Pei Shiyu walked out wearing a long-sleeved shirt.
The food Xu Qing had delivered half an hour ago remained untouched. Meanwhile, the two brothers, Wan Yi and Wan Li, were huddled together with their heads touching, whispering about something. Hearing Pei Shiyu open the door, both brothers looked up at the same time.
Wan Yi said, “Captain! Captain! Come look at this!”
Seeing Pei Shiyu approach, he asked casually, “It is the middle of summer, why are you wearing long sleeves?”
Pei Shiyu’s expression flickered with unease for a moment. He ignored Wan Yi’s question and asked, “What is it?”
Wan Yi shoved the replay of the previous match into Pei Shiyu’s face. It was the exact moment in the 10-minute dragon pit fight where Xu Qing had performed a masterful play.
Upon seeing the name “Leiwu,” Pei Shiyu’s expression darkened involuntarily, as it brought back some unpleasant memories. However, after watching the mechanical skill displayed on screen, he raised an eyebrow and praised him without hesitation, “Improved.” Leiwu was his former team. Even if it was just the second-string substitute team, for Wan Yi to single-handedly bump into a full-strength Leiwu squad and win with such impressive results was already quite remarkable.
Hearing Pei Shiyu’s words, Wan Yi felt his face grow hot with embarrassment. He lowered his head in shame, “It was not me who played that.”
Pei Shiyu showed a look of astonishment, glancing at Wan Li, “You played it?” For a split second, he even considered telling Wan Li to switch permanently to the marksman role.
Seeing the surprise on Pei Shiyu’s face, Wan Li also lowered his head, muttering, “It was not me either.”
Pei Shiyu: ?
At the Leiwu Club, starting jungler Jiang Mian sat in his chair, watching the replay of a certain match and asking the operations manager, “Have you investigated the person I told you to look into?”
Operations answered, “My friend requests have all been rejected, and his teammates have disabled incoming requests as well. Other clubs do not have much specific information on Jingzhe either.”
Jiang Mian murmured, lost in thought, “Is that so?”
“Is it someone you know?” The manager did not quite understand why Jiang Mian was so focused on a mere top-8 team from a city tournament.
“He looks like an old friend.” Jiang Mian continued to stare at the Dawn team’s match, specifically at the jungler with the ID Jingzhe, whose playstyle always carried a familiarity that reminded him of someone.
That person had disappeared from the KOL arena for three years.
“However, our second-string team did run into their marksman during a match.”
Jiang Mian regained his focus, “How was it?”
The manager pointed toward the corner of the training room, where the second-string players looked visibly dispirited. An entire squad had been toyed with by a random team. Not only were they outplayed, but they had also been leading in the early game only to be defeated in a comeback.
The manager pulled up the footage and pointed to the marksman, “That match was carried entirely by the marksman, who controlled the rhythm of the game from start to finish.”
Jiang Mian raised an eyebrow, “A marksman acting as the caller and tactician?”
“That is right, at least that is how it appeared in this match.” Seeing Jiang Mian’s darkening expression, the manager added, “However, this marksman’s form is very unstable, and he only started exerting real pressure in the second half of the game.”
Jiang Mian’s expression remained grim, “Keep a close watch on all the members of this team and their match data.”
“Understood.” The manager agreed, but as he looked at this small team, which had been registered for less than 30 days and whose roster seemed thrown together like a temporary pick-up group, he could not help but grumble inwardly. He wondered why the captain was so nervous. What could a random team possibly do to threaten Jiang Mian’s status in the entire KOL league?
Threaten his status? Three years ago, there was indeed someone who could.
Jiang Mian sank into his gaming chair and could not resist clicking on Jingzhe’s profile.
Pei Shiyu, is it really you?
At 10:00 PM, when Xu Qing left Boss Cai’s restaurant, he was carrying some meat scraps that no one wanted, along with goat milk and ham sausages he had just bought from a convenience store. For the past few days, he had been feeding the local stray cats and dogs after his shift.
He placed chicken and pork at the stray dog feeding spots. At the cat spots, he provided the same food along with a carton of goat milk, as a new litter of kittens had recently been born nearby. Both the mother and the kittens were in desperate need of nutrition.
The kittens wobbled toward him, following their mother.
“One, two, three, four, five…”
Xu Qing frowned and counted again, realizing one little black kitten was missing. There were clearly six in this litter before. In the middle of summer, there was no risk of them freezing.
Xu Qing snatched the bowl away from the mother cat, who was buried in her food, causing her to let out an annoyed yowl. He poked her wet nose with his index finger, “Stop eating! Your baby is gone, and all you care about is eating. Where is your baby?”
The response was a series of dissatisfied meows from the mother cat, and her sharp claws were already unsheathed. Xu Qing had no doubt that if he kept pestering her, she would leave a map of scratches on him.
Since he could not get an answer from the mother cat, Xu Qing had to go look for the kitten himself.
The area was a small alley. Even though there were streetlights, they were likely older than he was, flickering on and off. Since the missing kitten was pitch black, it was incredibly difficult to find it even with his flashlight set to maximum brightness.
He even opened a video app and played some cat-calling sounds that looked incredibly silly.
