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He Xingluo insisted that the system sincerely agree with his viewpoint. How should I put it? After working for a long time, a person always needs to go a little crazy.
The little system humbly asked, “Is this the legendary peaceful craziness?”
He Xingluo immediately performed the unpeaceful kind.
“I am not crazy, why would I want to be crazy? The person who can’t find love right now isn’t even him!” He Xingluo issued a triple denial, then returned to a capybara state of mind.
Once a person completely gives up on struggling, they stop having any worries!
As a mere NPC, what else could he possibly do?
He Xingluo casually reached into the passenger seat, picked up a bag of sliced bread, and asked, “Young master, can I eat in the car?”
Li Zhanbei replied, “It’s not my car.”
Alright, so eating was permitted.
By the same logic, since the sliced bread wasn’t his anyway, eating it was also fine.
He Xingluo smoothly unsealed the package and began chewing. His physical expenditure tonight had been far too great, and he needed to replenish some energy; otherwise, he might start picking at his fingers out of sheer stress.
For the rest of the journey, He Xingluo nearly finished the entire bag of bread. When he reached the very last slice, he finally remembered to ask, “Young master, would you like some?”
Li Zhanbei answered, “How rare, you finally remembered there is a living person in this car.”
Phrased like that, it sounded a bit terrifying.
He Xingluo countered, “Well, you’re driving.”
Li Zhanbei asked, “And who am I driving for?”
He Xingluo fell silent.
He Xingluo said with a guilty conscience, “I’ll put the slice away for the young master, and you can eat it when we hit a red light.”
Li Zhanbei scoffed, “Heh.”
Successfully returning to Li Zhanbei’s manor villa, it was already close to midnight.
As soon as he stepped out of the car, He Xingluo eagerly initiated his off-duty mode: “Goodnight, young master. Goodbye, young master.”
“Go ahead,” Li Zhanbei said with great magnanimity, adding a thoughtful reminder, “Don’t forget to take your medicine and apply the ointment.”
He Xingluo froze.
Truly, many thanks; if not for the reminder, he almost would have forgotten that he sustained work-related injuries today.
Fifteen minutes later, Housekeeper He successfully located his room. He cut the little system off before it could start jumping around: “Don’t say anything, I need to sleep!”
He Xingluo took a shower half-asleep, and the moment he stepped out of the bathroom, he collapsed flat onto the bed. He had waited far too long for this sleep!
Today had simply been too long. The second He Xingluo closed his eyes, he felt as though he still had to rush to the next plot point, making his entire corpse feel cold all over.
The next morning, He Xingluo was woken up by the cleaning lady pounding on his door.
When He Xingluo sat up, his head involuntarily bobbed forward. Last night’s sleep was still far too short for him; he had slept, yet it felt as though he had not slept at all.
Much like the feeling of receiving a paycheck back when he worked during his mortal days, he got it, but barely.
He Xingluo opened the door wearing a face full of grievance.
“Good morning, Housekeeper He, I am the cleaning lady,” she said to him in heavily accented Mandarin that failed to distinguish between flat and retroflex sibilants. “The young master just woke up from his five-hundred-pye room, and his very first priority is to see you.”
The cleaning lady’s look seemed to say that he truly enjoyed the young master’s exclusive favor. Before He Xingluo could speak, the cleaning lady pulled out a skateboard: “Your ride is right here.”
He Xingluo felt completely numb.
The next second, the cleaning lady propped up a skateboard for herself as well: “We are going together. I still have to go change the young master’s ten-piece bedding set, which he has only used once.”
What kind of ridiculous setup is this?
His young master seemed somewhat abnormal.
“Which normal person needs a ten-piece bedding set?” He Xingluo accidentally externalized his inner monologue into words.
The cleaning lady beside him offered a mocking smile and gloomily added:
“Not only that, it has to be replaced with a brand new set every single day.”
“And it has to be sprayed with hand-brewed perfume.”
What kind of unhinged deity is this?
“However, Housekeeper He,” the cleaning lady asked him, “why haven’t you changed out of your pajamas? Where is your uniform?”
He Xingluo tugged at the jacket he had thrown on haphazardly and stated quite frankly, “Because after I finish acting as this human alarm clock, I plan to come back and crawl right back into bed for a nap.”
The cleaning lady experienced an epiphany.
