"A new product crowdfunding campaign?" Everyone looked puzzled.
"Boss Mai, do you want to borrow money?" Mo Bai pondered Mai Ge's words carefully before asking.
"A new product! Boss Mai, are you planning to sell other dishes at your restaurant?" Ha Beng's eyes lit up. Yang Zhou Fried Rice was delicious, but it would be nice to have other equally delicious options to change things up.
Kang Di and Ha Ga also looked at Mai Ge with some doubt. This owner seemed kind, but always maintained a certain distance. Asking for money so soon seemed a bit strange.
"Yes, I'm planning to launch a new product, but purchasing equipment and ingredients requires a sum of money. The restaurant's own operations can cover that this month, but I want to enrich the menu as soon as possible, so I'm launching a crowdfunding campaign. You can think of it as a voluntary borrow money. I'm in charge of initiating the campaign; the decision to accept or refuse is up to you." Mai Ge smiled and nodded.
Then he took out the six crowdfunding forms he had just prepared and placed them on the table, and continued, "New product crowdfunding, 500 gold coins per share. If you subscribe to one share, you can have priority to try the new product and receive two free Yang Zhou Fried Rice. You can use the crowdfunding funds to offset your spending in the restaurant this month. At the end of the month, you can get a full refund for any unused amount."
"Five hundred gold coins isn't even enough for a hundred servings of Yang Zhou Fried Rice. We're going to be in Chaos City for a month, so getting to eat Boss Mai's new dishes as soon as possible is the most important thing. I'll take two shares for a thousand gold coins." Ha Beng said generously, waving his hand. He pulled two subscription slips from the table and placed a money bag on it, saying, "Here are one hundred dragon coins."
"Okay, thank you." Mai Ge glanced at the full money bag, smiled, and nodded, not showing too much excitement.
"Then I'll also subscribe to two shares. Six servings of Yang Zhou Fried Rice a day will last until the end of the month, plus four extra servings." Mo Bai thought for a moment, then took two subscription slips and said to Mai Ge, "Boss Mai, I don't have that many gold coins on me right now. I'll bring them to you after I eat."
"Okay, sure." Mai Ge nodded, and in the blink of an eye, he had two thousand gold coins in his hands.
"Then I'll take one too. Please let me know in advance when new products come out." Kang Di smiled, stood up, took one, untied the purse at his waist, grabbed two handfuls of dragon coins, counted out fifty, and placed them aside.
"I… one." Ha Ga chuckled, took the last one, patted Ha Beng's shoulder, and said in orcish language, "You pay for it for me first."
"Big brother, don't you have your own money?" Ha Beng looked at him, somewhat puzzled.
"It's happier to spend other people's money first." Ha Ga said with a simple smile.
"..." Ha Beng was speechless. He could only take out another fifty dragon coins and put them on the table. He felt like his older brother had become a little different.
"Daddy, are all these dragon coins ours?" Amy looked at the mountain of glittering dragon coins on the table, her mouth slightly agape as she looked at Mai Ge.
"No, these are the start-up funds raised by our guests for the new product. They're just temporarily held here so Amy can enjoy the new food sooner." Mai Ge smiled and shook his head.
"Then the Loudmouth is being very well-behaved today." Amy gave Ha Beng a rather appreciative look, then happily began counting the dragon coins.
Being called well-behaved by a little girl made Ha Beng feel a little happy, but then he thought about it and felt something was off, so he just chuckled awkwardly.
Mai Ge smiled at the four people and said, "Thank you all for your generous subscriptions. I will expedite the launch of the new product and will keep you informed of its progress as soon as possible. If all goes well, it should be launched in these two days."
"It's alright, I trust Mai Ge's cooking skills." Ha Beng waved his hand dismissively, then asked curiously, "But is there any meat in the new product? Big chunks, the kind I love—I love eating big pieces of meat."
"There's meat in it. You'll try the rest when it comes out." Mai Ge said with a smile, maintaining the mystery of the new product.
"As long as there's meat, that's fine. Let's start with the Yang Zhou Fried Rice. I'm really hungry this time." Although Ha Beng was itching to talk about it, he didn't press Mai Ge if he didn't want to.
Of course, he was mainly hesitant because he felt Amy's sudden gaze on him.
Mai Ge put all the dragon coins in the drawer. After greeting everyone, Amy happily sat down behind the counter to count money, thoroughly enjoying herself.
Mai Ge started making fried rice for everyone. Once Mo Bai brought the thousand gold coins, they could buy all the ingredients to complete the mission.
However, although the time allocation for learning in the Chef God Space had been adjusted, it still required some practice time, so he would have to wait until night to enter. There was no rush to think about that now.
Breakfast was relatively less busy. Besides Mo Bai and his group, there were two merchants who had eaten there last night. They said they were leaving Chaos City for the capital of the Los Empire today and would probably not be back for several months. They wanted to enjoy this delicious food one more time before setting off.
"Little boss, eighty dragon coins, two hundred gold coins, please count them." As the morning business hours ended, Mai Ge was wiping the tables when Mo Bai pushed open the door, placed a bag of money on the table, and smiled at Amy, who was slumped over it in a daze.
"Really?" Amy's eyes lit up. She reached out and somewhat laboriously pulled the money bag closer to her, beginning to count the gold coins one by one, separating the gold coins and dragon coins into two piles.
"Boss Mai, I'll get back to work then." Mo Bai said to Mai Ge again.
"Okay, thank you." Mai Ge nodded, watching Mo Bai leave, glancing at Amy happily counting coins, and continued wiping the table.
"Daddy, that's exactly eighty dragon coins and two hundred gold coins!" Amy finished counting the money and looked at Mai Ge as he finished arranged.
"Little Amy, you're great! Let's put the money in the cash register, and then we'll review the multiplication tables again later." Mai Ge nodded with a smile. After two days of practice, Amy had almost completely mastered the multiplication tables.
"But Daddy, Little Amy had discovered a secret. Don't be sad, okay? It seems some money has been stolen from our cash register. Yesterday, when Little Amy counted it, there was more than this much, but this morning I found half was missing." Amy said to Mai Ge, her expression worried.
Mai Ge was a little surprised. He hadn't expected Amy to remember how much money they made each day and to be so worried about him being upset. He smiled and explained, "It wasn't stolen. We needed to buy ingredients for fried rice, which cost some money, so the cash in the register decreases everyday, but it will definitely keep increasing."
"Oh, I see. Let's put the money in and buy some new food." Amy's face brightened with joy again, full of anticipation.
"Okay." Mai Ge helped put all the money into the cash register, then said in his mind, "Purchase ingredients worth 3000 gold coins."
"3000 gold coins cash ingredient purchase completed. Mission successful." the system's voice rang out.