Peking University.
Lü Zhiping couldn’t even wait for the elevator, sprinting up to the sixth floor in one breath. When he pushed the door open, he was panting like an ox, “Mengmeng, hehe… Quick… quick…”
“What’s wrong? Look at how you’re panting, are you headed off to paradise?” Fang Jingxi delivered three or four smacks to Lü Zhiping’s back in three quick steps, almost knocking the breath right back out of him before he could catch it.
Sitting at the desk on the left side near the balcony, Qiao Meng turned his head. “Brother Lü, is something the matter?”
“There’s… there’s a big matter. Come with me quickly, kid. Your chance to put your heroics to use has arrived.”
“Old Er, what are you talking about? Did you find some good job to recommend?” Deng Shaoheng knitted his brows. “Don’t go messing around. Our Old Si isn’t going to work in those kinds of fish-and-dragon mixed-up places.”
Otherwise, given Qiao Meng’s looks, he’d probably get “eaten” until not even a scrap of bone was left.
Lü Zhiping clapped his hands together and hopped up in excitement, “Aha! I would definitely never introduce bar work to Mengmeng again. Have you guys heard? The Physical Education Department is holding a recruitment drive, and the hiring company is a Fortune 100 enterprise what’s it called, Xiyang Group! You snooze, you lose, a rare opportunity indeed. Old Si, let’s go take a look with Second Brother. When the time comes, you show off a trick or two, and you might just get hired.”
Previously, Qiao Meng had worked at bars; he had done everything from bartender, dancer, to DJ. Later, because he danced a bit too passionately and caught someone’s eye, it blew up into a bit of trouble. Not only did Qiao Meng lose half a month’s wages, but he also ended up offending people for nothing, making it impossible to find any work at other nearby bars.
Thinking of Qiao Meng’s ox-like strength, coupled with him being a top-two straight-A student across dual majors at Peking University, Lü Zhiping felt this job was as good as secured!
Before Qiao Meng entered Room 602, Lü Zhiping, Deng Shaoheng, and Fang Jingxi all averaging over 1.8 meters tall—once thought their dorm would be the department’s most hardcore, fiercely Alpha dorm. It wasn’t until the last roommate walked in carrying a sack on his shoulder that the three realized a gathering place for handsome, fierce studs was completely out of the question.
It wasn’t that Qiao Meng wasn’t tall enough. The guy was tall standing at 1.83 meters with a standard broad-shouldered, narrow-waisted build. Just from the back, he could be called a back-view killer, capable of making countless little Os and Bs shriek in succession.
But if you looked at the front…
Uh… calling him a handsome hunk or anything was completely impossible; calling him “little brother” was more like it.
His face still carried baby fat, with big eyes, rosy little lips, a high and delicate nose bridge, and long, upturned eyelashes like hand fans. No matter how you looked at it, he was exquisite beyond compare, practically flawless.
Dammit, this was the textbook appearance of a pretty O, the dream O of countless fierce As!
Back then, Lü Zhiping, Deng Shaoheng, and Fang Jingxi had once thought Qiao Meng had gone to the wrong dorm building. Blushing and heart-pounding, they had asked him in soft whispers, “Classmate, did you enter the wrong dorm area? This is Alpha District B, Building 6, Floor 6, you know.”
Qiao Meng had been stunned for a moment, pulling out his admission notice to compare it over and over again. “I didn’t walk to the wrong place. The dorm the school assigned me is right here.”
Lü Zhiping: “…… What?!”
Deng Shaoheng: “…… What the hell!?”
Fang Jingxi: “…… Holy crap, you’re an A?!!”
You’ve gotta be kidding me!
What on earth is going on these days?
An Alpha can actually look this exquisite?!
Exquisite and gorgeous to boot!
Just look at those distinct black-and-white big eyes, long eyelashes, little nose tip, and small watery lips. Weren’t these the exclusive traits of a little cute O?
How can someone look so contradictory yet just right in their perfection?
Qiao Meng nodded twice, his slightly long hair that covered his brows soft and fine, swaying twice with his movements. He looked obedient to the extreme.
Goodness gracious, these days, in the Alpha circle where people were called rough As, coarse As, big As, fierce As, and handsome As, basically anything incompatible with cuteness an “anomaly” had actually appeared.
In Room 602, ranked by age, Second Oldest Lü Zhiping, Eldest Deng Shaoheng, and Third Oldest Fang Jingxi made up the group, while Qiao Meng the youngest and best-looking was Old Si (Fourth).
Eldest Deng Shaoheng hailed from S City; both his parents worked in the civil service, and coupled with his grandparents owning six houses, he was the only grandson. With plenty of cash on hand, his monthly living allowance reached a whopping twenty thousand yuan.
Second Oldest Lü Zhiping came from H City, where his family farmed over a thousand mu of land and raised thousands of cattle, bringing in a living allowance of twenty-six thousand yuan a month.
As for Third Oldest Fang Jingxi, he was even more incredible. A native Beijinger, his Alpha father ran a large company while his mother was a Peking University professor. His living allowance had no fixed amount, belonging to the type where he got however much he wanted.
As for Fourth Oldest Qiao Meng pardon him, his tuition was a student loan, the living allowance for the first month of school was borrowed, his current total net worth was two thousand yuan, and he still had a grandmother back in the village to support. He could be said to be clearly and unmistakably poor.
The three big brothers in the dorm all knew Qiao Meng’s family conditions were poor and hadn’t failed to think about helping out, but Qiao Meng was unwilling. Usually, he took on odd jobs everywhere during his spare time. Finally dragging himself through to his senior year, look next semester would be his internship period. According to Beijing’s market rates, even graduating from a national key institution like Peking University, an intern’s ceiling was at most around ten thousand-plus a month. Now, people had come to the school to recruit, and the company wasn’t just a Fortune 100 enterprise, but entry immediately paid sixty thousand!
