"Damn it, why am I dreaming of this place again, staring at the pitch-black void all around." A mouthful of seawater took the opportunity to drill right into his mouth. What is going on, this is for real, you know. The salty and bitter taste in his mouth instantly brought him to his senses; this time it was genuine seawater, and he was going to drown.
No, this was a dream, it was impossible to drown. This feeling of being unable to breathe must be Lu Mingze putting his arm across his face in the dream to block his breathing, but what on earth was this eerie weightless sensation? Even though it was a dream, Lu Mingfei still thrashed his arms desperately, trying to swim upward. After paddling for a long time, he felt as though he hadn't moved at all. Everything around him was pitch black; apart from black, there was simply nothing else—no points of reference, not a shred of light. He had no idea how far away the surface was, and the intense feeling of suffocation made him feel like he was truly going to die.
He thrashed his arms frantically, kicking his legs with all his might, but a feeling of powerlessness engulfed him. In the deep sea without a single ray of light, for a mortal without an oxygen tank, how could anyone possibly swim out?
Right at that moment, the darkness before his eyes was suddenly slashed apart. A young girl wearing shrine maiden robes stood on a small boat, looking down at him.
Saved. Lu Mingfei opened his eyes, and what met his vision was the ceiling of a bedroom, while a familiar sound of snoring echoed in his ears. He was certain he hadn't seen wrong—that red hair, that girl was one thousand percent Uesugi Erii, only for some reason her eyes were golden.
"A thousand desolations, taking this as a dream. A million weary steps, taking this as home! Shall we trade, Big Brother?"
"Ohayou (Good morning)." Who else could it be, greeting someone with a notebook, if not Erii?
"Morning." Lu Mingfei yawned, handed the notebook back, and the two of them exchanged a smile.
"Lu Mingfei didn't sleep well last night?"
"Had a nightmare." Lu Mingfei stretched lazily. "Dreamed of you."
"Then shouldn't that be a sweet dream?" Erii smiled faintly.
"Good dreams are easy to wake from; I woke up several times during the night." Looking at that angelic smile, Lu Mingfei felt as though his heart had just taken ten thousand points of critical damage.
"So that's how it is. What you think about by day, you dream of by night. Did Lu Mingfei miss me that much?" Erii drew a smiley face on the page, a mischievous grin playing across her face.
For a cute girl to pull an expression like that had an astronomical killing power, causing Lu Mingfei's heartbeat to instantly skip a beat. Lu Mingfei shook his head—when this girl decided to be cute, it really was lethal. Early in the morning and he'd already been shot twice.
"Erii, let's talk about something," Lu Mingfei said, rubbing his hands together.
"What do you want to do?" Erii looked at him with a trace of wariness, wondering if he was about to ask to borrow money.
"Um, have you checked the school forum?"
"Forum?" Erii clearly had never used such a thing.
"It's a place where everyone posts online to chat, discuss things, and vent."
Fearing he wouldn't explain it clearly, Lu Mingfei began gesturing frantically, which actually amused Erii. In the blink of an eye, it was already Friday. After two days of inner struggle, Lu Mingfei had originally intended to make things clear to Erii today—that they weren't boyfriend and girlfriend, and that walking this close wasn't really appropriate. Yet looking at the super cute girl smiling before him, Lu Mingfei had no idea how to bring it up.
"So?" Erii wrote in her notebook.
"There's club activity class this afternoon. Today is club recruitment day, and also your welcome party for joining the Literature Club, don't forget." Lu Mingfei handed the notebook back.
"Mmh-hmm." Erii nodded obediently.
"Welcome, Uesugi-san, to the Literature Club!" Xu Yanyan and Xu Miaomiao set off party poppers, causing Erii to instinctively dodge behind Lu Mingfei, leaving him covered from head to foot in colorful confetti.
Lu Mingfei, standing by the door, wore a face dark as thunder, while Erii behind him looked at the confetti-covered version of Lu Mingfei and laughed so hard she couldn't close her mouth.
"You two, stay right there!" Lu Mingfei lunged forward, but grabbed only empty air.
"Don't go causing trouble, Lu Mingfei," Zhao Menghua said, stepping in front of the two brothers. "Today is Uesugi-san's welcome party, and you walked right into the party popper yourself. How can you blame the two of them?" Anyone with eyes could tell he had designs on Uesugi-san, and presumably the Xu brothers' stunt had been orchestrated entirely by him.
"Are you saying it would have been fine if that party popper had gone off right on Uesugi-san instead?" Lu Mingfei seized upon the loophole in Zhao Menghua's words, truly wondering what was going on inside his head—he already had Chen Wenwen, yet he still insisted on coming over to flirt with Uesugi-san.
"Call me Uesugi-san," Erii said coldly.
Lu Mingfei turned his head to look at Erii. Whose fault was it anyway that I got sprayed all over with confetti? Damn it, you were the one who told me to call you Erii in the first place! Lu Mingfei shook his head—a woman's heart is as unfathomable as the sea.
"I was talking about him." As if guessing Lu Mingfei's thoughts, Erii pointed at Zhao Menghua.
"Oh, oh, oh! Zhao Menghua, Erii says you should call her Uesugi-san." Lu Mingfei felt a wave of inexplicable glee. Zhao Menghua had always looked down on him and constantly picked faults with him, so seeing him take a hit like this for the first time, Lu Mingfei couldn't help laughing out loud; if he had held it in any longer, he feared he would have fallen ill.
"You..." Seeing that Zhao Menghua was about to explode with rage.
