Serial Player
Chapter 379 - 57 Noodle Shop_2

Chapter 379: Chapter 57 Noodle Shop_2

Hu Li could only complain a little.

"After all these years, the once No. 1 noodle shop owner has finally become a greasy middle-aged man." Li Changhe sighed, slurping his beef noodles.

He mumbled, "Hu, your noodles are not as delicious as the girl’s."

"Nonsense, she learned from me. How could she be better than her master?" Hu Li snorted proudly, "If you two weren’t old customers, I wouldn’t have taught her."

"A student surpasses the master." Li Changhe responded.

The two were old acquaintances. When Li Changhe and Xiao Nan first came to eat noodles, they came to this noodle shop.

In a sense, Hu Li watched them grow up.

The photo in Xiao Nan’s room was even taken by Hu Li himself.

After finishing a bowl of noodles, Hu Li burped contentedly and looked at the young man in front of him with some emotion, "You’ve both grown up. When you first came here, you were only this tall."

He gestured on the dining table.

"Now the girl has become a graceful beauty, and you’ve become handsome and dashing too."

Li Changhe didn’t mind, every time he came to work, Hu Li always reminisced about his lost youth.

"So, why did you think of coming to help today? Where’s the girl? It’s rare not to see you two together." Hu Li asked while picking his teeth.

"Oh, she went home for the New Year."

"Meeting the parents already? You’ll be busy."

"Uh... it’s fine."

"Don’t underestimate this, especially the girl’s father. Those wild boys who want to steal his daughter will not be let off easily." Hu Li looked serious, "I have a daughter too, so I can understand."

"Your daughter is so young, do you really need to worry so much?"

"Hmph, as the father of a girl, you have three enemies in life. The first one is your love rival, you must win. The second one is your wife’s father, in his eyes, you are the thief who stole his beloved daughter. The third one is your own son-in-law. The logic is the same as the second one! Get it?" Hu Li showed off his plump arm, making a muscle-flexing gesture.

"Oh, I see." Li Changhe nodded. He read in a book that men would inevitably meet many enemies when entering the world. Hu Li was right.

"Besides, you say she’s young... do you have the right to say that?" Hu Li pointed to the photo cabinet of the noodle shop, where there were still some photos left by customers for their memories.

Among them, a photo of a young boy and girl was very noticeable.

Li Changhe thought for a moment and admitted that he really had no right to say that. Although they were just friends at the time, no one would believe him if he said so now.

As for why he was working, there were mainly two reasons.

The first reason was naturally that he was running out of money. Although being a [Player] meant he didn’t need to worry too much about this, it would be hard to change the habit he had already developed.

The second reason was a personal habit. Who knows how many [Players] were there in the great mud pit of Yanyun? Li Changhe usually worked so hard, but suddenly he would become very well-behaved. It might be suspicious. Although the chances were slim, it was better to be careful.

So, Li Changhe usually consciously worked in crowded places to help and blend in.

As the two chatted, Li Changhe’s gaze shifted, and he saw a seven or eight-year-old girl hopping into the noodle shop.

Her little face was flushed from the cold wind outside, wrapped in a thick cotton jacket, looking very cute.

"Oh, my baby girl." Hu Li immediately dropped his chopsticks and went to greet his daughter.

"Li, I’ll transfer your salary later. You can go first." Hu Li turned back to Li Changhe, but saw his gaze looking towards the door.

"Boss, don’t rush to close the door. There’s a customer coming in." Li Changhe looked at the entrance.

Hu Li was stunned, then saw two people enter the noodle shop.

The taller one looked around thirty years old, with a robust physique and about 1.9 meters tall.

He wore a military coat and a cotton hat.

The shorter one was about the same age, with a height of around 1.5 meters. He wore a dark cotton jacket, sunglasses, and a face mask.

His hands were tucked into his clothes, seemingly holding something.

"How come there are still customers this late?" Hu Li scratched his head, let his daughter go inside to play, and greeted the two men, "What would you like to eat?"

