When Bai Zhi woke up in the early morning, she found that the warmth beside her was gone. Qi Qi had probably been up for a while, and she couldn’t help but feel a little surprised that she had slept so deeply.
Touching the icy chill next to her, her heart felt strangely hollow.
Rubbing her eyes, she walked out of the room and saw a note and breakfast on the table.
【You’re finally awake.】
Calling it breakfast was a bit of a stretch, it was just a bottle of familiar sweet milk from the fridge and a packet of biscuits.
It was obvious that it had been pulled out in a rush, and that the person hadn’t been gone for long, as there wasn’t even much condensation on the glass bottle of ice cold sweet milk taken straight from the refrigerator.
Bai Zhi looked for a few moments at the note on the table, written in a sharp, energetic hand, and at the pig’s head drawn at the end of the line. She folded it up and put it in her school bag.
Cute.
In a high-spirited mood, she hummed an unknown tune and went into her room to change into her school uniform.
Even as her phone screen flashed repeatedly with incoming messages from the contact labeled 【Father】, it couldn’t stop her mood from improving.
Perhaps because she had worn a mask of smiles for too long, she would always become expressionless when no one was around. Her peach blossom eyes, usually filled with bright cheer, were left with only a cold, indifferent chill. If anyone saw her at a time like this, they probably wouldn’t recognize her at all.
Yet, completely unaware, even in the empty room, her lips were currently curved into a smile.
It wasn’t the fake, pretentiously innocent and bright smile she wore in front of others, but a genuine smile that slipped out inadvertently.
I want to go to school quickly.
I want to see Qi Qi right now.
The first thing Qi Qi did upon arriving at school was to look for Shen Lu. However, she forgot that Shen Lu usually arrived right as class was about to start. After a long wait, she finally spotted the gloomily distant girl whose bangs covered her brows and eyes.
The moment the girl saw her, a look of pleasant surprise washed over her face, and she quickened her pace, jogging over to her.
“Qi Qi, did you come to find me?”
“Yeah,” Qi Qi answered casually. She held her in place, parted the girl’s overgrown bangs, and examined her face over and over with a critical gaze, using her fingertips to carefully feel the texture of that birthmark.
Compared to the skin elsewhere, it was a bit rough, but it couldn’t possibly be described as raised to the point of turning into scales.
“Qi Qi, is something wrong?”
The girl’s expression was purely bewildered. Facing her earnest scrutiny, she seemed caught off guard, her eyes darting away slightly as her pale skin flushed red from being rubbed.
Hearing those two words, Qi Qi felt like she had developed PTSD, instantly forced to recall what happened last night. Her fingers touching Shen Lu’s face snapped back like they had received an electric shock.
“Did you feel anything strange last night?”
Qi Qi hesitated for a good while before carefully choosing her words to ask slowly.
“Anything strange?”
Pure confusion shone in the girl’s eyes.
Shen Lu looked as though she had no idea what had happened last night. Besides, based on Qi Qi’s understanding of her, she really couldn’t imagine this girl lying to anyone with such a sincere face.
“Sorry for asking you such a weird question,” Qi Qi said, though she still wasn’t quite ready to give up. Changing the subject, she asked, “Do you have any sisters? Or relatives who look similar to you…”
Hearing this, Shen Lu’s expression didn’t change drastically, she just shook her head in the same bewildered confusion.
“I don’t think so. But since I’m an orphan, maybe I might have one, though I don’t know for sure.”
“Is that so? Thanks.” After asking, Qi Qi was already eager to have someone investigate it. Maybe the thing last night was just a person or a monster, that looked somewhat similar to Shen Lu but had no relation to her at all.
It was just that those subtle hints of familiarity made it impossible for her to ignore.
Watching Qi Qi lost in thought, Shen Lu snapped back from her fleeting joy of “Qi Qi actively touched me,” remembering the two rather strange questions just now.
The first one might have just been concern for her life, which was fine, but asking if she had a sister…
Recalling how Qi Qi had repeatedly rubbed that birthmark when touching her just now, Shen Lu’s eyes dimmed slightly. She carefully tugged at Qi Qi’s sleeve and asked in a low voice, “Qi Qi, why did you suddenly ask if I have a sister? If I do…”
If I do, what do you want to do, Qi Qi?
Could it be that you think a version of me without the birthmark would be better, so you want to find a better replacement?
Is she going to abandon me?