Lesson learned.
The skateboards glided smoothly through the magnificent and glittering manor villa.
Despite how luxurious and massive the place was, He Xingluo could not summon the tiniest shred of appreciation. May I ask: do office workers trapped in commercial skyscrapers ever admire urban architecture?
No, office workers only ever want to blow up the skyscrapers.
In short, one could never imagine an office worker exclaiming, “My, what a large office building this is!”
By the same token, He Xingluo did not want to spare a single extra glance toward the overwhelming wealth before him. It was an advanced yet common state of mental numbness, hardly worth mentioning.
Following the cleaning lady, He Xingluo discarded his skateboard and entered the young master’s bedroom.
Guided by the system prompts, He Xingluo found his workstation right beside the young master’s bed. Caught off guard by a direct gaze from the young master, he stuttered slightly as he delivered his lines: “You… young master, it’s time to wake up.”
Li Zhanbei stared.
He Xingluo froze.
For a moment, the young master’s bedroom hummed with an atmosphere of sheer joy.
The cleaning lady patted He Xingluo’s shoulder consolingly; life is very short anyway, it will pass by quickly.
After suffering social death for a few seconds, He Xingluo was once again filled with resentment toward this human alarm clock job. Clearly, the young master was already awake, while he was not.
He Xingluo silently took half a step back, attempting to flee the scene.
Li Zhanbei stopped him: “Where are you going?”
He Xingluo replied, “If I said I was going to test for the national Putonghua proficiency certificate, would you let me go?”
Li Zhanbei instructed, “Speak the truth.”
He Xingluo admitted, “I need to erase the social death I just experienced from my memory. Didn’t we agree that human life shouldn’t have this many spectators?”
Li Zhanbei offered comfort: “They won’t remember.”
He Xingluo fell silent.
What a pathetic attempt at comforting someone.
Farewell, young master, for I must now set sail across the vast seas.
Accompanied by the female maids crowding inside the room, Li Zhanbei went through the complete wakeup procedure before finally dismissing everyone. He Xingluo watched in astonishment:
“Young master, you’ve had it hard. Could this possibly be the price of becoming a wealthy heir?”
“Perhaps,” Li Zhanbei replied, sitting back down with a lazy expression. “Why did you come over in your pajamas? Did you have another allergy flare-up?”
He Xingluo remained speechless.
His life truly had far too many spectators.
He Xingluo had no choice but to confess: “Yes, young master. I am heading back to treat this tendency to get allergic.”
Li Zhanbei asked, “How do you treat it?”
He Xingluo answered, “Return to my room and find a comfortable posture to lie down on the bed.”
He Xingluo ultimately achieved freedom of the second sleep, taking a revenge-driven nap. He had originally wanted to return to his post earlier, but heaven forbid, he had no idea what a housekeeper was actually supposed to do.
So he slept for an extra eternity!
The little system also remained dormant for several hours until He Xingluo leisurely changed his clothes, washed up, and stepped outside, where human and system stood side by side to sunbathe by the window.
The result, naturally, was abandoning the idea because the sunlight was far too blinding.
He Xingluo squinted and muttered, “It’s suddenly so quiet today, I’m almost not used to it.”
The very second his voice trailed off, the system chimed with a series of notification tones. The little system bounced up to check: “We submitted a bug report yesterday about not being able to view the plot, the feedback results must have arrived.”
The little system excitedly opened it.
The primary system’s reply stated: “Upon investigation, the protagonist’s emotional fluctuations are within the normal range. Please keep up the good work!”
Ah?
What is this supposed to mean?
He Xingluo glanced at it once and looked away. He had to admit that this type of work feedback felt utterly anthropomorphic; the wage-defaulting company he used to work for operated in the exact same manner.
A familiar sense of deja vu washed over him.
He Xingluo sneered, “This is the feedback result?”
The little system stayed quiet.
He Xingluo asked, “What does this emotional fluctuation part mean?”
The little system explained, “The main brain system captures the protagonist’s emotional fragments to determine whether the plot is deviating. This result proves that the protagonist’s emotional shifts have not strayed from the main plotline.”
He Xingluo expressionlessly summarized, “You mean that even though they appear completely unrelated on the surface, they are actually secretly falling in love behind the scenes.”
The little system stayed silent.
