Descent of the Demon Master

Chapter 255: Getting Them Back (5)

“Yawwwwwn~...”

Park Yu-Min stretched his limbs grandly while yawning loudly. The pizzeria had become spotless. Kang Jin-Ho was a hardcore neat freak, so cleaning the store until it met his standards proved to be an arduous task. However, seeing the sparkling interior of the store, as if everything was brand-new, made Park Yu-Min feel a sense of accomplishment.

Kang Jin-Ho and Ju Yeong-Gi were inside the kitchen, preparing the dough for the pizza bases.

“I hope we have a few customers today…” Park Yu-Min muttered while thinking about sweeping the front of the store.

Having a spotless front yard obviously wouldn't lead to a greater number of customers, but sweeping the outside of the shop would still be better than doing nothing. So, he grabbed a broom and headed outside.

“Wow. It's so quiet around here…” Park Yu-Min looked around the deserted street. Maybe because it was still early morning, but there didn't seem that many shoppers out and about. “I hope the business will pick up today…”

If the store continued to limp along in this manner, the matter of paying Ju Yeong-Gi and Park Yu-Min for their services wouldn't be the only issue to worry about. Even paying the rent would become a challenge. After all, they started this whole pizzeria thing to make money, not to burn more of it to keep the store going!

“At least I should do my part and sweep this place clean.” Park Yu-Min nodded, then began sweeping away. Since he had nothing better to do, he figured focusing on cleanliness would keep his mind off other things. But then—

“Uhm, excuse me?”

.

Park Yu-Min stopped sweeping and looked behind him. “Yes?”

“Good morning. We heard there's a pizzeria around here, but do you mind telling us where it is?”

Park Yu-Min made a weird face while turning around to face a group of three women. They were curiously looking around, clearly lost. He pointed to the pizzeria behind him. “Uhm,?it's this one right here.”

The three ladies frowned deeply. “What the heck, it was this one all along?”

“I told you, even the nav said we were at the right place!”

“But who would think this is a pizzeria? I thought it was a bar, you know! Anyone who saw that interior would think the place is a beer hall!”

Park Yu-Min finally learned one of the reasons the pizzeria's business was in the pits.

Who said that interior style was in the spirit of the pizza's birthplace?! Park Yu-Min should have suspected that such a catastrophe was in store for them when Ju Yeong-Gi, a dude who had never traveled to the USA before, argued vociferously that this interior décor and the store sign were definitely following the style of Americans.

The whole premise about the pizza's birthplace being America instead of Italy was wrong, to begin with, but...!

One of the women muttered to no one in particular, “Is it open, though?”

“Yes, it is open,” Park Yu-Min swiftly replied to her and opened the pizzeria's door, “Please, come inside.”

“Ah, you work here...” The group nodded but didn't immediately enter the store. They hesitated for a moment before cautiously asking Park Yu-Min, “Excuse me, but... Does 'he' run this pizzeria?”

“He? I'm not sure who you're talking about...?” Park Yu-Min narrowed his eyes a little.

“You know, 'he' from that TV show.”

“Aha, you mean him. If you're talking about Jin-Ho, yes, he's inside.”

The group suddenly started jumping around in excitement when Park Yu-Min confirmed the truth for them. They even started shouting as well, “What should we do? What should we do?!” before calming down a little and staring intensely at the pizzeria. “Excuse me! Is it true that he'll take pictures with us if we order a pizza?”

“...I don't know anything about that, but please do go inside,” Park Yu-Min bowed his head smartly and watched the group step into the pizzeria. Finally, a satisfied grin floated on his lips. “As long as customers show up, that's good. Hopefully, we'll get many more customers from that TV show exposure…”

And then, Park Yu-Min would come to regret his own words less than two hours later.

***

“...What the heck is going on here?” Park Yu-Min gasped in stupefaction.

The pizzeria's dining area was so packed a queue had developed outside the store, and it was even a queue long enough to go around the proverbial block! With such a crowd, it was inevitable that the street would be blocked, and the complaints began coming in thick and fast. So, Park Yu-Min had to rush outside to act as a traffic officer. “Holy cow. It's not like everyone's been hypnotized by a Goblin or something, so how—”

He remembered how empty the dining area was during the same time yesterday. It was so empty that flies were having a party inside. As such, Park Yu-Min couldn't understand just why there were so many people here today.

Of course, he already knew the reason for this craziness deep inside.

“Can he take a selfie with us?”

“When is the owner coming outside the kitchen?”

Ju Yeong-Gi hesitantly retreated from the flood of questions. “O-one question at a time, please!”

“Will the owner take selfies with us?”

The question helped Ju Yeong-Gi realize something. This pizzeria's success or failure would depend on how he responded right this moment!

