Tan Yin’s heart sank straight to the ground. Inwardly, she wanted to scream with tears she couldn’t shed—Jiang Yilu, didn’t you swear on all your romantic luck that this buying agent was reliable?! Going by that oath, it looked like Jiang Yilu was destined to be single for the rest of her life!

But Tan Yin had no time to think about Jiang Yilu’s romantic future right now—those words had completely shaken off any drowsiness she’d had. Tan Yin bolted upright from her bed and hurriedly called Chu Hang.

The phone rang for a long time, and just as Tan Yin was about to give up, Chu Hang finally picked up.

Tan Yin asked anxiously, “Chu Hang! That thing I gave you tonight, did you use it?”

“…”

For some reason, there was a dead silence on the other end of the line. Tan Yin could only hear Chu Hang’s low, deliberately controlled breathing—he sounded strangely angry, somehow?

Tan Yin felt uneasy. “Did… did you use it?”

“No!” Chu Hang flatly denied it, resolute. “I didn’t use it. I haven’t even opened it, and I don’t want to know what you gave me, and I’m not going to use it.”

Tan Yin wasn’t sure what Chu Hang was doing, but she felt like his voice carried a slight, ragged breathlessness, as if he was working hard to suppress some emotion.

Though Tan Yin found Chu Hang’s behavior a bit odd, hearing that he hadn’t used the helmet, she relaxed. Not wanting to admit outright that she’d bought a fake, she said evasively instead, “This one I got you this time apparently doesn’t have great functionality. I’ve found another product that works way better than this one. Next time, once I buy that one, you can use it instead!”

But to her surprise, at these words, Chu Hang on the other end exploded, nearly gritting his teeth. “Tan Yin, isn’t this a bit much? Even stronger functionality?!” Chu Hang paused, as if trying to reign in his emotions, then said coldly, “You don’t need to send me anything else. Whatever you send, I’ll treat it all the same way—if you don’t take it back, I’ll just throw it out.”

With that, Chu Hang hung up directly.

Tan Yin listened to the dial tone in her earpiece, utterly baffled. She glanced out the window—the weather forecast said there’d be thunderstorms tomorrow. Chu Hang probably just really hated rainy days, she figured.

Compared to Tan Yin’s peaceful sleep that night, Chu Hang spent the whole night having nightmares about electroshock therapy, which left him with a headache the next morning—whether from lack of sleep or the electrocution, he wasn’t sure.

But Chu Hang wasn’t the only one who hadn’t slept well—so had Duan Yingfei.

Since the previous night, the moment Duan Yingfei returned to the dorm, she’d noticed her roommates giving her strange looks. Duan Yingfei gave a cold snort and paid it no mind. Having been born with a silver spoon in her mouth, she usually associated with well-off friends and looked down on her ordinary roommates and classmates from more modest backgrounds; even living in the same dorm, she wasn’t particularly close with them. Those strange looks, Duan Yingfei simply chalked up to jealousy.

But she hadn’t expected this “jealousy” to last so long—even the next morning, that strange, off look in their eyes hadn’t gone away. Still, Duan Yingfei paid it no mind. The same old story—weren’t they just jealous of her good looks, wealth, and taste?

Duan Yingfei tossed her hair and gave a light laugh, and for some reason, thoughts of Tan Yin, whom she’d thoroughly put in her place over the weekend, crossed her mind, and her mood improved considerably—she suddenly felt like eating something sweet.

So she headed downstairs to the school’s small convenience store. But while she was browsing the snack shelf, she overheard a few girls chattering from the shelf across the aisle.

“That Duan Yingfei girl is such a piece of work!”

“Yeah, seriously gross, acting all virtuous and refined in front of guys, and then behind their backs, so scheming—total little b*tch.”

Duan Yingfei frowned, thinking she’d misheard. She held her breath and leaned in closer to the shelf.

Someone across the aisle was asking, completely puzzled, “Who’s Duan Yingfei?”

The other girls scoffed. “Nana, you’re so behind the times. Haven’t you read The Temptation of the Campus Hunk?”

“I have! I’m a diehard fan of Wild Poodle! I’ve been following this comic since day one it started serializing on the campus forum! But who is Duan Yingfei, I really have no idea?”

