Qi Wei was fishing over there, and from his position, he couldn’t see Qi Wei’s face, nor should Qi Wei have been able to see his. Yet, the moment Qi Wei realized he was watching, the man had walked right over. Moreover, upon arriving, Qi Wei’s expression and tone held not a shred of surprise, as if he had known all along that they would appear here today.
Shi Liang walked back toward Shen Bingchen and Bai Yuan.
“What were you and Qi Wei talking about just now? You surely aren’t thinking of rekindling old flames, are you?” Bai Yuan asked.
Bai Yuan had always harbored a lingering dissatisfaction toward Qi Wei. Recently, having hit a wall with Qi Wei over that piece of land, his impression of the man was worse than ever.
“We talked about that plot of land. He somehow found out that we wanted to build entertainment facilities here. He bought the plot intending to build the exact same thing, and he’s willing to let us buy in as partners.”
While Bai Yuan was typically insensitive to matters of romance, he caught the underlying implications this time.
He glanced at Shi Liang. “What are you planning to do? Are you going to buy in?”
Right now, money was the last thing Shi Liang lacked, so there was no need for him to do anything he disliked just for the sake of cash. However, he knew Bai Yuan desperately wanted to pull off this project. It was meant to be a test run in Yunzhou, and if successful, Bai Yuan planned to expand such shopping centers into various other cities.
Over the past few years, Bai Yuan’s career in Kyoto had been decent, but his ventures elsewhere had been a mixed bag, particularly after a few trial runs in certain industries that had left him losing money down to the bone.
In their social circle, everyone viewed him as a wealthy, well-off prodigal son, a piece of hopeless mud who kept frantically struggling to build a career yet possessed no business acumen, with every cent he invested simply vanishing into the water.
Compounding this was his relationship; Shen Yuan was so exceptionally talented and surrounded by an endless stream of suitors that Bai Yuan felt immense pressure. Moreover, Shen Yuan loved him so deeply that Bai Yuan didn’t even know how to bring up a breakup, feeling like bringing it up would make him look like a heartless scoundrel.
Because of all this, Bai Yuan was desperate to prove himself.
At the same time, because he had been staying here longer and longer, Shi Liang found himself increasingly unable to tell whether he belonged to the 2D world or the 3D world.
He felt more and more like he truly was the Shi Liang of this world, having already forgotten many things from his past. When he tried to think back earnestly during the previous period, aside from his own name and the habit of reading before bed, most of his memories existed merely in fragmented forms, unable to form a complete recollection in his mind.
In other words, he could no longer recall things from the third dimension.
Concurrently, toward the friends and family in this world, he felt an inexplicable sense of familiarity that grew stronger by the day. Lying in bed awake at night, he himself no longer understood whether he was the Shi Liang who had transmigrated here, or the Shi Liang who had loved Qi Wei for many years.
Whether for Bai Yuan’s sake or his own, he needed to go talk business with Qi Wei tomorrow.
Shi Liang said, “I’ll secure this project through the school first.”
Bai Yuan argued, “You completely don’t need to do this now. You aren’t short on money.”
Shi Liang replied, “Don’t you badly need an opportunity? A location as good as this plot of land is genuinely hard to find. Besides, if we include Qi Wei in this test run and things happen to fail, we won’t lose nearly as heavily as we did last time.”
Bai Yuan walked over and gave Shi Liang a hug. “Good brother, you’re truly loyal!”
Shen Bingchen picked up several pieces of charcoal, placed them into the barbecue grill, and continued grilling the meat as the charcoal crackled with pops.
Shi Liang suddenly remembered: “When Qi Wei came over just now, he acted as if he knew we were here. Did any of you tell him?”
Shen Bingchen glanced at him. “Yesterday during our production crew’s wrap-up dinner after discussing the script, Qi Wei was there too. He asked me what my plans were for today, and I told him we were going on a picnic. Didn’t we always bring him along whenever we went on picnics before? Naturally, he knew we’d be here.”
Shi Liang nodded. Shen Bingchen added, “I don’t think you need to put too much pressure on yourself. I feel like he’s different from the person you described before. Even though he really wants to win you back, he definitely won’t force you. Didn’t you just arrange to talk business with him tomorrow? Just have a proper chat with him when you get there tomorrow!”
Shen Bingchen walked over, picked up a bottle of wine, draped one arm over Shi Liang’s shoulder, and raised the bottle with the other hand. “Anyway, all of that is tomorrow’s business. Today we drink while we have wine, tomorrow’s sorrows can wait for tomorrow. Since we came out to unwind, let’s not think about anything today and just focus on having fun.”
The four of them ate and drank for a long time, and by the time they headed back, the sky was pitch black.
As they parted ways, Bai Yuan spoke up, “Tomorrow is Shi Liang’s birthday, let’s go eat hot pot tomorrow.”
Only then did Shi Liang realize that July 16th was indeed his birthday.
Shi Liang said, “Alright!”
Shen Bingchen chimed in, “Didn’t Li Yanxiang return to the country? Let’s call him along too, call him along, it’ll be more lively with more people.”
Bai Yuan glanced at Shi Liang, and seeing no sign of refusal, he agreed, “Alright!”