In the headphones, the girl’s soft, affectionate voice came through, “Teach me, please? I never really came out to play games before; I just stayed home and read literary classics.”
“What classics do you read?” Lu Mingfei asked.
“…”
“She even played Pan Jinlian before,” Chips coughed, “but she probably only read the script. To make it unique, the screenwriter wrote Pan Jinlian and Ximen Qing as a couple madly in love.”
“It’s already 6 p.m. According to our plan, the dragon should die eighteen hours from now.” Mai pointed at the countdown on the screen. “Two hours ago, we were supposed to have packed Lu Mingfei off to the dragon’s lair, yet he’s still soaking in that internet café… At this rate, I swear I’ll flatten that place with a high heel.”
Mai and Chips encountered an obstacle at the first step of their plan—not a huge obstacle, but an annoying one. Ricardo M. Lu, whom they were preparing to forge into a top hero, had not stepped out of that underground internet café for the past five days. Hungry, he’d order takeout; tired, he’d sleep on the sofa, fermenting in sync with Mai, perhaps even more so, seemingly intent on turning himself into yogurt in the café. Mai and Chips analyzed that all of this was because of some silly emotional crisis involving a girl he secretly liked getting engaged, but that it was affecting a dragon-slaying mission critical to human history made them want to storm the café and kick that gaming geek with a stiletto.
An utterly useless fool.
After careful consideration, they concluded that the best way to replace an old romance was with a new one—using a beauty as bait was the ideal choice to lure the target out. Chips mentioned that the company had two talent agencies and a model team in Beijing; the girls were all mixed types—some plump, some slim, whatever was needed. These girls were in the entertainment industry, bold and daring. As long as they were paid, seducing a pathetic guy was no problem. Thus, Mai selected a small starlet who resembled Chen Wenwen, matching Lu Mingfei’s taste, and specifically instructed her to wear white.
But it seemed that if you didn’t read books, you wouldn’t gain knowledge. Even Pan Jinlian couldn’t become Qin Xianglian by putting on a white dress.
“Should I step in personally?” Mai grabbed her pigtails, looking ready to take charge.
Chips immediately applauded, “You’d be great! You’re the atomic bomb of the beauty trap strategy!”
Mai was stunned. “That’s not what I meant. Do you think I’m in any state to go like this, with my messy hair? I meant to pose as his sister or something and tie him up to drag him out.”
“Hey, hey! Look!” Chips pointed at the surveillance screen. They had installed dozens of cameras inside and outside the café.
A figure in white appeared on the screen. It was a girl in a white dress, walking with her head down, a butterfly hairpin clipped to her flowing black hair. She hesitated for a moment at the shabby basement entrance but gathered her courage and walked in.
“Chen… Chen Wenwen? Is that the real one? Why would the real one be here? Hurry and tell our fake one to pull out!” Mai was shocked.
“How would I know? But maybe this is a good thing, you know—rekindling an old flame or whatever. Maybe the artsy girl can help us get this guy out of the café?”
Doggo felt like his life had just rewound. Five minutes ago, he had seen a girl in a white dress and square-toed shoes sit beside Lu Mingfei. Five minutes later, the scene replayed before his eyes.
Upon closer inspection, the one who came later seemed more attractive than the one who suddenly jumped up and ran away, but their expression was so melancholic—if they weren’t freshly heartbroken, they must have just failed a class.
Lu Mingfei was huddled in the sofa watching a video when he suddenly caught a familiar scent. He turned his head in fright and saw Chen Wenwen standing right next to him. It seemed to be raining outside; Chen Wenwen’s white dress was soaked halfway through, her skin partially visible, her head lowered, and wet hair dripping water. At that moment, he had no time for any romantic thoughts—there was just a chilling sense of dread, as if he had seen a ghost.
“Uh… what are you doing here?” Lu Mingfei quickly minimized the video he was watching. It wouldn’t do if Chen Wenwen saw that.
“It’s fine,” Chen Wenwen said softly. “I’ve seen Zhao Menghua watching those kinds of movies before.”
Lu Mingfei let out a couple of awkward chuckles, scratching his greasy hair—he hadn’t washed it since his last time in the U.S.
“What are you doing here?” he asked again.
Earlier in the morning, he happened to open QQ and saw a message from Chen Wenwen. It just said, “Mingfei, are you there?” He replied, “Yeah, I’m in Beijing, the college sent us here for something.” Then he logged off QQ and spent the rest of the day playing sixteen rounds with Brother Dog, battling until the world turned upside down, and hadn’t received any more messages from Chen Wenwen. Yet here she was, having found him on her own. He awkwardly scratched his head, trying to make his hair look less awful, his heart racing—why had Chen Wenwen come to find him? Could it be because of that dinner at Aspasia? Why so solemn and downcast… it was just a meal! They hadn’t even held hands! Why did she have that “accidentally pregnant” expression?
Okay, trust science! Just eating a meal together wouldn’t lead to an unexpected pregnancy… Could it be that Chen Wenwen had fallen for him since then? And after many sleepless nights, she finally couldn’t resist the yearning and came to see him?
Such a beautiful scenario just wasn’t something that would happen to him!
Chen Wenwen lowered her head, clutched the hem of her skirt tightly, and began to tremble slightly. After a long silence, tears silently spilled from her eyes.
“Don’t cry, don’t cry!” Lu Mingfei panicked.
If she were deeply in love, shouldn’t she throw herself into his arms? Why did it feel more and more like an unexpected pregnancy? Had something beyond the realm of science occurred? Did he have some Yanling that could make a girl pregnant through eating a meal?
“Boss, a box of tissues!” he called out in a fluster.
The boss threw a box of tissues onto the table, glanced at the pair, and sneered, “Hey, how bad can it be? If something happened, there’s no choice—go to a proper hospital…”
Lu Mingfei really wanted to grab the monitor and smash it over that pig-headed guy!
“I had no choice but to come to you…” Chen Wenwen sobbed. “I’ve been looking for so many people over the past few days, but none of them believed me. I ended up leaving you a message on QQ, and after seeing your reply, I spent the entire afternoon calling for you on QQ, but you never logged back in. Luckily, I had QQ with IP tracking, so I managed to find you here.”