Brother, You'll Have Pork Belly for Life

The dilapidated bus and poor county road that Bian Guanyue found terrifying were common sights for Chen Guiliang during his student days.

Even when he was in junior high, Chen Guiliang couldn't afford to take the broken-down bus.

After a bumpy two-hour ride, Chen Guiliang arrived at school again, feeling as if he had entered another world.

In 2003 China, the country was naturally divided into many different worlds.

For farmers, the poor and broken small county towns were already paradise.

"Rural person" had even become a derogatory term, and even ordinary low-level city dwellers could use "rural person" to insult others with a clear conscience.

Chen Guiliang got off the bus at the school gate and first went to a pharmacy by the roadside to weigh himself.

117.6 catties!

The weight gain plan was going very smoothly. Eating a full meal with a mix of meat and vegetables every day, he was gaining an average of 0.7 catties per day.

It was like he was eating pig feed.

His sunken cheeks were visibly filling out.

Happily returning to the dormitory, only Xu Haibo and Yang Hao were inside.

Chen Guiliang asked, "They haven't returned to school yet?"

Xu Haibo said, "They went to play basketball. Only Xie Show-off is acting sneaky, I bet he secretly went online."

"That son of a bitch, he's definitely going to renege on eating shit," Chen Guiliang cursed with a laugh.

Xu Haibo said, "There was a parent-teacher meeting today, and your parents didn't come again. Teacher Liu got angry on the spot. She also criticized Bian Guanyue's parents, saying Bian Guanyue shouldn't have skipped class with you."

"I called it taking leave," Chen Guiliang corrected.

Xu Haibo reminded him, "You still haven't submitted your leave slip."

Chen Guiliang stopped arguing, took out the first-year high school textbooks he brought from home, and sat in the dormitory studying diligently.

He had even forgotten concepts like sin, tan, and cos, and had to start from the basics.

Until dinner time, that guy Xie Yang still hadn't shown up, probably really went to the internet cafe secretly.

Chen Guiliang carried his first-year high school math book with him, went to the cafeteria for dinner first, and then to the classroom for evening self-study.

Not long after, Bian Guanyue and Zheng Feng walked into the classroom, one after the other.

Bian Guanyue walked into the classroom expressionlessly, but when she reached Chen Guiliang, she took the initiative to greet him.

Chen Guiliang lowered his voice and said in a deep tone, "I am Qin Shi Huang."

Bian Guanyue's sense of humor was actually quite low, and she instantly couldn't hold back her laughter when she heard this. She remembered the phone call the night before and couldn't help but ask with a hint of a smile, "Are you giving me the money now?"

Chen Guiliang said, "Proceed according to the plan."

Bian Guanyue took out ten yuan: "I only have this much."

Chen Guiliang said, "The sea accepts all rivers, it does not reject small streams."

"Where is the token of Qin Shi Huang?" Bian Guanyue asked.

Chen Guiliang took out a pebble and spoke nonsense with a straight face: "The He Shi Bi Jade was made into the Imperial Jade Seal back then, and there were some scraps left over. This jade is one of them. I hope you will keep it carefully. When I open the Qin Mausoleum, recruit soldiers and horses to rebuild the Great Qin Empire, you can hold this token and be granted the position of Empress!"

"Then I'll wait," Bian Guanyue pursed her lips to suppress a smile.

Chen Guiliang gave the pebble as a gift and actually accepted Bian Guanyue's startup capital.

He was able to pick up girls without spending a dime, and even made ten yuan in return.

Bian Guanyue played with the pebble.

This broken stone was the size of a quail egg, entirely white and indeed looked like jade, with a blue stripe in the middle.

It was quite pretty.

Bian Guanyue put the stone in her pencil case.

Zheng Feng stood by the side the whole time, watching, not understanding what they were saying.

What the hell is Qin Shi Huang?

And rebuilding the Great Qin Empire, and making Bian Guanyue the Empress?

Bian Guanyue actually accepted the broken stone and kept smiling. She never smiled at me!

What exactly happened when you went to the city to fix the computer?

You were gone for two days over the weekend, how did everything change?

Zheng Feng looked at Chen Guiliang, then at Bian Guanyue, feeling as if he was already out of the picture.

"Want to listen to music?" Bian Guanyue took out her MP3 player.

"Okay."

Chen Guiliang distinguished left and right and put on one of the earbuds.

Under Zheng Feng's stunned gaze, Bian Guanyue picked up the other earbud and put it on. These two were actually sharing a pair of earbuds to listen to music, and their actions were so natural?

