Chapter 17

He tossed the paper bag to him again. "Bought it for you."

"You really are such a good person!" Shi Jihan was happy again, changing moods faster than flipping a page.

He took out the beef and egg sandwich, took a huge bite, then gulped down several mouthfuls of cola. The rich aroma of grease mixed with the fizz of iced cola, making him like a tiny light bulb plugged into a happiness circuit—biu, he lit up.

Zhou Jingcheng was chatting with his younger brother. Zhou Zeyang had gotten used to waking before dawn to walk the dog. Today, his biological clock had woken him up with nothing to do, and he was feeling rather lonely.

[Yangzi Fried Rice: Bro, what are you doing? When are you bringing Pizza back?]

Zhou Jingcheng glanced sideways at someone whose cheeks were puffed full of food. The corner of his lips suddenly lifted, and he snapped a photo of Shi Jihan's chubby cheeks, which looked remarkably like Crayon Shin-chan's, before sending it to Zhou Zeyang.

[z: Enslaving your boss to walk my dog [photo]]

[Yangzi Fried Rice: Whoa, the boss is so cute! I want to poke his cheeks.]

[z: ?]

[z: Don't you have your own face?]

[z: Poke that.]

Over there, the bread in Shi Jihan's hand attracted quite a few pigeons from the square. One plump little pigeon after another fluttered onto him, trying to snatch his sandwich.

Shi Jihan beamed. "Hey, hey, don't grab it. There's enough for everyone, I'll tear some off for you... I said don't grab it! That piece is mine!"

Amid the flapping pigeons, he ducked and weaved. After they yanked his hair and rumpled his clothes, he gathered his breath in his abdomen and erupted with an angry roar: "Aaaah! Get away from me, all of you!!"

The shout startled the evil cooing pigeons, and they fled in every direction. As one fluttered away, it accidentally slapped this overly dramatic human across the face.

The fallen slice of bread was snatched into Pizza's mouth in one bite.

Shi Jihan: ...

After the collective rebellion of its bread slices, his sandwich was left with only the filling.

A camera flash went off.

"...Forgot to turn it off?" Zhou Jingcheng withdrew his phone without the slightest guilt, admiring his candid shot.

Shi Jihan's little curls had exploded into a dandelion, while five or six pigeons danced wildly atop his head, tearing apart the bread slices they had seized from his hand. One especially arrogant fat pigeon was even hopping back and forth on his sandwich, no different from standing on an enemy's corpse and repeatedly mashing the recall button to flash an emote.

And Shi Jihan could only rage helplessly, waving his hands in the air like the final desperate struggle before being plucked bald.

Zhou Jingcheng carefully admired the candid photo. He even zoomed in on sections of it, repeatedly subjecting Shi Jihan to execution, and picked out the most absurd frame from the Live Photo.

"Delete it!" Shi Jihan lunged to grab it.

Zhou Jingcheng immediately stood up and, with his absolute height advantage, pressed a hand to Shi Jihan's head and pushed him away, letting him flail. He held the phone high overhead and, right in front of Shi Jihan, saved every candid shot as a meme.

His gaze swept over Shi Jihan's angry brows and eyes, his tone slow and amused. "Shorty, can you reach it?"

The fingers threaded through Shi Jihan's hair also brazenly tousled his little curls.

Shi Jihan was furious: !!!

He broke free from Zhou Jingcheng, retreated two steps, lowered himself into a lunge, and charged after gathering strength.

He gave Zhou Jingcheng a righteous headbutt!

It slammed straight into Zhou Jingcheng's chin.

[Ding, Malice Points +5!]

"Hiss—!" His teeth crashed violently together in that instant, and the tip of his tongue tasted rust. Zhou Jingcheng sharply sucked in a breath, his fingers reflexively covering his chin.

The only thought in his aching head was: Why was Shi Jihan's head so hard?

Pizza was panting at her owner with her tongue out, a wicked sneer gleaming within the black eyeliner-like markings around her eyes.

Zhou Jingcheng took out his phone and checked. His tongue had split, and it would show whenever he spoke; even his words came out slurred. Sucking in a breath, he said, "Shi Jihan, I have a card game this afternoon. How am I supposed to socialize with people like this?"

Shi Jihan was smug, wagging a finger. "Easy. Use sign language. If you don't like someone, just slap them."

Zhou Jingcheng: "..."

Why had he been so stupid as to insist on provoking this guy?

He regretted it to death.

[Ding, mission issued: Ruin Zhou Jingcheng's Texas Hold'em game. Reward: Malice Points +13.]

[Texas Hold'em game? What's that?] Shi Jihan went blank. [I've only ever eaten Texas-style braised chicken.]

Zhou Jingcheng thought, if he couldn't provoke him, couldn't he at least avoid him?

He had just sworn to stay far away from Shi Jihan, yet that afternoon, the two of them were seated at the same card table, staring at each other.

Zhou Jingcheng covered his eyes. His chin started hurting again, and he felt that he must have committed too many sins for heaven to send someone like this to curse him.

Shi Jihan spotted Dianjia Bro, sitting alone in the corner and quietly falling apart, at a glance.

Zero-Zero-Zero asked him, [What's wrong with Dianjia Bro? He looked like he was in a good mood this morning.]

