Chapter 30
"Why are you being so stubborn again?"
Hearing that Gu Ran wanted to eat at the cafeteria, Ye Jinliang's face filled with resistance, and he struggled to back away.
"Don't you know the cafeteria changed its menu this week?"
With his weight of over 180 pounds refusing to cooperate, Gu Ran couldn't do much with him for a moment. He could only try to persuade him with reason and emotion.
Ye Jinliang shook his head, his chubby cheeks trembling along with the motion. "I don't know about that, stop lying to me!"
"It's true. The cafeteria's weird menu experiments got reported by a joint petition from the parents. Starting this week, they're making normal food. Let's go try it out. If it's decent, we won't have to eat out anymore."
Gu Ran said this, adding a sentence in his heart: This way, I can also eat with Ye Zhenzhen. For no other reason than looking at a beautiful girl makes the food go down easier.
After all, who wants to stare at a fat face while eating?
After much coaxing, he dragged the chubby boy to the cafeteria and lined up at the serving counter.
Ye Jinliang peeked at the dishes under the counter, then patted his chest and breathed a sigh of relief.
Thank goodness. Putting the taste aside for now, at least they looked like normal dishes, without the previous dark cuisine.
Gu Ran stepped forward, looked down, and ordered a few decent-looking dishes. Then he looked around, searching for that aloof figure.
"Young man, your food is ready. Move along quickly, don't hold up the people behind you."
The cafeteria lady looked at Gu Ran and felt he looked increasingly familiar. Then she realized, wasn't this the kid who ran up to her a few days ago and then decided not to eat?
Hearing this, Gu Ran paused, pointed at a dish on his tray, and asked, "Auntie, what is this?"
The cafeteria lady glanced at it and said lightly, "Potato stew with meat."
Although he got an answer, Gu Ran was still confused and pressed on, "Potato stew with what?"
"Potato stew with meat!"
"Potato stew with WHAT?!"
After a few rounds of this back-and-forth, the cafeteria lady finally caught on. She silently picked up her ladle, scooped up a few pieces of meat, and added them to Gu Ran's tray, which had previously been full of only potatoes.
Watching this entire operation, Ye Jinliang's eyes widened. He quickly rubbed his hands together, stepped forward, and mimicked the exact same routine.
"What is this?" He pointed at his own tray, which also lacked even a speck of meat, and asked the cafeteria lady.
The latter glanced at him and replied flatly, "Potato stew with potatoes."
"Potato stew with wha... uh... Potato stew with potatoes?!"
Ye Jinliang was dumbfounded. He blinked at the disdainful cafeteria lady, not understanding why she didn't play by the rules.
Meanwhile, Gu Ran had already carried his tray over and found Ye Zhenzhen, who was eating quietly. He parked himself straight down on the right side of the girl.
Suddenly having someone beside her startled Ye Zhenzhen. Turning her head and seeing it was Gu Ran, she rolled her eyes in annoyance.
"Why are you sitting here eating by yourself again?"
Why did he say 'again'?
Ye Zhenzhen narrowed her eyes slightly, a trace of suspicion flashing in them.
But hearing this, Pei Susu, who was sitting beside her, was not happy.
Popping her head out from the girl's left side, she glared with her almond-shaped eyes and said, "Hey, Gu Ran, you might be good-looking, but watch your mouth! What do you mean 'eating by yourself'? Am I not a person?!"
"Oh, there's another person here. I'm so sorry, I didn't notice."
Gu Ran apologized very sincerely, but Pei Susu pouted. She couldn't help but feel that his apology sounded a bit weird.
She wanted to say something else, but then she felt a pale hand clamping down firmly on her inner thigh, as if warning her not to speak out of turn.
It seemed... that was exactly the case.
She curled her lips, silently cursing a certain someone for prioritizing a boy over her best friend, but ultimately, she kept her mouth shut.
Seeing her take the hint so well, Ye Zhenzhen nodded in satisfaction, then turned to look at Gu Ran's tray.
Noticing that his plate clearly had more meat than hers, she frowned slightly and unceremoniously snatched a piece with her chopsticks.
"Why do you have so much meat?"
Her mouth moved slightly, her aloof eyes filled with confusion.
"Maybe... it's because I'm good-looking?"
