Journey to the West: Starting by taking Sun Wukong as my disciple!-Chapter 383: Obsession, Crazy for Sneaking a Bite

Chapter 383: Chapter 383: Obsession, Crazy for Sneaking a Bite

Fortunately, the last bit of self-control he had woke him up, and while the other disciples were not paying attention, he vigorously stirred the spoon again.

Because it was intentional, this time more soup spilled out, and he hurriedly licked it clean.

The flavor this time was even richer; where the first taste of umami was the size of a peanut, fragrant but fleeting.

This time, the umami was like a bowl of tea, rich and full-bodied, even with a lingering aftertaste.

After the initial attempt, the disciple couldn’t stop himself; his explorations grew bolder.

Soup alone gradually failed to satisfy him, so he turned his attention to the ingredients.

The first victim was the mushroom; although it was drenched with a broth made from various meats, it was still just a mushroom.

The disciple thought, "It’s just one mushroom, mushrooms aren’t a meat dish; if I eat this one bite, it wouldn’t count as breaking my fast, after all, it’s just a mushroom."

Thus, behind the backs of the other disciples, he put the mushroom into his mouth.

Upon entry, the first taste was the broth, but unlike simply sipping soup, the mushroom’s umami was stronger, not only delicious but also satisfying.

Having just smelled it for so long, the fulfillment of finally tasting it filled him entirely.

While appearing calm and composed on the surface, he had already bitten into the plump, savory mushroom.

The collision between the teeth and mushroom began, and ultimately the mushroom could not withstand the hardness of the teeth and was bitten into halves, quarters, eighths, then pulverized.

The mushroom’s flavor intensified, its umami and unique fragrance bursting forth in the mouth until it slid down the throat.

What remained was the mushroom’s lingering scent and the taste of the broth made from meats, which even yielded a hint of sweetness after swallowing the mushroom.

There’s a saying among the common people, "Everything is difficult at the beginning, but once that’s over, everything else falls into place."

After eating a mushroom, the satisfaction that filled him vanished once he swallowed it, leaving behind emptiness a hundred, a thousand times greater than before.

Therefore, he stirred more forcefully inside the small bowl, searching for another mushroom.

Unfortunately, the greater the hope, the greater the disappointment; each ingredient within was precisely portioned by Sun Wukong, with only one of each type per bowl, to maintain the diner’s sense of novelty.

Having searched the entire bowl without finding a second mushroom, he decided to target the next ingredient.

This time he had his eye on the scallop.

The scallop was cleaned meticulously and, at a glance, seemed not much different from the mushroom he had before.

But upon closer inspection, one could see that the scallop and mushroom were completely different ingredients.

Using the spoon, the disciple scooped up the scallop and shakily brought it to his lips. Was he really going to eat it?

This time there was no excuse, the scallop was a meat dish, a living creature before it became an ingredient.

If he ate this scallop, he would truly be breaking his fast, and he might even be expelled from Buddhism, rendering his hundred years of cultivation fruitless.

In fact, from the moment he tasted the bit of soup that had splashed out of the bowl, he had already been breaking the rules.

He could evade responsibility for the subsequent actions with other excuses, but with this scallop, there was truly no room for justification; eating it was breaking the fast, with no other excuse to be found.

"What are you doing?" the senior disciple saw his junior raising the spoon and asked, "You’re not thinking about eating, are you? That would be breaking the precepts."

The junior hurriedly set the spoon down. "What are you talking about, senior brother? I had no plans to eat."

"Is that so?" The senior brother still harbored some doubts.

"However." The junior licked his lips, the residual flavors of the dish still on his tongue, "Senior brother, don’t you really want to try it? Such a fragrant dish, it must be worth tasting even if it means breaking the precepts and being expelled from Buddhism, don’t you think?"

Caught off guard by his words, the senior brother also gazed at the small bowl in his hand. Indeed, as his junior brother had said, he too had been longing for the food inside the bowl, thinking it might just be worth breaking the precepts and being expelled from Buddhism if he could have just one bite.

Logically speaking, not a single Buddhist disciple who came to the Imperial Kitchen lacked the desire to eat these dishes—if they truly didn’t want to eat, they would not have come here.

Yet despite their cravings for the dish, deep inside, they still retained a shred of rationality.

They knew in their hearts that the dish was meat, which they absolutely could not eat—doing so would mean breaking their precepts.

But with so many people around, who could guarantee that none of them would eventually succumb to temptation and actually eat the dish, thus breaking their precepts?

Actually, deep down, they were all hoping someone would eat the dish first, setting a precedent, giving those who hadn’t yet broken the precepts some justification.

When the Buddha Ancestor sought to place blame, they could then argue that it was someone else who had broken the precepts first, setting an example for them.

The junior’s questioning caught his senior brother off guard, and he was somewhat at a loss.

In his heart, he truly wanted to eat; no one could smell such a fragrant dish and have it in front of them without wanting to eat it.

But it was clear that, even if he wanted to eat, he couldn’t openly say so. He was a clever person, and he certainly didn’t want to be the one to set that precedent.

"No, of course not, who said I wanted to eat?" the senior brother said, smelling the dish and swallowing saliva before stubbornly insisting, "I just wanted to see what kind of tricks Sun Wukong is playing. Aren’t we all here to study that?"

Hearing this, several other disciples chimed in, "Right, right, what’s up, junior brother, why ask such a thing? Could it be that you want to eat and now you’re testing us?"

If the disciple hadn’t already tasted the dish, he would definitely feel guilty at these words.

But knowing that he had already eaten, he had nothing to fear, and what was more important now was to drag others down with him.

"Right, I really do want to eat," he blurted out nonchalantly, prepared to take down someone with him even if he fell.

The other disciples were stunned, not expecting such a response from their junior.

"You, junior brother! What’s gotten into you? How can you say such a thing? That goes against the teachings of our order!"

"Oh? Are you saying you don’t want to eat it?"

The junior brother laughed, his eyes gradually taking on a hint of madness: "I’m straightforward—I’ll say what I think. I really want to eat this dish; it smells so good."

"From the moment I left the Dharma feast, I’ve been obsessed with this dish. I want to taste the deliciousness of the broth described by the divine officials, as well as the unique flavor of each ingredient. I really want to eat it, so how can you all not want to?"

His words made all the Buddhist disciples present swallow hard. They looked at the small bowls in their hands, the desire to eat welling up in their eyes.

It seemed as if they might pick up their spoons any second now and bring the food to their mouths. Those with particularly strong willpower shook their heads, "No, it’s not like that, we are..."

"Hahaha." The junior brother laughed at the sight.