Dragon Raja; Chapter 76: Stars and Flowers (2)

Dragon Raja

They were quite content until a Student Union officer wearing white gloves rang a brass bell, and those black-clad boys and white-dressed girls appeared. Before then, they had been happily enjoying their meal.

The ringing of the bell cut the air in the lobby of Amber Hall, and suddenly the scattered guests stopped talking. All the lights came on at the same time, and down the two curved staircases leading to the second floor, a dignified man in black walked down one side, and a girl in a white dress wearing silk white gloves walked down the other side.

“Do you know what you do when someone blocks your way to the lobster at a buffet?” Finger, who had not yet realized the change, joked loudly with his mouth full of food, “You should poke his fat waist with the handle of the fork!”

“What if he still doesn’t let me?” Lu Mingfei had also heard this joke. Because he enjoyed the meal so much, he was more than happy to accompany Finger and act as a supporting actor.

“Use the fork tip instead, junior brother!” Finger laughed three times.

The whole hall was silent. The guests had wisely retreated to different corners to prepare for the dance. Only two guys standing in the middle with plates were left. And this tasteless joke was like a ghost with a disgusting face, coming and going in the hall that reflected the echo. Lu Mingfei and Finger successfully attracted everyone’s attention in this way. There were about two or three hundred cold eyes cast on them. The guests who walked to the stairs stopped as soon as they put their hands together.

The two of them suddenly realized their situation, stopped eating, and wiped their mouths.

Lu Mingfei began to look around to see which corner was closest to them. They could run over there like mice returning to their nest and stop being icy lumps under the gaze of these cold eyes.

“Do we really have to dance?” Lu Mingfei was dumbfounded, swallowing the lobster in his mouth.

“The one with his mouth covered in mustard sauce… is that the new S-Rank?” a girl on the stairs asked in surprise.

“I heard he comes from a poor family,” her dance partner said, “but he works very hard!”

“‘Hardworking’—is that how they explain a poor kid?” Lu Mingfei thought to himself. “I just have unreliable parents!”

“He looks so shady… And the one next to him… looks even shadier.” Another girl frowned. “That cheap formal attire… The quality is really terrible.”

“I heard he’s the Principal’s illegitimate child, one who’s been wandering outside for years—someone with connections.” Someone else commented.

“Could the Principal have such an illegitimate child? My impression of the Principal just went down…”

“Sir, please leave the dance floor; the social dance is about to begin,” a waiter politely reminded them.

Lu Mingfei, his head drooping, had already prepared to make his exit, feeling relieved after hearing that. But he didn’t manage to leave—Finger stopped him!

“It’s been so long since I danced!” Finger clapped his hands, making a statement that would have him searching the world for regret pills in seconds. “When I enrolled, I was the king of dance!”

The waiter stared at him in astonishment.

“Why are you looking at me? Am I someone who doesn’t understand social etiquette? I’m waiting here because I’m going to dance!” Finger glared, adjusted his bow tie, and snapped his fingers stylishly.

Finger looked up and down at the ladies on the stairs. Lu Mingfei understood that he was out of options and had no choice but to find a dance partner to ease the current awkwardness.

However, the entire hall was filled with couples, and there wasn’t a single girl who was free. Every girl that Finger glanced at made an “Oh” sound and turned away in unison, as if they had just seen a pile of cow dung—quite a natural reaction.

They were the only two “extra” men in the entire hall.

The deep red curtain on the second-floor side opened, revealing a small band tuning their instruments. The conductor leading them was none other than the chef who had delivered food to Lu Mingfei and Finger late at night—the man was clearly multitalented. The chef-slash-conductor was just about to wave his baton when he saw the two men standing awkwardly in the middle of the dance floor, unsure of what to do. Without instructions, the members of the band could only keep repeating the short prelude.

“It’s tango! This is my specialty!” Finger’s eyes showed a determined gleam. “Come on, brother! Don’t embarrass yourself; hold on! You and I, let’s fight our way out and show Caesar something impressive!”

“Great! Point the way out for us!” Lu Mingfei echoed his senior brother’s courage.

“It makes me happy to see your ambition. Now, dear junior, you’re taking the woman’s steps…” Finger grabbed Lu Mingfei’s waist, holding his hand, and gave a confident snap of his fingers towards the conductor on the second floor. “Let’s rock!”

This was the first time Lu Mingfei saw Finger exuding such a strong aura, filled with a kind of fearless spirit one would expect from a streetwise wanderer. Perhaps if there were any women fascinated by bad boys, they might have developed a slight attraction to this scruffy man. However, Lu Mingfei was not a woman, and facts had proven that every time Finger acted in high spirits, they would end up in dire straits—a dire situation beyond salvation.

The music started, skirts twirled. Under tremendous pressure, the two “weasels” had no choice but to hold each other.

The air was filled with the faint scent of perfume. The guests had evidently all attended the same dance lessons, with their moves coming from the same teacher—graceful steps and precise footwork. They formed neat rectangular formations at times, and at other times spread into circles, with black-clad men on the outer ring and white-dressed women on the inner ring.

The only out-of-place element was Lu Mingfei, dancing in the inner circle… gracefully.

“Hey, is this some kind of bride-selection event? The Austrian-Hungarian Emperor’s bride selection, right? I’ve seen ‘Sissi,’ and it’s exactly the same.” Lu Mingfei regretted not kicking Finger in the face and running away when he was grabbed. By the time they were surrounded, it was already too late.

Around him, the lace-trimmed white dresses of the girls spun like giant blooming white flowers.

“Cassell College is a Germanic-style college, so you aren’t wrong about it being like Austria-Hungary. We have top-tier court dance instructors.” Finger was dancing passionately.

“This is what you call fighting our way out? Come on, we’ve embarrassed ourselves as much as possible!”

“Use your brain—this is a European classical-style social ball. They’ll switch dance partners!” Finger said in a low voice as he gallantly took big strides. “They’re paired up like XY chromosomes, while we are two Y chromosomes… From a genetic point of view, we are destined to win. You know what Y chromosomes are, right? Think of what you learned in high school biology,” Finger spoke seriously, in a very academic tone. “A man’s chromosome pair is XY, and a woman’s is XX. Only a so-called ‘super male’ is the invincible ‘YY’! This means that no matter how we swap partners, at most we still end up as YY—we absolutely won’t lose!”

“I honestly can’t imagine how your head is filled with so many biology lessons and such optimism. Even now, you still firmly believe that we are in an invincible position.” Lu Mingfei spun Finger, whose waist was as thick as a bear’s, and hesitated over whether he should try that fancy high leg kick like the pretty girls around them. The others were so in sync with their dance moves—everyone was doing a high kick, and if he didn’t do it, it felt a bit out of place.

“No,” Finger said mournfully, “I’m saying we have nothing left to lose. We are like a stock that has fallen to rock bottom, and it’s bound to bounce back. Also, I think you can drop the idea of doing a high kick. They’re wearing long dresses, while you’re wearing pants—your crotch seam is going to split…”

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