Don't underestimate the poor and elderly; I was thrilled to refuse the class beauty's adva

Guo Hao turned around and saw Zong Wen holding chopsticks in one hand with a dark, gritty thing stuck in them, while his other hand covered his mouth, his face a mixture of pain and anger.

"Steel wool!"

Zongwen held the wire up to the light; the silvery-white wire shimmered under the fluorescent light.

"See that? A steel wool pad! Are these cafeteria workers using wire brushes or bombs to scrub the dishes? How could that fall into the food?"

Zhang Yifan silently put down his chopsticks, looked down at his plate, and then fell silent.

"Wait—" Zongwen's scream wasn't over yet. He poked around in the vegetable leaves with his chopsticks again, then froze. "There's more!"

He turned a leaf of vegetable over.

On the underside of a vegetable leaf, a tiny green worm, no bigger than a grain of rice, lay quietly, its legs clasped tightly together, as if it had found a warm haven on the leaf.

Zongwen slammed his chopsticks on the table and stood up abruptly.

"I can't take it anymore!"

He picked up his tray and strode towards the food serving window.

Zhang Yifan reached out to pull him, but failed. His fingers only touched the corner of Zong Wen's school uniform sleeve before that piece of sleeve, carrying a resolute air, slipped away from his fingertips.

"Hey, Zongwen—"

"Don't stop me!"

Zong Wen didn't turn his head, his voice carrying a tragic grandeur that finally erupted after being long oppressed by the smell of braised pork belly and steel wool-like vegetable leaves.

"This needs an explanation! I tolerated finding a bug in my food last week, I tolerated finding a thread the week before that, I tolerated finding a strand of hair in my seaweed soup the week before that, but today it's steel wool and a bug again! If I keep tolerating this, I'll become the dish that the cafeteria cooks!"

Zhang Yifan silently withdrew his hand.

He didn't really want to stop him, but he felt that Zong Wen's demeanor was more like that of someone going to fight than to demand an explanation.

The students in the cafeteria had long harbored resentment towards the food.

Braised pork always has more potatoes than meat, green vegetables always have more salt than vegetables, and rice is either so hard it could be used as a ping-pong ball or so soft it could be used as wall paste.

People might curse each other in private, but they would just continue eating afterward, and no one would step forward to take the lead.

Now someone has stepped forward.

Zongwen walked to the food serving window, placed the plate on the windowsill, and the plate made a crisp sound as it hit the table.

"Master, could you please take a look at this?"

He pointed to the green worm on the vegetable leaf, then to the gleaming silver wire in the plate.

"Explain this to me, what is this?"

Behind the window, the cook was a chubby man in his fifties, his white apron stained with grease, and he was carrying a large iron ladle.

He glanced down at the worm in the plate, then at the steel wool, and said expressionlessly, "This? It's just an extra treat for you."

After saying that, he picked up the iron spoon, turned around, and was about to leave.

"Wait!" Zong Wen's voice rose half an octave. "What do you mean by 'extra meal'? You call this an extra meal?"

The cook turned around, looking impatient: "So what do you want? Should I get you a different one? Fine, fine, here you go."

"I don't want a different dish!" Zongwen slammed his plate on the windowsill. "I want an explanation! Is anyone even checking the cafeteria's hygiene standards? Last week it was bugs, the week before that it was loose threads, and today it's steel wire and bugs! If this keeps up, will we find rat tails in our food tomorrow?"

The two were quite loud, and the surrounding classmates put down their chopsticks and gathered around.

Someone peered into Zongwen's plate and immediately let out a series of gasps and retching.

"Holy crap! There really are bugs!"

"Steel wool! I found it in my food yesterday too!"

"Damn it, I thought it was just Sichuan peppercorns and didn't pay any attention, so I chewed it and swallowed it!"

"Is nobody in charge? Is nobody in charge of this cafeteria?!"

The crowd grew larger and larger. At first, there were only a few tables around Zongwen, but later even students who were engrossed in eating in the distance came over with their trays.

It's unclear who started it, but someone picked out the suspicious black particles from their plate and held them up in the air, while someone spread unwashed rice husks from their rice on the table. In no time, the cafeteria was filled with arms waving "evidence," like a small-scale peasant uprising.

"Refund!"

"Refund!"

"Bring the cafeteria manager out here!"

"Did we go all our food money to feed the dogs?!"

The sounds rose in waves, the cacophony echoing beneath the high ceiling of the cafeteria.

The cook finally snapped, threw down his ladle, and yelled into the kitchen, "Old Zhou! Old Zhou, come out here right now! Something's happened!"

A moment later, a person strolled out of the kitchen.

The man was in his forties, wearing a dark blue polo shirt with the collar not turned up properly, one side sticking up and the other side hunched over, his belly sticking out high, stretching the fabric into several horizontal folds.

He held a cigarette in his left hand and a toothpick in his right, slowly picking his teeth, a trace of oil still clinging to the corner of his mouth.

Zhou Degui is in charge of the canteen.

Zhou Degui took the toothpick out of his mouth and glanced sideways at the students surrounding the window.

He flicked the toothpick onto the ground and cleared his throat.

"What's all the noise about? What's all the commotion about?"

His voice wasn't loud, but it was full of energy, and it immediately drowned out the surrounding noise.

Zong Wen placed his tray in front of him: "You're in charge? Look at the food in your cafeteria, it's full of steel wool and insects, how are the students supposed to eat it?"

Zhou Degui glanced down at the plate, then raised his eyelids, his expression unchanged, as if he were used to this kind of scene.

"That's it?"

"What do you mean by 'just this'?"

Zhou Degui clicked his tongue, put the cigarette back in his mouth, and put his hands on his hips, striking a pose that said, "What do you kids know?"

"Let me tell you..."

He held up a finger and pointed at the insect on the vegetable leaf.

"The presence of bugs means what? It means this vegetable wasn't sprayed with pesticides; it's organic food, don't you understand? Those organic vegetables in the supermarket cost several times more than regular vegetables, and you guys are complaining even when we're giving them to you for free?"

Zong Wen was so shocked by this logic that he opened his mouth, but before he could refute it, Zhou Degui pointed to the steel wool thread with the same finger.

"And this too. What does finding steel wool fibers in your food mean? It means we scrub our pots with steel wool every day! Would you dare eat it if it wasn't thoroughly cleaned? This is a guarantee of food safety! You young people don't understand anything, always making a fuss over nothing. What's all the fuss about?"

Zong Wen clenched his fists: "You're talking nonsense!"

"Hey, how can you talk like that?" Zhou Degui took the cigarette out of his mouth, his face darkening. "If you don't like it, don't eat it. Nobody's forcing you."

"But we all paid for our meals!" someone in the crowd shouted.

"So what if I paid for meals? I run the school cafeteria, so I call the shots. Eat if you want, eat out if you don't. Go ahead and try sneaking out to eat at restaurants every day, then see if I care!"

Upon hearing this, the surrounding noise rose another notch, and several boys looked quite grim, as if they were about to climb over the windowsill and "have a good talk" with Zhou Degui at the slightest provocation.