Gao Shuai felt his eyelids twitching uncontrollably. Never in his wildest dreams did he expect that the one thing he feared most would actually happen. What made it worse was that he was the one who had suggested taking this route in the first place, all because there was a rarely-visited herbal jelly shop down this street—a place he had specifically tracked down after asking several girls for directions.
How could he have possibly run into his "lifelong nemesis" right here?
Regret washed over him. He wanted to remind Sun Qianyue that he was standing right beside her, but he was terrified of displeasing her. Since he wasn't her boyfriend yet, he had no right to make such demands.
Right now, his greatest hope was that Liu Chuanfeng would turn her down. But upon second thought, that was practically impossible. Sun Qianyao was so breathtakingly gorgeous; who on earth would say no?
Well... actually, it wasn't entirely impossible. He *had* rejected Zhang Jingyi's confession, after all.
A tiny flicker of hope instantly ignited in Gao Shuai's chest.
Liu Chuanfeng didn't say a word. Instead, he took the lighter from Wang Yaofa's hand, turning the adjustment wheel all the way down as he accepted it.
*Click.*
*Click.*
"Huh?"
Liu Chuanfeng frowned, shook the lighter, and tried again. It was the same result. "Out of fuel?"
Wang Yaofa raised an eyebrow, looking utterly bewildered. "That's impossible. It was working just fine a second ago."
With that, he reached out to take it back, but Liu Chuanfeng kept it away from him, looking instead at Sun Qianyao. "Care to give it a try?"
"I have a feeling your luck is better than mine."
Wang Yaofa seemed to understand something, yet at the same time he didn't quite get it. Still, he tactfully pulled back his hand and retreated to the side. At that exact moment, he felt it more clearly than ever: his good friend seemed to have changed.
What the hell?
Fury burned in Gao Shuai's chest. It was painfully obvious that Liu Chuanfeng was asking his goddess to light the cigarette for him—this was going too far! He immediately thrust out his hand. "Let me!"
Though his voice was loud, no one paid him any mind. For that brief moment, everyone seemed to act as though he didn't even exist.
Sun Qianyao tilted her head, her gaze shifting with a fluid grace, pausing for just a fraction of a second. "Alright~"
"Let me give it a try."
"But I can't guarantee it'll work, though~"
Sun Qianyao added a playful lilt to the end of her sentence, making her sound utterly charming. She stepped forward, reached out, and held out her palm. "Hand it over~"
Gao Shuai's eyes widened in disbelief. From the day he started pursuing her until now, he had never even had the chance to touch that hand, yet Liu Chuanfeng had so casually placed the lighter right on her fair, delicate palm. Gao Shuai saw it with crystal clarity—Liu Chuanfeng's fingers had brushed lightly across her palm as he did.
It must have been so soft.
A wave of bitter envy washed over him, yet not a single person spared him a glance. Because the moment Sun Qianyao gently pressed down with her thumb, the world suddenly had light.
"Oh, looks like my luck isn't bad after all."
Sun Qianyao's pretty eyes curved into slight slits, as if striking a flame was some kind of monumental achievement.
Liu Chuanfeng, with the cigarette clamped between his lips, took a step forward. Cupping his hand around the flame, he lowered his head and took a deep drag, then straightened up and exhaled a thick cloud of smoke. The two of them were instantly swallowed up by the haze. Unlike other girls who would have found it off-putting, Sun Qianyao actually found the sight rather intriguing.
"This is my first time lighting a cigarette for a guy, you know."
She spoke with a slight nasal tone, her eyes drifting away as if she were feeling shy. This sight left Gao Shuai in a daze; when had he ever seen the goddess look at him with such coy shyness?
They always said that the shy lowering of a young girl's head was the most moving sight in the world.
Heh. Well, that depended entirely on who she was looking at.
Liu Chuanfeng merely offered a faint smile. "With a face as pretty as yours, how could you not end up lighting cigarettes for people sooner or later?"
Young as she was, Sun Qianyao wasn't quite familiar with modern internet slang yet, and she didn't fully grasp what he meant. She only had a gut feeling that he was complimenting her looks.
By the time she snapped out of it and wanted to ask him what those words meant, Liu Chuanfeng and Wang Yaofa had already walked some distance away. She desperately wanted to call out to him, but shouting at that distance would be rather unseemly. A wave of disappointment instantly washed over her—she still hadn't gotten his WeChat.
This was the first time since her debut that she had ever asked a guy for his WeChat, and her opening battle had ended in failure.
Just then, however, she noticed the guy walking back a few paces. Bathed in the sunlight, he looked dazzlingly bright as he waved and shouted at her, "Hey~ I'll leave the lighter with you for now. Return it next time."
Sun Qianyao's spirits, which had just been sinking into dejection, somehow surged right back up. Before she could even process it, she found herself calling out in a loud, involuntary response: "Okay~"
As soon as that single word left her lips, she couldn't help but wonder: Was that really her just now?
She always paid meticulous attention to her words and actions when out in public—had she just lost her head for a moment?
