Camping, true wilderness survival, generally means leaving the city with a tent, settling in the wild, and spending one or more nights away from the hustle and bustle of modern industrial life.
But this so-called “authentic” wilderness survival is really just a way for the petite bourgeoisie to show off their professional gear after dinner, feigning a proper indignation at industrial civilization to prove their love for the original state of nature… Yet if you made them live somewhere without a flush toilet or a hot shower for three days, they’d end up bawling and messing their own pants…
At this very moment, the social practice activity Jiang Chi signed up for was all about cleaning up the mess left by this group of petite bourgeoisie. The full name of the activity was “Protect the Environment, Clean Up Trash—Start With You and Me,” commonly referred to as “Trash-Picking.”
Psh!
Skewering an empty can and tossing it into the trash bag dragging behind him, Jiang Chi wore a blank expression beneath the scorching sun.
For this event, he and Ji Yueniang were grouped together, responsible for cleaning up a mountainside. However, the moment the activity began, Ji Yueniang slung her backpack over her shoulder and ran off into a small grove nearby, leaving all the work to him. Who knows what she was up to.
Speaking of Ji Yueniang, Jiang Chi’s feelings were rather complicated. At first, she was just a classmate with no sense of boundaries, then became a loyal but not-too-bright friend. After learning the truth, she was someone he wanted revenge on. But after some time and adjustment, he started finding her rather cute, and in certain moments, he even developed some starry feelings toward Ji Yueniang.
And now… recalling that tearful, regret-filled phone call in the early hours, Jiang Chi’s lips twitched. Some of this tsundere girl’s actions were truly beyond common sense.
“Senior Jiang.”
Suddenly, a soft, youthful girl’s voice sounded from behind, making Jiang Chi jolt as if struck by lightning.
A faint scent of gardenias drifted to his nose as he turned around and saw a figure both familiar and strange.
A girl with long hair down to her waist stood behind him, dressed in a white tracksuit and black pants, a baseball cap perched on her head, her large eyes shining with curiosity and excitement—she looked downright adorable.
Jiang Chi’s heartbeat instantly lost its rhythm, all those wonderful memories from the past surging up like a tide.
But immediately after, as he took a good look at the girl under the sunlight in her baseball cap, his face turned cold as ice, his voice chilling to the bone.
“Ji Yueniang, what are you up to?”
“I want to make it up to you.”
The girl blinked her beautiful, guilty eyes as she spoke, then reached up to remove her baseball cap. Her long hair spilled out, revealing the face of “Ji Qingchan”—those eyes impossibly pure.
“I know you like ‘Ji Qingchan’, but I’m sorry, as a character I played, she never really existed. But now, she does.”
She rushed over and wrapped her arms around the man’s waist, pressing her head into his chest.
“Now, I’m ‘Ji Qingchan’. I’m your junior, your girlfriend.”
“So… ‘Ji Qingchan’” tilted her head back, those innocent, lovely eyes looking straight into his, “Senior Jiang Chi, my dear boyfriend, hurry up and kiss me. Do everything you’ve wanted to do to me these past days—anything but that one thing, everything else is fine.”
“Jiang Chi, let me make it up to you, okay?”
Her gaze was as clear as water, playful and filled with anticipation. But the man’s face had turned ashen.
He pushed her away with one shove. “Ji Qingchan” staggered, took a few steps back, lost her balance, and landed hard on the ground, staring up at him with bewildered eyes.
“Ji Yueniang, what do you take me for?”
Jiang Chi looked down on the girl at his feet, voice cold and detached: “You think I’m some little boy who loses one toy, gets a similar one, and is all happy again?”
“You have no idea what my heartbreak was like. You haven’t felt the agony of having your heart ruthlessly carved out, haven’t tasted the despair of utter hopelessness, as if everything inside you has turned to ash.”
“And now? What do you want? Make me your clown, to be toyed with and have my feelings played with again?”
“I just want to make it up to you.” The girl gritted her teeth.
“Make it up to me?” The man laughed as if hearing the world’s funniest joke, doubling over with laughter so hard that tears streamed down his cheeks.
After a long while, he wiped his eyes and looked at the stubborn girl on the ground, his gaze filled with contempt and mockery.
“Your so-called compensation is just for your own peace of mind.”
“Ji Yueniang, you’re truly the height of hypocrisy! You love looking good on the outside, crave fame, and yet want to play the noble, generous, kindhearted soul.”
“And now you put on this act, coming down from your high horse to ‘make it up’ to me.”
“‘Make it up’? Those words mean nothing coming from your lips, and you don’t even understand what they mean to me.”
“It means, after you ‘make it up’ to me, I’m supposed to forgive you. It means the girl I loved never really existed. It means you can sleep soundly tonight without a care.”
“You don’t know what ‘compensation’ is. You don’t know what ‘forgiveness’ is, either!”
“Because you never felt guilty. You never knew heartbreak. You never really saw me—you always thought I was just some otaku obsessed with fictional girls!”
“Draping your so-called ‘compensation’ over me is just you satisfying your own selfishness.”
“Ji Yueniang, you are selfish!”
“I’m not!” Ji Yueniang retorted.
“I really do want to make it up to you!!”
“Compensate? Fine.” Jiang Chi grinned, his smile a little deranged. He pointed at himself, blue eyes laced with veins of madness.
“Then fall in love with me. Love me as deeply as the girl I loved loved me. Can you do it? Can you really love me?!”
Jiang Chi let out a cold snort, his voice thick with savage sarcasm: “Ji Yueniang, you are selfish and fake to the very core!!”
With that, he turned to leave.
But Ji Yueniang stood up, slowly raising her head, as if a fire was burning in her eyes.
“Fine, I’m selfish, I’m fake.”
She grabbed Jiang Chi’s arm, using all her strength to yank him back hard.
“But who am I? I’m Ji Yueniang! I’m the school tyrant! You’re right, I just want to ease my own conscience, so I want to make it up to you—and nobody can stop me!!”
With that, she suddenly raised her head and kissed Jiang Chi fiercely.
His blue eyes flew wide open, pupils contracting violently, his heart thundering as if smashed by a heavy hammer, a strange, indescribable sensation surging up from his heart and flooding through his whole body. He froze in place, as if bound by an immobilizing spell.
Ji Yueniang, eyes red, threw Jiang Chi to the ground, roughly yanked open his collar, and bit down hard on his collarbone. The taste of blood instantly filled both their noses, leaving them both dizzy, as if lost in a dream.
Just as the girl started to undo the man’s pants, suddenly, a loud shout rang out.
“Brother Ji, Brother Ji, all the trash is cleaned up, when are you and the campus heartthrob going to… Whoa!”
“Campus heartthrob, you… you two keep going, don’t mind me… I just came to find Brother Ji, didn’t see a thing.”
With that, Su Tian, looking as if her worldview had been shattered, turned and dashed away, leaving behind the two disheveled, flushed figures still tangled on the ground.
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Honestly until now I didn’t think she was dumb enough to go there, but it seems she’s always capable of going even lower