“Just tonight, she dropped a side story! Said it was giving The Temptation of the Campus Hunk an ending—I clicked in feeling all excited, and now, after finishing it, I want to gouge out my own eyes. Out of nowhere, this scheming law school b*tch shows up, that Duan Yingfei, and she just up and steals away our messed-up architecture department head Zhu Kangmei, domineering basketball captain Chen Jian, and yandere student council president Li Yilin, all in one go!”

The girl speaking still sounded worked up, clearly unable to accept this ending even now. “I mean, I’m a multi-shipper, during the serialization I loved all of them—Zhu Kangmei, Chen Jian, and Li Yilin, any of them—so if the author had wanted to pair Chu Hang with any of them, I’d have been okay with it. But this? Absolutely not. What is this, did this Duan Yingfei buy her way into the cast? She actually stole away every single one of Chu Hang’s men! Chu Hang doesn’t even get a look-in anymore!”

“Didn’t you read it? This side story is literally titled When Love Becomes the Past—thinking about it, that title actually fits pretty well. However much these fickle men used to love Chu Hang, they love Duan Yingfei just as much now…”

“But who does this Duan Yingfei correspond to in real life this time?”

“That freshman in the law school, apparently—there’s a real new student with this exact name. I asked my hometown friend who’s in the law school, said she looks similar to how she’s drawn in the comic, and apparently she’s also really good at playing frail and gentle in front of guys, while being super arrogant around other girls…”

These girls had clearly vented all their resentment over the comic’s ending onto this bizarre new character, completely unaware that the real-life inspiration was standing right there behind the shelf, her face going dark.

Duan Yingfei felt the blood rush to her head, nearly ready to explode on the spot. She pulled out her phone and went to the campus forum, and without even needing to search, When Love Becomes the Past appeared right in front of her as the hot topic post.

Half an hour later, Duan Yingfei felt like a single explosion wasn’t nearly enough to vent all her emotions. Especially when she saw how the scene of her smugly making things difficult for Tan Yin earlier that day had been drawn straight into the comic, her eyes went red with fury.

This so-called mysterious author, Wild Poodle—wasn’t that obviously Tan Yin?!

In When Love Becomes the Past, Tan Yin had crafted an utterly detestable version of her, and what drove Duan Yingfei even more to the brink was those ridiculous, over-the-top romantic lines exchanged between “her” and the basketball captain and the student council president.

“Yingfei, we shouldn’t be together…”

“Senior Chen, if loving you is a mistake, I believe it’ll be the most beautiful mistake of my life! I just want to keep making this mistake with you, forever, like the higher math exam I can never pass!”

……

“Baby, do you know why my body gets weaker every day? The reason is simple—because I love you too much, my hormones have gone into overdrive, my kidneys are failing too, that’s why I’ve ended up like this today.”

“My dear husband Yilin, you’re still so young, what will you do in the future?”

“Baby, it’s fine, kidney weakness is no big deal, don’t forget, America invented Viagra ages ago—one little blue pill and us men can rise to the occasion again!”

……

Duan Yingfei stared at her phone, eyes wide with fury, shaking with rage. She’d spent the whole weekend filing complaints against Tan Yin, making trouble for her, relying on the fact that Tan Yin, needing to keep her job, wouldn’t dare confront her directly—but she hadn’t expected Tan Yin to turn out to be this ruthless.

Duan Yingfei bit her lip until it nearly bled, utterly unable to swallow this humiliation. Even though it was pouring thunderstorms outside right now, with strong wind and rain and rolling thunder, completely unsuitable for going out, Duan Yingfei didn’t care anymore. She rushed to the school’s print shop with red eyes and, in short order, printed out every single page of When Love Becomes the Past.

Wasn’t Tan Yin madly infatuated with Chu Hang? Duan Yingfei thought—she’d make sure Chu Hang saw exactly what this woman’s true, shameless face looked like, so she’d never win even a shred of Chu Hang’s goodwill for the rest of her life!

While Duan Yingfei fumed with fury, the instigator of it all, Tan Yin, was sitting by a window seat in one of the campus food court’s small restaurants, chin propped on both hands, watching the thunderstorm outside with idle boredom.

“The weather forecast finally got it right for once,” she sighed, smelling the aroma of food from the restaurant, feeling ravenously hungry.

