Luckily, Su Qing quickly regained her composure.

However, she still kept making mistakes at the dinner table, and her table manners were a complete mess.

This made her mother frown, and just as she was about to speak up to correct Su Qing, Su Yi stopped her hand.

“Mom, Qingqing has been through a lot today. Let her take some time to adjust,” Su Yi said quietly. Looking at Su Qing’s distracted state, Su Mu sighed and didn’t say anything further, at most giving Su Qing a disapproving look whenever she made another mistake.

But even those disapproving looks made Su Qing painfully aware of her behavior throughout the meal.

After going through the painful experience of bad table manners, she finally remembered that she had a boyfriend.

Su Qing hurriedly took out her phone to contact Zhou Mu, but Zhou Mu was currently at an internet cafe, carefree and enjoying himself.

He had snuck out to the internet cafe, and with time being precious, he wasn’t in the mood to chat with or comfort his girlfriend.

The more Su Qing called, the angrier she became, and her mind couldn’t stop running wild, wondering what Zhou Mu might be doing.

Even though Su Qing knew he was probably at the internet cafe, playing with his brothers, she couldn’t be a hundred percent sure about it.

Cheating.

The possibility of that played over and over in Su Qing’s mind, making her mood even more unstable.

But Zhou Mu still wasn’t answering the phone.

Fuming, Su Qing almost threw her phone against the wall, but fearing her mother would notice, she stopped herself, tossed the phone into the drawer, and started preparing to do her homework.

…And then she saw the pile of papers—over eight sheets—and other assignments.

Su Qing: “…”

Did all the teachers eat the wrong medicine today?

There wasn’t even a holiday, so why was there so much homework?

Ye Wangxing had the same question.

Looking at the huge pile of assignments in front of him, he weakly knocked on his mind, asking the ever-present “System 19” in his head.

[Haven’t we already had curriculum reform? Why is there so much homework?]

19 quickly analyzed the situation.

[Li Qiang thinks that two things happened in one day, so the cause must be that there’s too little homework and people are getting too bored.]

So Head Teacher Li decided to personally raise the intensity for them, huh?

Ye Wangxing: “…”

Was it too late for him to drop out of school and become a small business owner at a milk tea shop?

But of course, that wasn’t possible.

Ye Wangxing wasn’t at a point where he needed to drop out of school, and fate wasn’t going to let him stray too far from this path.

Moreover, once he left school, he’d lose the ability to gather attention there.

But that didn’t stop him from becoming a walking zombie after finishing his assignments.

After all, Ye Wangxing had already graduated from college and nearly forgotten all of his high school knowledge, so he immediately traded 1 attention point for a jar of 100 candies that could trigger the knowledge hidden deep in his subconscious.

The side effect of these candies was that they would quickly tap into his brain’s potential, boosting his hand speed. However, after the effect wore off, Ye Wangxing felt so weak he could hardly function.

Thankfully, a good night’s rest would restore him.

Yet he still couldn’t afford to rest. Today’s task had taught him the true benefits of competing for attention with the male and female protagonists. He now needed to quickly confirm his next set of tasks with 19.

So, Ye Wangxing decided to head downstairs for a glass of ice-cold lemon water to clear his mind.

However, when it was 9 o’clock and Ye Wangxing had finished his assignments and wandered downstairs to the family milk tea shop to relax, his cousin Wang Qi was still startled by his condition.

Although Wang Qi knew that pressure in top-tier schools was high, he hadn’t expected his little cousin to look so worn out.

He had entered the room full of energy, and now he looked like someone who’d been working 996 for a month.

(“Working 996” describes the Chinese work culture of working from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. for six days a week, a total of 72 hours per week )

Looking at the huge dark bags under his eyes, Wang Qi felt a pang of sympathy. He patted his cousin’s shoulder and handed him a cup of milk tea, telling him to sit down and take a break, while he himself went to remove his mascot costume.

Ye Wangxing didn’t care about being fat anymore. He now truly understood why some researchers were so addicted to sweets—because they really did replenish mental energy.

He finished the entire cup of extra-sweet lemon water in one go and finally started feeling a bit more energized. Afterward, he began asking 19 about the male and female leads.

19 quickly summarized the information.

[…Su Qing is still calling Zhou Mu. Zhou Mu has already given up, muted his sound, and is still playing games.]

It seemed that the original plot was still quite stubborn and managed to turn around from this angle.

Ye Wangxing stroked his chin and said, looking at the report from 19.