“It’s nothing, non of your concern. I’m leaving,” Qi Qi said, taking two steps. Suddenly remembering something, she turned back under Shen Lu’s expectant gaze and said, “I’m still very busy lately. I’ll have someone deliver your meals to you every day, so don’t come to my private lounge, got it? You’ll listen to me obediently, right? This is an order from your master.”
Left behind, the girl froze upon hearing those words and bit her lip tightly. The dark gloom that had been brewing between her brows and the sharp sting hidden in the depths of her eyes gradually dispersed, as if placated by that final sentence. She barely forced out an expression that could pass as a smile. “Mm, I got it. I’ll listen to Master obediently, so…”
So if I listen obediently, Qi Qi will give me more rewards, right?
Qi Qi was in too much of a rush and didn’t hear the rest of her words.
Nor did she see Bai Zhi, who walked out from the other side with an expressionless face after she left.
Beside Bai Zhi were two people behaving obsequiously, chattering away about topics she had zero interest in. Seeing Bai Zhi stay silent for a long time, the two followed her gaze and saw this scene, mistakenly thinking Bai Zhi was interested in those two.
“I heard Qi Qi is interested in that ugly freak. I used to see them together all the time before,” one of the boys lowered his voice instinctively, as if sharing a taboo secret. “Some people even say they’re actually in that kind of… relationship.”
Not to be outdone, the other boy chimed in right away. “I heard about that too! I even saw that ugly freak wearing Qi Qi’s school uniform before, and she goes in and out of Qi Qi’s private lounge all the time. The two of them in there must be…” He glanced at the girl beside him, whom he considered the most pure and innocent, and abruptly shut his mouth.
Minde, as a elite high school, not only made no effort to create an equal environment, but actively reinforced the divide in the opposite direction. Although the uniforms provided for regular students and special scholarship students were of the same style, they differed in details. Essentially, just by looking at the uniform, one could tell a student’s status.
That time, because Shen Lu had struggled too violently, Qi Qi had instinctively used the showerhead to drench her, clothes and all. With Shen Lu’s uniform soaked, Qi Qi had no choice but to let her change into her own spare uniform, never realizing what a shock it would cause to everyone else.
However, Bai Zhi wasn’t actually listening to what they were saying. She stared at the scholarship student whose ear tips were quietly turning red. Even though Qi Qi had long walked away and her back was no longer visible, the girl was still gazing in the direction where she had disappeared.
This sickly sweet posture made her feel inexplicably annoyed.
Bai Zhi turned toward the two still garrulous boys with a smile. It was her usual pitifully endearing expression, and her tone sounded somewhat distressed, yet the words coming out of her mouth were the complete opposite of her usual public persona. “Could you two please shut up?”
The moment their chatter abruptly ceased, expressions of mixed shock and confusion appeared on the two boys’ faces, as if doubting whether they had misheard.
“S-Student Bai, what did you just say?”
Bai Zhi was in no mood to consider anything else. She simply mulled over the scholarship student’s title for that person again and again, stepping toward her.
Master?
Back when she and Qi Qi first met, it was also because of Shen Lu.
She had been curious about why the young mistress of the Qi family, who was supposed to be high and mighty, aloof and indifferent to everything, would pay attention to an unremarkable scholarship student covered in mud, which was why she had taken the initiative to approach her afterward.
Yet, even after the two of them unexpectedly developed into a romantic relationship, Qi Qi had never mentioned Shen Lu once, as if they had never known each other.
Bai Zhi walked over, seemingly just passing by casually. She glanced at the scholarship student who was still standing there dazed, and displayed a flawless, friendly smile.
“Do you know Student Qi? You two seem to be on really good terms.”
Shen Lu’s expression instantly turned intensely defensive, like a hedgehog that had just been showing its soft belly suddenly entering full alert mode and raising all its quills. But although she took two steps back as Bai Zhi approached, her expression unconsciously softened for a split second at the mention of that name by this unfamiliar girl. In response to her words, she merely nodded and turned to leave.
Bai Zhi’s smile only lasted until the scholarship student turned around.
Then, the emotionless smile dropped, and she stared blankly at that receding back, her eyes growing terrifyingly dark.
The two boys, who had snapped back to their senses and were striding over indignantly to question Bai Zhi, both shivered simultaneously and slunk back the way they came, quiet as mice.
Qi Qi had no idea that those two had already met.