Since the weather forecast had almost never been accurate before, Tan Yin had defiantly run to the food court before the rain, not believing it would actually happen. She’d stayed up late the night before drawing the Duan Yingfei comic, gotten up late this morning, and had planned to combine breakfast and lunch into one meal—but just as she’d sat down at the small restaurant, the thunderstorm arrived.

Now she could only sit miserably by the window, hoping the rain would stop soon. The storm had come on so suddenly that she hadn’t even had a chance to order yet.

The food court’s small restaurants were separate from the regular cafeteria windows, located on the top floor of the food court, essentially leased out to private restaurant operators. Everything from various Western cuisines, teppanyaki, ramen, Sichuan food, Hunan food, to Huaiyang cuisine, desserts, and drink shops—there was quite a variety. Though the menu selection was more limited compared to proper restaurants outside campus, it was still a step up from the regular cafeteria windows downstairs. For students who didn’t feel like leaving campus but wanted to elevate their dining experience a bit, these small restaurants were a good choice.

Still, no matter how accessible, these weren’t the regular cafeteria windows, so most students still chose to queue up downstairs for meals. Even during meal times, there weren’t many people up here. Tan Yin had chosen the most expensive Japanese restaurant on this top floor, and right now, besides her, there was no one else there.

Of course, in everyone else’s eyes, there was no one there at all.

Just as the server turned around, teapot in hand, to pour tea for her sole customer, she discovered that the table was suddenly empty. She looked out at the sudden thunderstorm outside and thought regretfully that this one customer had probably changed her mind and already left the restaurant.

But her disappointment didn’t last long, because soon after, a man and a woman walked into the shop together. The man had a somewhat cool air about him, but was tall with long legs, his face striking enough to outshine several popular male celebrities; the woman was quite beautiful too—together, they made for a rather eye-catching couple.

The server bowed practiced and greeted the customers in Japanese as customary.

“You two, please sit wherever you’d like.”

“Chu Hang, let’s sit by the window then,” Duan Yingfei said, pursing her lips, pointing toward the table where Tan Yin sat. “It’s a bit stuffy in here, I want to sit there so I can open the window for some air later.”

In this pouring rain, what air are you trying to get?! Are you trying to get struck by lightning with the window open?!

Tan Yin watched, wide-eyed, as Chu Hang and Duan Yingfei walked into this Japanese restaurant, and then watched as Duan Yingfei, of all the tables available, chose the exact one where she was sitting…

It wasn’t until Chu Hang pulled out the chair next to her and sat down that Tan Yin finally grasped the reality of it—she was somehow, inexplicably, seated at the same table as Chu Hang and Duan Yingfei?

Fortunately, ever since gaining the ability to turn invisible, Tan Yin had grown used to all sorts of bizarre situations. But right now, with Chu Hang sitting just an arm’s length away, Tan Yin only needed to lean forward slightly to touch his hand resting on the table. Since this seat was against the window wall, Chu Hang sat on the aisle side, which meant Tan Yin was boxed in on the inside of this four-person table, with no way to leave.

“Here’s the menu, you two.”

The moment the server brought out the menu, Tan Yin couldn’t help herself. “Oh? This menu’s been updated, looks nice!” She spotted the newly redesigned layout right away and curiously leaned in to look at the page in Chu Hang’s hands. “Wow, they finally have geoduck in the sashimi section!”

As Chu Hang flipped through the menu, Tan Yin followed along, and though no one else could see or hear her, that didn’t stop her from enthusiastically commenting on every page of the new menu.

……

Ever since receiving Tan Yin’s hair-growth helmet, Chu Hang felt his whole life had gone downhill—first that thing had electrocuted him; then Duan Yingfei had called him in tears, saying Tan Yin was bullying her, asking him out to lunch to help her seek justice; then just as Chu Hang was about to leave the dorm, a massive thunderstorm suddenly started; and then, on the way to the restaurant, he’d been splashed with mud all over one pant leg by a speeding motorcycle…

He thought this was probably already the peak of bad luck in his life, but then, just now, he’d inexplicably started hearing Tan Yin’s voice.

The entire Japanese restaurant had only him and Duan Yingfei as customers, and yet Chu Hang was absolutely certain he could hear Tan Yin’s voice, so real, so vivid, so close, as if… as if she were sitting right beside him…

“Oh? This menu’s been updated, looks nice!”

