EFB Chapter 78 Finally, I was tricked.
Chapter 78 Finally, I was tricked.
Lin Xiaolu floated between the two, looking left and right, her shoulders shaking as she tried to suppress her laughter.
These two people, one pretending to be stupid, the other pretending to be well-behaved.
On the surface, the seniors and juniors are polite to each other, but in secret, they have already been testing each other for eight hundred rounds.
The real highlight of the night is waiting at Kim Tae-yeon's house, and she's quite looking forward to it.
When it was time to pay, Lim Yoon-ah consciously took out her card to pay, and Kang Yeon silently carried two large bags of heavy groceries and followed her into the car.
The white Hyundai drove back into the night, and the destination on the navigation screen changed to Kim Tae-yeon's home address.
The carriage was quiet for a moment. Looking at the neon signs rushing past the window, Lin Yoona suddenly spoke up: "Jiang Yan, what's that 'Erjingtiao' you mentioned earlier?"
Jiang Yan gripped the steering wheel, his gaze fixed straight ahead, a barely perceptible curve appearing at the corner of his mouth.
"A type of chili pepper, a specialty of Sichuan, is more fragrant than the Cheongyang chili pepper from South Korea, with a moderate spiciness and a slightly sweet aftertaste."
"Oh." Im Yoona nodded. "It sounds delicious."
"It really is delicious. If Nuna has any Chinese friends, she can have someone bring some over, and I'll make it for her to try."
Lin Yoona paused slightly.
She suddenly realized that the person in front of her was much more interesting than she had imagined.
Thinking about it more deeply, this was clearly a veiled confession of the lie he had told her before. How could a real time traveler from China not want to go back? How could he need her to help bring back local specialties from his hometown?
But she couldn't expose him.
Jiang Yan is as cunning as a devil. What if she breaks the ice first and he then denies everything? He might even turn around and bite back, and in the end, she'll be the one who suffers.
The car drove smoothly all the way and soon entered a quiet, upscale residential area. The buildings were spaced far apart, and the shadows of the roadside trees stretched long under the streetlights.
The building where Kim Tae-yeon lives is hidden deep inside the residential complex.
Jiang Yan parked the car, took out bags of groceries from the trunk, and followed Lin Yoona into the elevator.
Lin Xiaolu followed closely beside Jiang Yan, her usual mischievous and clever demeanor gone, replaced by a rare somber look in her eyes.
The elevator slowly ascended and stopped on the twelfth floor with a "ding".
Im Yoona walked ahead, turned right after exiting the elevator, stopped in front of a light brown door, and then pressed the doorbell.
A dozen seconds later, the door lock clicked open, and warm yellow light shone through the crack in the door.
Kim Tae-yeon appeared at the door.
She wore a loose gray loungewear set with sleeves that covered half of her hand, and her hair was casually tied into a low ponytail.
She wore almost no makeup, her lips looked a bit dry, and the dark circles under her eyes were quite noticeable under the warm light.
When Kim Tae-yeon saw Im Yoon-a, a soft smile immediately appeared on her face.
But when her gaze passed over Lin Yoona's shoulder and landed on Jiang Yan, her smile instantly froze.
She instinctively took a half step back, covering her face in a flustered manner: "Xiao Yan? What are you doing here?"
Jiang Yan held up the two large bags of ingredients in his hands and said with a smile, "Yoona said she didn't eat tonight, so I volunteered to come along and show off my skills. I hope Taeyeon won't mind me bothering you?"
"How could I be bothering you... Please come in. It's just a bit messy at home, please don't mind. I'll go to the restroom first. Yoona, please entertain Yeon."
As she spoke, Kim Tae-yeon's figure quickly disappeared from the room, and then the bathroom door clicked shut softly.
Jiang Yan, carrying some things, looked at Lim Yoona with a deep gaze: "Didn't Noona tell Taeyeon and Noona in advance that I would be coming?"
When Lin Yoona met his gaze, instead of feeling guilty, she shrugged matter-of-factly: "Didn't you see her reaction just now? She didn't even know I was coming, how would she know you?"
"...Noona, you're making me very embarrassed."
"Yeah, I know." Lim Yoona readily admitted, bending down to rummage through the shoe cabinet and pulling out a brand new pair of pink bunny ear slippers. She tore off the tags and tossed them at his feet. "Here, change your shoes first."
Jiang Yan looked down at the slippers with long, dangling ears, his lips twitched, and resignedly changed his shoes, carrying the groceries into the living room.
Out of politeness, he didn't look around, but instead followed Lin Yoona straight ahead without glancing at her. Even so, he still managed to take in the scene of the living room out of the corner of his eye.
The beige wool blanket was crumpled up on the sofa, as if someone had just crawled out of it.
One cushion was under the blanket, and the other was on the floor.
On the coffee table sat a half-cold cup of barley tea, with a few unfinished soda crackers scattered around it. The phone screen was face down, and the charging cable dragged crookedly along the sofa armrest.
