Each book includes EPUB + PDF files for easy reading on any device.
Click the link or head to the menu. Thank you for supporting the translations!
Xiang Sheng stood at the doorway with a puzzled face. “What are you doing not sleeping? Don’t you have class tomorrow?”
“I’m on break this week and going out to eat with a few classmates. I’m picking clothes. Don’t worry about it.”
Xiang Sheng didn’t understand. “You’re just going to eat. Just wear your crappy school uniform. It’s not like you’re a celebrity walking a red carpet.”
Xiang Di ignored him and continued looking for clothes.
Xiang Sheng stood at the doorway for a while, then still asked, “Those classmates of yours — boys or girls?”
“Both.”
“Are you familiar with all of them? Do you need me to pick you up afterward?”
Xiang Di immediately refused. “You absolutely must not come pick me up.”
His kind offer to pick her up was rejected just like that. Xiang Sheng lost face and his tone turned bad. “Xiang Di, I’m warning you not to be ungrateful. Having such a handsome real brother pick you up, you should be secretly happy.”
“No.” Xiang Di’s tone was crisp. “I don’t want people to know my brother is a borderline thirst-trap internet celebrity.”
…He was speechless. He had filmed so many normal handsome videos before and she acted like she was blind and didn’t see any of them. Just because of that one video showing abs, she directly labeled him as a thirst-trap guy.
Xiang Sheng sneered. “You’re noble. You’re amazing. If you have the ability, then never watch thirst-trap videos in this lifetime.”
Xiang Di said decisively, “Of course I won’t watch them.”
His kind offer to pick her up was rejected just like that. Xiang Sheng lost face and his tone turned unpleasant. “Xiang Di, I’m warning you not to be ungrateful. With such a handsome real brother picking you up, you should be secretly delighted.”
“No.” Xiang Di’s tone was crisp. “I don’t want people to know my brother is a borderline thirst-trap internet celebrity.”
…Unbelievable. He had filmed so many normal handsome videos before, and she acted like she was blind and didn’t see any of them. Just that one video showing his abs, and she directly labeled him a thirst-trap guy.
Xiang Sheng sneered. “You’re noble. You’re amazing. If you’ve got the ability, then don’t watch thirst-trap videos for your entire life.”
Xiang Di said firmly, “Of course I won’t watch them.”
Xiang Sheng was just about to sneer again when she suddenly smiled sweetly at him. “What’s so interesting about thirst-trap stuff? Half-revealed, half-hidden, scratching an itch through a boot. Isn’t it better to just watch obscene porn directly? Want me to recommend a few websites for you to study? Doing thirst-trap content has no future. You might as well just go into porn.”
Xiang Sheng: “……”
Xiang Sheng collapsed and covered his face, completely convinced.
Can some enlightened master please hurry up and take this damn sister away.
─── ꒰ঌ·✦·໒꒱ ───
After school on Saturday night, Xiang Di still went to look for her aunt.
Her aunt suggested that she didn’t need to dress too formally, or it would look like she was trying too hard. A natural, fresh style would be fine.
A person’s aesthetic is tied to age and experience. At this time, having a mature adult woman with good taste give outfit advice was far more reliable than directly searching online.
Eighteen was originally an age where one looked good even without makeup, but girls all love beauty. Xiang Di also had some of her own cosmetics, though not as complete as her aunt’s — she at least had simple primer and lipstick.
After applying the primer, she took a live photo and sent it to Qianqian for inspection, afraid she might not have blended something evenly.
【It shouldn’t look super pale and dead-white, right?】
Liang Qianqian replied quickly: 【Baby, you’re just a juicy little peach.】
Liang Qianqian: 【I’ll kiss you to death -3-】
Xiang Di: 【Hehe.】
If only Bai Jiangxin could think so too.