"Seven bowls of beef noodles and five braised chicken legs to go," replied the tall man after glancing at the menu on the wall. The short man sat in the corner of the noodle shop without saying a word.

They didn’t seem to be from Yanyun, or even from Nanzhe, based on their accents.

Hu Li didn’t pay it any mind and spoke to Li Changhe before entering the kitchen, "Wait a bit, Li. I’ll get you a chicken leg for a late night snack."

"Okay, thanks, boss." Li Changhe responded with a smile, but his attention remained focused on the two men.

It was normal for Hu Li not to notice anything, but Li Changhe was always on alert, sending his Black Hawk to hover in the sky for surveillance whenever he had a chance.

These two men had followed the girl all the way back, and the short man had tucked his hand into his clothes as if he was holding something.

At first, Li Changhe didn’t care, thinking they were just strolling around or it was a coincidence. After all, the noodle shop was closing later than usual due to Li Changhe, and it was the only lit-up eatery on the old street.

But after the short man entered the shop, his gaze lingered on the little girl for a moment, making Li Changhe feel something was off.

Did they think wearing sunglasses would prevent others from noticing them?

Unfortunately for them, with Li Changhe’s level 12 Physique, he could even hear their gradually accelerating heartbeats if he focused.

Now, it was past nine in the evening, and these two grown men had followed a little girl through the sparsely populated old street. Their heartbeats started to speed up when they saw the girl enter the noodle shop. What were they nervous about, or what were they plotting?

Li Changhe mentally reviewed the nearby terrain while cleaning up the tableware on the dining table.

At this point, Hu Li had packed up the noodles and chicken legs and handed them to the tall man.

"You guys aren’t from around here, right?" Hu Li greeted.

"Yeah," the tall man replied as he handed over the money, "We’re here for work. Our contractor just brought us to Yanyun. We’re not familiar with the area and it took us a while to find an open noodle shop. We’re starving."

"Well, you’re in luck. Not to brag, but my place has the best noodles on the old street," Hu Li chuckled, "Come back next time and eat here. If you take the noodles with you, they might go stiff."

"Alright. We’ll definitely come if we get a chance." the tall man responded, and he and the short man picked up the noodles and left the shop as if they were ordinary customers buying late-night snacks.

Li Changhe controlled the Black Hawk to follow them, and accepted the late night snack prepared by Hu Li, saying, "Hu, be extra careful these days with the New Year coming. There are more thieves and other dangers around this time."

"I know. You should go home early, too. I have to get up early tomorrow to take my daughter to her grandmother’s house," Hu Li, who hadn’t noticed anything, waved his hand and said, "You shouldn’t tire yourself out too much either."

...

Li Changhe controlled the Black Hawk to lock onto the location of those two men and saw them boarding a van on the side of the street. After circling around the nearby area, they headed west of Yanyun.

He followed them with the Black Hawk.

Li Changhe was certain that those two men were up to something, and they might even be part of a criminal group.

There were too many [Players] in Yanyun, creating many uncertainties.

The safest method was to find their address first and then notify [Great Wall] or the police to take action.

This was the safest approach for [Players] and would not pose any danger. It was the most reliable way for [Players] to handle things.

As Li Changhe was thinking this, his eyes suddenly ached.

The Black Hawk’s view, which was about to enter the city with the van, vanished all of a sudden.

"Damn it!" Li Changhe instantly understood something - his Black Hawk had been attacked! But by who?

[Player]? Impossible, those two were ordinary people.

Or, had the Black Hawk inadvertently flown into another [Player]’s perception range while following them and got eliminated on the spot?

Well, if Li Changhe found a summoned creature above his head, he would either pretend to be an ordinary person and act oblivious, or he would eliminate it without being noticed by anyone.

Li Changhe released the Black Hawk again, but he couldn’t find any trace of the van, and the [Hawkeye Demon Eyes]’s tracking couldn’t pick up its trail among the traffic on the busy road.

"Damn it, I’ve lost them," he said.