In the original plot, the female lead got discovered by the head of the teaching department, and Zhou Mu, under the pressure from the head of the teaching department, pretended not to know her. The female lead got angry and eventually confronted Zhou Mu, having a big argument with him.

However, Zhou Mu still liked Su Qing deep down, and in the end, he chose to bow his head for Su Qing.

His way of admitting his mistake was—late at night, he told Su Qing to tell her family that she had evening study sessions, but in reality, he skipped class and took her to sneak out for a joyride.

Su Qing was indeed charmed by this.

Seeing this, Ye Wangxing fell silent, and 19 raised a soul-searching question.

“Did the female lead really not realize that the male lead didn’t contribute anything in this situation?”

Whether in money or words, he hadn’t given anything. What he contributed was only taking Su Qing out for a dangerous ride on the street.

Ye Wangxing had the right to speak on this.

His father was a grassroots civil servant in charge of the community, and his mother ran a small clothing shop. He grew up in these two big gossip hubs and was already immune to all sorts of gossip and melodrama.

—Otherwise, could a normal person come up with such a ridiculous plot?

“From the plot, it seems that Su Qing felt that her family environment was oppressive, so she chose Zhou Mu to seek freedom and prove that she was different from others.”

“My mom’s best friend, Aunt Liu, had a daughter like that. She caused so much trouble back then that Aunt Liu was worried sick. That girl was even about to steal the household registration book and run away with a little thug. But she eventually turned out fine. By the time I came over, she had joined the county’s poverty alleviation office.”

Ye Wangxing sighed as he recalled.

The story of Aunt Liu and her daughter outsmarting each other still circulated in the underground city. One of the protagonists of the story had turned into a public servant.

He had listened to that girl’s advice and entered the unit, but didn’t expect…

Thinking of his mother, who had aged ten years when he saw her in the hospital bed, Ye Wangxing’s gaze lowered, and his expression became a little sad.

“Did she realize in time?”

19 asked quietly—his emotion monitor on the host had already gone off.

Although it was a bit expensive, and it could only alert for dangerous emotions, general systems wouldn’t install it. But for 19, it was necessary to monitor his fragile host.

He was really too fragile.

Ye Wangxing recovered from his sadness, and not knowing what had been installed on him, he shook his head when he heard 19’s question.

“No, it was Aunt Liu who gave her a year off, took her on a trip around the world with thirty thousand yuan, and she came back fine.”

Ye Wangxing added: “Aunt Liu was the landlord of my mom’s clothing shop. When my mom bought her shop, she even gave my mom a 35% discount.”

19, after analyzing the situation, responded: “It had already simulated most of what parents would do in such situations and the consequences.”

“The people around the host seem to be just like the host.”

—Their mental state is a bit too free.

19 paused for a moment before asking.

“So, are you planning to give her thirty thousand yuan to send her on a trip?”

Ye Wangxing immediately shook his head frantically: “No, no, how could I? My balance doesn’t even reach thirty thousand!”

“So, what do you plan to do then…” 19 asked, slightly confused.

“Su Qing’s situation is quite similar to that girl’s. To accomplish the side mission, it’s simple—physical intervention is enough. But constant blocking will only make her develop a rebellious mindset. To be with Zhou Mu, she will definitely cause a big scene.”

Ye Wangxing analyzed, and after 19 had established a personality model, he nodded.

“Su Qing’s mother isn’t Aunt Liu. She probably won’t notice Su Qing’s situation, and Su Qing herself probably won’t want to speak up. But if we let her go completely, she will cause trouble. It’s better to make her lose her filter for Zhou Mu first.”

19 furrowed his brow and asked: “So, what’s your plan? Do you need to formulate a plan for the male and female leads?”

Ye Wangxing recalled the image of Su Qing he had seen before—the girl in her school uniform didn’t yet have the clueless look she would have later in the plot, nor had she locked her image as a love-struck fool because of the gossip about Zhou Mu among her classmates.

She wasn’t entirely hopeless…

“Let the female lead have a reference group. Compare the male lead and 19’s differences. Just make sure not to let things escalate too much. Prepare other events in advance so that everyone’s attention is focused on us.”

Ye Wangxing smiled, stroking his chin.

Although 19 wasn’t sure exactly what his host had in mind, he knew that the host would probably use two biological bodies to act out the script next.

In fact, it was almost certain. Ye Wangxing quickly planned out the script and then turned to his cousin Wang Qi, who was helping a police officer make ice cream, and asked.

“Bro, can you help me bring two cups of milk tea to my classmates when you deliver tonight?”

 

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