The Game of Life

“Mother,” Jiang Huiqin said softly, her eyes reddening.

Liu Xiuzhen appeared as if she hadn’t heard at all, staring out the window blankly, her right hand gently stroking the urn as if patting a child who had just fallen asleep.

“Let’s go, later we’ll bring some sweet porridge back for mother,” Li Mingyi said helplessly.

“Huiqin, after you move, you, Mingzhe, and Mingqing should all go to school together,” Liu Xiuzhen suddenly spoke up.

Jiang Huiqin and Li Mingyi were both stunned at the same time.

“Zhen’er (the eldest sister) has been gone for two months, and I have been thinking for two months, it’s better for girls to get some education,” Liu Xiuzhen’s eyes showed a faint, dim light, “These days, I keep thinking, if I had sent her to a girls’ school back then, even if just to learn a few English phrases, would her personality have become as bright as yours? If, when choosing her husband, I had thought more and not just considered his family background, and if I had scolded her less over these years, perhaps she wouldn’t have ended up this way.”

“My whole life has been lived for others, and Zhen’er’s whole life was the same, she no longer wanted to live, but I still have to. When Mingyi first started at the academy, he would often tell me that education could enlighten one’s mind and intelligence, and he urged me to send Zhen’er and Chun’er (the second sister) to girls’ school. I didn’t believe and didn’t listen, it’s my fault, all my fault,” Liu Xiuzhen lamented, clutching the urn and walking into the room.

On a table in the room lay a lone picture frame.

The photo inside was a family portrait taken on New Year’s Eve: a black and white image where everyone wore a smile, with the eldest sister standing in the corner holding Fen, and Fen smiling sweetly at the camera.

Things remain, but people change.

Chinatown was like a decrepit and complex maze, with randomly arranged small houses and low buildings; street vendors carried baskets on poles, and various shops featured signs that were either old or even older, with wooden, stone, or mud walls that were mottled or even more so. The deeper inside one went, the more dilapidated and dark it became.

Jiang Huiqin and Li Mingyi stopped in front of a shop without a sign, the door half-open. In front of the door lay a dust-covered wooden plank with crooked Chinese characters written on it: New merchandise 7 yuan per pound.

“Mrs. Chen,” Jiang Huiqin called from outside.

“You’re here!” a middle-aged woman with disheveled hair and a draped garment pushed the door open, clearly just awoken and speaking in accented Mandarin, “Mrs. Li, oh and Mr. Li too, I heard you bought a place up on the high ground, are you moving there?”

“We’re preparing to move. I heard you came back yesterday. Did you find her?” Jiang Huiqin got straight to the point.

“It’s extremely difficult. Everywhere is at war now, and I’ve called in quite a few favors. It’s not that I took your money and didn’t do the work; the whole north has erupted in conflict. Before I boarded the ship, I heard even the south might start fighting soon, it’s chaos! You only gave me a few photos, I’ve asked so many people, none of them remember her. Your brother and your nephews are all males, luckily, but your Fen, with her good looks… well,” Mrs. Chen hesitated for a moment, then spoke, displaying a troubled expression.

“Don’t blame me for speaking unpleasantly, but I know nearly all the traffickers of some repute, and not one of them remembers Fen. With her looks, she’d be a prime commodity in our line of work. I’m afraid your Fen… is gone. And in these times, a pretty young girl like her, alone outside… it’s better to be dead than alive,” Mrs. Chen said.

Jiang Huiqin found herself at a loss for words.

“Then, could you trouble someone to keep looking?” Li Mingyi sighed and asked.

Mrs. Chen was the largest trafficker in San Francisco, nearly every woman sold there passed through her hands. She didn’t run a brothel, just sold people, trafficking women who couldn’t survive in China and were either deceived or voluntarily signed contracts to be sold to bachelors here who could not find wives.

“I won’t be able to go for the next few months, it’s too chaotic everywhere with fighting. I’ll have to wait at least until next year… Ah, you should prepare yourselves,” Mrs. Chen said before going back inside, her voice rising to a screech, “It’s almost noon and you’re all not up working yet, pigs are more hardworking than you, who would want to buy a lazy sow as a wife…”

“She’s right, it’s better for Fen to be dead than alive,” Jiang Huiqin murmured softly, taking a deep look at the wooden sign at the door.

7 yuan per pound.

Li Mingyi took Jiang Huiqin’s hand and led her outside, “Death may end it all, but only by living can we wait for hope.”

The two entered a very simple restaurant, with only four or five small tables, where an elderly person with graying hair sat peeling garlic.

“Liu Agu.” Jiang Huiqin greeted her with a smile.

“You’re here, all the ingredients are prepared for you in the kitchen,” Liu Agu said.

Li Mingyi was taken aback and asked, “What are you going to make?”

“It’s a secret,” Jiang Huiqin wouldn’t let him enter the kitchen, “Today is a good day; I recently learned a new dish. I wanted to make my mother happy by having her try it, but since she doesn’t want to come, you’ll have to eat it for her.”

