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Ningguang and Beidou sit behind a countertop in one of the kitchens located in the Qixing’s headquarters, aptly named the ‘Jade Chamber’. Several pots and pans have been laid out, and there are a few dustings of salt on the counter.
“Hello all, and welco-” Ningguang starts, Beidou practically vibrating in excitement beside her.
“Ayyyyy what’s up my guys, welcome to another video!” Beidou says, grinning at Ningguang as if to show that she knows the annoyance displayed on her fiance’s face isn’t genuine.
“As I was about to say”, Ningguang continues. “Welcome to another video on our channel, the Qixing. Feel free to subscribe and boost us in Celestia’s algorithm, we welcome the traffic. Today’s video will be a bit different than usual. It’s been highly requested that we do a Q&A with cooking video, so here you go. These questions have been compiled by Yanfei and Hutao from the comments sections on various videos. I hope you all enjoy.”
Beidou grabs a box from on top of the counter, enthusiastically throwing it to Xiao as Ningguang starts preparing various ingredients, grabbing a chunk of pork and some matsutake mushrooms from the fridge and carefully snipping a couple leaves from the qingxin poised in a delicate vase.
Beidou begins chopping ginger, which had been laid out on a chopping board with a few sprigs of green onion and a couple star anise.
The rustling of paper is heard as Xiao picks a question.
“Just so you all know, Ningguang and Beidou are currently preparing a classic dish, Tianshu meat. The recipe will be linked in the description. Okay, so this question was from…. wandering_samurai_2910. When are you guys going to finally tie the knot?”
Ningguang gives Beidou an unimpressed look, but Beidou is too busy laughing to be properly offended.
“Kazuha, stay out of the comments sections. They’re very thirsty. Anyways, how you thought that would escape our notice with a username like wandering_samurai_2910….. I can only hope that Beidou and I taught you better. Frankly, I’m disappointed.” Ningguang does her best to look stern, but another look at Beidou, who is laughing even harder, makes her crack an unlikely smile.
Nevertheless, she continues to cook, picking up a spray gun, carefully burning the skin of the pork before washing it, first with hot water, then scrubbing it clean.
“Zuzu, be careful, or you’ll make Ning break her stone-cold businesswoman persona” Beidou snorts, setting the chopped ginger aside, grabbing a wok and turning the stovetop on. The pork is placed into the wok, and Ningguang adds some cold water and the sliced ginger. The sound of a cross between a cough and a wheeze comes from behind the camera.
Ningguang’s gaze fixes on Xiao and she shakes her head.
“I’m disappointed in you Xiao. I thought your poker face was better than that. Must be why you keep losing to Venti at Liyue Millennial.” Ningguang turns to grab a knife, pointing it at Xiao for a second before grinning and setting it down.
Xiao appears briefly in front of the camera to shoot Ningguang an unimpressed look, passing the paper slip to Beidou, before returning to his spot behind the camera.
“Okay, while the meat is blanching, let’s do another question.” Paper rustles as Ningguang and Beidou both sit down at the countertop, Beidou with her arms slayed wide and a feisty grin on her face, Ningguang sitting with perfect posture and poise, as usual.
“From hutaoismyvibe, when and how did you two meet?” Although he isn’t visible, there is a smirk evident in Xiao’s voice.
Ningguang speaks up first.
“Well, as some of you may know, aside from being our resident alcohol expert, Beidou also has her own ship, which she uses to go on, as she calls it, adventures. Oftentimes she’ll be going to far off places, trying new foods, meeting new people, and trading with others, so she used to be a resource supplier for the Qixing, in its early days.”
Beidou laughs.
“So you’re going to tell them the official story? Not the interesting one?” Beidou snickers, combating the dirty look Ningguang sends her with a flirtatious wink.
“Beidou.” Ningguang warns. Her fiance simply shrugs.
“While it is true that the second time we met was when I was a supplier for the Qixing, the first time we met was when our precious Tianqian was a teenager.” Ningguang scowls, attempting to hide her fondness for Beidou with a cold look. “Ning was actually training to become a police officer, doing cooking as a side gig. She had started up a small business selling these absolutely delicious mora meats, for those of you who don’t know, mora meat is like a street food, kind of hamburger dish, and she made her own special version, Qiankun mora meat. Now I was a novice sailor at this point, skirting on the side of the law-”
“When she says skirting on the side of the law, Beidou means straight up bending the rules.” Ningguang cut in.
Beidou simply smirks again.
“Now, this one time, our darling Ningguang was chasing me down, trying to arrest me for some reason or another. She didn’t catch me of course, but I recognised her as the pretty girl who sold street food at pop-up stalls every so often.” Ningguang hid her blush behind a cough, as Beidou’s smirk grew wider.
“I found her, turned myself in, and asked her out, not necessarily in that order.” Ningguang coughs louder, looking meaningfully at anything but Beidou.
“Aaand I think that’s all of that story I can disclose without Ning murdering me later, so Xiao, toss us the next question while we return to the Tianshu meat.”
Xiao pulls out another slip, reading it aloud.
“50/50morelikedeathtof2p asks how you both got into cooking, and how you both joined the Qixing.” Ningguang and Beidou both return to the dish, Ningguang slicing the meat into large, bulky square pieces while Beidou methodically chops the green onion, grabbing the rest of the ginger, and smashing some rock sugar into smaller chunks.
Ningguang starts to chop the matsutakes, talking as she goes.
“I got into cooking as a business venture at first, but I ended up enjoying it. I’ve got quite a bit of experience working in different restaurants, and while I was training for the police, I was also attending culinary school. I eventually quit the police force, became one of the founders of the Qixing, and here we are. Beidou?”
