CHAPTER 31: 31. VEGETABLE PANCAKES

Zeno was completely confused after hearing Riki’s story. But after learning more about it, he realized that it was only Riki’s perspective. After all, he was just a teenager.

A teenager who had a lot of heavy burdens in his life. With such a heavy burden to bear, it was a miracle that he was still sane.

Zeno had always been curious about Riki. He wanted to be close to him, but Riki always kept his distance, insecure.

And after hearing his story, it was no wonder that he closed himself off from many people. Especially since Anton had always made things difficult for him.

It’s not that Zeno didn’t know, but it seemed like Riki’s suspicions about Anton’s family were true. Anton’s parents hated Riki’s parents, even though they didn’t know why. That hatred had spread to their children.

Something that sounds so unreasonable might actually happen in this world, right?

Meanwhile, Sean also heard Riki’s story because he forced him to listen. Sean thought he had to repay Riki’s kindness, even though he didn’t know how yet.

"What do you guys think, should I investigate further, or just report the woman with all this evidence?" asked Riki, who had just explained his suspicions about Sandra.

"I think we should investigate further, Riki... go back to your plan to use Deva, who is the woman’s nephew. I think we shouldn’t be reckless in handling this kind of situation, so you can make sure you’ll win in the end," said Zeno.

Riki nodded, "I think so too. I can’t be reckless, because they might be more cunning and can wriggle out of it with various excuses, and then I’ll end up losing."

Then Riki turned to Sean, who had been silent all this time, eating the pizza that Zeno had ordered to accompany their night together.

They were talking in a special room on the roof of the villa. Zeno called it the star room. Because the roof of the room could be opened, they could see the stars directly at night.

Coincidentally, the crescent moon was shining brightly that night. Several stars were also clearly visible. However, they did not open the roof. With the transparent glass roof, they could see the sky clearly.

In that room, there was also a large mattress measuring 200×200 cm, which was thick and comfortable.

Various items for stargazing were also available, but at that moment, everything was neatly arranged at the edge of the room.

"Why are you so quiet, Sean?" asked Riki.

Sean shook his head, his gaze still staring blankly ahead. His mouth was still busy chewing on meat pizza with mozzarella cheese.

When he finally swallowed his food, he spoke, "Actually, I’m remembering Deva’s aunt. Because she is an acquaintance of the owner of Golden Entertainment. In fact, it was Deva’s uncle and aunt who introduced us to the agency... oh! I remember now, the mother of the agency owner and Vicky are friends with Deva’s aunt. Friends from high school... Travis was actually offered a spot there too, but he immediately refused, so he ended up starting his own agency with the help of his cousin. Even though Golden Entertainment skyrocketed in popularity, Travis’s agency was also quite good. Although Travis’s agency was later acquired by Hayper Entertainment, it became even bigger after that. Uh, why am I telling you this? Anyway... I’ve seen that woman before, and I think she does look fake."

It seemed like Riki had heard of Hayper Entertainment—uh, didn’t the system award him the shares?

"Wait a minute, explain about Hayper Entertainment, I have shares there. But I don’t understand why Travis’ agency was acquired by Hayper," asked Riki.

"You bought shares without knowing anything, Riki?" asked Zeno, feeling amused and worried at the same time.

Riki shrugged, "I bought them without thinking much, I just knew it would give me a profit."

Zeno laughed upon hearing this, as did Sean.

"Are you some kind of fortune teller? You knew it would give you a lot of profit, but you didn’t know anything else?" Zeno asked again.

Riki rubbed the back of his neck, feeling very stupid at that moment. But he couldn’t argue. He knew he didn’t really understand the entertainment world. How could Riki know that he would be given shares from the largest entertainment agency in the country? Riki had only heard about Hyper in passing, but after that... he wasn’t really interested.

Besides, the system gave him business skills that made him lucky in business. It should have made Riki understand business better—but oh well.

Isn’t luck better in any case?

"Okay, let me explain... Hyper is a large entertainment agency, as you surely know. It always buys shares from agencies that have good potential. By buying those shares, it gains a stake in them, acquires them, and makes those small agencies even bigger under its umbrella. If all those small agencies become big, then Hyper’s name will become even bigger. Moreover, Hyper has several competitors that are also the largest entertainment agencies, such as SH Entertainment and Topaz Entertainment. Currently, Hyper Entertainment has several small agencies that are already big names, one of which is Travis’ agency. In fact, Golden offered to be under Hyper, but for some reason Hyper rejected them. Well, that’s all I understand. If you ask Travis, he probably knows more. But Riki... how much money do you have to have shares in Hyper Entertainment? Getting shares there is very difficult, you know."