"He's gone."
Gao Shuai broke her post-mortem analysis at a thoroughly inappropriate time. Consumed by jealousy, he didn't want to linger in this heartbreaking place any longer. "Let's go get some herbal jelly."
"I'm not hungry anymore. I'm feeling a bit under the weather, so let's have you accompany me another time."
Sun Qianyao had lost all appetite for it now, so she simply turned him down flat. At the same time, she worried he might be too heartbroken—after all, it was a rare stroke of luck to run into the campus hunk today, which had caused her to lose her composure and even neglect her loyal backup suitor. Throwing him a bone would keep him on the hook.
Sometimes, a backup suitor could still come in quite handy.
Take today, for instance: if he hadn't suggested going for herbal jelly, she never would have crossed paths with Liu Chuanfeng, nor would she have discovered just how interesting he actually was.
*Damn it, why am I thinking about him again?*
Realizing she was getting way too carried away, Sun Qianyao decided she needed to head back and calm down immediately. When a girl wants to succeed on her own terms, the first thing she must cut down is her romantic distraction—no matter how handsome the guy was.
After all, the high-caliber guys and big-name directors at the Shanghai Theatre Academy were her true targets.
For now, she would relegate Liu Chuanfeng to the substitute bench, and push Gao Shuai even further down the line.
"Are you alright? Let me take you to the hospital."
Gao Shuai remained intensely concerned about the goddess's physical well-being. In countless TV shows, this was the exact moment where the male lead accompanied the female lead to the hospital, and their relationship rapidly heated up. He figured his chance had finally arrived.
"No need."
Sun Qianyao turned him down once more. "I'll be fine once I go back and lie down for a bit."
In truth, she just wanted to go back and ponder what his parting words really meant, and to find out more about this former campus hunk.
Pity that Gao Shuai was completely oblivious to the goddess's thoughts. He was still feeling immensely relieved that the two of them hadn't exchanged WeChat contacts, while simultaneously nursing a bit of disappointment that he couldn't escort her to the hospital:
"Alright then."
"How about we head to a bar sometime? My cousin is coming back the week after next, and I heard he knows people at High House. Do you want me to take you along to check it out?"
"We'll see."
High House was a bustling local club, and rumor had it there were plenty of handsome guys and beautiful girls inside. Naturally, Sun Qianyao was tempted—she had never set foot in a bar in her life. At the same time, she worried it wouldn't be safe for a girl to go alone. "Would it be okay if I invited a few other classmates to come with us?"
"Sure, absolutely."
Gao Shuai readily agreed to anything. As long as the goddess said yes, what did bringing a few friends matter? Besides, he had his own little scheme brewing in his mind: *When the time comes, I'll order plenty of drinks, and then confess my feelings when she's had a bit too much to drink. That's how they always win over the goddess in the movies....*
"I never would've guessed."
On the walk back, Wang Yaofa kept turning his head to stare fixedly at Liu Chuanfeng. In his memory, although Liu Chuanfeng could be mischievous, he had never played so many psychological games with girls. In just that brief encounter back there, he had witnessed at least a half-dozen tactics: creating something out of nothing, killing with a borrowed knife, playing hard to get, turning the tables to take the initiative... and those were just the ones he managed to spot.
"What?"
"Did you only just realize how handsome I am?"
"Oh, the handsome part is undeniable."
Wang Yaofa never doubted his good friend's looks. "But your flirting game today was genuinely top-tier."
"I totally misjudged you before."
"I was practically embarrassing myself trying to show off in front of an expert today. With your level, when it comes to you and Sun Qianyao, there's no telling who's playing who."
Liu Chuanfeng smiled faintly. "She's interested in me for pretty much two reasons."
"First, I'm ranked number one in looks at school, and I'm probably the only guy who doesn't have her contact info and has never pursued her. It's like collecting cards—she's practically completed the whole set and is just missing this final piece. Naturally, she wants that last card in her hand."
"Second, even though she has a bit of a reputation at school, she's always lived in Zhang Jingyi's shadow. Competition between girls is always a silent, behind-the-scenes war. Even if Zhang Jingyi has no intention of competing with her, Sun Qianyao certainly does."
"And me? I turned down Zhang Jingyi's confession yesterday. If I were to fall under her spell too, just imagine how much that would feed her vanity."
"I was simply utilizing her own little ambitions."
Wang Yaofa still had doubts. "Then why didn't you strike while the iron was hot and get her contact info when she was already being proactive?"
Liu Chuanfeng shook his head. "No need. For girls, things that are too easily obtained aren't cherished. Better to reel her in slowly."
"What if you never cross paths again?"
Liu Chuanfeng shrugged, completely unbothered by the thought. "So what?"
"There are plenty of pretty girls out there; why obsess over just one? If we miss each other, we miss each other, and I haven't lost anything. But if I hook her, I win big."
"If you only feed one fish and it dies, you'll be heartbroken. If you keep a whole school of them, you won't even notice if a few kick the bucket."
"The core strategy is to cast a wide net and haul in a bountiful catch."