Going Grocery Shopping with My Apprentice

The wet market.

The clamor of voices intertwined with the mixed scents of various ingredients, brimming with vibrant, worldly vitality.

Ning Qingcheng followed behind Lin Mo, watching him expertly weave through the stalls. Finally, unable to hold back, she gently tugged at the corner of his shirt.

"Senior Brother."

"Hmm?" Lin Mo turned his head.

"Can you really... handle it?" she asked cautiously, a hint of worry in her eyes.

Lin Mo raised an eyebrow and replied as a matter of fact, "Why wouldn't I be able to handle it? It's not like I'm playing with their feelings. As long as they choose me, I will take responsibility for them."

Ning Qingcheng froze for a moment, and then a Dragon King-esque smirk curled on her lips. "No, I didn't mean that... I meant, buying all this food, can you handle eating it all?"

Lin Mo: "..."

This girl was absolutely doing this on purpose.

"But I still want to say, you're such a scumbag."

In front of Lin Mo, she was indeed becoming more and more uninhibited, no longer the cautious and timid eldest daughter of the Ning family.

Yet even so, she still couldn't agree with her Senior Brother's behavior of having a foot in three boats.

But she still couldn't approve of Lin Mo's behavior of having a foot in three boats.

"Eating clean, wiping your mouth, and running away—that's what you call a scumbag."

Lin Mo spouted nonsense with a straight face. "What I'm doing is called taking responsibility, understand? It's a manifestation of accountability."

Ning Qingcheng instantly caught the loophole in his words, her eyes widening into perfect circles. "You've already eaten them?!"

Lin Mo stumbled, almost losing his footing.

"......"

He took a deep breath, feeling that his pure reputation had been tarnished, and immediately clarified, "I didn't, I am not, don't talk nonsense."

A triple denial.

"Not even once?"

Ning Qingcheng pressed, then as if thinking of something, a flash of slyness crossed her eyes. "Then what if... someone else beats you to it?"

"Absolutely impossible, there won't be such a toxic plot point!" Lin Mo waved his hand.

As soon as the words left his mouth, he suddenly reached out a large hand, clamped it down on Ning Qingcheng's small head, and shook it vigorously from side to side.

"You're just a kid, don't fill your head with all sorts of messy thoughts all day!"

Ning Qingcheng was shaken dizzy, her hair completely messed up. She finally managed to break free and glared at him with puffed-up cheeks, but there was nothing she could do about him.

Having taught his disciple a lesson, Lin Mo felt greatly refreshed. He walked over to a vegetable vendor and continued picking out ingredients for tonight.

As for why it was him and Ning Qingcheng out grocery shopping, it was mainly because the others at home either didn't want to go or all wanted to tag along. Five people marching through the market in a grand procession—just thinking about that scene gave him a headache.

Therefore, Lin Mo decisively chose to only take his disciple out.

Only to discover that this disciple was not only precocious but also painfully sharp with her words.

After buying vegetables, Lin Mo dragged her to the seafood section, picked out some lively prawns, conveniently bought a box of the famous local Hexing Shunde fish skin dumplings, and added some hotpot meatballs.

Passing by the fruit stand, he picked out a few heavy coconuts, and finally grabbed a clucking young hen that had yet to lay eggs.

Ning Qingcheng looked at the growing pile of bags in their hands, completely bewildered. "Senior Brother, what kind of grand feast are we making?"

"Hotpot. Have you ever had it?" Lin Mo turned to look at her.

Ning Qingcheng shook her head like a rattle-drum.

Lin Mo understood. It made sense; a wealthy young lady of her background had been raised with the etiquette of individual dining. How could she have ever been exposed to a lively, boiling dish like hotpot?

Considering that none of the girls could handle spicy food very well, a sweet and clear coconut chicken hotpot was undoubtedly the best choice.

He even took a detour to find a hand-beaten beef meatball shop hidden deep within the market.

The shop wasn't large. The boss was shirtless, vigorously pounding the beef on the chopping block with two iron rods. Every strike produced a dull, powerful thud.

"Boss lady, give me two catties of freshly beaten beef meatballs."

"Coming right up!"

"Add some garlic oil, please."

"Sure!"

The beef meatballs here were expensive, but that bouncy texture and rich meaty aroma were completely incomparable to those mixed-meat balls you could buy several catties of for fifty bucks.

Afterward, he went to the beef stall and had the boss slice a few catties of rib-eye and tender meat. The sliced meat was cut thin enough to be translucent.

Carrying bags big and small of ingredients and seasonings, the two returned fully loaded.

Upon arriving home, the living room was completely empty, uncharacteristically quiet.

Lin Mo's divine sense subconsciously swept through his bedroom door. The next second, the corner of his mouth twitched involuntarily.

On his bed, three figures were lying haphazardly, sleeping soundly.

Even Hajimi had monopolized the most comfortable pillow, its belly rising and falling, sleeping dead to the world.

Fine, fine, fine. So today, the birthday boy has to turn around and serve you group of pampered misses.

Lin Mo felt both annoyed and amused in his heart, but his movements were very light.

He raised a hand and waved it, causing a silencing array to envelop the entire bedroom, isolating all outside noise.

Only after doing all this did he grab the ingredients and turn into the kitchen.

Tonight's main dish was coconut chicken, so there wasn't too much to prep.

He casually tossed the live prawns into a basin of water. With a tap of his fingertip, an oxygen-rich water bubble formed in the basin, enough to keep them lively right up until they hit the pot.

Besides the chicken and the coconuts, everything else was very easy to handle.

A quiet figure followed him in. Ning Qingcheng poked her small head in, still carrying the remaining vegetables, her voice kept low.

"Alright, you go peel the garlic."

Lin Mo didn't even turn his head. He fished out several whole garlic bulbs from a bag and casually tossed them behind him.

Ning Qingcheng caught them steadily, then obediently retreated to the living room, found a small stool to sit on, and started battling with the garlic.

In truth, Lin Mo had much better and faster ways to peel garlic, but it was better to give the kid something to do, rather than let her sit idle and let her imagination run wild.

Now alone in the kitchen, Lin Mo couldn't be bothered to hide his abilities anymore.

He picked up a rock-hard green coconut and gently flicked it with a bent finger.

"Crack."

With a crisp sound, a perfectly smooth circular opening split across the top of the coconut, without a single extra crack.

He poured all the coconut water inside into a large soup pot, sealed it with plastic wrap, and put it in the fridge for now.

Next, he wiped his palm across the coconut's body. The hard outer shell peeled off inch by inch like a fragile eggshell, revealing the white, tender coconut meat inside.

With a few empty slashes of his fingers, the coconut meat was sliced into even, thin pieces and fell onto a plate.

Coconut water plus coconut meat—this was the purest soup base for coconut chicken.

After processing the coconuts, Lin Mo's gaze fell upon that plump free-range chicken.

He raised his hand, splayed his five fingers, and made a grasping motion at the whole chicken through empty space.

A series of fine, dense sounds of bone separation rang out.

The next moment, an entire, intact chicken skeleton separated from the meat out of thin air, dropping onto a nearby plate, while the chicken slumped limply onto the cutting board, becoming a perfect piece of boneless chicken.

The entire process didn't even leave a single nick on the chicken skin.

It required absolutely no knife skills; he was even more impressive than the protagonist of a culinary novel.