Translator: Noodletown Translations Editor: Noodletown Translations
“Hahahahaha!” Jereff, who was not far away from Mu Fan, noticed the situation over here and laughed loudly at him. “Are you daydreaming? Or are you already scared by a sandbag? It’s not a place for you to play house, you know? Hahahahaha!”
Mu Fan punched straight at the target with a steady rhythm repetitively, going left, right, left, and right. It was like… It was rhythmic like his breathing when he was asleep. If someone looked closely enough, it wouldn’t be hard to notice that his eyes weren’t focused on anything, and a bit of saliva was dangling at the corner of his mouth.
Jereff felt disappointed that Mu Fan didn’t respond to his mockery, so he felt bored. It wasn’t fitting for him to do anything else, so he decided to leave the kid who was zoning out alone.
Five minutes passed. Everyone was practicing, and Mu Fan was punching with a steady rhythm.
Fifteen minutes passed. Everyone was still practicing, and Mu Fan still continued to throw punches with a steady rhythm…
Half an hour passed. Some people were taking a water break, yet Mu Fan still kept on punching at the same tempo. Few people had noticed Mu Fan by now. If they were sensitive enough, they would have noticed that he was punching with the exact same rhythm that he had before, but the target sandbag hadn’t moved a bit.
Fifty minutes passed. Most people had stopped to rest and chat with each other, including Jereff. However, Mu Fan was still throwing his punches at the target with the exact same steady rhythm. But this time, he attracted more attention as some people were starting to chatter about him.
“This boy seems okay. He has been going at it for 50 minutes straight.”
“Look at the target, it hasn’t moved a bit. He’s not using much strength, and you are only hearing the sounds.”
“Jereff’s heading over again; is he going to teach that boy a lesson since he doesn’t like him?”
“Shh… Look, Jereff’s ‘patting’ the boy! Is that boy going to get pushed onto the ground from that? Hahaha.”
Jereff took a sip of water and frowned as he walked over to Mu Fan, but Mu Fan didn’t notice anything as he continued to throw his punches in a steady manner with his eyes still out of focus.
“Hey, boy, use some strength.” Jereff sneered with a bad intention and secretly added some strength when he slapped his left hand onto Mu Fan’s left shoulder as if they were best buddies.
He knew that most people that weigh less than 100 kg wouldn’t be able to withstand his slap. This Mu Fan kid weighs 70 kg at most, and he keeps on punching non-stop like an idiot and didn’t respond to anything like an idiot. Is he here to be a bodybuilder? All in all, Jereff found the existence of this boy to be very irritating!
However, just like with Man Kun, the situation that Jereff anticipated did not happen. He felt as if his hand had slammed onto a rock, and all he really felt was Mu Fan’s joint movement as he pulled back his hand.
“Boy!” Jereff felt embarrassed again and smiled viciously at Mu Fan who slowly turned back towards him.
All he saw was that the pair of unfocused eyes shook a little and concentrated onto him.
Mu Fan stared at the big man before him as he raised his brows with joy. “Is it lunchtime now?”
“Huh?” Jereff was confused and couldn’t keep up his aggression anymore.
“Is it lunchtime now?” Mu Fan raised his head at Jereff and asked again.
“Oh. Oh yeah, almost.” Jereff was completely dumbfounded as it was the first time that he met someone like this.
“Okay, thanks!” Having heard that it was almost lunchtime, Mu Fan became energetic again like when he first walked into the Budokan.
“Kid, you are thinking about eating already when you haven’t even worked yet? How much can you even eat with that slim figure of yours? I hope you don’t choke from eating too much,” Jereff mocked Mu Fan after coming back to his senses.
“What’s ‘choke’?” Mu Fan never had enough to eat before, so he didn’t even have the concept of being full from eating, let alone what it meant to choke on too much food; he really didn’t know.
“You!” The blade scar on Jereff’s forehead was even twitching from anger. If no one was watching, he really would have punched Mu Fan; he wanted to send this boy flying.
“How much you can eat is proportional to your strength, boy.” After Jereff had retired from mercenary work, he was becoming more and more ordinary, and his mind had become more twisted as he worked at the Budokan for the last two years.
“Don’t pretend like you’ve never eaten before and then try to sneak food out too after you fill your stomach. The Budokan prohibits people from taking out food, or they’ll beat you until you’re crippled if you are caught.”
