Lin Feng frowned, feeling that this phone call was suspicious no matter how he looked at it, so he said:
"You say you're Lu Qingxue, how am I supposed to know if that's true?"
"Besides, Lu Qingxue and I aren't even close."
"Coming out of nowhere and telling me to go to the Maternal and Child Health Hospital makes no sense."
With that, not wanting to listen to any more of the person's quibbling, Lin Feng simply hung up the phone.
Then, Lin Feng turned his head to look at Zhou Cheng and found that, under Zhou Cheng's organization, a group of girls had already begun lining up in an orderly fashion to sign up.
Lin Feng was silent for a moment. Why hadn't he noticed before that Zhou Cheng had such strong organizational skills?
Oh well, the arrow was already on the bowstring.
He might as well honestly pick a girl next and try to build some chemistry with her.
Just as Lin Feng was thinking this, the phone in his pocket rang again.
It was that same unfamiliar number.
"Will you ever stop..."
Before his voice trailed off, the voice on the other end changed, and someone informed him with absolute seriousness: "Your girlfriend is in labor at the Maternal and Child Health Hospital in the Economic Development Zone, get over here right now and sign the papers!"
"Huh?"
"Huh? What huh, hurry up and get over here! The mother said—Four Seasons Hotel, let that sink in... What? Amniotic fluid is murky? Has bed number 8 opened up yet..."
Beep, beep, beep—
The call was disconnected. Lin Feng looked at the phone in his hand and fell into deep thought.
Judging by the commotion at the end of the line, it really sounded like they were at a hospital.
But!! When on earth did Lu Qingxue become my girlfriend?? And she's having my baby?? Wait!
Lin Feng recalled something, and his eyes widened slightly.
The Four Seasons Hotel... A long time ago, he really had been intimate with a woman there.
He remembered that day was to celebrate getting his scholarship, and he and his dorm brothers had gotten completely hammered at a bar.
The next morning when he woke up, he found himself in a hotel with a woman lying next to him.
His head had been pounding at the time, and coupled with his thin skin, he hadn't dared to look closely at what the woman looked like.
He only vaguely remembered a silhouette...
Pausing for a moment, Lin Feng quickly took out his phone, logged onto the campus forum, and began searching for keywords:
"Lu Qingxue takes a leave of absence."
As one of the campus bigwigs, Lin Feng quickly found the old post along with a photo of Lu Qingxue.
Then, his mind exploded with a roar.
The campus belle taking a leave of absence happened three months after that incident—the timeline matched up! Moreover, this facial contour faintly overlapped with his memories from back then...
The woman from that night turned out to be Lu Qingxue?! And Lu Qingxue was going to have a baby now??
For a moment, Lin Feng's mind was in utter turmoil, filled with a chaotic mess of thoughts! "What the hell? The campus belle took a leave of absence just to go give birth to my child??"
After a pause, Lin Feng opened his navigation app and searched for the Maternal and Child Health Hospital.
The map showed it would take about three hours to get there from the campus, and Lin Feng panicked a little.
It wasn't that he had deep feelings for Lu Qingxue,
but rather that if the child really was his, and something happened to her while she was giving birth all alone in the hospital,
he wouldn't be able to live with himself, morally or conscientiously.
Lin Feng turned back, looked at Zhou Cheng standing in the center of the crowd, and shouted:
"Dacheng, I've got an urgent matter, I'm heading out!"
"Urgent matter?"
Zhou Cheng looked up from the crowd, only to see Lin Feng's retreating back as he hurried away.
"What could possibly be more urgent than finding a wife?"
Nearby, Liu Ruyan watched Lin Feng's hurried departure, her expression full of resentment.
She truly couldn't understand it.
How could a man with no family background, no money, and nothing going for him except a pretty face be so popular?
The way these girls were throwing themselves at him was truly unsightly.
"Hmph! Once you get out into the real world, you'll find out that a man's face can't be used as a meal ticket."
She looked at the girls competing to sign up and said with utter contempt.
With that, she turned to leave, only to see her roommates—who had accompanied her—looking eager to make a move.
"You guys aren't leaving? You wouldn't still want to sign up, would you? Is the campus hunk's reputation really that attractive?"
"Ruyan, you'd better worry about yourself. Today's events are definitely going to blow up on the campus forum."
