Xing Wu started the car, and after Qing Ye closed the door, her gaze lingered on him from the corner of her eye. She remembered casually mentioning long ago that he must look handsome while driving. Indeed, he did look handsome – his arm resting on the car window, steering with one hand, his deep eyes containing a faint light. That feeling was incredibly familiar yet somehow distant.

Until… Xing Wu turned to say something to her, she turned to look at him but didn’t hear anything he said. Her gaze was direct as if she was looking at him yet not really seeing him. In her mind’s eye, she saw the scene of him sitting alone in the infusion room – during the New Year holiday, in the empty clinic, with firecrackers going off outside in the streets, and the IV needle in the back of his hand.

Thinking of the needle, she unconsciously looked at his hand again, until Ji Bo tapped the back of her passenger seat: “Qing Ye.”

Only then did she suddenly snap back to reality. “Huh?”

“I was talking to you. What are you daydreaming about?”

She struggled to suppress the emotions hanging in her chest and turned to ask Xing Wu: “What did you say earlier?”

Xing Wu glanced at her: “Couldn’t hear?”

Qing Ye felt somewhat dazed, and Xing Wu simply turned the steering wheel to park the car by the roadside. He reached over directly to grab the passenger seat belt, and in that instant when he leaned over, Qing Ye froze against the seat back. Her heart instantly jumped to her throat, her eyes filled with moisture. Xing Wu looked up at her, noticing her reddened nose and eyes, which made his expression quiver slightly. They were only a fist’s distance apart, and in those two seconds, countless emotions crossed between their gazes.

With a “click,” he fastened her seatbelt, and the warning sound that had been going off finally stopped. The narrow car cabin returned to silence.

Xing Wu pulled the car back onto the road, and Qing Ye quickly turned her head, only to meet Ji Bo’s eyes in the rearview mirror.

When they arrived at the Industrial and Commercial Bureau, Quan Ya was already waiting there. All necessary materials were prepared, and the transfer procedures were simpler than imagined, taking only a morning to complete everything.

Xing Wu and Qing Ye sat face to face at a desk in the hall. Xing Wu reviewed the materials, signed them, and then passed them to Qing Ye. She signed her full name without much examination.

Ji Bo checked the documents while jokingly reminding Qing Ye: “Signing so quickly, aren’t you afraid someone might sell you out?”

Qing Ye ignored him. Xing Wu continued passing materials to her, each time his clearly defined fingers pointing to where she should sign.

Where he pointed, she signed, without any hesitation or need for questioning.

After leaving the Industrial and Commercial Bureau, Qing Ye no longer had any connection to Qing Gu. It was as if the last thread connecting them had been severed. From now on, she seemed to have no excuse to return to this place.

Xing Wu drove them to the hotel to check out and get their luggage. Huang Mao drove his minivan with Pang Hu to meet Qing Ye at the hotel entrance.

Qing Ye took out a complete set of “Chekhov’s Plays” from her suitcase and gave it to Pang Hu, telling him he could read it when practicing recitation.

She also gave a book to Huang Mao, “On the Importance of Speaking.”

Huang Mao held the book with an expression between laughter and tears. Pang Hu consoled him: “Not bad, at least Qing Ye gave you a book instead of blocking you.”

“…”

After chatting briefly with them, Xing Wu drove them to the bus station. When the bus pulled out from the station, Qing Ye saw Xing Wu’s car parked by the roadside, with him leaning against the car door and watching them leave.

Qing Ye opened the window and stuck her head out. For just that moment, she almost had the urge to jump off the bus, but soon his figure became increasingly blurry until she could no longer see him when she turned her head back.

Qing Ye’s phone suddenly vibrated. She quickly took it out – Xing Wu had sent her a message with just three words: “Take care of yourself.”

She stared at these three words for a while, her eyes moistening as she typed back: “You too.”

They took their flight in the afternoon and arrived in Beijing by evening. After getting off the plane and collecting their luggage, Ji Bo walked beside Qing Ye and suddenly said: “You and Xing Wu aren’t blood-related, right?”

Qing Ye turned her head and shot him a piercing glance. Ji Bo suddenly burst into laughter – Qing Ye swore she had never seen such an infuriating smile in her life. If it weren’t for all the people around, she would have ground his bones to dust right there.