This was definitely not the first time.

Oh my god!

Zheng Feng started to doubt his life.

After a while, Wang Siyu came for self-study.

Just as she put down her schoolbag, she also saw the bizarre scene and quietly asked Zheng Feng, "What's going on with them?"

"Don't disturb my self-study!" Zheng Feng was extremely annoyed.

Wang Siyu pouted, thinking: Why are you getting mad at me? If you have a temper, go argue with Chen Guiliang.

Li Jun came into the classroom again, holding a basketball and covered in sweat.

He had been pursuing Ou Yafei from the next class for the past two days, but had been scared into giving up halfway – Ou Yafei's father had beaten up her ex-boyfriend.

The reason was that the ex-boyfriend, unable to accept the breakup, spread rumors, saying that Ou Yafei had had an abortion for him during the summer vacation.

How did Li Jun know?

Because Ou Yafei's ex-boyfriend was one of their basketball team buddies!

During the parent-teacher conference today, they went to play basketball at the North City Primary School, which had already been closed. That primary school was next to the Second Middle School, and now it had been merged and had no students. In a few years, it would become the junior high division of the Second Middle School.

Ou Yafei's father, after finishing the parent-teacher conference, went directly to the basketball court at North City Primary School and publicly beat his daughter's ex-boyfriend until he was black and blue.

Li Jun witnessed the whole thing and the more he thought about it, the more scared he became, feeling that Bian Guanyue was more suitable for him.

Li Jun excitedly walked to Bian Guanyue's desk: "Bian Guanyue, a milk tea shop has opened in the county town. Do you know pearl milk tea? It's from Treasure Island. Let me tell you, the business is super popular, and on the opening day, there were a lot of people queuing."

In this broken county town, it was already 2003, and the first milk tea shop had just appeared.

Moreover, it would be another two years before the first fast-food restaurant appeared. At that time, all the rich people in the county drove their cars to queue at Dicos, causing local traffic jams for several consecutive days.

Bian Guanyue ignored him and kept her head down, doing problems.

Li Jun asked again: "Have you ever had pearl milk tea? I queued for 40 minutes yesterday to finally buy a cup. It's especially delicious, worthy of being a drink from Treasure Island. I'll bring you a cup tomorrow noon."

Bian Guanyue continued to do problems.

Li Jun finally noticed something unusual. He saw Chen Guiliang and Bian Guanyue sharing a pair of earphones.

This guy didn't think much of it; it was normal for male and female classmates to listen to music together. He also often shared earphones with girls to listen to music, but most of them were not his girlfriends; he had only officially dated one in his second year of high school.

But at this moment, he was jealous and angry.

Bian Guanyue should have been his deskmate, and it should have been him listening to music with her now!

"Yo, Great Hero Chen, your sleeves are all torn, can't you bear to change to new ones?"

Li Jun started his foul-mouthed mode again: "Don't you have money to buy them? Do you want me to lend you some?"

If it were the Chen Guiliang of his student days, if Li Jun dared to mock his poverty, he would definitely curse back on the spot and possibly even fight.

Chen Guiliang, with a 40-year-old soul in his body, smiled and looked up, saying: "Yes, I don't have money to buy clothes, thank you, classmate Li Jun, for your concern. Are you really willing to lend me money to buy clothes?"

"What?" Li Jun thought he had misheard.

Chen Guiliang's reaction was completely unexpected.

Chen Guiliang actually held out his hand: "I'm so poor I don't even have enough for food, and I've always wanted to buy a piece of clothing. Can classmate Li Jun lend me two hundred?"

Li Jun immediately remembered the hundred yuan he had been tricked out of that evening self-study because of changing seats. He subconsciously took two steps back and sneered mockingly: "I'm not your dad, what clothes you wear is none of my business!"

Chen Guiliang laughed: "If you don't have money, what are you talking about! I thought you were going to be filial to your dad. You raised such a big son for nothing, you should have just shot him into the toilet with a shiver back then."

"Say that again, you motherfucker!"

Li Jun rushed up and grabbed Chen Guiliang's collar.

His strength was quite great, but unfortunately, he didn't tear the clothes, otherwise Chen Guiliang would have had an excuse to extort money.

"Li Jun, don't bully your classmate!" Bian Guanyue immediately spoke up to stop him.

She wasn't actually afraid of Chen Guiliang getting beaten, because she knew Chen Guiliang was very capable. But Chen Guiliang was currently on probation, and if he fought again, he would definitely be expelled.

