The Disguise Falls Off! Professor Song's "Death Stare"

Jiang Jianguo swallowed hard, his Adam's apple bobbing up and down.

Trying to let my gaze wander naturally, pretending to be indifferent, I picked up the all-English financial newspaper again.

But his eyes, hidden behind his reading glasses, kept glancing uncontrollably in Song Wan's direction.

The phrase "fly restaurant" was like a bomb with a countdown timer ticking in his mind.

Too much talk leads to mistakes; the ancients were right.

Song Wan ignored her husband's unease and didn't even look up at him.

Her slender fingers slid across the screen at a leisurely pace, occasionally tapping lightly on the edge.

The interface displayed the homepage of "Lin's Restaurant," a restaurant hidden deep in Nanluoguxiang without even a proper signboard.

Because of its short opening time and lack of commercial promotion, the store's review page appears somewhat deserted.

There were only a pitiful three or five comments, most of which were perfunctory evaluations with just a few words.

But among these few reviews, the one at the very top is as dazzling as a searchlight in the dark.

That was an article that was automatically tagged as "high-quality long review" by the system.

The piece is outrageously long, roughly estimated to be over two thousand words.

Her gaze fell on the account named "User 9527".

The profile picture is a generic, gray, system-default silhouette.

But the very first sentence of the full text made Song Wan's eyes almost overflow with mockery.

"Having navigated the business world for decades, I have tasted countless delicacies. Today, I happened to pass by this obscure little shop and would normally have looked down on it."

This is a condescending and old-fashioned opening.

This arrogant sense of superiority, looking down on everyone else.

It's as if it was directly copied verbatim from the annual address of a multinational corporation's chairman.

Song Wan patiently read through the text, just like grading a student's paper, word by word.

"The selection of ingredients is extremely rigorous. The fruit acids of oranges and the lipids of crab roe achieve a perfect molecular fusion at high temperatures."

"But in my opinion, the timing was clearly underestimated. Young people are impetuous and lack depth and experience in their work."

"What kind of precious ingredients haven't I seen? How could I be impressed by such common goods?"

"Although the boss is young, he is steady in his work and has rare traditional virtues in his dealings with people."

"They demonstrated exceptional humanistic care and moral character towards the elderly and vulnerable."

The entire piece, a full two thousand words, covered everything from ingredients and cooking time to plating and service, and was "criticized" mercilessly.

She knew all too well the bluster and cowardice behind those words.

This lengthy review is riddled with logical inconsistencies and flaws.

For example, after each harsh denigration, he would add a seemingly innocuous sentence like, "Although... the meat is quite tender and melts in your mouth."

What's this? A slap followed by a sweet treat?

For example, he habitually adds three exclamation marks to the end of all sentences that express strong emotions.

It's as if they simply carved the three characters "Jiang Jianguo" in bold regular script directly onto the gate of that courtyard house in Nanluoguxiang.

"Um... why is the newspaper being delivered so slowly today? Where's the butler?"

Jiang Jianguo made small talk, his eyes darting around, but he didn't dare look at the other end of the long table.

Song Wan didn't respond; she didn't even lift her eyelids.

She simply placed her phone face down on the table.

A slender index finger presses against the back of the phone and gently pushes it along the smooth marble tabletop.

The phone glided half a meter like a curling stone, making a barely perceptible friction sound, and came to a steady stop in front of Jiang Jianguo.

"Jianguo, take a look at this."

Song Wan's voice was very soft, revealing no emotion whatsoever.

But this was precisely her most dangerous moment.

Jiang Jianguo felt that his back was completely soaked with cold sweat, and his shirt was sticking to his back, making him feel extremely uncomfortable.

He steeled himself and, as if looking at some monstrous flood, slowly shifted his gaze to the lit screen.

I only glanced at it.

The muscles in his right cheek began to twitch uncontrollably.

The densely packed two-thousand-word comment on the screen was like two thousand resounding slaps, lined up to hit his old face.

"What... what is this? The words are too small and too densely packed, I can't see them clearly."

Jiang Jianguo quickly looked away, tactically adjusting his reading glasses on the bridge of his nose, trying to deceive the observer.

He picked up the newspaper again and pretended to study a stock that had plummeted.

Song Wan clearly had no intention of leaving him any way out.

She leaned back slightly against the mahogany chair, her hands casually folded in front of her.

Then, she spoke in a slow, clear voice, with a hint of intellectual mockery.

In front of his bewildered daughter, he read aloud the last paragraph of the commentary.

"...Although this boy is arrogant and rude, and doesn't know his place, his cooking is also full of flaws and not worthy of being served in a refined setting."

"But considering their respect for the elderly and care for the young, and the fact that they waived the meal fee, I'll reluctantly give them five stars, hoping they'll behave themselves."

Song Wan read it aloud with perfect pronunciation, each word like a heavy hammer blow.

She emphasized the words "free meals" and paused for half a second.

The restaurant fell into a deathly silence.

The air seemed to have been sucked out in that instant, and even breathing felt superfluous.

Jiang Jianguo stared with his mouth agape, like a fish that had been thrown onto the shore and was on the verge of death.

His complexion quickly changed from a normal rosy color to an eerie liver color, and a fine layer of sweat appeared on his forehead.