Qing Ye stopped in her tracks and asked: “What do you want?”

Ji Bo continued laughing, saying in an extremely irritating way: “To report the truth to your father, of course.”

Qing Ye scoffed: “Where’s your evidence?”

Ji Bo said casually: “Little sister, I told you I’ve been through this before. You’re still too green. What do you think would happen if your father found out he delivered a lamb into a wolf’s den? Wouldn’t he die of anger?”

Qing Ye turned and left directly, not even bothering to say goodbye.

She had thought her father would confront her within three days, and she had even prepared her arguments, planning to bring up all his old accounts from eight hundred years ago to confront him on the spot.

However, unexpectedly, until the new semester started, her father hadn’t mentioned this matter at all. She wondered if Lawyer Ji had a change of heart, or if the evidence was insufficient. After all, as a lawyer, one must be rigorous, and she believed that during this trip back, there wasn’t much evidence for Lawyer Ji to catch her in the act.

After returning from An Zi County this time, without Qing Gu’s connection, Qing Ye and Xing Wu were completely like kites with cut strings. When she first started university, Qing Ye would occasionally call Pang Hu and chat with Du Qi Yan, but once a person leaves a familiar environment, they gradually distance themselves from the original people and things.

Qing Gu moved to new factory premises, with its own warehouse and independent production and packaging lines. Quan Ya became a proper manager, complete with business cards, traveling everywhere to negotiate and integrate franchiser resources. Meanwhile, Xing Wu used his extra time to build an internet team. With Fang Jie’s financial and human resource support, offline and online resources developed simultaneously. In just a year and a half from when Qing Ye took over that factory, Qing Gu grew from a small workshop of four people into a proper internet-based food e-commerce enterprise.

If Qing Ye had initially planted a seed in that unremarkable land, then Xing Wu later helped that tiny seed grow into a towering tree. Continuing Qing Ye’s internet sales concept, half a year later, this team with an average age of just over twenty, without any physical stores, quickly won their market share using the B2C model, focusing on brand culture, supply chain management, and customized service. As An Zi County’s first pure internet food enterprise, they also received Qing Gu’s first round of financing since its establishment.

Meanwhile, Qing Ye’s university life was equally exciting. In the second semester of freshman year, several major events occurred in their dormitory 319. First, in Q University’s famous M-Cup sports competition, the Economics and Management Department won the most M-Cups among all 21 departments. Xie Qian Qian single-handedly won all three championships in women’s Group A track and field events. She instantly transformed from an unknown freshman into the focus of the entire school. The whole department was abuzz on the first day, and that evening, Q University’s forum and message boards were all discussing this girl’s background, asking if she was from the national team.

By the next day, every competitor who saw her was intimidated. However, what really made Xie Qian Qian’s name a hot topic at Q University was her participation in the orienteering race. This competition required a compass and a map, demanding strong logical thinking, analytical ability, decisive judgment, and robust physical fitness – all essential qualities. After intense competition, while emerging victorious among over a hundred participants, she accidentally injured a professor. The key point is… she accidentally injured a professor.

As for how she managed to injure a professor while participating in an orienteering race, no one knew, but because of this incident, the Economics and Management Department didn’t receive the “Sports Ethics Award.”

Thus, she was instantly thrust into the spotlight, with various praise and criticism following. It was said she got into quite some trouble, but later they didn’t see anything happen to her.

Not long after this incident, Qing Ye’s previously popular video imitating various national accents somehow spread within the class, and so on throughout the department. The counselor specifically sought her out, hoping she would represent the department in this term’s English debate competition.

The debate opened with a powerful English speech. Although everyone’s speech content was excellent, Qing Ye’s appearance quickly drew more attention. After several rounds, they directly faced Q University’s Foreign Language Department. The opponent was also an eloquent female student, but Qing Ye remained completely calm. With both beauty and talent, her impromptu debate content was fascinating with tight logic, earning waves of applause.

