Hey guys! It has been three weeks since I post the last chapter. I'm sorry to keep you waiting, but now school's in, and I'm back to my regular class schedule. If you want to know when I will update this story throughout the year, please refer to last year's updating speed. :) Without further adue, here's Chapter 24!
"OMG! Austin Moon is right in front of me! This is the best day ever!" Emma rushed in and wanted to hug Austin tight. But oppositely, she crushed Austin right to the ground while she was running fast. Emma immediately helped Austin up and hugged him.
"Hi, the crazy fan girl that I can't remember the name of." Austin said awkwardly, "I thought I would never see you again. It's a great pleasure to see you too. But, can you just let go of me first. Having, trouble, breathing."
Jessie followed up and greeted to Austin, "Hi, Austin. Remember me? Jessie Prescott, I played with you in a local mall in Miami. Even though I didn't write that song, but still a pleasure working with you, right? By the way, I have a huge improvement on song writing since the last time we met, so if you want anything, just tell me."
Before Austin could get a chance to say anything, his partner Ally Dawson walked by, "Of course we remember you, Jessie. Now, can you give me your credit card number? We still have some tabs from the last time for the broken instruments."
Trish came here too to gather with everyone, "Hello, friends from New York. What brings you here? Just to let you know, if you want to go to Miami again, I'll make all the arrangements." Then she turned to Austin and Ally, "The results of the first round is up, the others were disqualified before the scoring, only Dez and Chuck entered the next round. And, they will have a best two out of three, the first round goes to Dez." Everyone cheered out loud upon hearing that. Dez could put a new chapter in Chuck-beating record.
Ravi heard Dez's opponent was Chuck, wondering if this Chuck was one of the four Frenemies they were looking for. So he asked Trish. "Where's Mr. Dez? I have something important to tell him. He must win this cooking competition, or else we are also screwed."
"Don't worry, Dez and Chuck are always competing against each other, he is always shooting for his best when he is facing challenges. And, what do you mean by you guys are also screwed?" Austin asked Ravi after hearing what he said.
"I'll take it over from here." Lelle walked towards Austin and told them everything happened during this trip. From Tony winning the golden card and invite everyone for a vacation, to he is hired to be the tour guide of this trip. "So, we believe that Chuck is one of The Four Frenemies. He is not only Dez's competition, but also our competition."
"Okay, I still don't quite get what you're trying to do here. But if all the people in Toronto can put their peace on you, I guess I can trust you for this once. Wait, there's a Toronto? I thought Canada is only Canada." Austin said curiously, Lelle nodded.
Ally padded Austin's back on the side, "We really need to get you a map, and I wonder how you passed Geography." Trish also agreed.
The sound of the emcee came from the PA, "Everyone, our second round of the cocking showdown is about to begin. We're now down to two contestants, Dez Wade and Chuck McCoy. In the first round, Wade finished in front of McCoy with a score difference of 0.5 points. Now the judges have confirmed the theme for the second round. Listen up, the rule for this round is, use any materials beside you to make a Chinese poem. That is, you're going to make four entrees, each represent a line in the poem."
"I have a question." Before the emcee could finish, Dez started, "If I want to represent the poem "A Roamer's Song", does that mean I need to make six entrees?"
"Yes, one entree for each line. But, you only have thirty minutes to complete all the cooking process. You two can begin, good luck!"
After the sound of gong, Dez and Chuck rushed to their vaults in a speed of lightning, finding their materials to create a poem. Dez picked up three fat geese, some goose eggs, and a bunch of spinach. And Chuck on the other side only picked up a few lettuce leaves, a bunch of been seedling and two eggs. The war between both sides was so intense that their vein was about to pop out from their foreheads.
"You're really good, Chuck." Dez began his battle on mouth with his opponent, "But your poem creating skill is never going beat mine."
"Oh, yeah? Then I suggest you quit when you still have the chance, Red." Chuck got a hold on his glasses, refuted, "My poem is so good that Shakespeare and Liu Mao Xing are going to get out of the grave and beg me to be their master."
Dez followed up, "My poem is so good that people are calling me the Poem God, even the people from the past call me to help them to create a poem, whoever see my poem-presented entrees, they will be the luckiest in this life, and the next."
"My poem is so good that the Canadians are considering to let me converting their national anthem to the dishes on the table." Lelle shook his head after hearing this.