“Wow, they finally have geoduck in the sashimi section!”

“Sea urchin! I want sea urchin! Chu Hang, order some sea urchin!”

“Skip the grilled skewers, doesn’t that name make you think of guys getting a bit too heated down there?”

……

Chu Hang frowned and rubbed his temples hard. He thought, he must not have slept well last night, and having been pestered by this bad-luck charm Tan Yin for so long, he was probably starting to hallucinate. It would pass soon. As he thought this, he instinctively started flipping through the menu faster.

But no sooner had he thought this than Tan Yin’s presence appeared again, her tone urgent—

“Flip slower! I haven’t finished looking at that page yet!”

……

Fortunately, Duan Yingfei’s voice broke through this terrifying auditory hallucination. “Excuse me, could we get an order of teppanyaki beef tongue, sukiyaki beef hotpot, eel hand rolls, a sashimi platter, and cheese oysters. For drinks, two cans of cola please.” She finished, glanced at Chu Hang. “Chu Hang, anything else you’d like to order?”

But before Chu Hang could answer, he heard Tan Yin’s voice beside him laughing with malicious glee—

“Duan Yingfei, you really do have a talent for picking out this restaurant’s worst dishes! The teppanyaki beef tongue here is way too tough, the sukiyaki beef hotpot is too sweet, the eel hand rolls are barely passable, and their actually good dishes—chawanmushi, gyudon, crab hotpot, and tofu dishes, and the hot spring egg—you didn’t order a single one of them!”

……

“Chu Hang? What’s wrong? Still want to order?”

Chu Hang frowned, trying hard to dispel his hallucination, ignoring Tan Yin’s baffling commentary in his head. He pressed his lips together. “That’ll do, that’s enough for the two of us.”

Since the Japanese restaurant had only the two of them as customers, the food came out quickly, and before long, everything had been served.

“Chu Hang, whatever you do, don’t eat the teppanyaki beef tongue, it’s really not good!”

Chu Hang ignored this voiceover-like hallucination and, defiant, took his first bite of exactly the teppanyaki beef tongue. Tan Yin’s mouth was a lying ghost—even in a hallucination, her words couldn’t be trusted, and he should do the exact opposite of whatever she said.

Except… except this beef tongue really was way too tough! Almost the moment it hit his mouth, Chu Hang could tell something was off. His good table manners meant he only frowned slightly, forcing himself to chew and swallow it down without changing expression, even though it was practically impossible to chew.

But Duan Yingfei didn’t have that same tolerance—she nearly spat the beef tongue right back out. “Why is this so tough?”

“Hahahahahahahahahaha!”

Chu Hang barely registered Duan Yingfei’s complaint at all, his ears filled with Tan Yin’s explosive, hearty laughter…

If this sound hadn’t been coming from right beside him, Chu Hang really would have started to suspect that Tan Yin was hiding under the table with the tablecloth over her, just like she’d hidden under his bed…

“Never mind the beef tongue, Chu Hang, try the sukiyaki hotpot,” Duan Yingfei said, ladling herself a small bowl of broth, only to make a complicated face after her first sip. “The broth is way too sweet, isn’t it?”

Sure enough, Tan Yin’s voice piped up again in the hallucination—

She said gleefully, “You should drink plenty of that sweet broth, isn’t that a perfect match for how bitter you must feel inside right now?”

……

Chu Hang endured for a long while before finally realizing this hallucination wasn’t going to go away anytime soon. He chewed on the excessively tough beef tongue, drank the overly sweet sukiyaki broth, listened to the rumbling thunder outside the window, and felt something close to despair inside—here he was, a fine upstanding young man, and somehow Tan Yin had electrocuted him into having auditory hallucinations!

But despite the internal turmoil, Chu Hang’s face maintained an outward calm, and he told himself that in a situation like this, the first thing was not to panic—stay composed, stay rational.

Chu Hang, you can do this!

But the very next moment, he heard Tan Yin’s voice right by his ear again—

“Oysters boost the kidneys, cola kills sperm count—this deadly combo, I’d say your little sister Duan Yingfei here really has a complicated love-hate thing going on with you, huh?”