Gu Ran shrugged, then waved to Ye Jinliang, who was looking for him.
As soon as the chubby boy saw him, he stomped over with a tray, looking thoroughly indignant.
He couldn't hold it in anymore. That cafeteria lady was bullying him too much!
How could she treat people so differently?
When that guy Gu Ran asked what dish it was, she told him it was potato stew with meat. But when it came to him, she said it was potato stew with potatoes.
What, just because he had a lot of meat on his bones, he didn't deserve to eat any more meat?!
"So you mean... I'm not good-looking?"
Ye Zhenzhen blinked, narrowed her eyes slightly, and asked softly with a calm tone.
But Gu Ran sniffed out an imperceptible hint of danger in her words.
He paused, his brain spinning at top speed, his CPU practically starting to smoke.
"Well... it's mainly because you're too beautiful. Although that cafeteria lady is a bit older, she still has a tender, girlish heart. Seeing someone as pretty as you, she's bound to feel a little jealous."
Gu Ran replied smoothly, reaching up to wipe nonexistent cold sweat from his forehead, giving his quick-witted answer a perfect score.
"Get lost, all you do is talk nonsense all day!"
A flash of shy annoyance crossed Ye Zhenzhen's eyes. Watching his exaggerated movements, she couldn't help but reach out and smack him lightly.
"No way, I'm speaking from the bottom of my heart. Five-star General MacArthur once said that if there were a ranking for the most beautiful girls in the world, Ye Zhenzhen would definitely be the best-looking one!"
"Pfft! Just eat your food!"
A blush appeared on Ye Zhenzhen's usually calm face, and she quickly reached out to push Gu Ran's face aside.
Pei Susu, eating silently on the side, rolled her eyes repeatedly, thoroughly disgusted by the sickeningly sweet interaction of the couple next to her.
She stared at her food but couldn't eat another bite, having already been stuffed full of dog food.
Turning to look at Gu Ran, who had a smirk on his lips, she frowned.
This guy was such a smooth talker, he was obviously a playboy!
Unable to finish her own meal, she couldn't resist picking a bone with Gu Ran.
"Gu Ran, since you said that, why don't you tell us exactly how pretty our Zhenzhen is?"
Hearing this, Gu Ran tilted his head slightly, blinked, and said softly, "Do you understand what 'the most' means?"
Pei Susu: "..."
She silently gripped her chopsticks tighter, turned her head to look straight ahead, and kept telling herself: Don't get angry, don't get angry.
"Hurry up and eat your food, why do you have so much to say? Otherwise, you're not getting any more meat!"
Seeing this, Ye Zhenzhen chuckled softly. She helped her best friend scold Gu Ran, taking the opportunity to snatch another piece of meat from his tray.
Ye Jinliang, who had just walked over, witnessed this scene. He stopped dead in his tracks, his eyes wide.
What did he just see?
The campus belle, Ye Zhenzhen, taking meat from Gu Ran's plate?!
Watching their natural interaction, he blinked, inexplicably feeling that this world was somewhat fake.
Not only did the cafeteria lady treat Gu Ran with special favor, but even the aloof, unapproachable beauty looked at him with such affection.
What exactly did he do to deserve this?
Just because there's meat on the plate?!
] This is a dark fantasy-themed dating simulation game. The main gameplay involves containing various monster girls and investigating the truth of a world shrouded in mist alongside your companions. However, due to his love for the dark and bizarre atmosphere, Luo Wei ended up turning a dating game into a detective mystery game. Women? Women only slow down his quickdraw! To Luo Wei, the female leads in the game are more like tools to perfectly clear levels and squeeze out rewards. For Luo Wei, flirting with every girl he meets and then discarding them is standard procedure. Worried about characters losing affection points? No need. With his maxed-out charm stat, Luo Wei is practically a "human incubus." A little psychological manipulation and those points come right back. It's a bit scummy, but the paper cutout heroines in the game won't actually come at him with real cleavers. However... Luo Wei has transmigrated. He's accidentally entered the second playthrough of this game. His past actions have caused all the girls to transform into terrifying yanderes. Due to the game's setting, most of the heroines he once contained are "troubled girls." Obsessive, twisted, mentally unstable, all aggressive yanderes... The type who will kill you if they can't have you... Luo Wei wants to cry but has no tears left. "I really just want to survive..." In short, this is a story of battling wits and engaging in a love-hate relationship with yanderes.
