Aunt

After breakfast, Su Baizhou stood up, returned to her bedroom, picked up her bag, and seemed ready to go shopping.

"Watch the house. I'll be back soon."

After leaving those words behind, Su Baizhou left.

Luo Ye had no idea what his senior was going out to do. He returned to his room and continued writing.

If he wasn't writing, he was on his way to write. He truly was a diligent little writing machine.

In his novel, the male lead had given up on the second female lead he had secretly loved for years, and his relationship with the female lead was getting better and better.

The comments were full of applause and praise, with everyone calling it satisfying.

Luo Ye began plotting the next part of the story. The male lead would fall for the female lead, and she would gradually fall in love with him as well.

As someone who had been single for eighteen years, writing a romance novel was truly a strange thing.

Soon, his morning writing task was over. Luo Ye sat in his chair, ready to scroll through some short videos.

However, he always felt as if he had forgotten something important.

What was it?

Luo Ye fell into thought.

Just then, his phone suddenly rang with a video call. The words "Aunt" appeared on the screen.

Seeing this, Luo Ye looked flustered and hurriedly answered the call.

A refined-looking woman appeared on the video. Her features could be described as exquisite, and she wore expensive earrings and a necklace. Even her clothes looked costly.

Though her face bore some traces of time, Chen Shaoman, who took care of her skin every week, still looked as charming as ever.

"Ah, isn't this our little Xiao Ye?"

The moment Aunt opened her mouth, she said something that completely ruined her image.

She had the face of an elegant socialite, yet she spoke in a sugary voice. Like a girl spotting kittens, her eyes were filled with adoration.

Luo Ye's face darkened, but he had no way to get angry.

No one in this family would get angry at Aunt, nor did anyone dare to.

When Chen Shaoman was young, she had the personality of a noble young lady. Put nicely, that was what it was. Put bluntly, she had the personality of a Green Tea.

In Uncle's words, this wasn't Green Tea behavior. This was his precious little sister.

As a result, Uncle was completely wrapped around her finger. He was utterly smitten with Aunt all day long, and whenever Aunt shed tears, Luo Ye and Gu Mingxuan would get severely beaten by Uncle.

Because of that, Aunt was treasured by the entire family, even though she was no longer young.

Seeing Luo Ye's expression, Chen Shaoman put on a sorrowful look and muttered softly, "Little Xiao Ye hasn't seen Aunt for a month, and he didn't even call Aunt back. Aunt is really so sad."

"No... I've just been too busy, haha. Aunt, how have you been lately?"

"Not well at all."

Chen Shaoman shook her head and said miserably, "I only have one nephew. This past month, every day I've been wondering whether my nephew has been living well at school, whether he's been eating well. That bastard Gu Mingxuan actually went abroad when you started school. It's infuriating."

(Gu Mingxuan: Am I not your only son?)

Seeing Aunt ramble on to herself without stopping, Luo Ye smiled bitterly and asked, "Aunt, what did you call for?"

"What? Little Xiao Ye, can Aunt only call you when she has something to discuss now? What you said has truly broken Aunt's heart. Sob, sob, sob."

A cold bead of sweat slid down Luo Ye's forehead.

He forced a smile and said gently, "Aunt, that's not it. I think about Aunt every day too. Aunt can call me anytime."

This was why Gu Mingxuan said Luo Ye was good at taking care of girls.

Because his parents had both passed away, Luo Ye received even more affection in the Gu Family than Gu Mingxuan did. As a result, he also faced much more pressure than Gu Mingxuan.

That pressure came from Chen Shaoman.

"Now that you've said that, Aunt is happy."

Chen Shaoman immediately beamed, going from stormy skies to sunshine in an instant, as if the person who had just been sad had never been her at all.

"Little Xiao Ye, today is your birthday. Since you didn't come home, Old Gu and I were wondering what gift we should give you."

Hearing this, warmth filled Luo Ye's heart. He smiled faintly and said, "Aunt, you and Uncle raised me. That's already the best gift."

"That won't do. How can my Chen Shaoman's eldest nephew have a birthday without a gift? Old Gu, give Little Xiao Ye fifty percent of your company shares."

Luo Ye's mouth twitched.

In the video, Luo Ye's uncle, Gu Ransheng, walked over with a bitter smile and said helplessly, "Baby, I may be a director, but I don't even own fifty percent of the shares myself."

"I don't care. Go figure it out."

"Why aren't you taking action yet?"

"You don't love me anymore."

"Sob, sob, sob, Old Gu, you don't love me anymore. Sob, sob, sob."

Chen Shaoman's tears came as soon as she wanted them to, falling endlessly like little pearls. Gu Ransheng immediately panicked and hurriedly crouched down to comfort his wife.

They were nearly fifty years old and had been married for so long, yet they still called each other baby like young lovers. Luo Ye could barely stand to watch.

While the old married couple showed off their affection, Luo Ye exchanged a look with Uncle and then hung up.

Gu Ransheng's company might not have been a top-tier conglomerate in the capital, but in game development alone, it ranked among the best in the country.

Aside from the company behind Battle Royale and King of Glory, no one could challenge the Gu Family for the number two spot.

Gu Ransheng and Gu Mingxuan held fifty-five percent of the company shares between them, giving them the highest level of authority.

Luo Ye did not own a single share.

Anyone with eyes could see that Luo Ye's personality was unsuitable for managing a company, and he was not suited to being a leader either.

If Luo Ye became a leader, he would probably help count the money after the entire company had been sold out from under him.

So Luo Ye only needed to grow up carefree. He had no desire for that sort of thing himself, so Chen Shaoman had merely been joking earlier.

Besides, with Luo Ye's personality, he was not suited even to holding nominal shares—owning shares without interfering in company affairs.

He was too easily taken advantage of.

A young man under twenty simply could not deal with those company shareholders in their forties and fifties.

But Gu Mingxuan was different. Gu Ransheng had raised him from childhood as the company's heir, so his résumé was exceptionally impressive, as if he had been blessed with the protagonist's halo.

Meanwhile, Luo Ye had grown up carefree.

Having already lost his parents, neither Chen Shaoman nor Gu Ransheng wanted to place any pressure on him. They only hoped he could follow his own wishes and do what he wanted to do.

After ending the video call, Luo Ye finally realized what he had forgotten.

Today was his birthday.

But he was currently in Jiangcheng, and it happened to be the seven-day holiday. His roommates were all away.

It seemed that he would have to spend this birthday, the one where he turned nineteen, all by himself.

Well, not exactly...

He still had his great readers.

At the end of that day's update, Luo Ye wrote a sentence.

"Happy birthday to me."

Very soon, readers began leaving birthday wishes in the paragraph comments under that sentence.

Although these readers were usually very demanding about the plot and sometimes even cursed outright, at critical moments, every one of them was very gentle.

What a lovely group of readers.