Chapter 325 - 307: Boss, Are There Any Female Contestants?

Chapter 325: Chapter 307: Boss, Are There Any Female Contestants?

After finishing their noodles, the customers who had to work or run errands left one by one.

A few who had nothing else to do stayed behind to continue practicing.

Li You watched the customers practice with keen interest.

As he was watching, he got a call. It was from Liu Xu.

"Hahaha! Boss, I want to sign up for tomorrow’s tournament."

Liu Xu, Xiao Yue, Zhang Rui’Er, and the others, much like Wei Ping, were among the shop’s very first customers. Now, they came almost every weekend and were very familiar with Li You.

Clearly, Liu Xu now knew about the tournament tomorrow.

Li You was of course thrilled and more than happy to have Liu Xu sign up. He laughed. "Welcome aboard. You play King of Fighters?"

"Of course! I play ’97 and ’98. I don’t really play much anymore, but a King of Fighters tournament at your place, Boss? I have to be there. Especially with a prize that tempting."

"Sounds like you’re an expert."

"I wouldn’t call myself an expert, but I can probably put up a good fight."

"Well, I look forward to seeing how you do tomorrow."

"Hahaha! Great. Oh, by the way, Boss, some other people in my food group chat want to sign up too. I’ll have them send you their registration information in a bit. Make sure to tally them up."

"Okay, no problem."

"Alright, Boss, see you tomorrow."

"See you tomorrow."

After hanging up, Li You opened Liu Xu’s WeChat food group.

The group chat was already buzzing with activity.

Li You had always been a member of the group, but he rarely said anything.

Wei Ping, Jiang Caidong, Liang Heng, and others were also in the group.

"The *King of Fighters* series is one of the all-time classic arcade games. It’s awesome that the boss is putting on a tournament like this. So many people love this game, you know."

"Sign me up! I have to sign up. My skills are just average, but I’ve got to give it a shot."

"I’m not signing up. I’m so bad it’s embarrassing. But I’ll be there tomorrow to watch. Good luck, everyone! Hope the champion comes from our group."

"I’m going to be there too. It’s going to be packed and exciting. I can’t miss out on all the fun."

"Boss, I’m signing up. Here’s my name and number."

"Me too, sign me up!"

"..."

As the group buzzed with excitement, many people started contacting Li You to register.

Li You took down their names one by one.

When the flood of messages stopped, Li You counted. 79 people had registered.

The group only had a little over 400 members, yet a surprising 79 of them had signed up. And that didn’t even count others who might still register.

That was an incredibly high sign-up rate.

With these 79 people, the total number of participants had now reached 268.

The registration deadline was 9:00 AM tomorrow. He had a feeling the final number of participants would surpass 400.

This was far more than Li You had initially estimated.

If so, the tournament would also take much longer than he had anticipated.

But that was fine. If the tournament couldn’t be finished tomorrow, they could just extend it to the day after.

An extra day of excitement would be nice, too.

Just as he was pondering this, his phone rang again. This time, it was Xia Xiaoyue.

Hm?

’This girl isn’t going to sign up too, is she?’

He answered the phone.

"Boss, there’s a *King of Fighters ’97* tournament tomorrow, right?"

"That’s right! Are you planning to sign up, Xiao Yue?"

"I’d like to, but I don’t know how. I’ve never played before. But Senior Sister Mu wants to sign up."

"Mu Qingye? For real?"

"Of course it’s true! Senior Sister Mu is amazing at *King of Fighters ’97*. She’s an expert. She’s right here, I’ll hand the phone to her. You can talk to her."

"Boss, don’t listen to Xiao Yue’s nonsense. I’m no expert, I just know how to play. But I do plan to sign up. Could you please register me?"

"Of course, of course, no problem. I never expected you to play King of Fighters, Mu."

Li You was both surprised and delighted. He truly hadn’t expected Mu Qingye to enter the tournament.

Having such a beauty in the competition would definitely make most of the male players even more excited.

After all, Mu Qingye’s beauty was on par with that of Ling Xiaoru and Chu Yiwei.

Her figure was also quite perfect, and she was tall. Her height was at least 172 cm, just a little shorter than Xia Xiaoyue, and slightly taller than both Ling Xiaoru and Chu Yiwei.

However, the tallest was Ye Shengge, who was even taller than Xia Xiaoyue. Those long legs of hers were simply unbeatable.

’I wonder how good Mu Qingye actually is. Is she really an expert, like Xia Xiaoyue said?’

’She said she wasn’t an expert, but was she just being humble?’

Li You was full of anticipation.

This tournament was getting more and more interesting.

’I never thought an arcade game that the mainstream market had abandoned long ago would still interest so many people.’

’A classic for a reason.’

Customers continued to stream in throughout the morning, and more people kept signing up for the tournament.

By 11:00 AM, more than a hundred people had gathered in the arcade area.

The number of registered participants had also surpassed 300.

People started ordering food for lunch.

Li You’s next rush began.

He was busy straight through until three in the afternoon, when things finally quieted down.

Aside from a short break to eat his own meal, he had been busy almost the entire time.

