But after looking around, Lu Jiaoyue still failed to spot Lu Xiaoxiao.
"Jiaoyue? What are you looking for?"
Qi Yin asked her in confusion.
Only then did Lu Jiaoyue snap out of her thoughts. She shook her head and said it was nothing.
Qi Yin patiently pressed on. "Then can you answer my question now, Jiaoyue?"
With her sister on her mind, Lu Jiaoyue looked a little distracted. "Ah... but I don't really know what Lu Yubai likes, either. We didn't grow up together, and I only recently returned to the Lu family."
Unexpectedly, the moment she finished speaking, Qi Yin's smile vanished, and her tone turned much harsher. "If you don't want to help, just say so. Why make so many excuses? How pointless."
Caught off guard by her sudden change in attitude, Lu Jiaoyue was momentarily bewildered. But Qi Yin was already unwilling to say another word to her. With a cold huff, she turned and left.
Still, they had only just met. If the other girl insisted on misunderstanding her, she had no reason to chase after her and explain.
Lu Jiaoyue paid Qi Yin no further attention and continued scanning the people around her, trying to find her sister.
Afraid of missing even the smallest detail, she studied everyone so closely that she failed to notice right away when a woman took the seat beside her.
Seeing that she had gone unnoticed, the woman tapped her on the shoulder and struck up a conversation.
"Hey, little sister, was that girl who just snapped at you a friend of yours?"
Only then did Lu Jiaoyue come back to herself and get a clear look at the person sitting beside her.
The woman wore a beautiful, sexy black dress and oversized sunglasses that covered half her face. Judging by her outfit and bearing, she didn't seem to be anyone Lu Jiaoyue knew.
Just as Lu Jiaoyue was wondering why so many strangers were approaching her tonight, she suddenly heard Lu Xiaoxiao's thoughts again.
[Seriously, I'm speechless. She knew she was talking to the older sister of the guy she liked, and she still couldn't be a little nicer? Our Jiaoyue only let it slide because she's so good-tempered. If she'd offended me instead, I'd change my surname on the spot if I didn't shut her up with a few sharp words.]
[Don't be upset, sweetheart. It doesn't matter if she doesn't want to talk to you. Your big sister will keep you company.]
Those thoughts sounded so close, as if they were ringing right beside her ear. But the only person beside Lu Jiaoyue was this unfamiliar woman!
Lu Jiaoyue's eyes widened in disbelief.
Could this woman be my sister?
But that couldn't be right. Even with different makeup and clothes, and sunglasses hiding her face, her voice didn't sound like my sister's either.
In fact, Lu Xiaoxiao's voice really was different from usual. She had specifically redeemed a voice-changing item from the system, and the voice she was using now bore no resemblance to her original one.
While Lu Jiaoyue had been lost in thought a moment earlier, Lu Xiaoxiao had secretly sprinkled the powder the system had given her into the glass of juice in front of her.
Seeing Lu Jiaoyue's bewildered expression, Lu Xiaoxiao assumed her way of greeting her had startled her, so she explained gently.
"Don't be nervous. I'm not a bad person, and I'm not interested in your younger brother, either. I'm just bored and looking for someone to chat with."
Lu Jiaoyue stared at her without blinking, hoping to find some small details that would prove her resemblance to Lu Xiaoxiao.
Hmm... her lips do look quite a lot like my sister's.
And that casual, laid-back way of sitting is just like her, too.
Besides, those inner thoughts couldn't lie. As unbelievable as it seemed to Lu Jiaoyue, she became certain that the person before her was indeed her sister.
Although she didn't understand why her sister had disguised herself as a stranger to talk to her, Lu Jiaoyue saw Lu Xiaoxiao through such rose-tinted glasses that she simply assumed her sister must have her reasons. All she needed to do was play along.
With that in mind, she pretended not to know anything, nodded politely, and courteously explained.
"That girl wasn't my friend. She just came over to ask me something, and she got upset when I said I didn't know. But I didn't take it to heart."
"I don't think you're a bad person. What would you like to talk about?"
With the system's voice-changing item, Lu Xiaoxiao was confident the other girl wouldn't recognize her, so she decided to take this opportunity to ask what Lu Jiaoyue thought of her.
"Your name is Lu Jiaoyue, right? The Lu family's reunion banquet was quite a high-profile affair a while ago. You're pretty famous now."
Lu Xiaoxiao smiled at Lu Jiaoyue and propped her chin on one hand, taking a moment as she spoke to appreciate her own limited-edition sultry voice.
"I heard you have an older sister, too. As far as I know, she's not very easy to get along with. She always acts gentle and magnanimous, but she's done plenty to trip people up behind their backs. How do you get along with her?"
[Ugh, my little sister is far too oblivious. If I don't give her a warning as an outsider, she'll probably keep being this clueless forever.]
At the question, Lu Jiaoyue froze for a moment before gradually figuring out what Lu Xiaoxiao meant.
I get it! My sister must be doing all this to test me!
She must want to see how I react when an outsider bad-mouths her to me. It looks like she still doesn't trust me enough.
In that case, I'll offer her one hundred percent loyalty!
Lu Jiaoyue looked straight into Lu Xiaoxiao's eyes, her gaze as solemn as if she were facing an exam question, and answered with righteous conviction.
"I don't know where you heard those rumors, but my sister isn't anything like what you described."
"My sister is smart, kind, beautiful, and generous. She's especially good to everyone in our family. She just isn't very good at expressing herself, and sometimes what she does is completely different from what she's thinking. But deep down, she's a wonderful older sister, and we accept her as part of our family. We get along very well, too, so I don't want to hear anyone say anything bad about her!"
[Huh? Seriously? After the way I've treated you, you don't want to slap me to death?]
After hearing that speech, Lu Xiaoxiao's eyes nearly popped out behind her sunglasses.
Lu Jiaoyue looked utterly serious, not at all as if she were joking. Her impassioned tone made her sound as though she were reciting lines from the climax of a family drama.
Lu Xiaoxiao had no idea what had gotten her so fired up. All she could think was that this world really had gone mad.
No matter how hard she tried, she couldn't understand why Lu Jiaoyue would interpret her vicious behavior as kindness.
Ever since she'd transmigrated into the novel, she'd rarely spoken a single kind word to Lu Jiaoyue. Any normal person would have kept a respectful distance long ago. Why did Lu Jiaoyue have to act possessed all day long instead? Could this girl be a masochist?
Hopeless. Absolutely hopeless.
Seeing that this conversation was going nowhere, Lu Xiaoxiao felt a headache coming on. She simply gave up on chatting with Lu Jiaoyue and focused on persuading her to drink the juice as quickly as possible, then getting her to the sixth floor.
"All right, all right. I shouldn't have said anything. I don't know what things are really like between you, after all. A lot of it was just hearsay. Have some juice and cool down."
Before you continue