"Don't forget our bet. A gambler who loses must accept defeat."
"Exactly..."
Hearing her roommates' words, Liu Ruyan's face turned pale and green.
In the end, she stamped her foot and turned away in a huff.
A bunch of women with long hair and short sights!!
She wanted to see what kind of girlfriend Lin Feng would end up with!
...
Three hours later.
Lin Feng arrived at the hospital where Lu Qingxue was giving birth.
Asking his way all the way to the delivery room entrance, he saw a doctor in a white lab coat standing at the door shouting at the top of his lungs: "Lin Feng?! Lin Feng!! Hasn't the person arrived yet?!"
"I, I'm Lin Feng." Lin Feng hurried forward.
"Why didn't you wait until after dark to get here?"
The doctor snapped impatiently:
"Hurry up and sign the papers and pay the fees! Honestly, you're way too unreliable!"
"Uh, this..."
Lin Feng was hit with a barrage of complaints from the doctor, but he didn't even know how to explain.
He couldn't possibly say that he and Lu Qingxue weren't close, and that he had only just found out she was giving birth and rushed over, could he?
Lin Feng could only silently take the documents, and just as he was about to pick up his pen to sign, he saw the large fee breakdown on top—
Pending payment: 2,800.00 yuan.
"..."
Lin Feng patted his pocket; he only had 1,200 left for living expenses, so this wasn't enough money!
Besides, he still wasn't sure if the child was really his.
Just as Lin Feng was hesitating, an electronic chime suddenly sounded in his mind:
[Ding! Detected that the host's biological flesh and blood is about to enter the world, Super Dad System activated.]
[As long as the host earnestly cares for the child, you will receive random rewards from the system.]
[Congratulations to the host, you have received a startup fund of thirty thousand yuan for novice dads.]
"Respected customer, your bank card ending in 6916 has received a deposit of 30,000.00 yuan, and the balance is 3,1216.08 yuan..."
Looking at the text message on his phone, Lin Feng was both startled and overjoyed.
What startled him was that he could now be 100% certain that the child Lu Qingxue was carrying was his own,
and he was about to become a father.
After all, as a veteran web novel reader, Lin Feng didn't think the system would make a mistake.
As for his joy, it stemmed from the sudden appearance of the system.
With it, his upcoming life wouldn't be too desperate.
The three thousand yuan instantly deposited into his card was concrete proof of that.
"Doctor, I'll go pay the fees right now. Inside... I'll have to trouble you all."
Lin Feng took the documents, hurriedly signed his full name in a flash, and then rushed off toward the payment counter.
After clearing the fees, Lin Feng returned to the front of the delivery room.
Earlier, when he had abruptly heard that Lu Qingxue was giving birth without knowing for sure if the baby was his, he hadn't been able to fully process it.
But now, Lin Feng felt that the screams coming from inside the delivery room sounded exceptionally shrill.
Although he didn't know which mother's voice it was, the atmosphere instinctively made the palms of his hands sweat.
"How can giving birth take so long?"
With his mind in turmoil, Lin Feng paced back and forth incessantly down the hallway.
"It's been several hours already. Is Lu Qingxue going to be alright? Is the baby going to be alright?"
With a pale face, Lin Feng wore an expression of intense anxiety.
Every now and then, doctors would walk out holding swaddling clothes, and before they could even call out a name, he would lurch forward:
"Doctor, doctor, is this my baby?"
Every time he received a negative answer, Lin Feng would look dejectedly as other people hugged their babies, smiling and coaxing them.
"So this is what it's like to be a dad..."
Watching the reunited families in the hallway, Lin Feng felt both envious and uneasy.
After all, his relationship with Lu Qingxue hadn't even been sorted out yet...
Just as Lin Feng was sitting and standing on pins and needles, a nurse finally walked out of the delivery room carrying two bundles of swaddling clothes and shouted: "Are Lu Qingxue's family members here?"
"Here!!"
Lin Feng dashed over in a flash.
"Congratulations, a boy and a girl! Both mother and children are safe and well!"
Hearing those definitive words, Lin Feng finally let out a sigh of relief.
Only then did he belatedly realize that his legs felt a bit weak...
"She finally gave birth. That's great."
Lifting his head, Lin Feng noticed that at some point the lights in the corridor had blazed to life—it was already dark outside.
He hadn't noticed it at all until now.