With everything ready, she went out to the appointment. Usually, everyone wore school uniforms every day at school and were already used to seeing them. Today, everyone came out in casual clothes, and for a moment they were actually a bit hard to recognize. They exchanged all kinds of rainbow compliments, like how the school uniform had really buried Your Excellency’s unparalleled beauty.
They agreed to meet at the entrance of a large shopping mall. The buffet place was upstairs. Xiang Di and Liang Qianqian walked at the very front, arm in arm, chatting about recent top celebrity gossip, when, as they walked, Ye Minjia and Wang Sichen from behind suddenly caught up.
Liang Qianqian: “You guys walk together.”
Ye Minjia shook his head like crazy. Wang Sichen pointed backward. “I don’t want to be the green leaf for those two.”
Liang Qianqian turned to look back and instantly understood why Ye Minjia and Wang Sichen, despite both looking pretty good, were unwilling to walk together with the other two.
Two big handsome guys with completely different styles — the visual impact was indeed very strong.
Neither of them was wearing a school uniform today. One was dressed in a casually simple brown jacket; with that thick head of chestnut curls and that deep, exotic-featured face, his whole person gave off the vibe of a cheerful, sunny, tall and sexy Maillard-style mixed-blood handsome guy.
The other was dressed all in black. Black is actually the laziest and simplest outfit color for guys — as long as you’re not ugly to begin with, you basically can’t go wrong wearing black. But Bai Jiangxin belonged to the type who took deep black to the extreme. His tall, slender, handsome figure was enveloped in that full set of black, paired with that expressionless, ink-wash cold face. Clean and abstinent, crisp and sharp, with a strong sense of distance.
They were said to be walking side by side, but not really. There was still more than half a person’s distance between them. They didn’t talk to each other either, both lowering their heads to look at their phones. Just this short stretch of mall walkway was forcibly turned by them into a runway show. From what Liang Qianqian noticed alone, several girls had already stopped to stare at them.
Xiang Di turned her head away, clutching her poor little heart.
Oh my god, this was way too friendly to her eyes. If she weren’t afraid of exposing her looks-obsessed fangirl nature, she would’ve wanted to directly dig out her eyeballs — stick her left eyeball on Bai Jiangxin and her right eyeball on Zhou Linxiao, and just look her fill.
Liang Qianqian patted Ye Minjia’s shoulder. “I understand how you feel.”
Ye Minjia looked touched. “Thank you.”
Wang Sichen kept shaking his head. “We’re all born from parents, how can the comparison be this cruel?”
Left behind by the other four, Bai Jiangxin had no choice but to walk behind together with Zhou Linxiao.
Today was Zhou Linxiao’s treat. Even if Bai Jiangxin felt that Zhou Linxiao wasn’t as gentle and friendly as he appeared, surface-level harmony still had to be maintained for now.
With people beside them constantly looking over, Bai Jiangxin felt slightly uncomfortable and suddenly spoke. “Zhou Linxiao.”
Zhou Linxiao turned his head to look at him. “Mm?”
“Thanks for treating today.” Bai Jiangxin said. “Next time, I’ll treat you.”
Seemingly surprised that Bai Jiangxin would take the initiative to thank him, Zhou Linxiao immediately closed the distance between them and smiled at him. “It’s fine. Just a buffet, it’s not that expensive. As long as you all eat happily.”
Looking at the distance closing between them, Bai Jiangxin, for once, did not avoid it like usual. Instead, he raised his hand and proactively placed it on Zhou Linxiao’s shoulder.
He tried to ask Zhou Linxiao in a calm tone: “I heard you originally only planned to treat Xiang Di alone today? Can you tell me why?”
Feeling Bai Jiangxin’s hand on his shoulder, Zhou Linxiao froze slightly and looked at him as if he had seen a ghost.
Didn’t Ye Minjia say Bai Jiangxin hated physical contact the most?
But Zhou Linxiao still politely answered Bai Jiangxin’s question: “Xiang Di is my deskmate. She’s taken good care of me during this period. I’m treating her to a meal, does that need some special reason?”
