"The portions here are so generous, no wonder it costs this much!" Her mother gazed in delighted surprise at the beef noodles before her. "This is easily enough for the two of us!"

"Yes..." Chen Xi smiled bitterly to herself. This must have been that waiter's doing, putting in a special word with the kitchen for the two of them. After all, though there were few customers now, she had come to look the place over before and had paid special attention to other people's portions, and they had never been this large.

This bowl held more than half again as much! And there were so many more pieces of beef that the cost of this one bowl alone must have come to fifteen yuan!

Chen Xi cast a grateful glance toward the busy waiter, then handed the chopsticks to her mother. "Mom, shall we eat?"

"All right, let's eat, Xiao Xi, you first!" Her mother looked at Chen Xi and said with tender love.

"It's so delicious!" Chen Xi knew that if she did not eat, her mother certainly would not touch a bite, so she took a mouthful first and at once pushed the noodles toward her mother.

The flavor was truly, truly wonderful, yet the better it tasted, the less Chen Xi could bear to eat it. She wanted to save it all for her mother. She could eat anytime in the future, for her life stretched long ahead of her, but her mother...

"No wonder people stream in and out of here every day, it really is delicious!" After one bite, Chen Xi's mother nodded in contentment. "Xiao Xi, you are still growing, eat more meat!"

"You eat too, Mom!" Chen Xi could hardly bring herself to eat, taking only a small piece of beef for herself while slipping a large piece into her mother's mouth...

"See, the noodle portions here really are huge, aren't they!" Feng Xiaoxiao pointed toward Chen Xi and her mother as she spoke to Wei Zhao.

"Are you really stupid or only pretending?" Wei Zhao shot back.

"What?!" Feng Xiaoxiao nearly jumped up onto the table to stomp on Wei Zhao. Why are you so fierce to me? Shen Yushu is always asking silly questions too, so why don't you ever ask her if she is really stupid or just pretending?

"Feng Xiaoxiao, what are you really after? I keep feeling something is off about you?" Wei Zhao looked at Feng Xiaoxiao and said.

"What is off about me? I am not after anything. I told you, I like you and I want to pursue you." Feng Xiaoxiao said.

Wei Zhao shook his head. If Feng Xiaoxiao would not tell the truth, then there was naturally nothing he could do about it.

Over there, Chen Xi was still sharing the same bowl of noodles with her mother, whose eyes remained full of tender love as she kept urging Chen Xi to eat more. Yet the more she did so, the more Chen Xi's heart ached, and tears slipped down before she could stop them. Afraid her mother would see, she quickly rose to her feet and hurried toward the restroom, saying as she went, "I am going to the restroom, Mom, you keep eating..."

"Eh? Why is she crying!" Feng Xiaoxiao had been watching Chen Xi's every move, and seeing her cry, she was suddenly puzzled.

"Her mother is dying." Wei Zhao said flatly.

"What!" Feng Xiaoxiao was startled and nearly sprang up from her seat. "You say her mother is dying? Really?"

"Look at her mother's complexion, so clearly ashen and lifeless. I fear she has little time left." Wei Zhao said.

"You took one look and know she has little time left?" Feng Xiaoxiao did not quite believe it.

"When Bian Que met Duke Huan of Cai, he took one look and turned away. It is the same principle." Wei Zhao said. "Sometimes, one glance is enough to tell how long a person can live."

"Then tell me how long I can live?" Feng Xiaoxiao's heart stirred, though on the surface she asked casually, while inwardly she was unbearably nervous.

"You? I see no sign that you are dying." Wei Zhao thought Feng Xiaoxiao was joking and paid it no mind, answering casually.

"Oh..." Seeing that Wei Zhao had not taken it seriously at all, Feng Xiaoxiao was suddenly disappointed.

Just then, the beef noodles Wei Zhao and Feng Xiaoxiao had ordered were brought up, yet they bore no comparison to Chen Xi's bowl. Their two bowls put together barely matched the amount in that one bowl over there!

"See now? Is one bowl enough to eat?" Wei Zhao smiled.

"It is enough! I don't eat much!" Feng Xiaoxiao said stubbornly.

"Who was it last time who ate until she could hardly walk?" Wei Zhao could not help recalling the time Feng Xiaoxiao had gorged on seafood in Yanjing, stuffed until she looked like a great crab and could only walk sideways.

"That was only because I wanted to eat that Wu Tieshou into poverty!" Feng Xiaoxiao's face flushed as she argued back.

As the two were talking, trouble struck Chen Xi over there!

Afraid her mother would see her tears, Chen Xi had wanted to hurry to the restroom, but the moment she stood she bumped into a customer who had just walked into the shop. The man was lighting a cigarette with his lighter, and Chen Xi's turn sent the lighter in his hand flying to the floor!

"Damn it, you little wench, are you blind? Watch how you walk?" The man flew into a rage when Chen Xi knocked his lighter to the ground.

"Sorry, sorry!" Chen Xi jumped in fright and hastily bent down to pick up the lighter. "Here you are, I am truly sorry, I didn't mean it!"

"Sorry? You think sorry is enough? Do you know what brand this lighter is? Zippo! You chipped the paint off it. Can you afford to pay for it?" The man bared his teeth and glared at Chen Xi, shouting at her.

"This..." Chen Xi had never imagined that one turn would cause such trouble. Though she did not know whether what the man said was true or not, she knew she was in the wrong and could only lower her head. "Sorry..."

"Cut the nonsense and pay up!" The man slapped the table with a bang, and the jolt knocked the beef noodles in front of Chen Xi's mother to the floor, where the bowl shattered to pieces and broth and noodles scattered everywhere!

Chen Xi had never expected the man to be so unreasonable. She had already apologized, yet not only would he not accept it, he had overturned her beef noodles, the bowl she had only resolved with such difficulty to buy for her mother!

At the thought of it, Chen Xi could not help letting her tears fall in grievance...

"I am sorry, brother, the child is young and does not know better. Whatever the lighter costs, I will pay you for it..." Chen Xi's mother had never expected such a thing to happen. Mother and daughter, who had just been happily eating their noodles, had met with such calamity!

"Hmph, five thousand yuan!" The man snorted coldly. "Hand over the money, or I will call the police and charge her with deliberately damaging another person's property!"

"Five thousand!" Chen Xi's mother was badly frightened and suddenly at a loss. To an ordinary family, five thousand yuan, while no small sum, could still be produced, but to Chen Xi and her daughter, it was an astronomical figure!

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