With an intensely punchable expression, Lu Mingfei started making faces at him and purposely grabbed Erii's hand. *Heh heh heh, I get to hold Erii's hand, but you can't, can you?* His petty little triumph was written all over his face. A flush of rosy red crept up the roots of Erii's ears, but she did not pull her hand away from Lu Mingfei's grasp, an action that undoubtedly infuriated Zhao Menghua.
Zhao Menghua raised a hand, preparing to strike Lu Mingfei, when a hand pressed down firmly on his fist.
"Alright, today is Uesugi-san's welcome party, the two of you stop bickering," Chen Wenwen intervened in the nick of time, preventing the conflict from escalating.
"What's wrong with a bit of drama? A storyline about snatching a love away is so much fun." The Little Heavenly Queen, who loved watching the chaos from the sidelines, seemed less than satisfied with this ending, though it was obvious she was unhappy herself. She liked Zhao Menghua, so Zhao Menghua's deliberate posturing in front of Uesugi-san left her deeply displeased.
Equally displeased was Erii. She did not like Zhao Menghua—in fact, she disliked him intensely.
If you had to name anyone who was happy, it was only Lu Mingfei. To be honest, Lu Mingfei had always been a loser; for as long as he could remember, this was the first time a girl had ever stood up for him—make that two girls, or at least that was how he reckoned it in his own mind.
"Uesugi-san, tell us about life in Japan," Chen Wenwen attempted to ease the awkward atmosphere.
"Yeah, yeah! And by the way, tell us if there are any favorite authors you like, or literary works and things like that," Zhao Menghua chimed in, instantly re-energized.
"I like Nasu Kinoko," Erii nodded.
"Who's that? Are there any representative works we can check out?" Zhao Menghua appeared exceptionally eager, causing Chen Wenwen's brow to twitch slightly.
Looking at Chen Wenwen's earnest expression, Lu Mingfei truly couldn't hold it in anymore. "Nasu Kinoko is the creator of the Type-Moon world; his representative works include *The Garden of Sinners*, *Tsukihime*, *Mahoutsukai no Yoru*, and things like that."
Su Xiaoqiang burst out laughing upon hearing this: "What the heck, aren't those all two-dimensional light novels and Galgames?"
"I also like *Code Geass*, and Gundam," Erii seemed entirely unaware of the severity of the problem. "If I get the chance, I definitely have to pilot one and see what it's like." She shook her small fist, looking eager to try.
By this point, Lu Mingfei was already regretting bringing her to the Literature Club. She genuinely belonged in the Anime Club instead—this wasn't a literary young woman at all, she was clearly a late-stage chuunibyou.
"Banishment this world!" Erii formed a right angle with her thumb and index finger, making a finger-gun gesture and pointing it directly at the cake in front of her.
Lu Mingfei put a hand to his forehead—she was a lost cause; all she needed was an eyepatch.
"Alright, the underclassmen have already carried the desks and chairs back out, which means it's time for club recruitment," President Chen commanded after they finished the cake. "Let's head to the playground."
Shilan Middle School's annual club recruitment was always held out on the playground. Because Shilan Middle School encouraged students to develop in multiple areas, all sorts of clubs emerged endlessly, and only the playground could accommodate so many people.
As the group walked over to the playground, they saw that the Anime Club—usually the most popular one every year—was practically deserted. The guys and girls dressed in cosplay, singing, dancing, rapping, and shouting at the top of their lungs hadn't managed to attract many people at all.
"Did Lu Mingfei take a fancy to the girls from the Anime Club over there? Should the two of our clubs hold a joint mixer?" Su Xiaoqiang teased, shifting her gaze toward Erii. Sure enough, Erii was beginning to look worried—how interesting.
"No way, I was just thinking that if even the Anime Club can't recruit anyone, we're in big trouble," Lu Mingfei said, carrying boxes at the very rear. "Which club is that? It's completely packed."
Chen Wenwen frowned slightly. Following the direction Lu Mingfei was looking, there was a club recruitment booth with crowds of people standing outside it, overflowing so much that it had even spilled over into the booths on either side: "That looks like our booth."
"No way, a spectacle like this is something even the Anime Club in its heyday could hardly hope to rival," Su Xiaoqiang exclaimed in amazement.
"Is this the charm of the three campus beauties?" Lu Mingfei tried to squeeze through the crowd, but carrying his box made it completely impossible for him to get past.
"Could you please make way?" Erii asked softly beside him, and the noisy crowd immediately cleared a path for them.
"Looks like it's not my charm or Chen Wenwen's, but thanks to Erii's hard work after all," Su Xiaoqiang waved a hand, leaning in close to Lu Mingfei's ear. "Hold on tight. With so many rivals eyeing her like tigers watching their prey, I'd worry about Erii getting snatched away."
"Su Xiaoqiang, stop talking nonsense," Lu Mingfei blushed fiercely.
"Click." A woman in tight black clothing pressed the camera shutter.
"Long Legs, Long Legs, don't overplay your hand. The Boss only told you to take pictures of Lu Mingfei and the 'mute chick', why are you taking pictures of him and Su Xiaoqiang?" a voice said through the earpiece.
"Don't be so impatient, Su Enxi. Look, the Little Heavenly Queen and Lu Mingfei make a pretty good match too, don't they? Besides, it's not like I'm posting them publicly." Kudesu Mai sent a few recently snapped photos of Lu Mingfei and Erii onto the school forum, using the ID Egret.
"Call me 'Potato Chips', or I'll cut off your operational funding from now on."
"Don't, my mistake." Kudesu Mai chose to submit to her wallet.