[Xiao Yang Eats Today: Big news, big news! Second seems to be on a date outside with her little brother.]
[Xiao Yang Eats Today: (Picture)]
Zhu Niao picked up her phone and glanced at it, seeing the message and the accompanying picture that followed.
It was taken around four or five in the evening. The sky was still a bit bright, and the horizon above the rooftops seemed to have red, layered clouds like a fiery sunset.
Then, Zhu Niao looked at the time displayed in her phone’s status bar.
8:21 PM.
Great. At least this proved she wasn’t leaving messages on read this time; she simply hadn’t seen the group chat messages at all.
Below was a sharp comment from a roommate.
[Bad Luck: Pure voyeuristic paparazzi.]
Then, it seemed the two of them exchanged a couple of jabs in the dorm group chat, which was their normal way of greeting each other.
It ended with two messages from Ye Qingchang.
[Bad Luck: You’re done for. I’m opening your snack cabinet now, and I haven’t had dinner yet.]
[Bad Luck: (Picture)]
The picture was a selfie showing only the lower half of a face, complete with a standard swallowing shot. Paired with sickly pale skin, slightly blood-tinted lips, and bright red chili oil, the whole scene seemed to carry an extra hint of allure.
If this were an eating show, it would definitely be enough to whet someone’s appetite.
[Xiao Yang Eats Today: Nooo! My spicy strips! Didn’t we agree they were just for me!]
Zhu Niao was too lazy to keep scrolling. It was just more of the same pointless banter anyway.
As for the topic discussed at the beginning, clearly no one believed it.
Liu Xie had told them during the day today that her relationship with her good little brother was completely pure.
Furthermore, even if Liu Xie really did have some ambiguous relationship with Liu Anran, one that might even threaten their pure, single revolutionary friendship, the scene in that photo would be even more impossible.
Based on Liu Xie, who seemed like the most carefree one in the dorm on the surface, but whose first video website was actually shared by Zhu Niao herself…
This kind of person, who talks a big game non-stop but is actually pure-hearted to a fault, wouldn’t actively take Liu Anran into a lingerie store after confirming a relationship.
Liu Xie was probably someone who hadn’t even been to a lingerie store herself, the type who would sneak a peek or two through an open door when she was a kid.
On the contrary, this was exactly what made their relationship seem quite pure, still completely stuck in the sibling zone.
She could pretty much imagine the exchange between Liu Xie and Liu Anran.
Liu Xie needed to buy underwear but had never been before, was too scared to go alone, so she used threats, bribes, and endless pestering to beg Liu Anran to go in with her.
Liu Anran, truly helpless and unable to withstand Liu Xie’s relentless badgering, finally agreed.
Yep, that was probably the whole story.
As for why Ye Qingchang was the first to jump out and refute and denounce Yang Shuli after she sent the message…
It was because the last person to be secretly photographed was her, and it was also a case of pure fabrication, just like this time.
Maybe Yang Shuli really should go to journalism school.
Playing with her phone, she looked up at the battery level and reluctantly put it down.
She looked out the window. Outside were mountains rapidly passing by, tiny villages scattered below, the tracks right beside the train car, and the oncoming train speeding past on the opposite track.
Zhu Niao was on a high-speed train.
She was keeping her initial promise to Gou Yu, heading to his home over the weekend to help explain this incident to his family.
To be honest, though, she felt that even without an explanation, it wouldn’t be a big problem. It might even be good to let Gou Yu learn a lesson so he wouldn’t pull this kind of stunt again.
Right, that’s it. When she got back, she wouldn’t help Gou Yu explain. She’d even add a few embellishments to make sure Gou Yu learned a thing or two from this incident.
A smug smile tugged at the corner of Zhu Niao’s mouth as she looked out the window, the passing flowers and grass seeming a bit more amiable.
Although, given the speed of the high-speed train, even if she saw flowers and grass, they would linger in her field of vision for a maximum of one or two seconds at the extreme distance.
Every time she traveled on a vehicle that covered such vast distances in an instant, Zhu Niao felt a strange sense of melancholy.
Because she always thought that the tiny villages below, which stayed in her view for at most four or five seconds, might be the places where some people would spend their entire lives.
She used to be like that too, but she was trapped in a cage called “home,” called “expectations,” meant to twist her entire life into the shape they desired.
She ran away.
Those days were very hard. She even had to make sure she never caused any trouble at school because, having run away, she had no parent to call.
What she feared more was being sent back, being returned to that cage after the hard-won escape.
But being alone at school seemed to be a mistake in itself. Back then, just walking on the road would attract countless discussions and stares.
Especially when she was picking bottles out of the trash.
At times like those, she would start to hate everyone, hate everything she was going through.
But she didn’t regret it. She had to escape.
And then, someone popped up. A real jerk.
“Classmate, I saw that bottle first.”
A guy who looked downright obnoxious picked his nose right in front of Zhu Niao, then wiped it on his own pants with a completely calm expression.
It made Zhu Niao’s eyelids twitch.
But she didn’t react at the time. Maybe she was thinking about who this familiar-looking guy was, or maybe she was wondering if trash-picking had territorial divisions and a sense of ownership.
Then she figured it out. The familiar guy in front of her was called Gou Yu, her classmate.
“You’re even fighting me for a bottle? Your family doesn’t seem poor?”
“The old man said I couldn’t survive on my own. I’m not having it, so I’m currently in the middle of an awesome wilderness survival challenge.” Gou Yu even gave a thumbs-up.
Zhu Niao just thought he was talking nonsense.
“You can’t survive a wilderness challenge without relying on your family.” Zhu Niao snatched her plastic bottle back.
“Aren’t you surviving? I haven’t completely fallen out with them yet. How about this? I’ll use some money as a transition, and then the two of us can do wilderness survival together. You teach me.”
“Psycho.”
“Hiss…”
Zhu Niao sucked in a sharp breath and rubbed her arms.
She suddenly felt a bit cold.
Then, a weight settled on her shoulder.
She looked to the side. It was Gou Yu, eyes closed, sleeping in the high-speed train seat next to her, leaning on her shoulder in a posture guaranteed to cause a stiff neck.
He even seemed to be drooling.
Zhu Niao gave him a bland look, then swung her right hand in a full arc for a slap.
“Yelp!”