Want to have dinner together tonight?

Wen Ce listened as Zhao Li vented about everyone from his boss to his coworkers in the department, then those slippery "fish" he had been tailing for over half a month without a peep. Finally, he concluded, "No wonder you insisted on staying in school, Wen. School really is better."

He grumbled under his breath, "I was young and stupid back then. I thought special departments and all that sounded cool. And just like that, I joined in my sophomore year. After all these years on the job, I'm seriously done..."

He looked utterly miserable.

But Wen Ce only glanced at him. "You said before that you were really happy, though. That you'd found meaning in life."

"That was in front of the boss! I couldn't just say 'it's all right' like you, could I?" Zhao Li sighed. "You're a genius, the irreplaceable kind. I'm not."

Wen Ce put down his chopsticks and finally looked at him seriously. "You're irreplaceable too. Otherwise, you wouldn't be this exhausted."

Because they couldn't be replaced, no one could take their places, and in the end, they could only keep wearing themselves out like this.

Without exaggeration, Zhao Li felt as though Wen Ce had managed to gaslight him with a single sentence. It made so much damn sense.

His pent-up frustration seemed to ease a little.

He gave Wen Ce an amused look. "No wonder Uncle Chou likes you. Has he called you lately?"

"No. Why would he call me? I certainly don't want to get a call from him." Wen Ce clicked his tongue.

Zhao Li broke into a grin. "Serves him right. I see him going on about you in the office every day, so I figured he'd call you."

"He won't. I told him not to bother me while I'm in class," Wen Ce said ruthlessly. "A boss needs to have boundaries."

The frustration his boss had caused Zhao Li instantly melted away.

Every creature really did have its natural counter.

So when Zhao Li left, he was in high spirits, a stark contrast to the defeated state he had arrived in.

Wen Ce waited until he had left before starting to clean up.

Once he finished, he opened WeChat, tapped a clown icon, and sent a message. [I just gave your subordinate some psychological counseling. Remember to settle the bill. Three days off.]

The reply came quickly. [Wen! I have a program here...]

Wen Ce backed out without even finishing it. It looked like nothing major had happened lately, so he wasn't going to bother.

Then he ignored the clown avatar that kept sending him messages and opened Luo Lianqing's Moments instead.

She still hadn't hidden her posts from him. Her latest post was the two photos from today, and nearly everything further down was of the cat.

Wen Ce scrolled a few times, stopping on a post from half a month ago. The caption read: Egg Yolk absolutely loves the little cookies I baked for him!

There was a short video underneath. Wen Ce opened it, and sure enough, Egg Yolk was eating little cookies. Those cookies looked very familiar, too.

He couldn't help chuckling. So he really hadn't been overthinking it.

Wen Ce instinctively went to push up his glasses, forgetting he wasn't wearing them.

He pressed the bridge of his nose, then forwarded the video straight to Luo Lianqing. [Senior, do you always like baking cookies in this shape? They're pretty cute.]

What had Zhao Li said again? If he felt something, maybe he could take the initiative?

Watching "typing..." appear on her end, he put down his phone and went to wash the dishes in the kitchen.

Teasing a cat took patience.

When Wen Ce finished the dishes and came back out, she was still typing. He could even imagine how conflicted she was.

Just as Wen Ce opened the keyboard to give her a way out, a message arrived.

[Hear out my excuses-no, my explanation. Would that be okay?]

Wen Ce laughed aloud. If she could still joke around, she probably wasn't that conflicted.

Luo Lianqing was actually agonizing herself to death. What was with this Wen Ce?

He really went straight for it!

She had thought of countless excuses, but they all seemed far too rude.

In the end, she hadn't sent any.

But then she thought that if Wen Ce minded, giving him cookies meant for Egg Yolk really was rather rude.

She looked at the message Wen Ce sent. [I'm all ears.]

She sighed.

She simply gave up and tapped the voice-message button. After dying of embarrassment so many times, she had already gone numb.

"I'm sorry. Those really were made for Egg Yolk, but all the ingredients are safe and fresh. I sneak a few myself sometimes. I just leave out the seasonings and a few ingredients, so there really isn't much difference."

The second message: "Do you really mind? I didn't mean anything by it. I'm really sorry. I was just dying of embarrassment earlier."

The third message began with a deep breath. "I mean accidentally using the nudge feature. I really did tap it by accident. Ah, what am I even saying? Anyway, I'm sorry!"

After listening to all three voice messages, Wen Ce's smile had grown rather obvious. He could hear how genuinely upset she was with herself; even her voice had dropped.

She sounded pretty cute.

Wen Ce typed a reply. [I don't really mind. No wonder Egg Yolk kept pawing at the box earlier.]

[I'm really sorry. That was so rude of me. Let me make it up to you. Can I treat you to dinner?]

Wen Ce hadn't expected this unexpected bonus.

Looking at her offer to make amends, he deleted the half-written message in the chat box and replied, [Sure. When?]

[Tonight? A place opened across from the complex that looks pretty good...]

[Okay.]

And just like that, with two doors between them, they settled on dinner together that night.

Luo Lianqing exhaled and finally stirred, getting up from the rug. After walking into her bedroom, she muttered, "What should I wear tonight?"

If Wen Ce had been there, he would have noticed a photo frame on her nightstand. Inside was a picture of two little girls, exactly the same as the one in his frame.

Luo Lianqing looked through her clothes for a while, then stopped. "What am I doing? Dinner is still ages away."

The corners of her lips lifted slightly. For some inexplicable reason, she still felt a little happy.

She couldn't find the reason, either.

In the end, she decided to bake some cookies. The kind meant for people, of course.

She could trade them with Wen Ce to get Egg Yolk's treats back...

Wen Ce, meanwhile, hadn't spent much time on this.

After agreeing on a time, he turned on his computer.

Although Zhao Li hadn't explained things very clearly at noon, Wen Ce still knew that the issue with that professor might be rather serious.

Most things that required the Special Management Department to intervene were no small matter.

He opened a page and entered a string of code. A large map quickly appeared on the computer, with one red dot right inside the laboratory building at Wen Ce's current school.

After all this time, that thing still hadn't been moved.

Wen Ce frowned slightly. Those things had left this side so long ago. Did the people coming to take them over no longer want them?

He lightly tapped his fingers against the desk, then entered another string of code.

A movement trail appeared on the page.

It really hadn't moved at all. After leaving the sex toy shop, it had been transferred straight to the laboratory. There was no other movement whatsoever.