With one eyebrow raised, Ningguang turns to Beidou, her mushrooms chopped. Beidou smiles, splashing some oil into the pan to heat, and tossing the rock sugar in.
“I was originally a sailor, and I learned how to cook as one of the odd jobs I took on around the ship. I worked for a while on a Sumeran ship, went to Snezhnaya to learn more about seafood, which aside from alcohol is my other speciality, and eventually ended up as the captain of the Crux fleet. We partnered with the Qixing in the early days, and I’m not an official member of the Qixing, more like an occasional guest.”
Ningguang nodded as she added the spring onions, ginger and star anise to the mixture.
“Back to the Tianshu meat, we’ve tossed in all the ingredients, and while it is traditional to use osmanthus wine, it has too much of a salty taste for the kind of vibe we’re going for.”
Ningguang swats Beidou at the use of the word ‘vibe’, smiling reproachfully at her.
“So instead we’ll be using Qingxin wine, which blends nicely with the other flavours, and complements the use of Qingxin leaves in this dish.” Beidou continued, undeterred.
“Once the alcohol smell is gone, you’ll add your red yeast rice juice, and light and dark soy sauce. Just a splash, remember you can always add more, but you can never really get the taste out if you add too much.” Ningguang adds, visibly exasperated by her fiance’s shenanigans.
“Xiao, next question, while we wait?”
Another question is fished out.
“Favourite and least favourite foods?” He calls out, tossing the slip once again to Beidou.
“I’ve got a soft spot for Ning’s cooking, but anything spicy and hearty I’ll probably enjoy. And my least favourite…. Anything cold. God knows why Ning here likes ice cream so much.” Beidou gets a jab in the ribs from Ningguang at her last statement, although a smile has inexplicably appeared on her face as well.
“My favourite food would probably be…. slow-boiled chicken and pork bone soup, with cabbage leaves, one of the true staples of any respectable resident of Liyue.”
Beidou interrupts, snorting before exclaiming “Ning absolutely hates any expensive food. Anything too tacky or fancy, like golden crab, is absolutely off limits any time we go out.”
Xiao snickers.
“So that one time Xiangling cooked up some golden crab for her birthday, she really wasn’t joking about not liking it.”
Beidou giggles while Ningguang struggles to hide her smile.
“Poor kid, she was so crushed. Little did she know, Ningguang adores the girl. She’s practically her second child, after Zuzu, of course. Xiangling, if you’re watching this, cook her some soup or something, she’ll love that.”
“Beidou!” Ningguang’s cheeks are uncharacteristically aflame.
“Alright, that’s enough.” She chides.
“Okay, this video’s getting a bit long, so how about you two try to wrap things up while I run a few shorter questions by you.” Xiao remarks, walking in front of the camera and leaning against the bench, box of questions in hand.
“Got it, boss!” Beidou calls as she swiftly grabs a lid while Ningguang turns the heat down, pouring the mixture into a pot, with the ginger and scallion slices placed at the bottom.
“So now we’ll be leaving this to stew for around two hours. Xiao?”
“Got it. Dainsleifismyhusbando asks whether you’ve ever met anyone from the knights of favonius or the yashiro commission, and how you all decided to start this empire of food bloggers.”
Ningguang giggles at the mention of their ‘empire of food bloggers’.
“I’ve met quite a few, most notably Jean, of the knights of favonius, and of course Ayato and Ayaka of the yashiro commission. They are all very pleasant and impressive people, and it’s an honour to be able to work with them.”
“Diplomatic as always, Ning. Jean’s a real laugh once you get to know her, and Ayato has the best onikabuto fight strategies, and of course Ayaka is a total sweetheart.” Beidou adds, pinching her fiance’s cheek, causing Ningguang to pout at the camera.
Faint laughs can be heard from Xiao as he picks out a new question.
“Paimon_is_not_emergency_food, phew that’s a mouthful, asks if you would ever consider expanding the channels to include others from Fontaine or Natlan etc.”
“We’re actually currently trying to get a new branch set up in Sumeru, and we’ve been considering expanding to other nations too. Right now it’s really more a question of time, we’ve got Lumine and Aether, who you might know, they feature a lot in various of the other channels as well as this one, out scouting out new talent to set that up. Beidou’s also been helping out a bit with that, she was the one who brought them to Inazuma in the first place.” Ningguang pipes up.
“If you’re interested in that process, there should be a link to the project in the description, and if you’re someone with experience working with the cuisine of Sumeru, feel free to reach out! We’d love to hear from you or have you apply for this project, it’s a really exciting thing to be working on.” Beidou continues, a shine in her eyes.
Xiao walks in front of the camera once more.
“We’ve already received a few applications, and we’ve been going through them one by one. I just wanted to let you know that we are all incredibly honoured to have such talented fans, we appreciate you watching us.” He awkwardly bows, slightly flustered.
“Aw, Xiao, you’re such a softy. But as he said, we’re super honoured that we’re able to do this, and it’s all thanks to you guys! We’ve been able to come so far because of your support.”
Ningguang nods.
“With that said, I think we’ve run out of questions, and we’ve also finished up with the Tianshu meat. We’ll post our results at the end of this video, and a link to the recipe will be in the description. As always”, Ningguang turns to Beidou and Xiao, who both grin.
“May your contracts remain unbroken, and your hearts full.”
“See you next time!” Beidou smirks at the camera.
“We look forward to filming new videos for you all.” Xiao still looks slightly flustered.
“Farewell.”