a gloating smile, completely forgetting that he had also been knocked out with a stick.
"Clap clap clap!" Dōjima Gin clapped his hands to attract the attention of the three. "Alright, everyone, the chitchat ends here."
"Let's talk about what happened this time."
Dōjima Gin took out some documents from a file folder.
"Sena Hiromi over there, who is almost touching the Special-Grade Chef level, listen as well."
"The 611 Kitchen you went to this time had reports from staff as early as a few months ago seeing ingredients and bowls flying into thin air, and stove burners igniting automatically."
"Someone was brought in to look at it later, but the instigator was not found."
"Later, employees in the sixth-floor staff rest area and patrolling security guards stated that they heard noises in Kitchen 611 every night, but found nothing after opening the door."
"Until a week ago, the problem of the sixth-floor surveillance cameras breaking from time to time annoyed the maintenance staff. The maintenance personnel wanted to catch the mischievous prankster and came to squat at night, but ended up being scared into the hospital."
"The remaining cameras also captured some supernatural images that night."
"In other words, what attacked you—was a ghost."
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