Chapter 14

Zhou Jingcheng frowned. Who the hell is this? Zero manners. He shoved open the restroom door.

The voice suddenly became louder and clearer.

Someone was reciting lines with deep emotion: "Chuan, you must be thinking of me too... just as I'm thinking of you... No! Perhaps even more deeply, more painfully!"

An overwhelming wave of melodramatic cringe transformed into sound waves and blasted straight at the top of his head, making Zhou Jingcheng's teeth ache.

He silently stared at the short guy inside reciting poetry and forcibly pressed down the goosebumps rising all over his arms.

Shi Jihan had been giving the little actor one-on-one instruction on what abundant emotion and overflowing feelings meant when the suddenly opened door startled him. When he saw that it was Zhou Jingcheng, he froze. "Why are you here?"

Zhou Jingcheng stared at him with a frown for several seconds, then strode over. "Hasn't your brother given you living expenses lately? Are you so broke that you have to act in third-rate melodramatic short dramas?"

Shi Jihan's eyes darted around guiltily. "Huh? No... I was..."

...Wait, no! Why the hell was he feeling guilty?

He still hadn't settled the score with this bastard who had Photoshopped stupid memes onto him!

Shi Jihan raised his fist and was about to charge when a head poking in from outside interrupted him.

The client Zhou Jingcheng had arranged to meet had come looking for him after he failed to return for so long. "President Zhou, you're here. And this is?"

Shi Jihan suddenly realized that someone had already retreated three steps away, keeping his distance from him.

Zhou Jingcheng dusted off nonexistent dirt from himself, looking lofty and elegant as he said with a smile, "Don't know him. Who's this?"

There was no way someone in his social circle would be a short guy who liked trashy, melodramatic prime-time dramas.

From the moment Shi Jihan put his name on that big screen, they had been enemies.

He had declared it unilaterally.

Zhou Jingcheng said, "Let's go, Mr. Li. I believe we still have some business to discuss."

He led the client away.

Shi Jihan waved his fist at Zhou Jingcheng's retreating back.

But business came first. He would let this bastard off for now. The little actor said he was almost here and would arrive right on time.

Shi Jihan hurried back to the private room.

He ran straight into Shen Qinghuai, who had just stormed out and slammed the door behind him.

"Shi Bochuan, spend the rest of your life working overtime!"

Shi Bochuan hurriedly chased after him. "Listen to me, A-Huai! I really worked overtime all week because of work. I never meant to neglect you!"

Shi Jihan didn't know whether to pull one of them back or stop the other. In his fluster, he caught sight of a figure from the corner of his eye, and his eyes instantly lit up.

Zhou Zeyang spotted his target user at once, sprinted through the crowd, and threw himself into Shen Qinghuai's arms. "A-Chuan? Is that you, A-Chuan? With just one fleeting glance through the crowd, I saw the back that has haunted my dreams. I'm not dreaming, am I?"

"I can slap you and let you verify it," Shi Bochuan said, a vein jumping at his temple as he hurriedly separated them. "Let go! Who said you could hug him?"

Zhou Zeyang was pulled away and winked at Shi Jihan.

Boss, I got here in time, right? Hehe.

Shi Jihan frantically gestured at him: You got it backward!

Zhou Zeyang shifted his gaze to the tall, muscular Shi Bochuan.

Ah, this one?

Never mind whether their types were compatible; with their builds, they could go to a sumo ring and play bumper cars.

But he was a professional. He took money and got the job done. So, under Shi Bochuan's horrified gaze, he threw himself at him and clung to him like a koala. "Forgive me. I missed you so much. Now, everyone I see on the street has your shadow. They're all merely your stand-ins!"

Shi Bochuan instantly associated that with the words "public stand-in" and felt as though ten burly men had sexually harassed him.

"...Let go!"

To show Shen Qinghuai how close they were, Zhou Zeyang tightened his hold until Shi Bochuan could not break free. This guy's biceps are pretty impressive, he thought as he pulled out the graduation photo he had just printed from his bag.

"You're pretending not to know me again, aren't you? I knew you were so cold-blooded, cold-hearted, heartless, and faithless that you could even pretend not to recognize your first love. Luckily, I always carry our... uh... photo?"

For the first time, he looked directly at the graduation photo Shi Jihan had Photoshopped.

First of all, he looked incredibly handsome. Absolutely stunning. Perfectly retouched.

But that was not the point.

The point was, why was his head stuck crookedly onto his neck? And why was his head circumference a full three sizes bigger than everyone else's?

And beside him was this long-beaked bird-man, whose face had suffered because Shi Jihan had Photoshopped his. He was twisted into the winding shape of a noodle as he looked at the camera, his legs stretched to over eight feet long.

Even his tone became cautious, full of thirst for knowledge. "This bird... man... is that you, A-Chuan?"

Shi Jihan frantically gestured at him, moving so fast he was nearly forming hand seals. You really don't know how to talk! A white moonlight has to be delicate, gentle, and broken!

Who calls someone a bird-man?!

Zhou Zeyang felt terribly wronged and shoved the photo toward the middle. Look at it yourself!

Shi Jihan leaned over.

Even Shen Qinghuai, who had been angry just moments ago, looked over, wanting to know what was going on with this guy who had suddenly appeared and claimed to be his husband's first love.