Li Jun became even more angry and, without any sense of proportion, questioned Bian Guanyue: "You're actually helping him?"

Bian Guanyue said righteously: "If you two fight, I can be a witness. I can prove that you provoked him first, and you were the first to strike!"

Zheng Feng watched the good show with a grin.

Although he didn't like Chen Guiliang, he actually disliked Li Jun even more and hoped that Chen Guiliang would beat Li Jun severely.

Feeling the increased force on his sleeve, Chen Guiliang raised his voice and shouted: "Li Jun is hitting people, Li Jun is hitting people!"

The classmates in the classroom all looked over when they heard this.

Xie Yang, who had just returned to the classroom from the internet cafe, didn't even ask what was going on before rushing over in a few steps and delivering a flying kick: "Damn it, you dare to hit my brother!"

This guy was really on it when something happened.

Xu Haibo and the guys from dormitory 302 also ran over to support and cheer, but they only dared to talk tough and didn't dare to act.

The class monitor, Li Rui, shouted: "Don't fight, don't fight!"

Several other class cadres also spoke up to dissuade them.

Li Jun was almost kicked down by Xie Yang, and the two quickly became entangled.

Chen Guiliang shouted, "Don't fight!" and pretended to pull the two apart. But using Xie Yang to block everyone's view, he landed a vicious punch on Li Jun's waist.

A kidney shot.

Li Jun instantly bent over in pain, unable to speak. Chen Guiliang took the opportunity to separate him and Xie Yang.

Xie Yang pointed at Li Jun and cursed, "I'll beat you to death, you son of a bitch!"

Chen Guiliang sighed inwardly. He hadn't planned on fighting tonight and had wanted to use the excuse to extort some money, but he couldn't stop Xie Yang from coming to help.

It was purely an accident.

Xie Yang stylishly tossed his hair and patted his chest, saying to Chen Guiliang, "You're on probation. If you fight again, you'll be expelled. Leave the fighting to me from now on. At most, I'll get a major demerit!"

Chen Guiliang thought to himself, Brother, with those words, I'll make sure you have enough pork belly for the rest of your life.

Xu Haibo also stood by and cheered, "Xie Show-off is loyal!"

The class monitor, Li Rui, ran over and helped Li Jun up. "Are you hurt?"

This guy, Li Jun, wasn't very bright. He didn't take the opportunity to make a fuss about going to the hospital. Instead, he endured the pain for the sake of his pride, stood up, and pretended nothing was wrong. "Hurt? I'm on the school basketball team! Ten more of you wouldn't hurt me. I can take on a hundred of them."

"Come on, let's fight again," Xie Yang provoked.

The guys from Dorm 302, except for Yang Hao who was more timid, all gathered around.

They didn't dare to fight, but they were enough to boost morale.

The seven of them immediately surrounded Li Jun.

Seeing this formation, Li Jun didn't dare to curse loudly. He mumbled something under his breath, pushed Xu Haibo away with a fierce but timid look, and returned to his seat, continuing to grumble.

Class monitor Li Rui breathed a sigh of relief and quickly shouted, "Evening study is about to start. Go back, everyone go back to your seats."

Chen Guiliang cupped his fists towards his brothers from 302. "I'll treat you guys to lunch tomorrow at the small stir-fry place at the school gate!"

"No problem, haha." Everyone laughed and dispersed.

Yang Hao sneakily returned to his seat. He hadn't come over to help just now and felt he wasn't loyal enough. He was also afraid his roommates would ostracize him because of it.

In the blink of an eye, the classroom returned to quiet.

Bian Guanyue handed Chen Guiliang the earplugs he had taken off and asked with concern, "Are you really short on money?"

"It's alright," Chen Guiliang said.

Bian Guanyue was afraid of hurting his pride and said cautiously, "I can lend you money to buy clothes. It's getting colder and colder... Don't overthink it, I don't have any other meaning, and I'm not looking down on you. It's just... well, you took me to fix my computer, and classmates should help each other."

A beautiful girl saying something like this could easily make a poor young man feel embarrassed.

The Chen Guiliang of high school would definitely have refused outright to protect his pathetic self-esteem.

But at this moment, Chen Guiliang seized the opportunity and said with a grin, "I'm not very good at choosing clothes. The ones I buy always look ugly. How about we go to the store together this weekend, and you can help me pick out styles and colors?"

Bian Guanyue was willing to lend money but didn't want to go shopping together, afraid of causing misunderstandings.

She hesitated for a while, finding it really hard to refuse, and finally agreed, "Okay."

(Asking for monthly votes.)