A flawless answer. You couldn’t tell at all whether he had feelings for Xiang Di or not. Bai Jiangxin almost forgot — this person’s mother tongue was Spanish. Unless he went and learned Spanish, to Bai Jiangxin, Zhou Linxiao was simply a bug.
Finally, they arrived at the buffet restaurant. The two big handsome guys’ runway show could finally come to an end. Just as Ye Minjia had said, buffet was very convenient — you could eat together with people and also not worry about mixing up tableware. For Bai Jiangxin, it was very safe.
The meal was eaten in a lively atmosphere. Next week was the first mock exam. Among everyone present, only Zhou Linxiao had no exam pressure. So in order to relieve everyone’s stress, after finishing the buffet, Zhou Linxiao proposed going to play another round — his treat.
Ye Minjia: “Sure, where are we going?”
Zhou Linxiao: “Anywhere you guys want.”
After discussing in a circle, since they had just finished eating, it wasn’t suitable to go to places that required running and jumping, so everyone decided to go to KTV and book an afternoon private room to sing a few songs and relieve some stress.
As everyone knew, KTV drinks and snacks had their own pricing. Ye Minjia suggested going to a convenience store outside first to buy them, then secretly bring them in. Zhou Linxiao directly said there was no need. He said that he had been very happy at school during this period, and it was all thanks to everyone present, so today he also wanted everyone to have as much fun as possible.
Although everyone present was already an adult and could drink alcohol, they were still a group of high school students after all. If they drank too much and went home, they would definitely be scolded by their parents.
“Misses, can you drink fruit wine? It shouldn’t get you drunk, right?” Zhou Linxiao asked for the two girls’ opinions. “Otherwise, you can just drink soft drinks.”
Both Liang Qianqian and Xiang Di said it was fine, as long as they didn’t drink too much. After all, fruit wine wasn’t high in alcohol content.
“OK.”
Zhou Linxiao first ordered two cases of fruit wine. If it wasn’t enough, they could add more.
When two cases of fruit wine were placed on the table, paired with fruit platters and snacks, the atmosphere immediately came together.
Class monitor Ye Minjia, upon arriving at KTV, was still the good class monitor who served the people. He opened a bottle of fruit wine for everyone and placed them one by one in front of them.
“All these bottles look the same, don’t take the wrong one.” Ye Minjia specifically reminded Bai Jiangxin. “If you end up drinking one of our bottles by mistake and throw up on the spot, don’t blame me.”
Bai Jiangxin said coldly, “Do you take me for a three-year-old?”
But very quickly, he felt that this sentence was inappropriate.
Because before, he had drunk Xiang Di’s milk tea by mistake, and the result had gotten completely out of hand.
Looking at a certain person sitting far away from him, today she was wearing a skirt again. He didn’t know what she had put on her lips, but the color looked even pinker than the last time at the bakery.
She wanted to come fulfill Zhou Linxiao’s invitation first this week and eat something good. He had no objection. After all, first come, first served. He could follow along and create opportunities. But today she had been sticking to Liang Qianqian the whole time, sticking and sticking. He would like to ask — what exactly is there to stick about between two girls? Does she like him or Liang Qianqian?
A trace of restrained irritation flashed through his indifferent eyes. Bai Jiangxin clicked his tongue lightly, lifted the fruit wine, and drank nearly half the bottle in one go.
You clearly know this person likes you, and you don’t reject this person either, but she just doesn’t confess to you, doesn’t pursue you. You say she’s deliberately stringing you along — that’s not quite right. You say she isn’t stringing you along — that’s even more wrong, because you really are absent-minded because of her.
Right now, he both cared about Xiang Di and suffered because she was too timid, only daring to fantasize about him in her heart. Bai Jiangxin had been a lofty, unattainable flower for eighteen years. For him to lower his head and go find Xiang Di to lay everything out was impossible. So his current situation was like his heart hanging in midair — unable to go up, unable to come down.