……

Tan Yin had no idea what Chu Hang was thinking. She sat idly beside Chu Hang, watching him eat with elegant poise, his picturesque face maintaining its usual composure.

But though Chu Hang remained outwardly composed and dignified as always, his expressions during this meal had been unusually varied—at times frowning deeply, at times rubbing his temples desperately, occasionally shaking his head slightly, even once, when Duan Yingfei wasn’t looking, gently covering his ears…

“Chu Hang, you’re making a lot of expressions today,” Tan Yin leaned in close to Chu Hang. “But looking this closely, I have to admit, you really are pretty good-looking. Look at this skin, so smooth, and your face is practically glowing white—if I hadn’t seen what you look like with your clothes off, I really would have underestimated you!”

Tan Yin propped her chin on one hand, staring at Chu Hang’s profile, her tone somewhat apologetic. “Sorry about that, if I’d seen you without your clothes on sooner, I definitely wouldn’t have drawn you as the one getting pinned down—at the very least, I’d have let you conquer some other guys!”

For some reason, right as Tan Yin finished speaking, Chu Hang, who had been eating elegantly just moments before, suddenly started coughing as though he’d choked.

Tan Yin frowned, and said earnestly, “Chu Hang, mind your table manners, don’t let your image slip—your whole persona is supposed to be the eternally elegant, noble ice prince, you know.”

Chu Hang cleared his throat, saying with poorly concealed awkwardness, “I have a bit of a cold, that’s all, coughing.”

Duan Yingfei looked a little surprised, but quickly nodded. “Right! Chu Hang, the temperature’s been fluctuating a lot lately, you should take care of your health!”

Tan Yin couldn’t help herself, and gave a sideways glance. “Duan Yingfei, oh Duan Yingfei, has love really blinded you this badly? Your ‘Chu Hang darling’ clearly isn’t coughing, he’s choking!” She rolled her eyes skyward. “I’m never going to make fun of TV dramas again for having female leads cross-dress as men, putting on lipstick and rouge with an obvious chest, and having the male lead fail to recognize them—looking at this, apparently plenty of people in real life are just as blind.”

“…”

Fortunately, having eaten a bit, Duan Yingfei was finally ready to get to the point. She took a sip of cola, gathered herself, and her mood suddenly turned somber, her previously radiant face now taking on a pitiful, forlorn expression. “Chu Hang, the reason I asked you out today is because Tan Yin has really pushed me to my limit, I have nowhere else to turn! You have to help me get justice!”

Hearing her own name, Tan Yin couldn’t help but pause.

But Duan Yingfei didn’t give Tan Yin a chance to react. She pulled out a stack of papers from her bag and set them in front of Chu Hang, saying with tearful, accusatory grief, “Chu Hang, look at this, this vile comic—she drew this, and in it, she’s turned me into that kind of evil woman…”

Tan Yin glanced down and saw that this was, of course, her freshly finished work, When Love Becomes the Past.

Duan Yingfei looked haggard. “Chu Hang, this ridiculous female lead in it uses my exact name, and she’s also a law school freshman, and though some details are different, if people start assuming it’s really about me, this is basically slander! You have to help me! Teach this Tan Yin a lesson!”

Tan Yin sighed. If she hadn’t been invisible right now, she really would have wanted to give Duan Yingfei a heartfelt pat on the shoulder and say, “My friend, you clearly didn’t do your research. When Love Becomes the Past is just a special spin-off of Beneath Ten Thousand: The Secret of the Campus Hunk. If you’d actually read The Secret of the Campus Hunk, I promise you wouldn’t be complaining to Chu Hang about this—you should see what I did to Chu Hang in that one…”

Perhaps for dramatic effect, Duan Yingfei managed to squeeze out a few tears as she spoke, looking at Chu Hang with soft, delicate vulnerability. “And besides, everything she drew is fake—that I make trouble for people, that I’m scheming, that I say one thing and do another, that I’m petty and love causing trouble for others—that’s not me at all. Chu Hang, please don’t believe anything this comic says, I’m really not that kind of person!”

Having gotten this far, Duan Yingfei grew even more aggrieved, continuing her accusations. “Actually, it’s Tan Yin who’s the deeply scheming, unscrupulous, petty type. I know some guys think she’s pretty, but looks are only surface-level. Her grades are terrible, she has no ambition, and to chase after you, Chu Hang, she’ll stoop to such shameless lengths—clearly not a decent person. It’s a shame so many guys don’t get it, so many guys only ever look at looks and figure…”

The same tired old script—can’t you switch it up a bit?