Shi Jihan replied with great seriousness, [You wouldn't understand. It's all part of his persona. Dianjia Bro's persona today is obviously a melancholy onion-head.]

[Why not shattered White Moonlight?]

[That won't do. It clashes with mine,] Shi Jihan said. [When I was writing the twenty-seventh version of my thesis, that was my persona.]

So shattered he cried.

This was a business card game. Shi Jihan did not know why, but big shots always liked choosing places like this to flaunt their wealth and status—everywhere was some high-end venue he had never seen before.

The enormous oval card table had been polished to a mirror sheen, reflecting the Baroque crystal chandelier hanging from the ceiling. People sat in twos and threes in high-backed leather chairs. The scent of cigars lingered in the air, slowly curling around the soft tapping of bosses' pinky rings against the table, creating a suffocating gloom.

Like precisely programmed machines, the servers refilled the whiskey glasses just before they emptied, then silently withdrew.

Shi Bochuan had brought him here this time. Otherwise, Shi Jihan would not have had an entry pass. When he heard Shi Jihan wanted to come, Shi Bochuan had been extremely surprised.

Seeing him look around, Shi Bochuan lowered his voice to explain, "This card game was organized by Zhou Jingcheng's competitors. His expansion into the overseas entertainment industry has upset some people. This is a trap meant to take him down a peg."

"See that blond man playing cards with him? He's the local kingpin overseas."

Shi Jihan half understood. [Zero-Zero-Zero, I think we've gotten involved in a real business war.]

Zero-Zero-Zero rubbed its hands together and encouraged him. [It's fine, Host. We're businesspeople too. We'll have tens of millions in savings someday!]

Shi Jihan replied, [A phone with tens of millions of pixels is more like it.]

The atmosphere here was strange. Even Zhou Jingcheng's smile was different from usual. Shi Jihan swept his eyes over him and finally understood what a fake-smile guy was—his skin smiled while his flesh did not.

Only the despair he showed upon seeing him did not look fake.

The game was already more than halfway through. Zhou Jingcheng and the blond man had moved from tentative probing to outright battle. Both lightly rubbed the cards in their hands, constantly calculating probabilities in their minds and anticipating how to make their moves.

Zhou Jingcheng lowered his eyes, his lashes casting shadows under the cold light and concealing the precise calculations in his gaze. He looked relaxed and at ease, but he was actually having a hard time.

—Obviously. He had successfully isolated himself from everyone here.

Every guest at the table had come for him, each itching to tear a piece of flesh from him.

Oh. Except for the two Shi Family brothers.

Shi Bochuan did not play cards and could not make sense of this stuff. He had only come because his younger brother wanted to, and he guessed, "Is the dessert buffet here especially famous? Should I get you some?"

The moment he finished speaking, Shi Jihan pulled him down into a seat at the card table.

That action drew everyone's attention. The big shots silently watched his every move; some glanced sideways, while others frowned.

Shi Jihan said, "This game is too low-end. Let's play something else."

Low-end?

Someone laughed.

This was the first time they had heard anyone describe it that way.

The secretary brought by the blond man wanted to step forward and stop him, but the man raised a hand to halt him. In stiff, unfamiliar Chinese, he said, "Then tell me, what is high-end?"

Shi Jihan dumped the contents of the large canvas bag he had brought onto the table. Mahjong tiles scattered across it with a clatter.

"Let's play a national treasure."

A little shock for the foreigners.

Everyone: ?

The violinist smoothly changed tune with perfect timing, switching from "The Blue Danube" to "Wishing You Prosperity."

The upscale club instantly turned into a neighborhood mahjong parlor.

Shi Jihan pulled in his older brother, then brought over Zhou Jingcheng and the blond man. The four of them formed a table.

Zhou Jingcheng was dragged into a seat in a daze.

Someone explained the rules of mahjong to the blond man, and he thought: That simple?

He disdainfully played one of his tiles.

Shi Jihan said, "No, take it back. That's wrong."

The blond man questioned, "How is it wrong?"

Shi Jihan threw out a five wan tile, then a one bamboo tile. "I won. You all have to take three mandatory turns off."

The blond man was dissatisfied. "Why?"

"Because it's May Day, and our company gets three days off."

The other three: ???

The blond man thought quickly and threw out a four bamboo tile and a six wan tile. "Tomb-Sweeping Festival. You take three turns off too."

"No, take it back," Shi Jihan said. "You're not from this country, so you don't celebrate Tomb-Sweeping Festival."

The blond man: ?

His temper flared. He threw out a one bamboo tile and a one dot tile, arguing loudly, "January first, New Year's Day! That's a public holiday in both countries, isn't it?"

"No, take it back." Shi Jihan did it for the third time.

The blond man demanded, "What exactly gives you the right?"

Shi Jihan said, "I own shares in my company. I now order the entire company not to take New Year's Day off."

Zhou Jingcheng: ?

He silently turned his head away, covered his face with his cards, and laughed.

That excuse made the blond man so furious that he could finally speak Chinese smoothly. "You really are an idiot! A huge idiot! You're like a turnip—no! You're as awful as a burnt potato! You're such a potato!"

[Ding, Malice Points +0.35.]