“Cat language: Ten expressions to learn how to communicate with cats…”
The character in the video was overly dramatic, and Xu Qing could not help but meow back a few times.
“Meow, ooh.” “Meow, meow.”
He only meowed twice. By the third time, Xu Qing swallowed his words.
He looked up and saw a cool black motorcycle parked directly in front of him. The motorcycle looked familiar, and the person standing in front of it looked even more familiar.
Pei Shiyu watched Xu Qing’s series of indescribable behaviors with a complex expression.
After smoothly swallowing the “meow” stuck in his throat, Xu Qing showed no embarrassment at being caught. Instead, he greeted him naturally.
Xu Qing: “What a coincidence.”
Pei Shiyu looked away, remained silent, and subconsciously did not want to engage with him.
Xu Qing was not bothered by the lack of response. Since he started working at Boss Cai’s restaurant, the three of them had become regulars, and he was almost always the one delivering their food. Since the time he helped Wan Yi play a game, the two brothers had become quite warm toward him. Only Pei Shiyu remained the same as he was on the first day.
Xu Qing could sense that Pei Shiyu had a cold temperament, but for some reason, beyond the coldness directed at everyone, there seemed to be an added, inexplicable hostility toward him.
Xu Qing tried to recall his actions. Aside from bumping into his car and staring at his exposed abs, had he done anything else? He had not. The source of the hostility was a mystery to him.
Xu Qing watched Pei Shiyu’s cold, sharp profile under the streetlight, lost in thought.
Seemingly sensing Xu Qing’s overly direct gaze, Pei Shiyu frowned. He subconsciously checked his outfit, which was very decent today; aside from his arms and part of his shins, he was covered up quite thoroughly.
Pei Shiyu: “Is there something to look at?”
Hearing Pei Shiyu’s genuine confusion, Xu Qing laughed until the corners of his eyes crinkled and tears leaked out.
Pei Shiyu was annoyed, “Is something wrong?”
Xu Qing wiped the tears of laughter from his eyes, “Actually, yes.”
Pei Shiyu looked at Xu Qing’s smile, his brow furrowing even tighter. He spat out one word, “Spit it out.”
Xu Qing pointed to a frail, small black kitten sitting on Pei Shiyu’s motorcycle seat, “I am here for that.”
Xu Qing walked over and, without ceremony, stroked the kitten’s unkempt fur, “So that is where you ran off to.” He glanced at Pei Shiyu out of the corner of his eye, murmuring, “Do they not say animals have sharp instincts? It is surprising that you are not afraid of him.”
Xu Qing stroked the kitten’s head again and was about to take out the milk and cat food he brought, but he noticed a piece of fabric tied around the kitten’s back leg. Touching it carefully, he realized the leg was injured, and something like a wrist guard was being used as a splint to fix the kitten’s leg in place.
Perhaps Xu Qing’s movement made the kitten uncomfortable; it opened its mouth and meowed at him. Xu Qing soothingly opened the goat milk and fed it.
Throughout this, Pei Shiyu stood to the side, radiating a visible aura of annoyance, but he did not try to stop him, merely standing there lighting a cigarette.
The flame of the lighter flickered, shining brightly in the dark night.
Pei Shiyu lowered his head slightly, the cigarette tip glowing with faint sparks, held between his slender fingers. His cold, hard face was shrouded in smoke, making his expression blurred and hazy.
The smooth, fluid motion of Pei Shiyu’s actions made Xu Qing sigh. Sure enough, when someone is handsome, even smoking looks good.
So, Pei Shiyu was the one who bandaged the kitten, huh?
Xu Qing tilted his head and extended an invitation, “Should we send it to the pet hospital together?”
Pei Shiyu frowned, wanting to say that if it were not for Xu Qing wasting time just now, the kitten would have already been at the hospital. But seeing Pei Shiyu walk over, he asked, “What is wrong?”
When he had bandaged the kitten earlier, he had been swiped at several times, yet in Xu Qing’s hands, the kitten only let out a few annoyed meows without any extra movement, as if it had been born to Xu Qing.
Pei Shiyu heard himself say, “Fine.”
“Your bike should be able to carry two people, right?”
Xu Qing sat naturally on the back seat, cradling the kitten, sitting still while waiting for Pei Shiyu to come over and drive.
Seeing his precious treasure, which he cherished more than any significant other, being offended by Xu Qing once again…
Can someone do something about this? How can someone openly steal someone else’s significant other right in front of the owner?
Pei Shiyu remained silent. Pei Shiyu wanted to call the police. But seeing Xu Qing’s obedient, sweet face, then looking at his own emotionless, menacing expression reflected in the bike’s mirror…
He was afraid that if he called the police, they would count him as a self-surrendering culprit.
Pei Shiyu put out his cigarette.
Xu Qing looked at Pei Shiyu’s annoyed expression and thought he did not want to give him a ride. Just as he was about to pull out his phone to call a taxi, his vision went dark.
Xu Qing looked up, peering through a helmet at Pei Shiyu, whose expression was still grim.
Pei Shiyu curled his index finger and knocked once on Xu Qing’s helmet, speaking in that same cold, annoyed tone:
“Sit still.”