Several pairs of eyes stared at the graduation photo.

000 instantly boiled to 100°C. With a shriek like a kettle whistling, it said: [Host, you forgot to Photoshop your eldest brother back into his original form!]

Shi Jihan: ?

Shi Jihan: Damn it!!

Shen Qinghuai looked at the photo, then at his husband's face. "So this alien hybrid species was what you looked like in high school."

"No! How could I possibly look like that?" Shi Bochuan repeated the phrase for the third time that day. "A-Huai, listen to me explain!"

I'm factory original.

Too shocked to react, Zhou Zeyang forgot to let go of Shi Bochuan. He was still gripping the man's huge muscles.

When Zhou Jingcheng emerged smiling with his client, he saw that scene.

The client turned back and asked strangely, "President Zhou, why have you stopped?"

Zhou Jingcheng took a deep breath, the smile on his face on the verge of collapse.

He had gotten up too suddenly and seen his younger brother being the other man outside.

Chapter 14

Zhou Jingcheng had never intensely condemned himself for his low morals. He was even proud of them, skilled at taking everything that did not belong to him in business wars, lashing his enemies dozens of times and driving them from the estate.

But now, he suddenly realized that his moral standards were still too high.

Perhaps it was also because the sight of his six-foot-tall younger brother curling up against Shi Bochuan's arm and pretending to be a dainty little bird was too eye-searing, disgusting enough to rival strawberries mixed with Lao Gan Ma. In any case, Zhou Jingcheng's heart was boiling harder than a butter hotpot.

Seeing that his expression was off and that he was even inching backward, the client found it extremely strange. Unable to help himself, he followed Zhou Jingcheng's gaze and saw the group tangled together in broad daylight. He carefully examined one of the young men and suddenly understood. "That looks like President Zhou's younger brother. Since we've run into him, I'll go say hello."

Zhou Jingcheng hurriedly stopped him. "No, it isn't."

He said firmly, "You're mistaken. I don't know that person."

The client said, "Huh?"

He did not even acknowledge his own younger brother?

The one in the restroom earlier, he had said he did not know him. This one too? What was going on? Cognitive impairment?

The client hesitated. "But he really looks like President Zhou's younger brother..."

"Look more carefully," Zhou Jingcheng said in a low voice, his tone carrying hypnotic temptation. "That should be your younger brother."

The client scratched his head. I have a younger brother?

Zhou Jingcheng did not care what he thought. Seeing Zhou Zeyang's gaze sweep in their direction, he picked up a potted plant to block his face and turned to the client. "Let's go. Leave first." He did not want to embarrass himself any further.

Meeting Shi Jihan had made him taste all the hardships of life.

In the distance.

Zhou Zeyang made a noise of surprise, suspecting he had seen a familiar figure. But when he looked again, he found that the spot was empty.

"Seeing things?" He scratched his cheek and stopped looking that way.

He was highly career-driven. His boss was paying such a high hourly rate, so he could not slack off.

But after only a brief distraction, he could no longer squeeze into the center of the conversation. Shen Qinghuai was talking with Shi Bochuan about that pointy-beaked bird-man as if no one else existed, while his boss was regretfully banging his head against the wall.

The more Shen Qinghuai looked at the photo, the more he wanted to laugh. He had previously only seen online edits that disregarded other people's lives. This was his first time seeing one in person, so he deliberately teased, "Shi Bochuan, I never expected you to have appearance anxiety. Did you get plastic surgery after graduation?"

Shi Bochuan hurriedly pulled Shi Jihan over to prove his innocence. "No. Look how much my third brother and I resemble each other."

After thinking for a moment, he added quietly, "If you don't like how I look, then... minor adjustments are possible too."

Everyone present: ??

Shi Jihan's eyes widened. He suddenly could not understand Chinese anymore. [Holy shit, are all male leads in crematorium novels like this?]

000 replied with a string of garbled code: [Retrieving source text content... retrieval %￥#^@ failed... malfunction, under repair...]

Shi Jihan sighed. Love-brains really were something else.

One sentence had burned out a higher-dimensional intelligent machine's CPU.

"No, don't talk nonsense. I don't need that," Shen Qinghuai said, lowering his eyes and smiling with pursed lips. "You're at your best just the way you are."

As Shi Bochuan watched him stare at the photo, he did not know what Shen Qinghuai had thought of, but the gloom and coldness from before dinner vanished. His brows and eyes suddenly opened up, his smile like ice breaking across a frozen lake, so beautiful it made hearts race.

It looked like Shen Qinghuai would not argue with him anymore.

Did this photo have such a huge effect? Shi Bochuan thought, lifting his head to give Zhou Zeyang an approving look.

He had wondered why a first love had suddenly appeared. So it turned out this was one of his own employees, here to eat at the restaurant, unable to bear seeing him suffer for love and helping him win his wife's favor.

Mm, very perceptive!

With gratification in his eyes, Shi Bochuan patted Zhou Zeyang on the shoulder.

He was also quick-witted and emotionally intelligent enough to improvise, Photoshop a photo, and step in to resolve the situation.

Since A-Huai liked it, he would not hold it against him for Photoshopping himself to look better than his boss.