In an inconspicuous corner of the classroom.
The person originally wearing gloves and eating a chicken drumstick had changed from Shen Qinghan to Ye Cheng.
Shen Qinghan had only taken a few bites before losing her appetite and told Ye Cheng to take care of the food.
By "take care," Shen Qinghan meant to throw it away.
But for Ye Cheng, "take care" meant eating it, which led to the current scene.
Only after Ye Cheng started eating did Shen Qinghan realize something was off, but by then it was too late to stop him.
If she had spoken up, it should have been right at the start.
Saying anything now would make her seem petty.
She didn’t care about others’ opinions, but somehow, being looked at this way by Ye Cheng made her feel a little annoyed.
In the end, Shen Qinghan silently endured without showing any reaction.
Ye Cheng munched on the chicken drumstick beside her, while Shen Qinghan propped her head up and read her book—the scene was quite peaceful.
This harmony was broken as classmates gradually returned to the classroom.
Whispers and curious voices began to spread.
“Yesterday they ate together, and today again. Could those two possibly be...?”
“No way. Didn’t she just confess to President Dongfang? How could she switch so fast to the young master of the Shen family?”
“Maybe they’re just friends?”
“Friends with ‘benefits,’ you mean?”
“Stop talking, she’s looking this way. Her gaze is fierce—let’s go…”
A female classmate who had been gossiping was shooed away by Shen Qinghan’s sharp look.
Shen Qinghan withdrew her gaze and turned it toward Ye Cheng, who was still stubbornly focused on the braised chicken leg.
“Is this thing really that good?” Shen Qinghan asked.
She noticed Ye Cheng always liked to eat these meat-heavy foods.
With a chicken drumstick stuffed into his mouth, Ye Cheng said, “It’s delicious. How could it not be? They sell these for five yuan each outside.”
Of course, that wasn’t the real reason.
The truth was, when he was a kid, food was scarce. The meals at the orphanage weren’t exactly great—just edible, nothing more.
The only thing that was somewhat special was the braised chicken drumstick handed out every few months. Every child would get one, but Ye Cheng usually didn’t eat his, saving it for a little girl with poor health.
She was often sick, and because of her condition, the orphanage spent a lot of money on her care. She would always eat less, thinking it would save the orphanage some money.
But being already weak and eating less created a vicious cycle.
Ye Cheng couldn’t stand it, so he’d coax the not-so-bright little girl to eat more.
His excuse was always that he didn’t like it, so she could eat it without guilt.
As for Ye Cheng himself… he wouldn’t neglect his own needs. After convincing the little girl, he’d line up for food again, claiming he had just come back from the bathroom and missed the meal.
The same went for the chicken drumsticks that came every few months—he used the same trick to get her to eat them.
But they were just kids; how could they not want to eat? Ye Cheng was simply holding back.
The things a young boy can’t have will haunt him for life.
Though Ye Cheng’s situation wasn’t that severe, his habits of not wasting food and loving chicken drumsticks had been etched into his bones.
Now he had endless chicken drumsticks, able to eat as many as he wanted every day.
The only pity was that he never saw that silly little girl again.
Shen Qinghan calmly looked at Ye Cheng.
In her mind, she recalled the information she had seen about Ye Cheng the previous night.
She guessed that Ye Cheng’s current behavior was probably related to his childhood experiences.
“That makes sense. You should eat more,” Shen Qinghan’s usually cold voice sounded a bit softer.
After saying that, Shen Qinghan stopped paying attention to Ye Cheng and went back to reading her philosophy book.
Ye Cheng happily ate on the side.
As for the whispers and strange looks from those around them, neither of them cared. They got along very well.
…
Evening.
“All right, that’s it for today’s class. Everyone, go home early and get some rest. Class dismissed.”
Within less than a minute, most of the students had left the classroom.
But Ye Cheng was still being held hostage by some gang leader’s daughter.
“Miss, the cafeteria is open now,” Ye Cheng’s helpless voice came from nearby.
“I have something I need your help with today,” Shen Qinghan said calmly, grabbing Ye Cheng’s hand firmly without any intention of letting go.
She had already grabbed Ye Cheng’s hand five minutes before class ended.
Shen Qinghan knew very well that if she was even a little slower, Ye Cheng would have disappeared.
He was like a flash of smoke, gone in an instant.
Never underestimate Ye Cheng’s enthusiasm for eating.
“I have things to do too. How about next time, for sure?” Ye Cheng started making empty promises again.
Making empty promises was Ye Cheng’s specialty.
Sometimes when he was desperate, he even fooled himself with these promises.
Like telling himself that after finishing these last few hours of work, he’d get a promotion and raise; the factory boss’s daughter would happen to see his charming and handsome self while he was loading goods on the conveyor belt, fall deeply for him, and they’d start a beautiful romance.
In the end, Ye Cheng realized it was just a fantasy before he was exhausted to death being treated like a forklift.
Ye Cheng could even fool himself when he was ruthless.
His skilled art of making empty promises didn’t work this time in front of the scheming girl.
No matter what Ye Cheng said, she wouldn’t let go, nor did she lift her foot.
She pressed the back of Ye Cheng’s foot with her little black leather shoe.
They were stuck like this for about five minutes until Ye Cheng finally gave in first.
“Fine, I’ll go with you, but you have to treat me to a meal. The cafeteria’s charity window will close soon, and I’ll have nothing to eat,” Ye Cheng laid out his terms.
Shen Qinghan said calmly, “According to our previous agreement, you can’t bargain with me. You have to listen to me.”