“It’s lunchtime!!!” someone suddenly shouted, and Mu Fan’s eyes glistened brightly as he charged towards the cafeteria, completely ignoring Jereff who stood in front of him.
…
Cafeteria No. 3 was for Budokan staff only and it was open and spacious. Because it was the closest to the first floor and lunchtime just began, there weren’t many staff there yet when these practice partners entered. Everybody was in a line, taking out two boxes of nutritious meals from the counter behind the window and then seating themselves elsewhere to enjoy their meal. The difference between this cafeteria and the others was that it compressed cheap synthesized nutrients and added in different flavors to make it taste like different things. It contained rich nutrients, providing enough energy, protein, vitamins, and etc. for the staff to carry on with their day. But, the texture was far inferior compared to normal cooked food, and it was much easier to get full. An average person would be full from just one meal box. However, the energy content per 100 grams of the nutritious meals provided by the Budokan was still four times more compared to the synthesized food eaten by the poor and impoverished.
Even though it didn’t taste delicious, everyone still came and ate here since the staff meals were free and the nutrition content was high. Then at night, they would use some of the money that they earned to go out and eat some actual food or drink beer.
“Two boxes. Next… Next.”
The dining staff were handing out the nutritious meal boxes in an orderly manner.
“Oh, Kemal. Three boxes for you.”
Mu Fan’s eyes widened when he saw the tall man in front of him take three standard meal boxes from the dining staff.
“Two boxes for you. Next… Huh? Why aren’t you moving, there are people waiting behind you. Hurry up.”
Mu Fan held onto his two meal boxes and didn’t move a bit as he stared at the dining staff. He then pointed at the man named Kemal who had just left and asked in displeasure, “Why can he have three boxes? Is there a limit to how much you are allowed to eat?”
Everybody around Mu Fan was stunned for a bit before they burst out and laughed at him; tears even came out in the eyes of some of the people.
“Hahaha! I was right! You’re definitely wired up differently, even asking about how much nutritious meal you can eat! Of course, Kemal can eat three boxes with his figure. Do you think you can too? This is compressed food; it’s going to stuff you to death if you want to eat more of it. Hahahaha.” Loud mockery sounded from behind. Jereff had just witnessed the scene as he happened to walk into the cafeteria, and no one had anything to say when he squeezed himself in front of them in a rude manner since he was built like a bear.
Jereff walked towards Mu Fan and sneered in mockery as he said, “Watch this, boy.”
“Where’s my meal?”
“Oh, here you go; five boxes!”
Jereff held his five meal boxes with a single hand and patted Mu Fan with his right hand as he pointed his jaw at his meal boxes. “See this? Appetite is proportionate to strength.”
“Then, I want ten boxes for now!” Mu Fan looked seriously at the dining staff who was wearing a white chef hat.
“Hahahahahahaha.” The crowd laughed out loud again.
The staff member with the white hat sighed helplessly as he quickly handed Mu Fan one more meal box to make the total three. “Finish these first and then come again. Prove your appetite, and we’ll give you more. Remember that you are prohibited from bringing any leftovers home.”
Mu Fan nodded as he grabbed the three meal boxes before saying seriously, “I’ll come and pick up the rest after; please have them prepared.”
The crowd laughed even harder having heard what he said; some of them couldn’t even straighten their backs.
…
Mu Fan carried his three meal boxes to a table and sat down. He laid out the three boxes onto the table, and his stomach growled loudly when the smell of synthesized meat filled the air as he opened up the meal boxes. He had never had this much food in one sitting!!! Mu Fan had lived his whole life not having enough to eat, so this time, he already couldn’t wait any longer to dig in. He scooped out one-fifth of the food from one box and swallowed it without even chewing on it. The rough texture didn’t stop him from eating all of that in one bite.
Mu Fan’s eyes widened in an instant as he could feel the hunger of his stomach! The lower-grade synthesized food in the slums that he had before felt like it would disappear instantly after reaching his stomach, but now, he could feel the food expanding in his stomach for a second before disappearing. It was much better at filling him, even though it only lasted a second! He could finally feel the energy running to his body from the food, and it was thrilling. He could even feel his body’s desperate desire for even more energy! This synthesized nutritious food definitely didn’t taste as good as the meat of the beast that he had hunted, but he was able to absorb the nutrients faster from this. This was the type of food he was looking for.
“I like this!”