“Everyone, our store's motto is simple. If the customer wants it, we'll even sell jjajangmyeon!” Ju Yeong-Gi loudly declared as his eyes burned in the fierce flames of determination. “If you want selfies, you shall have them! But only after purchasing our pizza! When you buy a large pizza, the chef will personally deliver your order to your table and take pictures with you!”

“N-no, stop!” Kang Jin-Ho watching this scene from inside the kitchen in a daze instantly sobered up and reached out in a fluster, but a human hand couldn't stop a person's voice.

“Here! One large pizza, please!”

“We want two large pizzas!”

“One per person on this side, please!”

Ju Yeong-Gi silently held back his tears as the orders flooded in.

'Finally, it's starting!'

He still wasn't sure what caused this situation, but that wasn't important. The deluge of customers was the truly important thing here. Kang Eun-Yeong hadn't put on a concert to draw people in today, but so many people still decided to show up like this, which made it feel like the pizzeria was finally on the right track. No wonder Ju Yeong-Gi felt over the moon by this sight.

“Kekekeke.?It's up to you now, Jin-Ho...” Ju Yeong-Gi cackled ominously while looking back at Kang Jin-Ho.

Kang Jin-Ho flinched slightly and unknowingly stepped back.

***

“Cheese~!”

“...Cheese.” Kang Jin-Ho smiled awkwardly as another photo was taken. Two girls were standing on either side of him while making cute poses.

Meanwhile, Ju Yeong-Gi snapped their photo from a slightly artistic angle before handing the smartphone back to the girls. “Here you go, ladies.”

The girls started chatting among themselves while looking at the shot. “Mm? Don't I look weird in this photo?”

“Nah. The photo isn't weird. It's just that you were standing next to a squid generator, that's all.”

“Oh...”

“We can just mosaic our faces later.”

“You're right.”

Kang Jin-Ho sneakily backed away while the girls were preoccupied with evaluating the photo. H-He had to return to the kitchen, pronto!

“Please wait, Mister Owner!”

“Yes?” Kang Jin-Ho stumbled and looked back at the girls.

“We really enjoyed your show!”

“Thank you very much.” Kang Jin-Ho bowed deeply toward them. No matter who they were, these girls came all this way to pay him a visit, not to mention that they were customers of his pizzeria. As such, he knew that his duty was to be as polite as possible to them.

“Mister Owner, can you take your chef's hat off for us just this once?”

Kang Jin-Ho shook his head. “I'm sorry, but I can't do that. I have to go back to the kitchen, you see.”

“Eii~, you can wear a bandana instead, you know? That chef's hat is cramping up your looks, you see. Well, you're still good-looking regardless, though!”

“But, my hat—”

“...Will be changed to a bandana from tomorrow onward!” Ju Yeong-Gi abruptly cut Kang Jin-Ho off, thereby ruthlessly crushing his friend's opinion on the matter. He even ignored Kang Jin-Ho's sharp glare.

The customers clapped their hands in delight at Ju Yeong-Gi's prompt response. “And, and! Can the owner give us his autograph?”

“Autograph?” Kang Jin-Ho awkwardly smiled again. “My apologies, but I have never signed an autograph before, so...”

“Oh...”

Just before the girls' disappointment could be fully expressed, Ju Yeong-Gi grabbed the scruff of Kang Jin-Ho's neck and yanked him back. Then, he addressed the girls while giving them a smooth grin. “We can always design a new autograph right away. Any customer ordering a large pizza for takeaway will receive our owner's personal autograph as well!”

Kang Jin-Ho hurriedly cried out, “N-no, stop it!”

“We want to order takeaways!”

A victorious smile formed on Ju Yeong-Gi's face as he watched the girls nodding their heads in determination. He just sold three large pizzas to three young ladies. Such a stunning sales result would be unimaginable in other pizza franchises!

The corners of Ju Yeong-Gi's lips curled up suspiciously. “Fufufufu... We'll be rich in no time!”

Kang Jin-Ho groaned when his friend's grin threatened to shoot past his ears.

'It's good to see the business picking up, but...'

At this rate, Kang Jin-Ho feared that he would be squeezed dry to death. All these customers suddenly barging into the pizzeria didn't care about his pizza—they only wanted to see him.

When he tried to humor the customers by taking photos, some began hassling him about how wonderful the show was and which episode he would show up in again. Heck, several customers even requested him to recite the line from his scene in the show, too.

'…I'm sorry, everyone. But... that line was dubbed.'

Despite his personality, Kang Jin-Ho still had the minimum level of wits about him. He knew that carelessly opening his mouth now would only shatter the dreamy illusions these customers were swimming in. So, he did his very best to politely decline all those requests.

