The Spirit of Gourmet

Chapter 556 The Next Round Postponed

A "refusal card" represents that the contestant has met the requests of twenty diners in a single day without refusing or failing to meet their requests.

Because diners make all sorts of requests, it takes quite a while to find suitable dishes and try cooking them.

Getting two "rejection cards" in a single day is already extremely rare; getting a third is virtually impossible.

Yesterday, Qin Lang and the other two received two "rejection cards." Qin Lang used one, putting him in a temporarily lagging position.

But today, he received a total of six "rejection cards".

There was no way around it; cooking fried rice was far too easy for Qin Lang.

So he transformed into the one with the most "rejection cards" among the three.

After learning the whole story, Du Ziyan and Dai Lan both had strange expressions.

They were not satisfied with losing to Qin Lang because of this unexpected turn of events!
"Wait, there are still several days left," Du Ziyan said defiantly. "I still have a chance to catch up!"

“I’m afraid we don’t have many days left,” Dylan said quietly. “Didn’t you notice? When we finished, many of the cooking areas were deserted.”

"The vast majority of people were eliminated."

"So fast?" Du Ziyan looked surprised. "I remember the food marathon used to last a long time!"

"Perhaps it's related to that problem database." Qin Lang thought of the problem database he had seen before and briefly explained it.

"I wonder who did this." After learning the details, Du Ziyan's expression was somewhat strange. "This is just too unethical."

Those few were unaffected, but the other participants must be complaining bitterly about this problem set.
"Yes, that's really despicable."

A voice came from not far away.

That was Cao Dongdong with a long face, and next to him was Zhao Qian, who was happily eating an egg yolk pastry.

"Dongdong, you're not going to be eliminated too, are you?" Qin Lang couldn't help but ask.

He gave Cao Dongdong the recipe for fresh meat mooncakes yesterday.

"No." Cao Dongdong shook his head, then sighed, "But it will be soon. I turned down 99 people at the end of cooking time today."

Qin Lang: “…”

This is practically the same as being eliminated, isn't it?
"Didn't your fresh meat mooncakes meet the requirements?" he couldn't help but ask.

Shouldn't it?

Yesterday, he tried Cao Dongdong's fresh meat mooncake. Although the meat filling seasoning was all based on rote memorization and lacked flavor, it was still above average overall.

“Fresh meat mooncakes do satisfy the requirement of using meat as a dessert…” Cao Dongdong’s expression turned despairing again. “But they have new requirements!”

"These diners asked me to make desserts with seafood!"

Qin Lang: “…”

"So how did you do that?"

"Just do it this way!" Cao Dongdong shrugged, "You just taught me how to make fresh meat mooncakes. I figured meat and seafood are both salty, so there's not much difference."

"Then I replaced the meat with seafood, and kept the rest of the ingredients the same..."

"Wait!" Qin Lang interrupted him. "There are many kinds of seafood. Which kind of seafood are you using?"

“Uh…” Cao Dongdong looked around somewhat guiltily, “Oysters.”

Qin Lang: “…”

The oyster mooncakes were made using the same method as the fresh meat mooncakes.

Qin Lang could already imagine how dark the final product would be.

"Forget it, don't even think about it next time," Qin Lang sighed.

Zhao Qian has been eliminated, and Cao Dongdong doesn't seem to have much hope of advancing to the next round either.

"The elimination count for today has been released," Dai Lan suddenly announced, then took out her phone and opened the official website. "A total of 1019 people were eliminated today."

"The number of eliminated contestants has exceeded one thousand?" Qin Lang's expression changed slightly. Only 1,300 people had advanced to the final culinary marathon.

There were no eliminations yesterday (the first day), but today over a thousand people were eliminated.

At this rate…

Does this mean the food marathon is ending tomorrow?
"Please enjoy your meal."

After handing the dishes that met the customer's requirements to the customer, Qin Lang looked up, ready to greet the next customer.

Just then, an electronic broadcast rang out throughout the venue.

"Ladies and gentlemen, this year's food marathon has ended. We are no longer accepting guests. Please leave in an orderly manner."

"All participants who have advanced to the next round, please proceed to the designated location immediately."

"No!" cried the next diner.

He missed out on Qin Lang's fried rice yesterday, and all he wanted to eat today was a plate of fried rice. But the food marathon ended at this very moment!

"That's it?" Qin Lang was taken aback.

As he predicted, the food marathon ended on the third day, even earlier than he had expected.

He's only been cooking for two hours, and hasn't served many customers yet.

Looking at the diners in front of him with their expressions of despair, Qin Lang helplessly shrugged.

"Excuse me."

The diners turned around blankly and left with the crowd, their backs looking somewhat lost and dejected.

After feeling a moment of sadness for the diner, Qin Lang tidied up the cooking area and then went to the meeting point designated by the organizers.

Also present at the meeting point were 99 other finalists.

Qin Lang glanced at them and, unsurprisingly, Cao Dongdong was not among them.

Du Ziyan and Dai Lan had been standing there for a while. When they saw Qin Lang coming over, they waved vigorously at him, signaling him to come over.

"It seems you won this competition." Du Ziyan sighed. "The food marathon ended too quickly; I didn't even have time to catch up."

"What kind of victory is this?" Qin Lang said, both amused and exasperated. "To be honest, out of the three of us, only I refused the diners."

“But you used a rejection card, so that doesn’t count,” Dylan said calmly. “We agreed that if the number of rejections was zero, we would see who had more rejection cards, so you won this time.”

"Let's put that aside for now. Have you two heard anything?"

"what news?"

Upon hearing this, Qin Lang and Du Ziyan both looked at Dai Lan.

Dylan looked around, then lowered her voice, "The third round of the food festival will be postponed."

Postponed?

Qin Lang couldn't help but ask, "How exactly will it be postponed?"

"The third round is expected to take place in seven days."

Dylan slowly began, "Actually, it's not really a delay. If it were a normal culinary marathon, it would take at least ten days to finish."

"This time it ended early due to some unexpected events."

"And the third round is not ready yet."

"Therefore, there will be a relatively long interval in between."

"They must have called us here to talk about this." As she spoke, Dai Lan gestured with her lip toward the staff members who walked onto the stage.