These fragmented traces, pieced together, clearly outline a scene: before they arrived, Kim Tae-yeon had been curled up alone on this sofa for a long time.
Lin Xiaolu floated beside Jiang Yan, her gaze fixed on the sofa, her eyes filled with heartache.
Yoona picked up the cushion from the floor and put it back on the sofa. She then folded the blanket and draped it over the armrest. She gestured towards the kitchen with her chin and said, "Don't stand there, Chef Kang, the kitchen is over there."
Jiang Yan nodded, then looked away, picked up two large bags of ingredients, and followed her into the kitchen.
Kim Tae-yeon's kitchen is not big, but it is clean and tidy and has everything she needs.
He glanced at the stove and cabinets, got a general idea of what to do, and placed the ingredients one by one on the countertop.
Im Yoona leaned against the kitchen doorway, looking like she was waiting for a good show: "So? Is anything else missing?"
"I don't need anything." Jiang Yan took off his apron and tied it on, picked up the box of Korean beef, looked at the snowflake pattern, and nodded in satisfaction. "But if you don't have anything to do, Nuna, could you help me wash some vegetables?"
"I?"
"Yeah, you help out, I'll cook, it'll be faster with the two of us working together."
Jiang Yan handed her a bag of lettuce and bok choy as a matter of course, smiling innocently, "What, Yoon-ah, you should know how to wash vegetables, right?"
Lin Yoona looked at the bag of vegetables, then at Jiang Yan's smug smile, gritted her teeth, and finally reached out to take it.
This guy is actually ordering me around.
Regardless of what she thought, Jiang Yan turned around and began to prepare the ingredients. He cut the Korean beef into bite-sized thick slices, removed the skin from the pork belly and cut it into thin slices, took the kimchi out of the refrigerator and cut it into sections, and carefully cut the soft tofu into even small cubes.
He plans to cook two Sichuan dishes: boiled beef and Mapo tofu.
It's spicy and fragrant enough to make that Noona who's always been trying to trick him drink his fill of water.
But fearing that Kim Tae-yeon wouldn't be able to handle the spiciness, he also prepared an extra serving of Korean stir-fried beef and a pot of soybean paste soup to relieve the spiciness.
After washing the vegetables, Lin Yoona dried her hands and came over to watch him cut meat. She saw Jiang Yan wield his knife skillfully, slicing the meat into even, thin slices. His knife skills were better than any variety show chef she had ever seen.
"Your knife skills...were also learned in China?"
Jiang Yan nodded without changing his expression: "Yes, back in China, I had a Sichuan chef living next door, and I learned a few tricks from him. Noona, don't bother me while I'm working. If you're so free, go boil a pot of water for me."
Lin Yoona was taken aback by these words. Her breathing became heavier as she watched Jiang Yan's retreating figure, but she still turned around to get a pot to fetch water.
When the water boiled, Kim Tae-yeon also came out of the bathroom.
She applied a thin layer of powder to her face, covering the dark circles under her eyes, and applied light pink lip balm, making her look much more energetic than before.
She walked to the kitchen door and scratched her head a little embarrassedly: "Mianye, Xiaoyan, I'm sorry to have made you laugh. Yoona is really something, she didn't even tell me she was bringing you here, so I wasn't prepared at all."
"Don't say that, Nuna. It's me who has been presumptuous in disturbing you."
Jiang Yan put the sliced beef into a bowl to marinate, then turned around and bowed slightly. "Noona, just sit in the living room and wait. Leave the kitchen to me and Yoona."
"Yes, thank you for your help, Xiaoyan." Kim Tae-yeon wisely refrained from staying in the kitchen and causing trouble. However, before leaving, her gaze swept between the two of them, wondering a little about when they had become so familiar.
After Kim Tae-yeon left, only Kang Yeon and Im Yoon-ah remained in the kitchen.
Jiang Yan coated the marinated beef slices with egg white and starch, then heated the pan and poured in oil.
Once the oil reached about 60-70% of its maximum temperature, he poured in the chopped dried chili peppers and Sichuan peppercorns.
Sizzle...
The scalding oil instantly released the aroma of chili peppers and Sichuan peppercorns, a powerful and intense fragrance that filled the entire kitchen in an instant.
"Cough cough cough..."
Im Yoona choked and took three steps back, tears streaming down her face as she coughed. "Ugh! Jiang Yan! What are you cooking? It's so pungent!"
"The soul of Sichuan cuisine is stir-frying," Jiang Yan said seriously, suppressing a laugh as he stirred the chilies in the oil. "Didn't Nuna live in China? How come he doesn't even know this?"
Yoona stared at him with teary eyes, wanting to retort but unable to utter a single word.
She finally understood; this guy was definitely doing it on purpose! He was retaliating for digging a hole in the supermarket earlier!
She holds grudges too much!
She silently added another label to Jiang Yan's name: "petty".