"My poem is so good that if I make food out of my Chinese poem, it will cure people with cancer."
"My poem is so good that the historians are considering to rename Du Fu (Chinese poet in Tang Dynasty) 'Chef Du Chuck'."
"Okay, that doesn't make any sense at all. We better get on to our own business, and the result will be the end of it!" After Dez was finished, he started his creation quickly. First he chopped off the geese's heads, put them in the deep fryer, and line them up in a row after frying. This is the first dish. Then he boiled the goose neck, ordered them neatly in the plate, and drew a musical note on it using sweet bean sauce. Up next he hard boiled the goose eggs, curved the egg whites like tiny little plumes, and put into the spinach soup he made. Finally, he braised the goose feet with soy sauce, then drop them into the broth. Clearly, the poem that Dez chose to represent was "Ode to the Geese" by Luo Binwang: Geese, Geese, Geese, Your necks curve 'n sing to sky in glees. Your white plumes float on water green, Red feet paddle streams clear and clean.
But suddenly, Mrs. Kipling spotted Dez's third dish. She thought the egg whites that Dez curved were crickets. She struggled the rope open and climbed towards the delicious "crickets". "No, Mrs. Kipling, those are not crickets!" When Ravi realized Mrs. Kipling was heading towards Dez's table, it was already too late. Mrs. Kipling climbed up the table for that third dish, but accidentally flipped the table. Dez's "Ode to the Geese" reached to the ground as fast as it can. A few seconds later, after the cracking sound of the plate occurred, Dez's four cuisines had completely ruined.
Dez held Mrs. Kipling up after the plates dropped, "Mrs. Kipling, what are you doing here? Don't you remember me? What am I saying, of course you don't, look at what you did!" He squeezed Mrs. Kipling hard, in an attempt to snap her neck right off. Luckily Ravi got up on time and got Mrs. Kipling back using tricks and forces.
"We're running out of time!" Ally shouted at the side. She glanced at her watch, only one minute left.
This minute, Dez faced the four broken plates, wanting to pick up all the dishes. But he tried his best, because no matter how hard he tried, he just could not bring back the soup.
Time was up, Chuck brought up his four entrees to the judges. His four dishes were all eggs cuisine. The first one was two egg yolks filled with bean seedlings on the bottom. The second one was a row of neatly lined egg whites with a few lettuce leaves. Next was a pile of egg white crumble. Finally came a soup, with egg shells on top. It turned out that Chuck represented Du Fu's "seven character (in Chinese)" Quatrain: Two golden orioles sing amid the willows green, A flock of white egrets flies into the green sky. My window frames the snow-crowned western mountain scene, My door oft bids to eastward-going ships goodbye. The judges clapped at this instant, complimenting Chuck's out-of-the-box creation.
"Chuck was plagiarizing." Lelle said from the audience. "I read a story once before, the chef on it made these four dishes. This was the reading comprehension on my sixth grade Chinese Unit six test!" Everyone's eyes were peeled on Lelle, showing amazement, "Poor Dez, he could have nailed this round."
Then came the announcement: "Attention everyone, the result of the second round is in. Due to Wade's incompletion of the topic in the given time, so the winner of this round goes to Chuck McCoy."
"NOOOOOOO! Chuck! You listen up, I will show you what's the best cooking ever. I'll see you next round!" Dez kneeled down and shouted. Austin, Ally and Trish all came down to comfort Dez. Chuck on the other side left with a smile on his face.
Lelle came in to help clean up. Suddenly he smelled something funny, smells like crickets. He then examined around carefully, finding that the smell of the crickets came from Dez's goose egg whites. He then smelled the crickets in another place and ended up finding rubber cloves on Chuck's table. Lelle realized what was going on and followed Chuck.
"Ladies and gentleman, that's all for today. Tomorrow we will have our final round, the theme is: disgusting cuisine." Emcee turned off the mic after he was done, all it left was the sound of crowd chattering and Dez shouting.
Meanwhile, Chuck went back to the room he rented, just as he sat on the couch to celebrate today's victory, he heard a ring on the door. Lelle gave him a slap in the face as soon as he opened it.
Ohh, things are starting to heat up! What lessons will Lelle makes Chuck to learn? And how will Dez prepare for the final round to be sure he doesn't lose again. Chapter 23 is coming out in the beginning of November, see you then!