She simply instructed her people to look into Shen Lu’s family background, then checked her phone for the apartment’s surveillance footage from last night, trying to find any abnormal images.
Regrettably, even if she stared a hole through the screen, she couldn’t find anything resembling a monster’s shadow at all.
Of course nothing happened last night.
That was a monster of unknown nature! Even if it transformed into a human form, even if it hit every single one of my aesthetic preferences, even if we were in a situation and time where whatever we did wouldn’t be discovered by anyone…
Fine, although I’m a shameless superficial appearance monger, that bizarre law about minors not allowed to do explicit stuff is deeply ingrained in my head. I rejected the monster’s heat like mating behavior and held my ground against the temptation.
Although the monster was unwilling to give up, as long as she stopped it, it wouldn’t do anything more excessive. It was surprisingly obedient, merely unsatisfied as it licked her face all over like a piece of candy.
For the next few hours, Qi Qi had laid on the bed like a dead fish. No matter how the monster tempted or harassed her, she remained unmoved, her heart as cold as iron.
The moment the sky began to brighten, the monster seemed to sense something. It suddenly abandoned her, soaked and sticky from all the licking and vanished from the window in the blink of an eye.
Having hardly slept during the latter half of the night, Qi Qi immediately got up to take a shower to wash away that damp, sticky sensation before barely getting a brief nap and heading to school.
Maybe I should buy some realgar today to scatter around the apartment and bedroom to see if it repels snakes.
She swiped her screen in annoyance, returning to the home screen.
Qi Qi’s phone wallpaper was the “Plan to Bully Shen Lu” she had made earlier. By now, most of it had been completed. Obviously, this wasn’t something meant for others to see, but since no one ever dared to take things from her hands without permission, she had casually set it as her most accessible wallpaper.
To her, it was just like a class schedule.
“Qi Qi?”
The door behind her opened silently, the footsteps as quiet as a ghost.
Qi Qi was deep in thought when she was suddenly startled by the voice, goosebumps bursting across her skin. Realizing it was Bai Zhi’s voice, her tense, stiff body relaxed slightly.
“Why do you walk without making a single sound?”
Qi Qi turned her head in annoyance, meeting a strikingly pretty, smiling face right in front of her. Bai Zhi lightly rested her chin on Qi Qi’s shoulder, rubbing against her neck.
“Hehe.” Bai Zhi withdrew her gaze from where it had fallen on the phone screen, kissing her with a smile.
The moment Qi Qi saw that face, most of the anger inside her dissipated.
Forget it. I brought this upon myself, so what choice do I have?
Just endure it.
“So, what’s up?” She rested her chin on her hand, annoyed, picking up the melodramatic novel she hadn’t finished earlier to continue reading.
At least Bai Zhi was good at one thing, she knew better than to move the bookmark when looking at someone else’s book.
Bai Zhi glanced at Qi Qi’s phone screen, which had been locked the instant she heard her voice, and sat down beside her with a smile as if she hadn’t seen a thing. “Nothing much. Just came to thank you for making me a loving breakfast, and that pig drawing on the note was super cute.”
Hearing this, an inexplicable flare of anger flared up inside Qi Qi again.
Even though she knew last night wasn’t Bai Zhi’s fault, it was because the monster had done something to make her sleep so deeply, thinking about how she had faced the monster alone while this jerk beside her was enjoying a sweet sleep made her unable to help shifting the blame.
Claiming “I love you most” every day, clinging to her, acting spoiled, occupying her private time without a trace of self-awareness or guilt, yet at the critical moment when Qi Qi needed her girlfriend the most, she was nowhere to be found.
That pig head was also drawn because Qi Qi couldn’t help a surge of random anger when thinking about last night, so she had gone out of her way to draw an ugly pig head on the note, meaning. “You sleepy pig.”
Yet it was called cute, which was no different from coming over to provoke her!
Qi Qi took a few deep breaths to calm her mood. Before she could speak, she heard Bai Zhi ask casually from the side, “By the way, do you know that scholarship student named Shen Lu?”
It seemed like a casual question. When Qi Qi raised her head to query her with her eyes, Bai Zhi merely gave a innocent smile. “What’s wrong? Am I not allowed to ask?”
“It’s nothing. Just a bit surprised you’d ask me about someone else.”
Regarding Bai Zhi’s unusual and peculiar behavior today, Qi Qi raised her guard unconsciously. Instead of answering immediately, she asked back, “Why ask about someone else all of a sudden?”