Dragon Raja 2; Chapter 22: All Classmates Are Not Mean (2)

Dragon Raja 2

Still as unfashionable as ever.

Xu Yanyan decided to be cautious. With Lu Mingfei armed with a beautiful girl, a Ferrari, and a massive scholarship, he had crushed the confidence of countless people and was ranked first on Shilan’s “Top Enemies to Defeat List,” someone every boy wanted to get rid of. People couldn’t stand seeing someone they used to look down on surpass them, requiring them to look up. But Xu Yanyan couldn’t quite understand Lu Mingfei’s current demeanor, so he dared not take action and risk everything right away…

Xu Yanyan used to get along with Lu Mingfei, but when he heard in the group that Lu Mingfei was coming today, his heart skipped a beat. After all, Lu Mingfei used to be someone no one cared about, and Xu Yanyan had given him a hard time on more than one occasion. Now that Lu Mingfei was impressive, acting detached, who knew if he held a grudge?

Lu Mingfei paid no attention to Xu Yanyan’s gaze, still practicing his smile… His lips twitched stiffly, and in Xu Yanyan’s eyes, this smile looked unusually menacing.

“Are you… going to fix a toilet?” Xu Yanyan asked tentatively.

“No… It’s just more comfortable to use my own seat.” Lu Mingfei didn’t get what Xu Yanyan meant, but he replied without thinking.

“Alright then.” Xu Yanyan felt even more uncertain. A person receiving tens of thousands of dollars in scholarship annually, fixing toilets? Modest in victory, truly a formidable opponent!

Another person entered, looking just like Xu Yanyan. He glanced at Lu Mingfei and was also startled, “Lu Mingfei? You… alright?”

“All good, all good.” Lu Mingfei couldn’t understand why everyone kept asking that.

The room was eerily quiet. Xu Yanyan and Xu Miaomiao whispered to each other while stealing glances at the enigmatic Lu Mingfei, who seemed lost in thought, occasionally smiling, holding a toilet seat. They had no idea what he was up to, but his presence was certainly intimidating.

Fifteen minutes later, people arrived in small groups, each time greeted by familiar faces who would all ask Lu Mingfei the same question. This made him feel a bit on edge, scratching his head and smiling awkwardly. Even Liu Miaomiao, the rarely-seen piano beauty, came by. The literature club gathering had turned into a mini-reunion. The room grew lively, and fewer people focused on Lu Mingfei.

“What’s the special?” Xu Yanyan flipped through the menu.

“Who cares what’s on special? Zhao Menghua said he’d cover today’s bill, so everyone gets a surf-and-turf pizza combo and unlimited soda refills!” Xu Miaomiao said loudly.

“You simpletons! When Young Master Zhao is treating, why settle for pizza?”

He used to be one of Chen Wenwen’s loyal supporters, belittling Liu Miaomiao as a “little kid.” Actually, he admitted to himself that Liu Miaomiao was quite pretty, but he just couldn’t stand the boys in the class flocking around her, acting like servants to a young goddess. He even overheard two boys who liked Liu Miaomiao talking privately, saying, “I guess I won’t be able to marry Liu Miaomiao in this lifetime, so I’ll let you have her!” The other patted his chest and said, “Don’t worry, I’ll treat her well!”

What kind of brotherhood nonsense is that?

But Liu Miaomiao treated Lu Mingfei fairly well, and was willing to talk to him. Once, out of boredom, Lu Mingfei asked her how to practice piano, and she said it was very tough, requiring finger strength from a young age. Then Liu Miaomiao demonstrated by playing a few notes powerfully with one hand on the window glass, making it vibrate slightly. Lu Mingfei couldn’t get that effect at all. He remembered the beautiful light and shadow left by Liu Miaomiao’s long slender fingers on the glass, and from then on, he stopped calling her a “little kid.”

“Yeah.” Liu Miaomiao nodded.

Liu Miaomiao was wearing a Dai-style tube skirt, blue with wax-dyed mimosa flowers, paired with a white tank top, her hair tied up in a high ponytail, even wearing light makeup. In less than a year, the little kid had blossomed. Now, walking on the street, she would probably attract stares from creepy uncles. It seemed everyone had changed a bit over the past year; his schoolmates were no longer immature.

He drooped his head, getting up to leave the noisy place to take a stroll. When he pushed the door, there was a loud “bang.”

Outside the door was a large face with a red mark in the middle from being hit by the glass door.

Today’s host, Zhao Menghua, stared at Lu Mingfei, looking baffled, not understanding how this guy could be so calm after running into him. In the past, Zhao Menghua provided drinks and internet, and Lu Mingfei was in charge of flattering and buttering him up—their cooperation was seamless. But now Lu Mingfei’s eyes seemed hollow, as if no one else existed, or as if he was lost in his own world.

“I’m fine, I’m fine,” Lu Mingfei snapped out of it and quickly said. It had become a habit, as this was his first response to every classmate he saw today.

“I… I’m not fine!” Zhao Menghua held his head.

Normally, Zhao Menghua would have gotten angry by now, but this time he didn’t dare… because he couldn’t figure out Lu Mingfei’s current attitude.

Zhao Menghua was the top scorer in the city that year, admitted to Peking University’s Guanghua School of Management. His family had connections, and it was predetermined that he’d be on the list of exchange students to Yale in his junior and senior years. Everything was perfect, and he was supposed to be a legendary figure. But in that year, Lu Mingfei, a dark horse as unexpected as coal, completely stole his thunder. The old principal of Shilan Middle School didn’t know what Cassell College was, but when he calculated that Lu Mingfei’s scholarship was about 300,000 RMB per year, he was astonished. After the college entrance exam results were announced, Lu Mingfei’s name was above the top scorer Zhao Menghua’s, occupying a line by itself, truly outshining everyone else! Zhao Menghua looked up at the huge red list, with everyone around discussing that guy named “Lu Mingfei.” That little lowercase “i”? Zhao Menghua felt so frustrated he almost coughed up blood.

Lu Mingfei left as Zhao Menghua entered, and the door closed between them, while the private room echoed with cheers of “Boss!”

In the long hallway, blazing sunlight streamed in from the right, layer by layer wiping away the darkness from right to left. The long shadows of windows and people were cast on the ground. One of the shadows had long hair and a long dress, slightly fluttering in the breeze. Lu Mingfei slowly turned his head to the right and saw a white cotton dress, with folded hands holding a book on the skirt.

The hallway was very long, but unfortunately empty at the moment, with nothing to block the view between the two of them.

Silence.

“It’s not like meeting a first love, why am I so nervous?” Lu Mingfei’s prepared smile vanished. Meeting again, he still didn’t know what expression to use.

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