More interestingly, Qing Ye’s debate angles were unique, and as the attacking side, she constantly set traps for her opponent. However, the girl from the other side was also very rigorous, methodically defending and elaborating her points. Qing Ye’s reactions were particularly quick, using loopholes in the opponent’s arguments to dialectically support her views. After several exchanges, the girl from the Foreign Language Department began to struggle to cope, starting to pile various examples to overwhelm Qing Ye. The biggest taboo in the debate is trying to convince the opponent rather than the judges.

When Qing Ye noticed her opponent’s rhythm showing breakthrough points and their thinking beginning to follow her lead, a barely noticeable smile appeared on her lips.

When it came to Western background and historical overview, she was no less knowledgeable than the Foreign Language Department students. Her opponent even frowned several times, showing embarrassed expressions at the breadth of knowledge Qing Ye displayed. After Qing Ye threw out large amounts of Western development history as evidence, the debate began to gradually tilt.

Then she began to speed up her speech, playing psychological warfare with her opponent through momentum and eye contact. Finally, under her constant attacks, this girl hesitated for just half a second and fell into her trap, contradicting her debate content. The scene immediately erupted in commotion, and Qing Ye gracefully curtsied to her: “Thank you for agreeing with my point.”

With this, that statement made her instantly famous, and this debate became the most exciting topic within Q University recently, later being recorded as a textbook example of debate.

Meng Rui Hang specifically excitedly told Qing Ye that she had been crowned their department’s new goddess, and many people from the Foreign Language Department directly called her “Department Beauty.” An Economics and Management student being named Department Beauty by the Foreign Language Department people became a topic of conversation between the two departments.

During this time, Qu Bing was also busy, not missing any student work or volunteer public welfare activities, being very active, and meeting many department bigshots. Most of the news in the dormitory came from her. Her purpose in doing all this was clear – she planned to run for student union officer. For this goal, she truly developed comprehensively in moral, intellectual, physical, artistic, and labor aspects.

While others in the dormitory were flourishing in various ways, Sun Wan Jing, who had been inconspicuous all along, ranked first in the department at the end of freshman year, despite entering with the lowest score among the four.

This directly led to their dormitory 319 becoming a special existence in Building 36. In short, everyone in this dormitory had some kind of superhuman rhythm.

They didn’t know what Xie Qian Qian was thinking, but after the grades came out, Qu Bing and Qing Ye had to give a capital RESPECT to Sun Wan Jing’s late-coming momentum.

Before summer vacation, everyone asked about each other’s holiday plans. Xie Qian Qian said she was going to work part-time. The other three in the dormitory looked at her in silence for a long time – someone whose family butler drives a Rolls-Royce says she’s going to work part-time?

Although it seemed somewhat unreasonable, they had gotten used to her often shocking statements.

Then they asked Sun Wan Jing if she planned to go anywhere during summer vacation. She said vacation isn’t for resting, it’s for surpassing others – some people win during vacation, while others lose during vacation.

After she said this, the other three fell silent again. Qing Ye originally wanted to say she’d sleep in for a few days but didn’t dare say it out loud.

As for Qu Bing, she said her mother called her to return to their hometown, as her cousin had finished the college entrance exam, but she didn’t know the situation yet.

Speaking of college entrance exams, yes, this year’s exams were over, and from the end, until the results were announced, Qing Ye’s mood had been anxious. She couldn’t pinpoint where the anxiety came from, just an inexplicable restlessness.

Strangely, until July, she hadn’t received any news, whether good or bad.

It had been a long time since she had contact with people from the past, and the group from Zha Zha Ting gradually faded from her life. The only news she heard was from Shi Min telling her that Pang Hu had been admitted to the Central Academy of Drama. Besides that, there was no more news about that person.

However, in early July, Qing Ye suddenly and inexplicably received a sum of money from Du Qi Yan – two hundred thousand. She specifically called Du Qi Yan about this matter, and after talking for half an hour, she learned that Qing Gu was about to undergo its first round of financing, and they were incredibly busy there lately.

Until she hung up the phone, she had forgotten to ask why they suddenly gave her two hundred thousand. Could it be some kind of hush money? Were they afraid that after Mr. CEO Xing becomes successful, she might try to extort him? Qing Ye wouldn’t accept this – her studies weren’t finished yet, and who knows who would be more impressive in the future!

What a puzzling two hundred thousand!