“Your mother still doesn’t want to go out?” Liu Agu suddenly asked.

“Yeah.”

“Ah, she’ll get used to it. When my second child just died, I was the same. It gets better slowly,” Liu Agu said as she leisurely peeled the garlic.

Jiang Feng followed Jiang Huiqin into the kitchen.

The kitchen was ready with all the ingredients: soaked sea cucumber, cooked chicken meat, cooked ham, oil-soaked fish maw, soaked squid, soaked fu zhu (dried beancurd sticks), egg yolk cake, pigeon eggs, clean fish meat, soaked magnolia tablets, soaked shiitake mushrooms, cooked pork stomach, dried scallops, spinach stems, and cooked salted egg yolks. There were quite a lot of ingredients, so if they were just for one dish, the taste must be very rich.

Jiang Huiqin first cut the sea cucumber, fish maw, magnolia tablets, fu zhu, pork stomach, chicken meat, and some of the ham into strips of equal length and width, then shredded the rest of the chicken meat and ham, and boiled the pigeon eggs in cold water. The prepared ingredients were neatly arranged on a plate by Jiang Huiqin, in five colors, very orderly.

On a stove beside her, there was a pot of chicken soup still simmering on low heat. Jiang Huiqin uncovered it, and the rich aroma instantly wafted out. The chicken oil had been completely stewed into the soup, making it pure yellow and fragrant. After skimming off the surface grease, Jiang Huiqin scooped out a large bowl of chicken soup.

Chinese grand dishes typically use chicken soup to stew and concoct flavors in order to bring out the deliciousness of the ingredients, and Buddhas Jumping Over the Wall is also prepared this way. Jiang Huiqin put all the sliced ingredients into the pot with large chunks of green onion and ginger slices, poured in the chicken soup and added seasonings, then removed the green onions and ginger slices with chopsticks after stewing the flavors together.

After the dish was ready, Jiang Huiqin picked out a nice-looking porcelain bowl from the cupboard, black with a white rim and blue flower patterns—a type of porcelain bowl not commonly seen in San Francisco. After rinsing the bowl, she picked out the shiitake mushrooms and placed them at the bottom of the bowl, then stacked the other ingredients on top of each other in a neatly arranged circle by color, layer by layer. Just arranging these ingredients took dozens of minutes. In the end, she poured the remaining small pieces on top, added the original soup, and placed it in the steamer.

Jiang Feng thought that Jiang Huiqin’s plating was not up to par.

The chicken meat and pork stomach were clearly supposed to be placed alternately, but she put them on adjacent layers. Jiang Feng, who had been plating professionally for many years, thought this color design was not good. Moreover, stacking them like petals would be much prettier.

Jiang Huiqin’s plating was bound to be turned upside down upon serving, and the way it was stacked would make it spread out more attractively when flipped.

Jiang Feng couldn’t guarantee that his version of the dish would taste better than Jiang Huiqin’s, but it would definitely look better!

After ten minutes, it was ready.

The porcelain bowl was turned upside down in a soup basin, surrounded by a ring of pigeon eggs, with ham shreds and cooked chicken shreds placed across the mushrooms. The soup from the pot was boiled, thickened with rice soup, poured into hot lard, immediately releasing a delightful fragrance, and then poured over the hodgepodge.

Finally, a cooked salty duck egg yolk was placed on top of the shiitake mushrooms, with spinach stems inserted upside down on top.

The dish was complete!

All the ingredients soaked in the bright yellow chicken soup, blended with the fragrant hot lard, were plentiful and rich, colorful and bright, delicious and mellow without being greasy.

A full large soup basin was enough for two people to eat, no need for any staple food.

Carrying the soup basin out, just as a customer walked in.

“Oh, Li Hongzhang hodgepodge? Liu Agu, your family business is really quite something even selling this dish,” the customer exclaimed in surprise.

“I just prepared the ingredients; they made it themselves. I don’t have that level of skill. Chicken soup wonton noodles?” Liu Agu put down the garlic in her hands.

“The usual, you know,” the customer found a table and sat down casually.

This big bowl of Li Hongzhang hodgepodge on the table exuded an alluring fragrance, a famous dish from Huizhou that Mingyi had tasted before, but not prepared in this way.

Jiang Huiqin went to get bowls and chopsticks, and as Mingyi received his own pair, he asked, “Why do I remember my brother-in-law made it differently before?”

“This is a new method improved by Chinatown; it’s tastier than just using sesame oil for crispy frying followed by slow simmering on low heat,” Jiang Huiqin said as she picked up a mushroom with her chopsticks, then paused, “If my brother knew there was such a method, he would definitely be excited and study it for days.”

“After the war is over, we’ll return home. A talented person like your brother-in-law can make it anywhere. You learn well, so when we return, you can teach him yourself,” Mingyi consoled her.

“Right, when I return home, I’ll teach my brother,” she said.

