Atlas Studios

  Atlas Studios

  The way she walloped the chili was incredible. One could almost imagine the spicy heat burning through her stomach wall!

  Gong Jie gawked at his sister without a word. The tears that were brought forth by the pungency were still visibly hanging at the corner of his eyes. The moment he set orbs on the bright and red layer of chili oil again, he could feel his tummy revolting.

  His sister took a peek at him and could tell that he was no match for such spicy food. Letting out a guffaw, she turned her head to the boss and said, “Can you change to a non-spicy soup base for him, please? I’m afraid of the spicy soup burning a hole through his tummy if he finishes it!”


  “Sure!”


  The boss tried to hold back her laughter as she took the soup from the man’s hands to change it into another one.

  The memory of the disaster caused by the ultra-spicy soup was still fresh in his mind, so he took a sip of the new bowl of soup rather cautiously. It was only after confirming that the soup base this time was nothing like the former one that he could put his mind at ease.

  As he ate with poise and grace, taking in small mouthfuls of food with his head lowered, Yun Shishi could not help comparing her eating posture with his……

  She realized that she looked uncouth in the way she ate.

  Staring at the way her twin was having his food, she immediately tried to restrain herself by imitating his manners. Finally, she managed to finish her mala hotpot in a graceful and elegant fashion.

  As they left the store with her tummy bulging after a very satisfying meal, he could not help teasing her. “How did you live your life in the last decade or so?”


  The lady gave him a blank look.

  She had a quizzical expression on her face.

  “You hated chili when you were small.”


  From what he could remember, his sister detested anything spicy and hot when they were young.

  In fact, her tolerance for pungency was way below his.

  Once, when they went out to have soup dumplings, he played a prank on her by adding a tablespoon of chili sauce in her bowl of soup. He lied to her that it was ketchup sauce, and she was gullible enough to buy his story. All hell broke loose after that.

  She burst into tears after she tasted the soup. It got even worse when she rubbed her eyes with her hands, which were stained with the chili sauce. Her eyes began to swell in pain.

  Shocked by her state, he tried his best to placate her with hugs and consolations. Eventually, he had to piggyback her home.

  When their mother returned to find her daughter with red and swollen eyes, as well as lips, she almost flipped.

  She was short of thrashing him, making him kneel on the washboard as his punishment.

  He found the incident amusing now as he recounted their childhood story. Still, he was surprised to see that, after a decade, the girl who used to hate chili had become a chili craze!

  “You’re exaggerating, aren’t you?” She told him with a smile. Suddenly, she spun around and pointed to a building across the road. “Can you see that SOHO building across from us?”


  The man gazed in the direction that she was pointing and nodded his head.

  “That’s the place I had my first job after I graduated from college. I started as a clerk with a miserable wage. The salary was only 2,000 yuan a month. At that time, Youyou’s medical expenses were hefty, so to save money, I would often come here to eat.” The lady did not sound sorry for herself as she talked about her past.

  At that time, she frequented Xinmin Street during her lunch breaks because of the cheap prices of food here. When work was busy, she would get a scallion pancake from here to munch on while she made her way back to the office. When work permitted her the leisure of a full lunch break, she would order a mala hotpot and take her time to savor it. The food was economical, and she could have a good meal with just a few yuan.

  She was not used to the spiciness at first, but there was a time she visited this place when she was downcast. It was when her adoptive parents’ marriage was falling apart and her career was full of challenges. Feeling upset and rebellious, she decided to force herself to take a load of chili just so she could cry. Indeed, under the pungent stimulant, she was surprised to find her tears falling freely. She had reckoned her tears to have dried up long before.