Jiang Ruoyun sat diagonally across from him, propping her chin up with one hand and idly poking at her fried egg with a fork.

The moment I heard those words, I froze as if I'd been electrocuted.

She suddenly looked up, her gaze shifting back and forth between her father's purplish-red old face and the cell phone on the table.

My brain went blank for two seconds.

She grabbed the phone on the table and quickly scanned the familiar layout and grammar.

"Pfft—"

Jiang Ruoyun could no longer hold back. She clutched her stomach and burst into laughter, completely abandoning any semblance of a socialite.

He was laughing so hard that tears were almost streaming down his face, and his shoulders were shaking violently.

Jiang Ruoyun's voice rose eight octaves, and her hand trembled as she pointed at the phone screen.

"So that old man from last night was you, Dad!"

"Didn't you point your finger at me before and say that you wouldn't go even when that place was offered to you? Didn't you say it was a waste of life, a sign of self-degradation?"

"So after all that, you not only went, but you also got Lin Mo to give you a free meal? He saw you dressed like an old man in a t-shirt and thought you were a homeless person from the alley, hahaha!"

Jiang Jianguo felt as if his face had been ripped off and was being frantically rubbed against the rough floor.

The unprecedented sense of despair and shame made him wish he could perform a magic trick to disappear into the ground on the spot.

"Nonsense! Utter rubbish!"

Jiang Jianguo jumped up from his chair like a cat whose tail had been stepped on.

The heavy mahogany dining chair made a harsh scraping sound on the floor.

His face flushed red, and he frantically waved his hands in the air, trying to dispel the irrefutable evidence.

"Coincidence! Pure coincidence! Where on this document is my name, Jiang Jianguo? There are plenty of people in the world who call themselves 'this old man'!"

Jiang Jianguo was so anxious that his voice cracked, and he pointed to the ceiling and swore.

"Who do you think I am, Jiang Jianguo? How many five-star hotels do I own? Would I go to some run-down place without even a sign and dine and dash?!"

He was panting heavily, his mind racing as the richest man tried to find a logical excuse.

"These are paid trolls! They're definitely hired by our competitors! This is a tactic of corporate espionage!"

"Someone is deliberately misappropriating my writing style to spread rumors online, attempting to tarnish my illustrious image and destabilize our group's stock price!"

Jiang Ruoyun leaned back in her chair, laughing uproariously at her father's stubborn and ridiculous behavior.

"Stealing your writing style? Dad, do you think you're a famous writer?"

She ruthlessly switched to taunting mode, delivering precise and scathing blows.

"What kind of corporate spy would spend two thousand words writing a review for a small restaurant, and then insincerely give it five stars?"

"Besides, you're probably the richest man in the world who would make such a basic mistake as misspelling the character '免' in '免以其难'."

When his daughter ruthlessly exposed him, Jiang Jianguo felt a sharp pain in his heart.

He had previously belittled that Lin fellow to the point of being worthless, and even forbade his daughter from leaving the house.

As a result, he went to someone's restaurant in the middle of the night and ate and drank recklessly, without paying at the end.

This person has completely lost face.

"What do you know! I was... I was just traveling incognito!"

Jiang Jianguo straightened his chest, forcibly maintaining the last shred of the dignity that belonged to the head of the family.

"I was there to scout him out for you! To see what kind of person he really is. I didn't pay him; I was testing whether he knows the rules! To see his self-control when faced with the temptation of money!"

The more he made up his story, the more reasonable it seemed to him, and he even glared at his daughter with a sense of self-righteousness.

"How can we know if he's after our Jiang family's wealth without putting him to a test?"

however.

Song Wan simply watched his clumsy performance in silence.

A faint, cold smile played at the corners of his lips.

"Oh."

A very soft, cold laugh escaped from Song Wan's lips.

Immediately afterwards, she stopped smiling and fixed a cold and oppressive "death stare" directly into Jiang Jianguo's eyes.

Just that one glance.

Jiang Jianguo's newly established psychological defenses crumbled instantly.

His eloquent defense got stuck in his throat.

He opened his mouth, but couldn't utter a single syllable.

He lowered his hands silently, like a middle school student caught doing something wrong by the headmaster.

He sat back down obediently in his chair, not daring to make a loud sound even when breathing.

Song Wan looked away and stopped looking at him.

She calmly stood up and reached out to pull the cashmere shawl draped over the back of the chair.

She casually draped it over her shoulders, gracefully smoothing the wrinkles at the edges.

The playful and teasing expression on her face had faded.

Instead, he wore a serious and solemn expression.

"Since you, an old man who is always picky to the core, have already personally 'inspected' it and even lowered yourself to give it five stars."

Song Wan's voice echoed in the empty restaurant, carrying an irresistible decisiveness.

She paused for a moment, her gaze lingering on the fallen leaves of late autumn outside the window.

"It seems that this young man named Lin Mo does indeed have some real skills."

Song Wan ignored her husband, who was frantically wiping away sweat and sitting on pins and needles beside her.

She turned her head and looked at Jiang Ruoyun, who was still gloating, her tone becoming extremely serious.

"Ruoyun, wait for me at the shop tomorrow at noon. I'm going to meet him in person and see what kind of person he really is."