Courtyard House: In times of famine, my hamster became a spirit.

As Zhou Jianguo watched He Yushui mechanically chew the braised pork, the coldness in his eyes turned into a chilling intent.

He turned his head and glanced at Sha Zhu, who was still lying paralyzed in the snow, shivering.

Sha Zhu's right hand hung limply, the piercing tingling and numbness from his Neiguan acupoint had left half of his body numb.

What drove him even more insane than the pain was the humiliation of being trampled on in his own territory by an outsider.

"Zhou Jianguo...you've got guts." Sha Zhu gritted his teeth and, under the watchful eyes of the Liu brothers, swayed as he stood up, leaning against the door frame.

He spat out a mouthful of blood, his eyes bloodshot: "I admit you've practiced your chopstick skills, but a cook isn't a butcher! Even a fool could make delicious braised pork if you're willing to use plenty of oil and sugar. What you're doing is taking shortcuts, not real skill!"

"Real skills?" Zhou Jianguo scoffed, taking a step into the shadows in the corner of the room.

Actually, that was to provide cover for retrieving items from the system space.

From an angle unseen by others, Zhou Jianguo had a sudden thought, and a heavy cloth bag wrapped in three layers of old burlap appeared out of thin air in his hand.

He casually tossed it onto the table, and with a muffled "thud," the soup base of the braised pork bowl shook violently.

"Zhu Zi, don't say I didn't give you a chance." Zhou Jianguo said, tearing open the burlap.

"My God..." The second uncle, who was peeking out the window, almost popped his eyes out of their sockets, and his teeth ached from the cold air he was breathing.

A row of cleaned ingredients lay across the table: a piece of lamb spine with fine, glossy red veins; a pig's stomach washed until it was white and without a trace of fat; and most frighteningly, a piece of beef shank with marble-like snowflake patterns that were almost dazzling under the light.

"Beef? And lamb spine?" Liu Guangtian swallowed hard, his mouth watering. "How many tickets would that take? This is a meal only a ministerial-level leader could afford!"

Sha Zhu was stunned. His professional instincts made his mouth water, but then a mocking smile appeared on his face.

"Zhou Jianguo, you're wasting such a precious resource!" Sha Zhu shouted, as if grasping at a straw. "Beef and mutton have the strongest odor; without a secret recipe to neutralize it, it's just a pot of stinking water! Especially that pig's stomach—do you even know how to clean it with your amateurish methods? If you leave even a little bit of dirt, it'll smell like horse urine when it's cooked! If you're trying to show off, wait until this pot of meat rots, then I'll see where you put your face!"

Zhou Jianguo glanced at him sideways, his voice so calm it was impossible to tell whether he was happy or angry: "Guangtian, go and bring over that coal stove by my door, and borrow three sharp knives. It's snowing heavily today, I'll have the whole courtyard smell it."

"Alright! Brother Zhou, just you wait and see!" Liu Guangtian no longer cared about his second uncle; Zhou Jianguo's overwhelming domineering aura had already intimidated him.

In less than three minutes, the flames roared in the cold wind in the backyard.

"Wait a minute," Sha Zhu suddenly said.

He knew that if he couldn't outmaneuver Zhou Jianguo today, his reputation as the culinary master of the courtyard house would be completely ruined. "Since we're going to compete, let's go all out. There's a saying in our industry: you have to have eyes in your hands and a clear mind in your heart. If you're really that good, dare to try blindfolded?"

"Idiot Zhu! Are you even human?" He Yushui suddenly stood up, her eyes red, and roared, "Brother Jianguo was just helping our He family vent their anger, and you're here playing dirty tricks? Blindfolded and holding a knife, are you trying to make him cut off his hand?"

Zhou Jianguo raised his hand and stopped He Yushui.

He stared at Sha Zhu, a smirk playing on his lips: "Blindfolded? Sure."

Under the horrified gazes of everyone in the hospital, Zhou Jianguo took out a black cloth from his pocket, slowly covered his eyes, and tied a tight knot behind his head.

"Here comes the knife."

Liu Guangtian handed over a freshly sharpened kitchen knife with trembling hands.

Blindfolded in black, head covered in snow.

Zhou Jianguo stood in front of the cutting board, his whole being seemingly fused with the piece of meat.

His master-level culinary skills have given him such keen perception that he can count the direction of the meat strips even with his eyes closed.

"Da da da da da—!"

A sudden burst of sound, like a torrential downpour hitting tiles, shattered the deathly silence of the courtyard.

Zhou Jianguo's right hand moved with incredible speed; the neighbors could only see a ball of silver light tumbling wildly on the cutting board.

"Holy shit..." Sha Zhu's mouth was wide open, big enough to fit a duck egg.

He was an expert; he could tell exactly how much force each blade struck the cutting board.

As Zhou Jianguo gently stroked it with his left hand, the huge beef shank seemed to vanish in the wind, leaving behind neatly arranged slices of beef as thin as cicada wings.

Next up is pig's stomach.

This kind of tough material is the hardest to cut, but Zhou Jianguo's knife tip seemed to have eyes, gently and slowly slicing, perfectly avoiding all the connective tissue on the inner wall.

"Sizzle—!"

In the blink of an eye, the entire pig's stomach transformed into a handful of crystal-clear silver threads.

"Avoid the bone... or make a blind cut?" Sha Zhu's legs began to tremble, his eyes filled with fear.

That was a divine skill he had seen in that tattered family recipe book. It was said that top-level grandmasters could locate ingredients by listening to the wind and sensing their breath.

Is this Zhou Jianguo?

That childless family that grew up eating food from many families?

"Start the fire." Zhou Jianguo uttered two words, removed the black cloth, and pushed the ingredients precisely into the red-hot iron pot.

He didn't add soy sauce or star anise; he just scooped up a spoonful of the leftover broth from the braised pork and added a few drops of the super-fresh oil that the system had rewarded him with.

"boom--!"

The iron wok felt weightless in his hands, and the ingredients traced perfect arcs in mid-air.

three minutes.

In just three minutes.

An unprecedented fragrance filled the air above the courtyard!

"Thump."

Sha Zhu could no longer stand and knelt down in the snow, his eyes glazed over.

He could smell it.

The richness of beef, the intensity of mutton, and the chewiness of pork belly were perfectly combined into a single strand by a cooking technique he couldn't comprehend.

Compared to the Tan family cuisine that he is so proud of, this pot of food is simply a miracle.

"I'm not worthy... I'm really not worthy to be a cook..." Sha Zhu muttered to himself, two lines of turbid tears streaming down his old face.

That was his faith, his dignity, shattered into ashes at that moment.

The aroma wafted out of the alley on the north wind, and the dogs on the whole street barked wildly as if they were going crazy.

Neighboring residents opened their windows, greedily inhaling the scent in the air.

Zhou Jianguo put away the fire and casually tossed the spatula aside.

He didn't even glance at Sha Zhu kneeling in the snow, and waved to He Yushui, who was in a daze.

"Come inside and eat."

Zhou Jianguo stepped over the broken door panel, his voice as cold as ice: "From now on, anyone who dares to think about the smell in my house again will meet their end with this broken door panel."

The entire ward was utterly silent, not daring to even breathe loudly.