As soon as Changli finished speaking, the contestants all rushed toward the ingredient area and started scrambling for supplies.
Even though Zane's gladiator-style ingredient battle had been mercilessly rejected by Changli, the part where contestants chose and fought over ingredients themselves had still been kept.
After all, a chef who couldn't pick ingredients wasn't a good soldier.
The rules for the preliminary round were simple too: finish your dish as quickly as possible. Every completed dish submitted would receive a score.
As long as it passed the qualifying line, the faster it was finished, the higher the score would be.
'…Seriously?'
Stelle was stunned by the scene in front of her. It looked like a crowd of aunties fighting over discounted vegetables at a market. Afraid of falling behind, she immediately started running over too.
She was confident that with the physique of a Stellaron vessel, forget grabbing ingredients, beating up everyone present wouldn't even be difficult.
But after only taking two steps, the Doctor grabbed her and pulled her back.
"What are you doing? Everyone's already rushing in!" Stelle lifted her eyes again and saw several chefs returning to their stations bruised and battered, clutching ingredients as they hurriedly began preparing their dishes. She immediately stamped her foot anxiously.
"How about we just snatch ingredients directly from other people instead?"
Her gaze swept maliciously across the contestants.
"No rush. Their whole approach is wrong."
"Wrong?" Stelle blinked and looked away from the contestants who had already secured ingredients.
After observing the arena again, she finally noticed there were quite a few people, just like Rover and the Doctor, calmly standing there with folded arms waiting for the chaos to end.
Among them were Panhua, the owner of Jinzhou's Panhua Restaurant; Mahe from the general store; Gansue, the clerk from the Pioneer Convention shop; and two unfamiliar young girls.
One wore a bamboo hat that concealed her face, along with a white cloak that hid her figure. The other had gray twin braids.
"That's right." Rover cut in at the perfect moment.
"Cold dishes are just a trap. Huanglong people prefer hot food, and cold dishes are usually only appetizers before the main meal. They're fast to make, but it's hard to score high with them.
"And with so many people making cold dishes, advancing becomes even harder."
Stelle nodded. Her specialty was listening to advice when it mattered.
After the frantic scramble died down, the remaining few finally moved, quickly stepping forward to choose their ingredients.
Anyone capable of entering this competition was basically a professional chef with at least some skill, and their movements flowed smoothly and naturally.
Among the best were naturally Panhua and Mahe. As Jinzhou's publicly acknowledged master chefs, there was nothing they couldn't fry, stir-fry, steam, braise, or stew.
Rover and the others also quickly decided on their dishes before beginning to cook.
Before the competition had even reached the halfway point, many of the contestants making cold dishes had already finished their creations. They immediately carried their plates over to the judges.
Taking over the judges' taste buds before they ate anything else was a strategy in itself.
Rover only glanced up once before lowering her head again to continue slicing the chilies in her hand.
Just as they had expected, the contestants trying to coast through with cold dishes were directly sent back to redo their work.
Seeing the annoyed expressions on those people's faces, the other chefs who hadn't finished yet finally realized something was wrong.
They hurriedly stopped preparing their cold dishes and frantically went to choose ingredients again.
But in the end, they were still too late.
As Changli rang the bell, many people immediately lost their qualification to continue. Only eight contestants remained in the arena, including Panhua and Mahe.
As expected, Panhua advanced with Star Crisp Pastry, while Mahe advanced with Porridge. Gansue, meanwhile, made a bowl of Chestnut Fruit Porridge.
Compared to the first two, Gansue's technique was still somewhat immature. In terms of ingredient quality, the porridge made from water chestnut fruit and poultry was actually superior to both Star Crisp Pastry and Porridge.
But the key to Chestnut Fruit Porridge was slow simmering over low heat. Only patient stewing could bring out the natural sweetness of the water chestnut fruit itself.
Gansue lacked experience after all. She focused too much on the final result while overlooking the core of the dish, which was why she had chosen such a time-consuming recipe for a competition.
The other girl in the white cloak had realized this point and instead chose a relatively simple dessert called Spring Welcome Pastry.
Looking at the pastries in front of him, Zane froze slightly, then gave the girl opposite him a surprised look.
He stuffed three Spring Welcome Pastries into his mouth in a few bites, patted his stomach, and raised the sign marked "Advanced."
Seeing his reaction, the girl could only sigh inwardly that there hadn't been enough time to cook, otherwise she could have made several more.
The gray twin-braided girl brought up a rather ornate-looking dish decorated with red currants and jam...
For some reason, this thing felt like it had been improvised on the spot.
Another improvised creation was the dish Stelle brought up.
'Instant noodles?'
No, not ordinary instant noodles. Looking closely, there were even some purple things floating in the soup.
To be fair, both of these chefs were quite creative.
Zane sampled both dishes in turn. The unfamiliar girl seemed to enjoy sour flavors, but Stelle's...
'What kind of normal person puts watermelon and grapes into instant noodles?!'
'Wait, what was that soft, sticky thing in my mouth with the weird smell?!'
Stelle exchanged a glance with the twin-braided girl. Seeing Zane happily rolling around on the floor, both instantly felt certain they had advanced.
Without another word, Stelle jumped onto the judges' table and raised the "Advanced" signs for both herself and the unfamiliar girl.
After struggling for quite a while, Zane finally crawled back out from under the table. Seeing that two of the "Advanced" signs were missing, he didn't think much of it and quickly turned to look at the Doctor's and Rover's dishes.
The Doctor seemed to have realized that both cold and hot dishes had become hyper-competitive, so she decisively chose... military rations?
And military ration biscuits soaked in water at that?
Well, fair enough. The Doctor was the sort of person who was perfectly capable of heating instant food directly in her mouth at four in the morning using boiling drinking water.
There was really no point expecting her to make anything delicious.
Zane shook his head, picked up a spoon, and scooped some into his mouth. As a judge, he still had to taste it no matter what.
But the next second, his eyes widened.
Although it still had the texture of military rations soaked in water, the flavor was much richer than plain soaked rations.
There was even a faint meat aroma mixed in. While maintaining its energy value, it also further satisfied the eater's craving for flavor.
Without any surprise, the Doctor successfully advanced.
At last, only Rover remained.
She carried up a simple plate of stir-fried pork with chili peppers.
"Huh? The famous Rover actually chose something this simple?"
"No, no, no, impossible. This definitely isn't ordinary stir-fried pork with chili peppers. There's probably some hidden trick to it."
"Look, the amount of chili peppers in this dish is obviously way higher than normal."
Faced with the endless discussion around her, Rover merely smiled faintly. Then she brought out another bowl of rice and placed it in front of Zane.
The main reason she chose this dish was because she was very familiar with it.
After all, she often cooked it for Zane. She knew very well that he liked extra spice paired with a bowl of plain white rice.
"Go on, eat. You're hungry, aren't you?"
Rover knew Zane usually ate dinner around six in the evening. But it was already past eight now. Aside from tasting small bites of everyone's dishes, he hadn't actually filled his stomach at all.
Whether Zane was full or not aside, the eliminated male chefs all smashed their woks onto the ground the moment they saw this scene.
"This competition isn't even worth watching anymore!"