The lunch hour came and went, and soon, it was dinner time—but the deluge of customers did not let up. There were so many customers that Ju Yeong-Gi and Park Yu-Min madly rushing around the dining area to clean and reset the tables couldn't keep up with the demand, causing the queue to build up even more. Of course, Kang Jin-Ho did his part by madly baking pizzas at a breakneck pace!

Without his scarcely-believable speed, the trio wouldn't have been able to deal with half of the customers today.

“Kehehe...! If we keep this up until midnight… How much revenue would we rake by the end of today?” Ju Yeong-Gi fell deep into an ocean of happy imagination, but the world wasn't that kind to dreamers.

Kang Jin-Ho quietly called out to his friend. “Listen, Yeong-Gi.”

“Yeah? What's up?”

“We don't have enough dough.”

“...Huh? What are you talking about?” Ju Yeong-Gi jumped up in alarm. They still have a long queue of customers waiting outside, so how could they run out of pizzas to sell?! “C-can't you prepare more dough?”

“No. I need the dough to settle and mature first. We don't have enough time.”

“But, d-do you really need to settle and mature the dough first?”

“Without that step, I can't use the dough.”

“Urgh...” Ju Yeong-Gi's expression cramped up to resemble a crying man, but he quickly resolved himself and stared at Park Yu-Min next to him. “We don't have a choice now. Yu-Min, let's resort to the final trick in our book!”

“Eh? The... final trick?”

“...Call another pizzeria and have them deliver their pizzas to us!”

“That's enough, you idiot!”

***

No matter how much tears of blood Ju Yeong-Gi shed, it was still impossible to bake pizzas without dough. When the waiting customers were told about how there would be no more pizzas for today after the pizzeria had run out of ingredients, some looked genuinely disappointed, while some others voiced their irritation.

Since individually pacifying every single person was impossible, Kang Jin-Ho decided that taking a group photo with them was the way to go. Only then did the waiting crowd finally disperse.

Creaaak...

Kang Jin-Ho stepped back inside the pizzeria and plopped down on the nearest chair.

“That... was a baptism of fire. And I'm ashes now...”

While muttering that to no one in particular, Kang Jin-Ho involuntarily shuddered.

'I'd rather be in intense training instead of this!'

Intense training would exhaust one's body, while today's event utterly drained one's mind instead. It felt like he had taken at least over a hundred and fifty photos today.

“We can't have the same thing repeat itself tomorrow! Get the dough! Yes, we gotta prepare enough dough for tomorrow! Toppings, too!” Ju Yeong-Gi roared in anger, evidently still annoyed about being unable to sell more pizzas. If only he had studied with such passion in high school, enrolling in a top university wouldn't have been a far-fetched dream for him.

“Jin-Ho, that was really tough for just three of us. I don't think us three won't cut it anymore.”

Kang Jin-Ho shook his head. “We don't know when the influx of customers will go away again, so we can't hire part-timers.”

“Mm... What should we do?” Park Yu-Min sighed and seriously started to ponder a way forward.

However, Ju Yeong-Gi responded triumphantly, “You're worried about some silly things, Yu-Min. Aren't the kids at the orphanage in the middle of a school vacation?”

“Yeah. Their semester ended not too long ago.”

“Then, get some of them to come here to work part-time. And pay them daily wages, too. Let them figure out the schedules among themselves, and they’ll come to work here on their own.”

“Oh…” Park Yu-Min was taken aback, his jaw slightly falling.

Ju Yeong-Gi cocked his brow. “What is it now?”

“You know, you sometimes surprise me with how sensible you are.”

“Sometimes?!” Ju Yeong-Gi's face reddened in anger. “How dare you subhumans speak of me this way when I took you under my wings and looked after you?! Sometimes?! Without me, you two would not even be able to pass off as human beings!”

“...Yes, yes. Sure thing.”

“In any case! We gotta roll our sleeves up and do this properly come tomorrow! I don't know anything about a TV show or whatever, but I do know it's time to make hay while the sun still shines!”

Just as Ju Yeong-Gi clenched his fists with his eyes burning in the flames of determination, Kang Jin-Ho's phone suddenly went off.

Kang Jin-Ho promptly answered, “Hello?”

- Good evening, Mister Jin-Ho. Do you have some free time this evening?

The caller was Jo Gyu-Min. Kang Jin-Ho nodded slightly. “Originally, I didn't, but now, I do have enough time on my hands. Did something happen?”

- We need to meet and talk, Mister Jin-Ho. Your items have arrived, you see?

“My... items?” Kang Jin-Ho tilted his head.

What items was Jo Gyu-Min talking about?

1. noodles in black bean sauce

2. 'Squid' is a common Korean slang term for an ugly person. In essence, she's saying Kang Jin-Ho makes anyone standing next to him look ugly.