Chapter 67: Even 30,000 Years Later, Still Squeezed On The School Bus
Monday, on the sports field of Demeter University Affiliated High School.
Second year and third year senior students were watching from the teaching building as the junior students on the sports field were about to head out for field training. They were exchanging thoughts on this year’s new students based on their contact with the lower-grade students in the club last week.
From an overhead angle, Class Eight Grade One’s group stood out particularly, and the reason was simple: there was luggage piled up as high as a cargo box inside.
“Classmate Xiang Chuan… we’re going for training, not fleeing a disaster.”
Zhu Bingwen rubbed his temples, looking at the student in front of him who was using a hovering transport robot to carry at least thirty medium-to-large meal boxes. He felt a headache unlike any he’d had before.
“Teacher Zhu, I heard the dishes at the training base are hard to eat,” Xiang Chuan said seriously. “We Xiang Family people don’t eat bad-tasting food.”
What an absurd reason! But coming from the daughter of the founder of Yue Xiang Group, who had driven the food processing industry revolution for over twenty years, it was extremely convincing!
When it came to personal principles, Zhu Bingwen was stumped too.
Actually, it wasn’t that students weren’t allowed to bring their own food to the training base. Every year during the new students’ field training, the leading teachers and principal didn’t even need to look to know that, under the guidance of their senior club members, the new students would stuff lunch boxes of various sizes—even some carefully camouflaged—into their luggage. But everyone turned a blind eye, and the students reciprocated by inviting the supervising teachers or officers at the training base to enjoy them during the training.
Over the years, it had become an unspoken agreement between students and teachers, and also a way to promote teacher-student relations.
But this new student, who had been restless since the start of school, was no longer offering a surprise for the teachers—it was a shock.
“Good morning, everyone.”
Just then, the principal arrived with the vice principal to inspect Class Eight. The noisy students immediately stood quietly at attention. Seeing that he was still quite respected in this class, which many teachers rated as “overly lively,” the principal felt gratified. But upon seeing the luggage at the back, the smile on his face nearly faltered.
“Teacher Zhu, your class has quite a lot of luggage…?” the principal couldn’t help saying.
“Um… actually…” Teacher Zhu lowered his voice. “It’s Xiang Chuan who insisted on bringing it. She said the Xiang Family principle is not to eat bad-tasting food…”
That was too straightforward! The principal’s mouth twitched as he listened. Though after tasting the buns and fruit milk combo that Xiang Chuan had Little Star No. 2 deliver every morning, he could somewhat understand her idea. After all, the food at the training base… well…
“Principal!” Seeing the principal hesitate, Xiang Chuan stepped forward. “Since A Bite of China Club was just established, our members and club activities preparation need time to gel, but field training takes up time. So I hope to use these ancient foods I’m bringing to discuss with members about the future development of A Bite of China Club during the field training.”
After she finished speaking, Ouyang Yating’s gaze toward Xiang Chuan changed: could lying through one’s teeth be done like this?
But since Xiang Chuan had brought up club activities as the premise, the principal had to put on a serious face. “I see. Then, Classmate Xiang Chuan, I hope you and your club members can gain training experience during the field training while also making progress in club activities. I’m looking forward to new results when you return from training.”
Xiang Chuan thought to herself: Does this count as agreement?
She was secretly delighted inside, but kept a serious face. “We certainly won’t fail to meet your expectations, Principal. During our absence from school, I’ll instruct Little Star No. 2 to continue inviting you and the vice principal to check the noodles and drinks each day.”
Meaning the buns and fruit milk supply wouldn’t be cut this week.
Hearing this, the principal and vice principal were in high spirits. They both smiled genuinely, nodded, patted Zhu Bingwen on the shoulder, and then headed to the next class.
Wow… she got away with it like that? For a moment, the Class Eight students’ gazes toward Xiang Chuan held a bit more admiration than usual.
“Ahem~!” Xiang Chuan smiled confidently at the sky. Hah, fooling leaders was something she’d been expert at since university, when she and her dormmates racked their brains discussing how to wrest back the vacation time deducted by the department head. Now with the perfectly legitimate excuse of club activities, making up reasons was a piece of cake.
Since the principal had tacitly approved, Xiang Chuan and her three Class Eight club members needed to figure out how to stuff the luggage into the transport ship. Each class would board their own small transport ship to head to the field training ground at the south end of the main ship, but Class Eight Grade One’s current problem was: Xiang Chuan’s luggage was too big to fit in the luggage compartment.
One boy had a flash of inspiration. “How about each of us eats half a box, then we only need to take half?”
No sooner had he spoken than he got cold stares from Ouyang Yating and Ainuo, plus a flying kick from Xiang Chuan (which missed, as he easily dodged).
So they had to put some classmates’ luggage in the aisles of the transport ship. This made the originally spacious seats as crowded as a train during Spring Festival travel rush.
When the four A Bite of China Club members finished stowing their luggage and boarded the transport ship, they were dumbfounded: the aisles were piled full of luggage cases. How were they supposed to walk? Xiang Chuan had to once again use her skills from squeezing onto the subway and navigating between desks in her student days, arduously leading Ouyang Yating and the others to the last four empty seats.
But seating arrangements posed another problem, mainly because Liang Gong wasn’t used to contact with the opposite sex. Xiang Chuan and Ainuo, for various reasons from before, didn’t want to sit too close to each other under normal circumstances. So the final result was, from the aisle side: Xiang Chuan, Ouyang Yating, Ainuo, and Liang Gong.
As soon as the transport ship started up, the slight vibration stirred Xiang Chuan’s sleepiness. These thirty-plus food boxes were prepared overnight by the kitchen AI over the past two days, using up a third of the ingredients at home and exhausting her as kitchen commander. If the homeroom teacher and principal hadn’t stopped her earlier, Xiang Chuan would have even wanted to close her eyes while standing.
Seeing Xiang Chuan drowsy, Ouyang Yating took out the issued thin blanket from behind her seat and draped it over her, then felt a piercing gaze from behind.
“What’s wrong? You’ve been pretty quiet these past two days.”
Ouyang Yating took out her water bottle and took a sip of fruit milk.
After Xiang Chuan authorized the fruit milk recipe for club members to use, she had become obsessed with making fruit milk from various fruits to drink. Lately, she’d wanted to try some new things and was planning to discuss it with Xiang Chuan, but forgot about the field training and had to put the new idea on hold for now.
“Isn’t this how I always am?”
Ainuo elegantly picked up his water bottle and took a sip of juice. This was the first request he made to Xiang Chuan after switching clubs: he wanted to taste the liquid before milk and fruit juice were mixed, so he got three cups of juice and liked it after one sip. Compared to the rich fruit milk, he preferred the pure, refreshing taste of juice.
That Friday afternoon, he had evaluated the taste difference between juice and fruit milk, nearly sparking an armed clash between male and female nobles with staunch fruit milk advocate Ouyang Yating in the A Bite of China Club room.
Over the weekend, the two kept arguing nonstop about whether fruit milk or juice was superior, while Xiang Chuan—who had been busy preparing dishes for the training period and watching the whole thing unfold in the terminal communication group—thought: Hmm, they’ve got that salty-vs-sweet faction tear-it-up vibe from back in the day.
Finally setting off to find new ingredients.
Sometimes I feel like it’d be better to just write about transmigrating back to ancient times or a fictional ancient setting. The comfy pit I dug for myself (or so I thought) nearly stalled my cooking mindset. Lately, I’ve been thinking about whether to just have Xiang Chuan make weight loss meals with existing ingredients (sweat).
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