Riki just smiled awkwardly at Sean’s last sentence. He couldn’t say that it was just a coincidence that the system gave him those shares, right?

"Well, it was just a coincidence that I got them, let’s just say that," Riki said finally.

"Riki always surprises me. Every time I see him, he’s doing something new," said Zeno.

"Hahaha, really?"

Zeno laughed, then said, "Thank God, Riki... I’m happier seeing you like this than when you were struggling before."

Riki was silent after that, he was just curious. Did Zeno not suspect him of suddenly having money? He could accept it just like that, even though he knew it was very surprising.

Zeno was... quite unique.

"Why are you looking at me like that, Riki?" asked Zeno.

Riki shook his head, then smiled slightly, "Nothing, I’m sleepy."

***

[Your first mission today is to cook food to distribute to people on the streets. Make sure you distribute it to thirty people.]

[Your reward is three million dollars.]

That was the first thing Riki heard as soon as he woke up that morning.

Distribute food?

But he was at Zeno’s family villa.

Riki, Zeno, and Sean slept in the star room. Zeno and Sean were still on the mattress, while Riki was already on the floor with his blanket.

"What was that kick I got last night? It wasn’t a dream, was it?" Riki muttered, scratching his head in confusion.

The bed was so big, but it wasn’t big enough for three people who were all around 180 cm tall.

Riki moved to wake Zeno up. He was grateful that Zeno was easy to wake up. However, when he woke Sean up, Sean kicked Riki instead.

"Just let him sleep. Let’s go to the kitchen. I’m hungry," muttered Zeno.

"But I have to go home soon, so he has to be woken up."

"Why do you have to go home so quickly? Stay here, okay? Or, do you have class this morning?" asked Zeno.

Riki shook his head, "It’s not that, usually on this day, I cook to share with people."

"You can do that here, didn’t we harvest yesterday? That’s also to share with people. You can use it."

Riki agreed to use the harvest to cook and share.

But he forgot that there were only vegetables there.

Riki pondered for quite a while. Suddenly his mind went blank, and he didn’t know what to cook.

Zeno, who had finished washing his face, looked at Riki, who hadn’t started cooking yet. He was already hungry.

"What’s wrong, Rik?"

"What should I cook?"

Zeno laughed when he heard this, "Oh my god, you can cook anything... as long as it tastes good. Vegetables can be made into a variety of delicious dishes, and anyway, whatever you cook tastes good." said Zeno enthusiastically.

Riki himself was also surprised at how strange the dishes he made were, yet they always turned out so delicious. Riki did have cooking skills from the system. But that didn’t make Riki know what to cook that morning.

There were eggplants, potatoes, cabbage, carrots, pumpkin, spring onions... oh, Riki decided to make vegetable pancakes. He didn’t know the name, but when he was little, his mother often made them.

"Can you help me peel and chop all this, Zeno?" asked Riki.

"Of course, what are we making?"

"Vegetable pancakes... I don’t know what they’re called, but they’re a dish my mother used to make when I was little. We just need to peel the carrots, potatoes, and pumpkin, then grate them with this tool to make them small and long. Then we slice the other vegetables, like cabbage, spring onions, and onions, into thin strips like this..."

Riki explained while demonstrating everything. Since Zeno also liked to cook, he was able to keep up with Riki, who cooked quickly, like a professional chef. He chopped the vegetables very quickly too.

"After all the vegetables are done, we make the pancake batter. It can’t be too thick, but it can’t be too thin either... we add chicken broth to the batter, a little salt... then we just add all the vegetables."

Riki turned on the stove, placed a non-stick frying pan on it, and added a little oil. Once it was hot, he poured the batter onto the frying pan.

"Hmm... That’s not enough, let’s make some more," said Riki.

They continued making vegetable pancakes until they had forty.

"We can eat ten, while we’ll share the other thirty," said Riki.

"Okay! Let’s share them first. The residents around here will definitely be very happy. There are also construction workers who are working on a resort around here."

Riki laughed at how enthusiastic Zeno was about distributing the food. Even though only Riki had received a reward from the system.

"Since you helped me, I’ll give you a reward, Zeno."

"Then, be my personal chef forever! Oh, how about you marry my sister?"

"I take back what I said!"

"Ooh? Come on, my sister is beautiful! She is Arvin’s twin sister, If you marry her, I can enjoy your cooking every day!"

"No! I’m not interested in marriage right now, especially with someone I don’t know."

"Do you like someone right now?"

Riki shook his head firmly, "Nope."