I'll Take That Shift!

Once he had pulled himself together, Cheng Yue found his phone in the jacket on the sofa. The screen lit up. Aside from his work group chats, everything else was messages and missed calls from Fang Zhiyou.

Annoying. Better not to look. He tossed the phone back, his attention drawn to the takeout again.

He still hadn't registered that this wasn't the room he had booked, or that the name and phone number on the bag had nothing to do with him.

He pulled out a rectangular box. When he saw its label, the good mood Cheng Yue had just recovered shattered all over again.

When the hell was this world finally going to end?!

Even a situation this disastrous couldn't stop this fashion-conscious Capital City guy from cleaning himself up first.

After last night's marathon, his baseball cap was long gone. With his lower back aching and his ass hurting, Cheng Yue bravely blow-dried his hair into a stylish look.

Only as he was about to leave did he notice the note on the table.

"Remember to apply the ointment."

The memories he'd buried launched another attack, and a needle-sharp pain began stabbing through his head.

He mercilessly hurled the crumpled note and the box of ointment into the trash, with enough force to obliterate everything.

Without looking up, Cheng Yue rushed out of the hotel as fast as his slow steps would allow.

Nothing in the world was sadder than losing his virginity the night before, then having to drag his battered body to work the next day.

Even the donkeys on a production team weren't worked as hard as he was.

Cheng Yue had neither an eighty-year-old mother nor a three-year-old child to support. He was the textbook example of one person fed, the whole family fed.

After graduating from college, he had chosen jobs purely according to his interests. He had experienced the nine-to-nine, six-days-a-week grind at a major company, stir-fried rice noodles at a night market stall, and occasionally worked part-time stadium security when he had nothing else to do, catching a few concerts for free.

He didn't buy a home or a car. Every penny he earned went toward clothes, accessories, and getting his hair done.

There was no need to explain how carefree his life was. Whenever they got together, Qi Su and the others always had to give him a few punches before settling down to chat.

In the first half of last year, while delivering takeout, he had set his sights on a job as a residential security guard. Wander around here, look around there, and the day's work was done.

What was that? He'd often have to stay up late? They couldn't have picked a better candidate.

Staying up late was standard for young people these days, and Cheng Yue was no exception. He never fell asleep before midnight.

What Cheng Yue wanted, Cheng Yue got. A mere security job? A piece of cake.

"Whoa, Cheng Yue, are your hemorrhoids acting up?"

Cheng Yue limped into the changing room with a hand bracing his lower back, smiling on the outside and swearing up a storm on the inside.

"I ate too many chilies yesterday."

Deputy captain Wu Haifeng teased, "See? That's what you get for keeping all the good food to yourself. If you'd called a few of us over to help you out, you'd have been perfectly fine."

Put a bunch of men together and they couldn't resist running their mouths. Expressionless, Cheng Yue let them tease him while he changed.

Oh, sure. If you knew how thick that chili was, let's see if you could still laugh!

The captain, who had been in the corner all along, spoke up at just the right moment. "All right, head out once you're ready. Cheng Yue, take the east gate. Everyone else, split into teams and patrol."

The security captain was a veteran, missing the ring finger and pinky on his right hand. A long scar marked his cheek, and he had a buzz cut, sharp brows, and bright eyes.

Perhaps because of his military background, he was usually taciturn and stern-faced, rarely saying anything except to assign work.

As a result, the entire security team was intimidated by him. Even the property manager didn't dare approach him.

The instant Zhao Li spoke, everyone instinctively fell silent, and the men who had been dawdling picked up the pace.

Soon Cheng Yue was the only one left in the changing room, struggling to get changed.

"If you're really not feeling well, you can take the day off."

Cheng Yue froze for a second, then looked up at the man standing backlit in the doorway. Faced with that solemn expression, he forcibly swallowed his budding delight and changed what he was about to say.

"I'm fine, Captain. I can do it!"

It's just a shift. I'll take that shift!

Zhao Li's brows drew together almost imperceptibly. His gaze lingered on Cheng Yue's face for several seconds before he turned and left.

The residential complex where Cheng Yue worked was one of the finest in Capital City. Most residents coming and going were highly educated professionals, and he occasionally spotted a few internet celebrities.

With a higher standard of living came higher security standards, unlike the wildly uneven quality of guards at ordinary residential complexes.

Blue Sky No. 1 hired only sturdy young men between twenty and thirty-five for its security team, and they had to be presentable and over 180 centimeters tall.

The requirements were high, and naturally, the pay was excellent. As far as Cheng Yue knew, every vacancy drew an endless stream of applicants. The spectacle rivaled an emperor selecting his consorts.

Cheng Yue had ultimately stood out partly because his own qualifications were strong enough, and partly because of the groundwork he had laid delivering takeout.

Practically everyone in the property management department had eaten food he'd delivered. The young man was always happy to help, too. Whenever they asked him to bring something along, he never let them down.

The woman in HR had even chided him, "If you wanted to work here, you only had to say so. Why bother filling out a form?"

And so, with his familiar face as his ticket, Cheng Yue easily landed a new job.

In his current physical condition, Cheng Yue couldn't manage the self-balancing scooter, so he could only walk slowly toward the east gate.

He regretted it every step of the way. Why hadn't he just taken the captain up on his offer and gone home to sleep? Why had he insisted on acting tough?

When he finally reached his post, he inevitably received another round of concerned questions from the colleague waiting for him to take over.

"Reporting for duty wounded, huh? You sure you can manage?"

Cheng Yue collapsed into the chair in the guard booth, too exhausted even to talk. He waved a hand, urging the man to sign out and leave.

They worked on a three-shift rotation, and Cheng Yue was grateful he had the middle shift today. At four in the afternoon, there were very few pedestrians or cars coming and going.

He could even squeeze in a little more rest. If he'd been on the morning shift, whether he'd survive would have been an open question.

Whichever way he looked at it, this was all that bastard's fault!

At the thought of last night, Cheng Yue angrily pulled out his phone and unleashed a barrage on Qi Su.

"Qi Su! Was that even a fucking human you found?!"

"He was a fucking animal!"

"Can you be fucking reliable for once?!"

He couldn't get through three sentences without swearing, which said plenty about how furious Cheng Yue, the world's biggest sucker, was.

That left Qi Su staring at his phone in utter bewilderment.

After finishing his work, Ji Huaijin picked up his new car from the dealership and drove straight back to the hotel.

As expected, the person who had been in the bed was long gone.

A faint trace of perfume still lingered in the air.

Ji Huaijin stood beside the trash can, silently staring at the ointment inside. A few minutes later, the room fell quiet once more.

In the guard booth, Cheng Yue was still locked in a war of words with Qi Su. Qi Su tried calling to find out what had happened, but Cheng Yue ignored his calls and kept firing off sixty-second voice messages on WeChat.

He also demanded that Qi Su not convert them to text!

"Qi Su! You need to understand that sixty seconds isn't my limit! It's WeChat's!"

Speechless, Qi Su appealed to the heavens. "Come on, man. Even death-row inmates get to know what they're charged with. You're killing me without telling me why. How is that fair?!"

"Ha. This is exactly what you deserve, you know that?"

Outside the window, a black sedan slowly approached.

Cheng Yue stood up, leaving him with one final line. "Wash your neck and wait for the axe!"