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That handshake was like sparks colliding with the earth, like Shenzhou-8 successfully docking with Tiangong-1. It absolutely deserved a place in He Zhizhou's personal history, never to be forgotten.

He Zhizhou's eyes brimmed with tears, and his voice turned choked with emotion. "A specter is haunting Europe—the specter of Communism."

Ning Ning stared straight into his eyes and answered with ringing conviction, "Prosperity, democracy, civility, harmony. Freedom, equality, justice, the rule of law. Patriotism, dedication, integrity, friendliness."

What a beautiful twenty-four-character motto. What beautiful words.

He Zhizhou's eyes reddened, like a party member in a spy drama finally reuniting with his organization. He was so moved he nearly burst into tears on the spot. "Comrade! I've been waiting for you so long, the flowers have all withered!"

Ning Ning nodded. "Don't be afraid. I'll pour you a cappuccino, and we'll fight to the break of dawn."

"So," Ning Ning said, taking a sip of water, "you were brought here by a system too?"

"Right, right, right! But my situation's different from yours."

After hearing her story, He Zhizhou looked enlightened. "You said you read a novel and directly became the female supporting character in it, and now you have to keep stirring up trouble according to the plot—but I've never even heard of that novel."

Seeing Ning Ning's confusion, he explained in a low voice, "I came straight to this timeline and was born into it. Ever since I was born, there's been a voice in my head telling me it's called the 'Whetstone System.' To make this world's chosen one grow stronger through hardship, I have to follow its instructions and keep doing bad things, serving as a whetstone."

That was actually pretty much the same as her situation.

As he spoke, He Zhizhou looked intrigued. "If the novel you read can really predict the whole story, what happens to me in the end? Do I become insanely cool and domineering, waking up every day on a five-thousand-square-meter bed?"

"You barely appear in the novel."

Ning Ning paused, thinking it over. "You're an unforeseen variable brought into this world by the system, so it makes sense that He Zhizhou has so few scenes in the original story. After all, without the system, you wouldn't go out of your way to provoke the main cast, so naturally you wouldn't get many chances to appear."

He Zhizhou's eyes were wide and round. He looked like a not-particularly-bright AI, nothing at all like the calm and collected poet he'd been during their verse duel.

After a long moment, he suddenly exclaimed, as if everything had just clicked. "So you were the one who hired people to beat up Pei Ji this time!"

At those words, both of them looked world-weary, tears gathering at the corners of their eyes.

The vicious female supporting character, Ning Ning, stared vacantly ahead. "Do you still have enough money to pay the medical bills?"

The male antagonist, He Zhizhou, clutched his chest. "I squeezed out the last Spirit Stone I had from my days as a male courtesan. I really don't get it. We set out to torment Pei Ji, so why are we the ones getting hurt? Are we the Big Bad Wolf and Red Wolf, or Team Rocket? Even our misery is painfully typical."

Oh, right.

The two heinous villains looked at each other. Their wan, feeble smiles concealed a big, fat zero in the performance column.

"But my next mission is really something. It's guaranteed to succeed, one hundred percent."

He Zhizhou sighed and clenched his fist with absolute confidence. "The system won't let me reveal anything. After this evening, I'll tell you everything, down to the last detail. Everything's been prepared so perfectly that there's no way Pei Ji can take me out in one shot. If this mission fails again, I'll eat this cup right here and now!"

Ning Ning nodded. "You take being a villain so seriously. Got any winning strategies?"

"I studied acting in my previous life. I get into character fast."

He Zhizhou chuckled foolishly and scratched his head, a little embarrassed. "I don't really have any tricks. I can only say this mission's so simple, I'd have to try hard to fail."

Oh.

Ning Ning thought for a moment, then asked, "Do you know any ways to make money?"

He Zhizhou's eyes lit up at once. "Now that's a topic I can stay awake for! I heard one of the women in the kitchen say that besides me, another girl went begging too. Was that you?"

Ning Ning said, "Yes, yes, yes! That was me!"

And so the two biggest villains of the novel's early and middle sections sat down together and spent a long, long time discussing how to pay off their debts and live like normal people in the land of the living.

From Spirit Stones to Bitcoin, from pinching pennies to the Engel coefficient, they talked until they clasped hands and gazed into each other's tearful eyes. They were only one step away from making a TV drama called Dreaming of the Rich Circle.

—What did tormenting the male lead matter? A bulging money pouch was way better!

Dusk, in front of Pei Ji's courtyard.

He Zhizhou secretly tightened his grip on the object in his hand. He didn't have to wait long before Pei Ji returned late.

He'd been bound to the system ever since he crossed over, but for all those years, he hadn't even seen Pei Ji's shadow. He'd only actually started carrying out missions recently.

Ning Ning had said he was the protagonist of a power fantasy xuanhuan novel, but He Zhizhou couldn't make heads or tails of it.

In his experience as a reader, the male leads in novels for men were usually handsome, refined, and steady-tempered. Nothing like Pei Ji, who radiated an aura of menace that warned everyone to stay away, and was so beautiful he seemed almost demonic.

Forget being the male lead—even casting him as the final boss would've been believable.

But! No matter how terrifying Pei Ji was, he, a successor to socialism, wouldn't back down so easily! The light of righteousness would always shine upon the earth!

"Junior Brother Pei Ji." He Zhizhou had prepared himself mentally. Drawing on his acting skills, he tried his best to look like a sinister little man who'd never gotten his way. "My name is He Zhizhou. I came to see you today... because I want to show you something. Don't move around. You wouldn't want to get hurt."

That's it! Keep it up! He Zhizhou, you're the cultivation world's Oscar-winning actor!

Pei Ji glanced at him indifferently, paid him no heed, and headed straight for the courtyard gate.

He Zhizhou, of course, wouldn't let him pass. He grabbed his sleeve. "I was born into the Demon-Subduing Clan, and I have an innate ability to sense the Devil Race. I happened to pass through here recently and sensed an extremely dense demonic aura. Would Junior Brother Pei Ji care to explain?"

After saying that, he couldn't help thinking that this performance was truly the work of a 24-karat jerk. Forget Pei Ji—even he wanted to punch himself in the face.