“Yeah, yeah, sure, I have tattoos, I drink, I smoke, I curse—but I know I’m a good girl at heart. The real btches like to act innocent, act pure, act shy, wear pink clothes. Men are shallow, they only see the surface. So they only end up missing the good girls and getting deceived into misery by the btches. Only women can tell who’s actually a real f**ing btch.”

Tan Yin didn’t even feel like rolling her eyes anymore at this point. “Duan Yingfei, I really failed to recognize the master in my midst—turns out you’re also an internationally renowned character appraiser, the sole holder of the internationally certified b*tch-detecting license, successor to the great Avril Lavigne herself.”

Tan Yin glanced down at Duan Yingfei’s chest as she spoke. “Though, you know, generally when someone attacks others over something, it’s because they lack that thing themselves. Duan Yingfei, I’m just saying, your chest is a bit excessively flat. Whoever ends up marrying you, in bed they probably won’t even be able to tell whether you’re facing up or facing down.”

Whether it was her imagination or not, no sooner had Tan Yin said this than she noticed Chu Hang beside her seemingly unable to hold back any longer, rubbing his temples as if trying to dispel something, his expression thoroughly complicated.

Tan Yin grew concerned. “Chu Hang, you’ve rubbed your head so many times now, don’t tell me you have a migraine? I heard migraines can cause insomnia, and insomnia can cause hair loss, and hair loss can cause anxiety, and anxiety can cause more insomnia, and insomnia leads to more hair loss again—this is such a vicious cycle, you should really be careful!”

“…”

“Huh? Why are your fists clenched so tight? Your knuckles are turning white!” Tan Yin stared at Chu Hang’s hand. “Are you really that worked up by what Duan Yingfei’s saying? So emotional? You didn’t even react this strongly when I drew that comic about you! That doesn’t add up—does calling you ‘darling’ really have that kind of effect? Sending men’s adrenaline into overdrive with a sudden urge to protect?”

Not believing it, Tan Yin leaned in close to Chu Hang’s ear to test it out. “Let me try calling you that a couple times too—Chu Hang darling, Chu Hang darling…”

Chu Hang felt every hair on his body stand on end. This hallucination was coming on fiercely—no matter how calm he tried to stay, the symptoms only seemed to be getting worse. Tan Yin’s voice in his head was even keeping pace with the scene, responding in real time. As Duan Yingfei cried and complained, Tan Yin’s voice would comment right alongside her, and worst of all, that voice had just called him “darling.”

Chu Hang was used to Tan Yin’s usual playful banter, but he usually kept his distance from her, and had never experienced her voice this close up, especially like this—

Her voice was affected and coy, with a sweet, clingy lilt, murmuring right in Chu Hang’s ear, over and over—

“Chu Hang darling…”

The exact same four words, and yet the way Tan Yin said them felt entirely different from the way Duan Yingfei did—there was a kind of rich, sultry thickness to her voice that was difficult to describe…

“Ah, Chu Hang darling, your cola spilled?” Duan Yingfei’s voice called Chu Hang back to his senses; he heard her complaining voice. “Chu Hang darling, is something on your mind? You seem distracted today.”

Chu Hang felt he couldn’t let this hallucination keep dragging him along. He pressed his lips together and turned to look at Duan Yingfei, and just as he was about to speak, he heard Tan Yin’s voice again at his ear.

She sighed first. “Honestly, this ‘Chu Hang darling’ business is really taking me out of the moment, every time I hear it I can’t help but want to break into song, that really nostalgic kind. Paired with Duan Yingfei’s woeful frown, actually, it fits the mood pretty well!”

Then, before Chu Hang could react, he really did hear Tan Yin’s singing voice drift into his ear—

“How many good sisters do you have, why does every sister look so worn down; how many good sisters do you have, ah, why does every sister end up marrying tears…”

“…”

Displeased with Chu Hang’s distraction, Duan Yingfei, wanting to reinforce the impact of her accusations, immediately held up three fingers and swore an oath. “I swear everything I’m saying is true, Tan Yin and I have never had any conflict before—she just saw that you and I are close, Chu Hang, and since she couldn’t win you over herself, she’s tarnishing my reputation out of jealousy.”