He Xingluo evaluated, “What a heavily secretive protagonist life.”
He Xingluo shook his head. Even though he still had no clue what a housekeeper was supposed to do, he decided to clock in before the young master, a true wage earner devoted to attendance records!
Carrying a mindset resembling going to work is like visiting a graveyard, he headed downstairs to find Young Master Li.
An extended luxury vehicle was parked right in front of him. Having grown entirely indifferent to such scenes of wealth, He Xingluo stood nearby as a spectator watching the spectacle.
Once the car door opened, a pair of exquisite leather shoes stepped out first, followed shortly by a visibly pampered young master filled with an aura of nobility. He Xingluo asked the system, “Who is this, a visitor dropping by?”
He hadn’t heard about any guests coming over today.
In any case, he didn’t recognize this person, so He Xingluo took a glance and turned to leave.
“Wait! Don’t move!” The young master pointed directly at him and shouted, “You are not allowed to leave!”
He Xingluo asked quizzically, “Are you talking to me?”
The young master put on airs: “Who else is around here?”
He Xingluo remained speechless.
He truly did not know who this person was.
The system ran an emergency search and quietly informed He Xingluo: “This is Xia Xu, an absolute worshipper of Li Zhanbei!”
He Xingluo understood: “Young Master Xia is here to see Young Master Li? Do you need me to guide you over?”
Xia Xu’s resolve clearly wavered for a moment before he firmly refused: “No, I am here for you.”
“Ah?” He Xingluo was baffled: “Why?”
Young Master Xia assumed an arrogant posture once again, lifting his chin: “Follow me.”
He Xingluo was clueless, but considering this was Li Zhanbei’s manor, he wasn’t afraid. Therefore, he agreed good-naturedly, “Alright then.”
Xia Xu looked momentarily choked, his gaze carrying a trace of inexplicable grievance.
He Xingluo grew even more puzzled.
The two of them arrived at a small pavilion, where Xia Xu had his bodyguards carry over a large cabinet. Xia Xu lifted his chin: “Open it and take a look.”
He Xingluo confirmed that Young Master Xia was indeed addressing him.
He Xingluo stared at the safe for a moment, then hesitated to remind him: “However, it requires a fingerprint password.”
Xia Xu paused.
Xia Xu extended his left thumb and unlocked the safe.
The interior was packed to the brim with jewelry and watches that screamed expense, alongside several gold bars. He Xingluo felt helpless; what kind of play was this?
Xia Xu pushed the safe forward, though he barely managed to budge it, and declared with supreme disregard for material wealth: “Leave the Li family and stop being Zhanbei’s housekeeper. This entire box is yours!”
He Xingluo: “!!!”
Could the identity of a housekeeper possibly be this lucrative? The internet joke regarding urgently needing money and selling a job was actually translating into reality!
However,
Thanks to the legal education Li Zhanbei had subjected him to the previous night, his anti-fraud awareness had peaked, leaving his mind echoing with three words: scam setup.
Staring at the box of luxury jewelry, watches, and gold, He Xingluo said with extreme temptation, “I’m afraid that won’t do.”
Xia Xu hadn’t expected rejection, making him look even more aggrieved: “Why? This is all I have, isn’t this enough?”
He Xingluo calmly stated, “Although you didn’t directly hand me a check, which counts as a form of innovation, you hadn’t specified that this is an unconditional gift. It’s hard to guarantee that my ultimate destination won’t be a prison cell.”
Xia Xu instantly deflated: “Can’t you just stop being Zhanbei’s housekeeper?”
He Xingluo quietly closed the safe; looking at this box for too long tended to induce wealth-envy. He asked out of genuine curiosity: “Why? I’m just a housekeeper.”
This position shouldn’t be worth this much money.
In this damn world of the wealthy, inflation needed to have a limit!
He Xingluo felt mentally exhausted.
Xia Xu was equally exhausted: “Because I heard that Zhanbei treats you very well. I’m so jealous, I don’t want him treating anyone else like that!”
He Xingluo fell silent.
Although this closely resembled the cliché plot of the protagonist being harassed by a love rival inexplicably landing on his head, the young master’s gaze was so pure that the whole scenario felt more like playing house, giving off strong vibes of being best friends and not being allowed to play with others.
How should he put it?
He felt as though his corpse had suddenly grown several years younger.