Looking at Long Aotian, Shen Mengjie felt a surge of discomfort in her heart.
When Hu Yuying and the others came looking for Long Aotian, Shen Mengjie had been keeping an eye on him.
But after some indirect probing, she learned that Long Aotian hadn’t returned to the dorm all weekend. For some reason, it just didn’t sit right with her.
So now, when she saw him again, she couldn’t resist teasing him.
"Mengjie." Huang Fei stepped forward to stand beside Shen Mengjie, easily picking up on the teasing tone in her voice. He shot Long Aotian an apologetic glance.
It really was just as Shen Mengjie had said—she had a petty streak...
And it was kind of unfair to Old Ao.
"Mengjie, Old Ao spent the weekend with his girlfriend. Cut him some slack, alright?" he whispered, trying to explain.
Hearing this, Shen Mengjie snorted, rolled her eyes at Long Aotian, and walked into the classroom.
"What’s her problem?" Long Aotian muttered, baffled by Shen Mengjie’s sudden mood swing.
"Old Ao, Mengjie’s just like that. I hope you can bear with her a little, for my sake," Huang Fei said awkwardly.
Even though Shen Mengjie hadn’t outright accepted his year-long pursuit, she had at least hesitated.
Love wasn’t rational, and Huang Fei knew it wasn’t fair to Long Aotian. Still, he wanted to smooth things over between them.
Long Aotian patted Huang Fei’s shoulder. "Don’t worry about it. I’m not bothered."
There was no real connection between him and Shen Mengjie. How she saw him, or how he saw her, didn’t matter.
Honestly, he could tell she carried an air of arrogance, probably from her upbringing. But it wasn’t worth his attention.
He’d rather spend his energy figuring out how to tease his little girlfriend next time—how to tease her while also making her happy.
Those two nights… maybe it was because he’d just tasted desire, but the moment she started sweating, her cheeks flushed with that irresistible charm radiating from her very bones, he’d lost all control...
He hadn’t been considerate enough of her feelings.
That was his failure as a boyfriend.
And he needed to plan a proper confession to make it up to her.
He’d taken her without thinking, and though she hadn’t complained, he couldn’t just let it slide.
With that in mind, Long Aotian smirked at Huang Fei, who still looked guilty. "Relax, I’m not that petty."
Once in the classroom, Huang Fei scurried over to sit in the seat next to Shen Mengjie.
Even though the campus forum posts had been deleted, there was no denying they’d left a mark on Shen Mengjie.
"Honestly, Shen Mengjie’s being a bit too much," Li Longlong sighed, watching Huang Fei’s retreating back. "Even if you look at it from every angle, Old Ao, directly or indirectly, helped her. And she’s still acting like this..."
"Yeah, if it weren’t for the fact that we’re all bros, I’d have called her out today," Xu Shuai chimed in.
Long Aotian chuckled. "Oh please, you’d get wrecked by Wang Lijuan."
Xu Shuai immediately straightened up, putting on a righteous front. "That’s different! For my bro, I’d take a knife for you!"
"Sure, but would that knife be for you or for me? Let’s get that straight first."
The teasing remark hit just right, making them laugh.
Xu Shuai owed a lot to Long Aotian for helping him get with Wang Lijuan. Deep down, he wanted to stand up for him.
Meanwhile...
Huang Fei settled into the seat beside Shen Mengjie.
Even with an empty seat between them, they could still talk.
Watching Shen Mengjie lean on her hand, chewing gum absentmindedly, Huang Fei hesitated before speaking softly. "Mengjie, Old Ao’s actually a really good guy..."
Before he could finish, Shen Mengjie cut in. "I know."
That left Huang Fei speechless.
He’d been trying to highlight Long Aotian’s good points to lessen her bias, but her blunt "I know he’s good" threw him off.
"He is good. But I’m petty, remember?" Shen Mengjie laughed lightly, though a closer listen would reveal more self-mockery than teasing.
Huang Fei, however, was too distracted by her alluring smile. "We should all hang out sometime. Old Ao’s my bro, and I really want to fix things between you two..."
Shen Mengjie glanced at him, her eyes glinting with amusement. "Sure."
"Wait, you’re agreeing?"
"Mhm." She nodded. "Why not?"
"That’s great!" Huang Fei clenched his fist in excitement. Stuck between his best friend and the girl he liked, he’d been miserable.
Especially since the tension between them was partly because Long Aotian had been looking out for him.
Now that there was a chance to mend things, he was thrilled.
"Earlier, you said Long Aotian didn’t come back to the dorm... was he staying with his girlfriend?"
Shen Mengjie kept her tone casual, feigning gossip.
"Oh, yeah! Actually, Xu Shuai was the one who noticed first."
"Xu Shuai?" Shen Mengjie raised an eyebrow.
She knew Xu Shuai—the kind of guy she could easily outmaneuver.
Surprising that he’d caught onto something like this.
"Shocking, right?" Huang Fei grinned, happy she was engaging with him. Shared topics meant progress.
He eagerly recounted how Xu Shuai had noticed Long Aotian’s odd behavior, even laughing when he mentioned how "weak in the knees" Long Aotian had been.
But he completely missed the way Shen Mengjie’s expression darkened.
She shot a glance at Long Aotian behind her. "Typical men. Lustful, shameless, absolute pigs..."
With that, she ignored Huang Fei entirely.
Huang Fei was left baffled. One second she was fine, the next she’d flipped.
And how was Long Aotian’s love life his fault? He was still a pure, upstanding virgin!
At this point, Huang Fei was convinced he’d just suffered collateral damage for no reason...
【Prologue: The Beginning of It All – Use holy water to heal the saintess tainted by demonic energy, then converse with her.】 Shen Nian stared at his older sister sipping yogurt, lost in thought. So you’re telling me my sister is the saintess, and yogurt is the holy water? 【Main Quest 1: Brave Youth, Become an Adventurer! Reward: Rookie Adventurer Title.】 【Side Quest 1: Find the Adorable Kitty! Reward: 1000 Gold Coins.】 Shen Nian: "Wait, I’m a high school senior here—did some guy who got isekai’d accidentally bind his system to me?" Hold on, completing quests gives gold rewards? Titles even boost stats? Is this for real? (A lighthearted, absurd campus comedy—not a revenge power fantasy.)
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.”
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.
d intelligence to keep the plot moving, and sometimes even the protagonists are forced into absurdly dumb decisions. Why does the A-list celebrity heroine in urban romance novels ditch the top-tier movie star and become a lovestruck fool for a pockmarked male lead? Why do the leads in historical tragedy novels keep dancing between love and death, only for the blind healer to end up suffering the most? And Gu Wei never expected that after finally landing a villain role to stir up trouble, she’d pick the wrong gender! No choice now—she’ll just have to crush the protagonists as a girl!