“Agreement? What agreement? Words mean nothing. Miss, you always need proof for everything you say and do. Where’s the evidence? Show me,” Ye Cheng acted like a stubborn old debtor.
He thought this would make the cold girl back down and agree to treat him.
But the calm girl didn’t flinch at all. It seemed she had already anticipated Ye Cheng’s slippery behavior and silently pulled out her phone.
She opened a recording and pressed play.
“I, Ye Cheng, hereby make the following promise to comply with the agreed terms…”
Ye Cheng: “???”
Dude, are you Doraemon or what? How do you always manage to pull stuff out of nowhere?
Is this reasonable?
After the recording finished playing, a few more minutes passed. The girl put away her phone and continued tugging at Ye Cheng with her little paws.
“Let’s go. Move faster, or there won’t be any good spots left later.”
Shen Qinghan stood up, limping a couple of steps before stopping.
Her gaze landed once again on Ye Cheng, who was already dumbfounded.
A flicker of light flashed briefly in Shen Qinghan’s calm eyes.
“Crouch down and carry me on your back,” the girl’s sweet voice echoed in his ears.
Ye Cheng: “...”
ut it can buy an entire year of absolutely perfect training results! Su Yu stared at his empty wallet and decisively opened up various online loan platforms. “Borrow a thousand bucks! Recharge my vitality!” Boom! His vitality broke a hundred points, shattering the limits of the human body! “Borrow ten thousand bucks! Recharge my combat skills!” Boom! A basic punching technique so common it was everywhere instantly maxed out, revealing the ultimate assassination technique of Five Elements Unity—Inner Force! When a rich kid hired assassins for a midnight ambush, aiming to break both of his legs, they instead ran headfirst into a monster—a human-shaped tyrannosaur, brimming with dragon-like vitality. With just two fingers, Su Yu snapped a steel staff reinforced with alloy. Staring at the killer’s stash of stolen cash—a staggering quarter-million dollars—he showed a corporate-sincere smile: “Thanks for the pre-exam gift pack, Mr. Zhao! I’m gonna go re-invest this!” Three days later, at the National Martial Arts College Entrance Exam, while everyone else struggled just to reach the passing line, Su Yu threw a single punch—and more than a thousand vitality points literally detonated the entire arena!
close your eyes and open them again, only to find yourself transmigrated into the role of a villainous male supporting character. Readers familiar with urban wish-fulfillment novels know that it is only through the relentless antics of the villainous male supporting character that the plot between the male and female leads can progress. As the villainous male supporting character, Long Aotian not only has to bully the female lead, harass the second female lead, and flirt with the third female lead, but he also has to go all out to antagonize the male lead. In the end, when his body is discovered, he is still clutching half a moldy fried dough stick in his hand. Fully aware of the plot, Long Aotian is determined to change his fate, starting with the female lead! In the beginning, the female lead lacks confidence: "Big brother, I hope I didn't scare you?" In the middle, the female lead treads carefully: "Brother Long, please don't hit me, okay?" Later on, the female lead becomes coquettishly clingy: "Aotian, it's time to pay the 'public grain' tonight." Long Aotian's legs go weak, and he feels like crying: "I taught you to be thick-skinned, not shameless!"
ing gift was a patch of barren land, and disciples were all picked up along the way. He spent fifty years diligently building three "ramshackle little sects," thinking he could finally live a carefree life relying on his disciples. But right at the fifty-year mark, he was suddenly swept away by a spatial rift and exiled to the Chaos Desolation, the Disorderly Ruins. There was no spiritual energy there, only slaughter. Relying on the cultivation feedback from his disciples, Gu Changyuan hacked his way through a sea of blood for eleven hundred years. When the system finally fished him back out, he discovered the ramshackle little sects he'd built back then had developed a rather... unusual style. Hold on... I vanished for a thousand years, so how did my ramshackle little sects become holy lands?!
e bizarre and supernatural had descended. The previous emperor was a thoroughgoing tyrant; no longer satisfied with human women, he had set his sights on a stunningly beautiful supernatural entity. He met his end in his bedchamber, drained of all his vital essence. As the legitimate eldest son and crown prince, Wang Hao was thus hastily enthroned, becoming the young emperor of the Great Zhou Dynasty. No sooner had he awakened the "Imperial Sign-In Intelligence System" than he was assassinated by a Son of Destiny—a classic villain's opening. The Great Zhou, ravaged by the former emperor's excesses, was in national decline. The great families within its borders harbored their own treacherous schemes, martial sects began to defy the imperial court's decrees, and border armies, their pay and provisions in arrears, grumbled incessantly against the central government. Fortunately, the central capital was still held secure by the half-million Imperial Guards and fifty thousand Imperial Forest Army who obeyed the court's orders, along with the royal family's hidden reserves of power, barely managing to suppress the realm. As the Great Zhou's finances worsened and supernatural activities grew ever more frequent, the court sat atop a volcano. Ambitious plotters everywhere dreamed of overthrowing the dynasty, and even some reclusive ancient powers emerged, attempting to sway the tides of the world. At the first grand court assembly, the civil and military officials nearly came to blows, fighting tooth and nail over the allocation of fifty million taels of silver from the summer tax revenues. The spectacle opened Wang Hao's eyes—the Great Zhou's bureaucracy was not only corrupt but also martially proficient, a cabinet of all-rounders. Some officials even had the audacity to suggest the emperor release funds from the imperial privy purse to address the emergency. Wang Hao suddenly felt weary. Let it all burn.