There were just too many customers eating lunch.

For the lunch rush alone, Li You did a rough calculation and estimated his revenue was around 15,000.

It was hectic, but the money he was making felt incredibly good.

No customers were eating for the moment, but the arcade area outside was still bustling with over a hundred people.

He’d be busy again tonight.

But tomorrow would be the busiest day of all.

’Oh, right. I definitely won’t be able to handle everything by myself tomorrow.’

’It’s not that the kitchen will be unmanageable, but the tournament itself will be.’

’While I’m busy in the kitchen, someone will need to be out there organizing the matches, recording results, and all that.’

’I need to find some people to help.’

’I’ll just ask Ling Xiaoru, Chu Yiwei, and Xia Xiaoyue.’

’Mu Qingye could also help when she’s not in a match.’

’An all-star cast of beauties. Perfect.’

’I’m sure they’ll be happy to help.’

’I wonder if Chu Yiwei will come by later?’

’If she does, I’ll treat her to dinner. And ask her to help out tomorrow at the same time.’

...

As it happened, Chu Yiwei arrived at six in the evening, just as Li You was getting busy in the kitchen again.

Li You asked Chu Yiwei if she would be willing to help out tomorrow.

Chu Yiwei was delighted to hear it and readily agreed, saying she would be more than happy to help.

Li You was happy too. "In that case, let me treat you to dinner tonight," he said.

Chu Yiwei didn’t refuse. "Well, don’t mind if I do," she said.

Li You said, "It’ll probably be a bit late, though. Around nine o’clock."

Chu Yiwei nodded. "That’s fine. It’s not too late."

Li You then asked, "By the way, are you familiar with the game *King of Fighters ’97*?"

"I know of it," Chu Yiwei said. "I’ve watched people play it before."

Li You nodded. "That’s good."

A short while later, Ling Xiaoru arrived as well.

Li You also asked Ling Xiaoru to help with the tournament tomorrow.

Ling Xiaoru was equally happy to help and said it was no problem at all.

After that, neither Chu Yiwei nor Ling Xiaoru went upstairs. Instead, they both stayed in the arcade area to watch the customers practice.

Since they would be helping at the tournament tomorrow, they wanted to get a better feel for the game.

Li You continued to work in the kitchen. There were even more dinner customers than there had been for lunch.

He didn’t finally get a break until eight-thirty in the evening.

There were still a few customers around, but he could start making their own dinner.

’Ling Xiaoru and Chu Yiwei must be starving by now,’ he thought.

By the time the food was ready, it was nine o’clock. Coincidentally, all the customers had just left. It was finally time to close up and go upstairs to eat.

’Chu Yiwei is definitely staying the night again.’

’Her willingness to wait this late for dinner pretty much confirmed she was planning on sleeping here tonight.’

’We should have a little something to drink.’

Li You asked Chu Yiwei, "Will you be drinking tonight, Teacher Chu?"

Chu Yiwei replied, "If you two are drinking, I’ll have a little. But no more than last time."

Li You nodded. "No problem, we’ll take it easy too."

In the end, Li You and Ling Xiaoru each had a bowl, while Chu Yiwei had half a bowl.

Chu Yiwei was a little tipsy, but it was nothing serious.

...

「The next day.」

Li You was up at six in the morning. He needed to make extra braised chicken and steamed pork with preserved greens today.

After a flurry of work in the kitchen, Ling Xiaoru and Chu Yiwei came downstairs together at seven-thirty.

They were up early today, too.

"Why didn’t you sleep in a little?" Li You asked.

"We were too excited thinking about the tournament starting soon to stay in bed," they both said.

Li You smiled. "What can I get you two to eat?"

They both chose Yangchun Noodles.

Just as Li You finished preparing their noodles, a group of a dozen or so customers arrived outside.

"Morning, Boss! I’ll have a large bowl of beef noodles."

"A large bowl of beef noodles for me, too."

"I’ll have a large bowl of Yangchun Noodles."

"..."

The customers all ordered their noodles. The reason they were here so early was, of course, the tournament.

Tournament or not, they still needed breakfast.

Li You took their orders one by one.

"By the way, Boss, what’s the total number of people signed up for the tournament?" a customer asked.

Li You replied, "439 as of right now."

The customers all nodded. Given how much buzz there had been over the past two days, they weren’t at all surprised by that number.

But even though they weren’t surprised, they were still deeply moved.

An arcade game that had been abandoned by the mainstream market long ago had managed to attract so many entrants in just a day and a half.

Besides the game itself being a true classic, the more important reason was clearly that this tournament was organized by the Boss.

It was because of him and his restaurant that everyone was so excited and interested in the competition.

They felt incredibly lucky that the Boss had opened a restaurant like this here.

"By the way, Boss, did any women sign up?" another customer asked, shaking off his reverie.

"There are! About ten of them. And there are some real beauties among them."

After Mu Qingye registered yesterday, several other women had signed up as well.

This was another pleasant surprise for Li You.

And when the customers heard that about ten women had signed up, they were just as surprised and delighted.

Women were actually signing up to play this game? That made things even more exciting.

...