Sixty thousand—this was nothing to the other three, but to Qiao Meng, it was truly a huge deal.
Having gotten the news from his good buddy in the Physical Education Department, Lü Zhiping didn’t even have time to let out a fart before he rushed back to the dorm in a blazing hurry.
Fang Jingxi frowned, “How come I haven’t heard of this? Old Er, you aren’t joking around, are you? Xiyang Group—that’s a big company, and campus recruitment time passed long ago.”
“It’s true,” Lü Zhiping swore up and down, practically ready to swear to the heavens, “Would I use this kind of thing to fool our Old Si?”
After all, Old Si Qiao Meng was the dorm treasure of 602!
“That’s Xiyang Group. If Mengmeng can go in for an internship for a few months, his resume will look great in the future. Besides, with our Mengmeng being so talented, once he goes over, what use is there for those P.E. jocks from the sports department?”
“Wait, no, no, no.”
Deng Shaoheng spotted the problem, “Old Er, since people from Xiyang Group came to recruit, why are they only holding it over at the P.E. department?”
Lü Zhiping: “Heh, this is a long story.”
Deng Shaoheng rolled his eyes, “Then make it a short story.”
“It’s like this. The chairman of Xiyang Group is currently recruiting a special assistant. Call it an assistant, but it’s actually fulfilling the duties of a bodyguard, doing the work of a bodyguard, assistant, and secretary all at once.”
An assistant and a secretary were different positions. In other words, the bodyguards recruited this time around had to do the work of three people by themselves.
External bodyguard companies had those skilled in martial arts but weak in literature, or those coming straight out of the military. After picking and choosing, it was hard to find one that fit the CEO’s tastes. Having no choice, Zhao Yun could only shift his target to the P.E. departments of major universities.
When Lü Zhiping put it that way, the other three suddenly understood.
Needing to know martial arts while also being literate, no wonder it paid sixty thousand a month. This wasn’t making money; this was practically selling one’s life.
Deng Shaoheng: “Is this treating people like oxen and horses?”
“Brother Lü, can the other party really pay this amount?” Regardless of whether the others were tempted, Qiao Meng was already too unsettled to sit still. Pulling Lü Zhiping, he prepared to walk out, looking extremely impatient, afraid that being slow would mean losing the chance. “Second Brother, take me there. I want to go for the interview. This job is great, I can do it.”
Forget holding three jobs at once; Qiao Meng would be willing even if he had to work twenty hours a day.
It wasn’t like Qiao Meng hadn’t worked harder jobs before. Back at the construction site, to rush the construction period, the foreman didn’t treat people like humans, making them work overtime day and night.
In the past, Qiao Meng liked high-intensity jobs like this the most. High intensity meant high wages, but the tiredness was real too. However, compared to fearing fatigue, he feared poverty even more.
Brick-moving at a construction site couldn’t earn this much even after working himself to death for a month. Just by doing three jobs, he could earn sixty thousand a month. Once he worked for a few months and returned to school for his graduate studies, having this sum of money as living allowance would make things much easier for him.
Grandma Qiao was getting older, suffering from bone spurs, rheumatism, and all sorts of ailments. Leaving her alone in the village was something Qiao Meng couldn’t rest easy about no matter what.
Nowadays, the young people in the village were all leaving, and even the old folks were taken to the city by their sons to look after grandchildren. With few people left in the village, if something happened to Grandma Qiao at home, there might not even be anyone to notice.
It wasn’t that Qiao Meng had never thought about bringing her to Beijing to take care of her, but in this city where every inch of land was worth gold, for a university student relying on work-study programs to settle down and make a living here was simply a joke.
The money he currently earned from working part-time every month sometimes wasn’t even enough to buy Grandma Qiao that so-called Omega gland repair fluid.
The so-called Omega gland repair fluid was a type of potion specially purchased for Omegas whose glands were damaged due to clearing a mark after being deeply marked by an Alpha, in order to repair their functions.
This kind of potion was damn expensive to Qiao Meng three thousand yuan per injection, and Grandma Qiao had to get an injection every single month.
If she didn’t get this injection, her damaged glands would enter a withered state, thereby severely affecting Grandma Qiao’s physical health.
Right now, having such an opportunity that could allow him to bring Grandma Qiao to Beijing, Qiao Meng naturally wouldn’t want to miss it.
Soon, Lü Zhiping brought Qiao Meng to the Physical Education Department.
My goodness, as expected of a recruitment drive by Xiyang Group. Look at this massive dragon-like queue who knows how many monkey years and horse months it would take to reach the front.
Seeing the spot, Qiao Meng let loose his legs and ran over to line up. Looking at the long queue ahead, he couldn’t help becoming anxious. “So many people. What if they finish recruiting before it’s my turn?”
“It’s fine.” Lü Zhiping, accompanying him on the side, scanned the long dragon in front, then looked at Qiao Meng who couldn’t help craning his neck forward to look and felt an inexplicable surge of pity.
“Hey, bro, aren’t you that little O Qiao Mengmeng from among the As? What are you doing here?”
Qiao Meng was Peking University’s campus bell. This guy was very interesting; clearly an Alpha, yet As would have their hearts flutter, Os would blush, and Bs would turn weak at the knees upon seeing him. In short, he could be called a human-shaped weapon, and back then was once voted by Peking University’s masses of Os as the top of Peking University’s most beautiful “fake O”.
If he remembered correctly, this kid wasn’t someone from their P.E. department, was he? Why was he sticking his nose into this commotion for no reason?
Qiao Meng, whose name had been called wrong, earnestly corrected him, “My name isn’t Qiao Mengmeng, it’s Qiao Meng. I’m here to participate in the interview.”