She glanced at the slightly open window and dramatically swore, “If what I’m saying is a lie, may the cold rain outside pour right onto my face!”

Well, sister, Tan Yin thought, such a simple wish—how could I not grant it? She reached out and pulled the window, which had only been slightly ajar for air, wide open.

Duan Yingfei watched, dumbfounded, as the window that had just been slightly open suddenly creaked wide open as if blown by wind. Then the pouring rain outside came sweeping in with full force, the wind blowing directly at Duan Yingfei, plastering her hair completely across her face, and big fat raindrops carrying a chill splattered right onto her face, exactly as she’d sworn…

Duan Yingfei’s expression instantly fell apart…

She shut the window, embarrassed. “I… I’m going to the restroom for a moment.”

Duan Yingfei hadn’t needed to say anything, but the moment she mentioned it, Tan Yin suddenly felt like she needed to use the restroom too. But given her current position, with Chu Hang firmly blocking the path to the aisle, one man holding the pass, Tan Yin couldn’t move an inch as long as he stayed put.

Tan Yin tried to hold it in, but the more she tried, the more the urge became impossible to ignore.

She looked with a pained expression at Chu Hang, sitting upright beside her. “Chu Hang, don’t you need to pee?”

Perhaps having taken Duan Yingfei’s tearful accusations to heart, Chu Hang’s expression had remained sour the whole time today, brows slightly furrowed, face cold, maintaining his usual difficult-to-please, hard-to-approach demeanor.

Relying on the fact that he couldn’t hear her, Tan Yin pleaded earnestly, “Buddy, seriously, you should go to the bathroom! Drink less cola, drink more water, or you’ll end up with prostate problems when you’re older. I read a news report recently saying men’s urological diseases are increasing at a rate of 3% per year, becoming a serious threat to men’s health.”

Chu Hang’s profile remained handsome and composed; he’d been reaching out to grab his cola for a sip, but midway through, he abruptly redirected his hand instead to pick up a napkin, elegantly dabbing at his mouth…

His expression remained so composed and his movements so natural that Tan Yin didn’t notice anything was off at all—especially since she herself was so desperate to pee that she was singularly focused on wishing Chu Hang would just get up already.

“Chu Hang, go pee.”

But Chu Hang remained resolutely unmoved.

“Chu Hang, a man should pee when he needs to pee.”

Tan Yin knew it was probably useless, but couldn’t help muttering on anyway, using the rambling to distract herself from her own urge to use the bathroom. “Don’t think going to the bathroom too often makes you seem like you have a weak bladder or something—holding it in is dangerous. Holding your pee can cause cystitis, which is actually worse for men’s health!”

“Men, gotta pee when you gotta pee, ain’t no crime…”

……

With Duan Yingfei having left for the restroom, Chu Hang had hoped to use the opportunity to calm down, but instead of calming down, the hallucination only grew fiercer. Even as he continued maintaining his composed front, Tan Yin’s voice grew closer and clearer, and this time she’d started urging him to go to the bathroom, going on and on right in his ear, like some kind of psychological torment.

Chu Hang had absolutely no desire to go to the bathroom, but harassed beyond endurance by “Chu Hang, go pee,” he finally stood up, deciding to go wash his face with cold water in the restroom to calm down.

And almost miraculously, the moment he stood up, that annoying voice of Tan Yin’s stopped! Right up until Chu Hang washed his hands in the restroom and walked back out, that voice never appeared again.

Maybe he really had just been too exhausted lately—a splash of cold water on his face really was quite effective for restoring his sanity.

By the time Chu Hang returned to his seat, Duan Yingfei had already sat back down too. She smiled at Chu Hang. “Chu Hang, the sukiyaki hotpot wasn’t great, so I just ordered a Japanese ramen instead.”

The restaurant was quite efficient, and not long after Duan Yingfei finished speaking, the server brought over the noodles for the two of them.

Free of his hallucination, Chu Hang felt in much better spirits, and seeing the ramen, felt some appetite return. He picked up his chopsticks, ready to eat—the hallucination hadn’t reappeared, and Chu Hang’s tense nerves finally began to relax, feeling he’d finally returned to normal.