young master of the Shen family—a figure of immense power and wealth beyond measure—and awakened the "Destined Ultimate Villain System"! His starting scenario? Running into his icy fiancée who shows up with a mountain-descending divine doctor to break off their engagement. The divine doctor arrogantly taunts: "What does your Shen family have besides a bit of stinking money? You're not even worthy of tying Qingxue's shoelaces!" Shen Fei just smiled. He completely defied the usual script: "Fine, I agree to break off the engagement. Also, notify the finance department to withdraw all investments from the Su family." Minutes later, with its capital chain severed, the Su Group teetered on the brink of bankruptcy! The once aloof and proud ice queen CEO was thrown into utter panic. That very night, she went to Shen Fei's villa, casting aside all dignity to beg and plead desperately... From then on, in this world teeming with Sons of Destiny, Shen Fei embarked on a path of extreme dimensional suppression! A mountain-descending divine doctor? Peerless medical skills? Shen Fei: "Reporting you for practicing medicine without a license! I'll gladly take your ancient medicinal cauldron and twin sister assassins." The Crooked-Smiling Dragon King? Commanding a hundred thousand soldiers with a single order? Shen Fei: "Illegal assembly and suspected treason! Let a fleet of attack helicopters sanitize the area and teach you what the state apparatus really means!" A reborn tycoon? Knows all the golden opportunities of the next decade? Shen Fei: "A trillion in capital to reverse and pump the stock market, making you blow your margin and jump on the very first day of your rebirth!" What Chosen Ones? What bearers of Heavenly Fortune? In Shen Fei's eyes, they're all just chives (i.e., suckers/marks) waiting to be harvested! Shen Fei: "Sorry, but as the Destined Ultimate Villain, I don't play by the rules of honor. I only play the game of dimensional suppression."
transmigrates into the world as the sect master of the Heavenly Yan Sect, which is on the verge of being wiped out. He binds a system that grants him cultivation power based on the number of disciples he has: for each disciple, he automatically gains a year's worth of cultivation every single day! Take one disciple: every day he gains 1 year of cultivation power. While others struggle through a year of bitter training, he gets the same just by sleeping through a single night. Take ten disciples: every day he gains 10 years of cultivation power. Foundation Establishment, Core Formation, Nascent Soul—he breezes through all bottlenecks without lifting a finger. Take one hundred disciples: every day he gains 100 years of cultivation power. Even a Soul Transformation Venerable before him can’t survive a single blow. Take ten thousand disciples: every day he gains 10,000 years of cultivation power! With a wave of his hand, he topples empires. With a single step, he crushes the sacred grounds of the universe. ... While others fight tooth and nail for secret techniques, Lin Yan casually hands out Nascent Soul-level cultivation manuals as beginner textbooks. While others strain to find talented recruits, Lin Yan opens his doors to anyone—so long as they’re human. In just three short years, the Heavenly Yan Sect went from a backwater sect made up of three crumbling huts to a sacred land that every cultivator under heaven would kill to enter. ... One day, otherworldly demon gods invade, with a million demon soldiers pressing down upon the realm. Lin Yan, yawning, rises from his lounge chair and glances at the system panel: [Current Disciples: 1.28 million] [Daily Cultivation Increase: 1.28 million years] He waves his hand casually, and the countless demon soldiers are reduced to ashes in an instant. “So noisy… interrupting my fishing.”
iemie, male, Race: Moon. Hobby: Collecting anomalies. At first, he thought he possessed two systems: the Crimson Rainbow Moon and the Clear Cold Frost Moon. One day, he discovered that he himself could also become a system for others, holding the chessboard of fate. The Eighth Epoch, also known as the Eternal Moon Epoch. Humans, witches, elves, bloodline descendants, specters, demons, and spirits together compose a new history. Walking the path on behalf of the moon, before he knew it, Chen Miemie's footsteps were followed by all manner of strange and wondrous anomalies. As time passed, many titles circulated about him—The King in Yellow, Lord of Anomalies, Heart of the Eternal Moon, and more. "Me? I'm just a traveler who enjoys collecting interesting creatures," Chen Miemie said.