“Chicken soup wonton noodles are ready,” Liu Agu said as she brought out a bowl of wonton noodles from the kitchen and placed it in front of the customer, then continued to peel garlic.

“Hey, Liu Agu, where’s your man gone? I feel like I haven’t seen him for a while.”

“Oh, he went back to Beiping to get married!”

“Why go all the way back there to marry? Just buy one from Mrs. Chen! Are not all her girls clean? It’s such a hassle to go back, with months of trouble and danger. I heard there’s fighting everywhere. Aren’t they fighting in Beiping too?” the customer chatted idly while eating his noodles.

“I don’t know; it was arranged by a matchmaker,” Liu Agu said. “Mrs. Chen’s girls are indeed clean, but they’re too expensive now, up to seven dollars a pound. Buying a girl weighing sixty or seventy pounds would surely be too much to support, and I can’t afford the more expensive ones. Ganzi is already 37; he can’t wait any longer. It’s cheaper to get married back home. Actually, I’m also worried about him going to Beiping, but the matchmaker said she was there, and by now he should already be on the ship back. That boy, not even sending a letter, really doesn’t give me peace of mind.”

“You all heard about Beiping?” a new customer asked as he entered.

“What about it?” both replied in unison.

“My son told me some news he read in the papers that Beiping has fallen.”

A clatter, Jiang Huiqin’s chopsticks fell.

“Beiping has fallen? When?” Jiang Huiqin abruptly stood up.

“Mrs. Li, oh, Mr. Li’s here too. I heard you bought a highland property and you’re still eating here?” the newcomer said with surprise, “Just a few days ago, I guess. My son told me after reading the newspaper at school. Don’t you read the papers too, Mr. Li? Didn’t you see the news?”

“It’s alright, it’s alright, Ganzi must be on the ship by now,” Liu Agu comforted herself, though her voice was trembling.

“Huiqin, please sit down,” Mingyi’s voice could not hide its shake, “I have not dared to tell you and father.”

“Beiping has fallen?” Jiang Huiqin slowly sat down, her entire body shaking, “Beiping has fallen, my sister and Master Chen are still there, where are they?”

“They’re all gone,” Mingyi lowered his eyes, not daring to look at Jiang Huiqin, “Uncle Fu sent a telegram four days ago; my sister’s husband and Master Chen’s son were killed because they were hiding wounded soldiers in the cellar, and my sister and Master Chen… they committed suicide by setting their house on fire.”

Jiang Huiqin was silent. When Mingyi looked up again, she was already in tears.

Wiping away tears, Jiang Huiqin choked up, “We can’t tell Mother.”

“Let’s eat,” Jiang Huiqin took another pair of chopsticks and picked up a piece of mushroom.

She tasted it.

“It’s not as good as the one my brother made,” Jiang Huiqin blinked, and tears fell into her bowl.

Mingyi also picked up a piece of mushroom.

He tasted it.

“Still, it’s not as good as what big brother-in-law made,” he said.

Salty tears dripped onto his hand.

This was the first time in four days since receiving the news that he had cried in front of others.

Jiang Feng sat enveloped in a fog.

Sitting blankly on the bed in complete darkness, Jiang Feng touched the corners of his eyes which felt moist.

After sitting quietly for a while to calm his emotions, Jiang Feng opened the game panel.

[Li Hongzhang Hodgepodge C-level]

Creator: Jiang Huiqin

Dish Details: A renowned Huizhou dish known both domestically and abroad, its selection of ingredients and cooking techniques are quite fitting. Due to the limitations of the creator’s own abilities, the dish falls somewhat short of its fame. Originally a Li Hongzhang hodgepodge that was slightly less than perfect, it has become a dish Mingyi could not forget in his lifetime, filled with the desire to cry evoked by his sorrowful moment and the hatred for his country’s and family’s plight, consuming it induces an overwhelming urge to cry and release negative emotions for 20 minutes.

Number of times it can be made per day (0/1)

Jiang Feng:…

If everyone in the restaurant had a bite of this big bowl, the whole place would be in tears.

The thought was somewhat moving.

All three of Jiang Huiqin’s dishes were now highlighted in the recipe column: Clear Soup Willow Leaf Swallow Dish (Fake), Sweet and Sour Yam, and Li Hongzhang Hodgepodge.

Three dishes, the entirety of Jiang Huiqin’s life.

In the item column was a memory fragment from Zhang Zhiyuan; Jiang Feng considered, then decided not to impulsively click and watch it now. If it was another depression-inducing memory, he might end up with insomnia until morning.

Just as he lay down and turned off his phone, ready to sleep, hearing Wang Hao’s thunderous sleep-talking even before his eyes had closed for a second. “Come out, god-tier golden fried rice!”

Jiang Feng: ???

Has he been writing novels so intensely that he’s even battling fried rice in his dreams?

“Die, two-dimensional Fourier analysis! Forward, golden fried rice!¹