But just as his mood settled and he prepared to eat the ramen, Tan Yin’s voice came again.

This time, the voice wasn’t right by his ear anymore, but from somewhere nearby, as if standing in the aisle.

Chu Hang heard her call out, sounding alarmed—

“Why did you two order ramen?! I just went and looked in this restaurant’s kitchen—that fat head chef just picked his nose without washing his hands and started making noodles! I thought it was for some new customer, but it’s for you two?! He was picking his nose for a good ten minutes, and when he finished he just flicked it away like that—if you two eat this ramen, doesn’t that basically mean you’re eating his nose pickings?”

Duan Yingfei had just been about to happily dig into her noodles when she saw Chu Hang’s handsome face suddenly change color entirely across from her, his chopstick-holding hand freezing completely mid-motion, his expression turning terrible, as if he’d suffered some devastating blow, his entire worldview crumbling. As particular as he was about dining etiquette, he actually dropped his chopsticks without a care, and rather roughly, yanked away Duan Yingfei’s chopsticks as well.

Duan Yingfei was startled. “Chu Hang darling? What’s wrong?”

Chu Hang’s face was dark. “Don’t eat the ramen.”

“Why not?”

“Because I’m already full.”

Duan Yingfei was quite confused. “But I’m not full yet, if you’re not eating it, I will.”

Chu Hang glanced at Duan Yingfei. “You shouldn’t eat any more either. I feel like you’ve put on some weight recently.”

“…”

Chu Hang knew this hallucinated content shouldn’t count for anything, but he still couldn’t help it—he had a slight case of germophobia, and there was simply no way he could calmly eat the ramen after hearing something like that. He didn’t even want to come back to this restaurant ever again. It wasn’t just about the ramen—this place probably had bad feng shui or something. He felt like he’d just sat through an entire one-man comedy show performed by Tan Yin.

In the end, Chu Hang paid the bill without wanting to stay a single minute longer, and left the Japanese restaurant without another word.

Duan Yingfei was baffled, but still gamely tried to continue her campaign against Tan Yin. Along the way, she kept up her accusations, entirely unaware that Tan Yin was walking right alongside the two of them, sheltered under Chu Hang’s umbrella.

“Chu Hang darling, about that Tan Yin matter…”

But before Tan Yin even got her chance to comment, Chu Hang cut Duan Yingfei off decisively. “You handle your own business yourself.” He added coldly, “Don’t mention Tan Yin in front of me again.”

“Wow! Cool! Handsome! Chu Hang, being like this, I might just fall for you! Right, how could you let Duan Yingfei slander me in front of you?! What kind of bond do we have? We’re fellow architecture grunts, future all-nighter buddies who’ll research anti-balding tips together—with a bond of mutual understanding like that, you’d let Duan Yingfei say my name however she—”

Before Tan Yin could even finish her sentence, Chu Hang’s cold voice cut through—

“Because just hearing her name makes my head throb.”

“…”

That slap was both perfectly timed and precisely aimed. Tan Yin’s face flushed with embarrassment—if she hadn’t been certain she was invisible and that Chu Hang couldn’t see or hear her, she would have thought he’d said that on purpose, just to strike back at her.

But by now, Tan Yin had no interest in continuing this one-sided battle anymore. The thunder had gradually weakened, the rain had lightened too—it looked like this storm was finally about to pass.

With Zhixing Hall only a few steps away now, Tan Yin immediately dashed out from under Chu Hang’s umbrella, running ahead into the building, where she found an empty stall in the women’s restroom to hide in and wait to return to normal.

She was starving, her mind entirely occupied with what to eat next—completely unaware of just how unusual Chu Hang had been on the way back.

He was even quieter than usual.

Of course Chu Hang was quiet—in fact, he was more than quiet, he was heavy with worry. Anyone who suddenly started experiencing such terrifying hallucinations probably couldn’t stay optimistic about it. To remain composed as the mountains crumbled before him, showing not a trace of abnormality in his behavior—Chu Hang felt he’d used up an entire lifetime’s worth of composure and calm just to manage that.

An inexplicable thing like this—telling anyone about it would surely convince them nothing was wrong except his own mental state. He’d probably be sent straight to the hospital, and might even be forced to withdraw from school to recover…