Chapter 258: Class Monitor, Are You of Age Yet?

"Who dares call me by name?"

Li Hua strode into the classroom, saw the table covered in drinks, and his face instantly soured. He couldn't help tilting his head back and letting out a long howl!

"I swear I'll never gamble again! Holy crap, I ran into a cheating scumbag. If I ever bet with Jiang Nian again, I'll jump off the fourth floor."

In truth, twenty-something yuan was nothing to Li Hua at all. Besides, treating his group members to drinks meant the favor would still land on his head in the end.

What he couldn't figure out was exactly how he'd lost to Jiang Nian.

One damn deck of cards, fifty-four cards.

This kid just drew and pulled the designated card on the first try. If you say there was no cheating, Li Hua wouldn't believe it even if he died.

Ma Guojun, seated at his desk, grew interested and shot the same upward stare as Brother Hu.

"You really gonna jump?"

"Just saying, you actually took it seriously?" Li Hua's face changed at the speed of light, grinning as he said, "Old Ma, how about a bet with me? I'm so trash I'd definitely lose."

"Get lost. Beat Jiang Nian first, then we'll talk." Ma Guojun knew Li Hua was going to cheat.

Half-baked tricks can't fool Jiang Nian, so he turns around and tries to fleece his own brothers. These cheap bastards are truly masters of playing dumb.

Li Hua returned disappointed, only to turn his head and see Jiang Nian grinning at him.

So infuriating. A cheating scumbag of a man.

Huang Fang watched the group clowning around and roughly figured out what had happened. Since it was a benefit for Group Six, she accepted it gratefully.

"Thanks for the drinks, group leader."

"Hey, why thank him?" Jiang Nian was a bit indignant, pointing at her. "I won the drinks. Li Hua is a pure loser, the defeated side, the brother among brothers."

"Then thanks to you too." Huang Fang was a bit helpless.

"No way!" Li Hua said righteously, slapping the desk. "Jiang Nian is a baby-level petty man, a Zhennan scumbag who cheats at games."

"You're not allowed to thank him!"

"Hey you son of a bitch, you lost and you won't admit it?" Jiang Nian unleashed the Desolate Prisoner Heaven Finger again.

"You son of a bitch cheated, what the hell am I supposed to admit!" Li Hua was also full of defiance, his voice so loud it drew a crowd of onlookers who pointed and whispered.

"This Li Hua is just lame."

"Yeah yeah, let's go, don't let the unlucky guy rub off on us."

"He's even staring at people, so annoying."

Li Hua stared blankly as the three guys walked away, secretly cursing these bastards for being truly shameless. Sometimes having too many friends isn't a good thing either—plenty of people ready to stir up trouble.

The last one with the handkerchief, Li Hua felt he wasn't faking it.

"Stop going on and on with all that nonsense, let's play another round." Jiang Nian interrupted someone's wild fantasies. "If you're really scared, you can find a referee."

Coincidentally, Zhang Ningzhi walked in from outside the door.

Hearing they needed a referee, she immediately got excited. After all, it was entertainment within the group—of course she had to watch—so she eagerly raised her hand.

"Me! Me!"

Li Hua just glanced at her and shook his head, vetoing her on the spot.

"I don't trust you. You'd be a mole."

Group-loving Zhang Ningzhi retired on the spot, unable to help but purse her lips.

"Hmph."

Ma Guojun wanted to be the referee, but Li Hua vetoed him with a single vote. The reason was that Fatty was too greedy and had probably already been bought off by Jiang Nian with drinks.

Li Qingrong came in, glanced around from the side, and went back to her seat.

"How about asking the class monitor?"

Faced with this suggestion, Li Hua hesitated.

Jiang Nian was born in the Year of the Dog, always sucking up to the class monitor—she might've already been recruited as one of his people. If she stared him in the eye and spouted nonsense, he'd be dead on the spot.

"No good, your choice of people is way too biased."

In the end, Li Hua pulled in Nie Qiqi—at least she wasn't on Jiang Nian's side.

"Ugh, you boys are so boring." Nie Qiqi didn't really care about being a referee, but thinking she could sit next to the class monitor while doing it, she agreed.

Five minutes later.

Li Hua hugged his head and wept, having lost his mind from losing, hammering the desk wildly.

"No more betting! I will never bet again!"

The matter was settled—Group Six had drinks for a whole week. All expenses paid by Young Master Li, which counted as robbing the rich to help the poor.

Everyone was happy, except Li Hua, who was a little upset.

But nobody cared. Pop the champagne, pop the champagne.

Evening study hall.

Sun Zhicheng was a bit confused. To be honest, Lin Dong had indeed been vigorously fulfilling his promise. But something felt off—how could the person he recommended

After a long pause, he turned to look at Lin Dong, who was loudly reading aloud from his biology textbook.

"The QQ account you recommended to me this afternoon—are you sure you didn't recommend the wrong one?"

Lin Dong was currently absorbed in his studies. Suddenly interrupted by Sun Zhicheng, he wasn't annoyed at all, and patiently explained instead.

"Just chat with confidence. They're all carefully handpicked by me."

Lin Dong's voice was a bit loud, startling Sun Zhicheng.

He quickly lowered Lin Dong's volume manually, thinking to himself: don't sell me out.

The fewer people who knew about that sort of thing, the better. Otherwise, he'd completely lose his right to choose a partner in class in the future.

Although he'd sworn that afternoon to become a player, a cunning rabbit has three burrows.

Was he really not leaving himself a way out?

Sun Zhicheng was very fond of a saying: Rome wasn't built in a day, but destruction could happen between morning and evening. So, meals still had to be eaten one bite at a time.

"No, Dong-ge." Sun Zhicheng scratched his head and lowered his voice. "The QQ numbers you gave me really are high quality — every one of them is fair-skinned, pretty, and has long legs."

"Isn't that enough then?" Lin Dong raised his brows and drew out his tone. "What more could you want? You need to work through these people first before you talk."

"Bro, I can't handle it." Sun Zhicheng got anxious.

"What? You like the dark, fat, ugly ones?" Lin Dong's face went pale. And believe it or not, really, believe it or not — "If you really need it, I—"

"How could that be? What I mean is—" Sun Zhicheng couldn't quite bring himself to say it, and pulled Lin Dong aside. "The ones you recommended to me — why do they all have boyfriends?"

That afternoon, as soon as school let out, he went along adding people through the QQ numbers Lin Dong had given him.

The opening and the process both went smoothly. He managed to add three people and chat with them all at once, relying on his eloquence — far beyond that of a Gao Zhongsheng — and his niche hobbies.

From poetry and lyrics to the literary life.

Later he started talking about Walden, then got to War and Peace, and along the way showed off a bit of his own ability, mentioning what car he'd buy after turning eighteen.

From buying a car to road-tripping, and just as they got to talking about travel, something happened.

Those three girls, almost in perfect unison, brought up — "Oh, my boyfriend (my baby) (hubby) and I are also planning to go to xxx."

Three sentences, and he broke down three times.

Wait — they're taken?

"So what about it?" Lin Dong asked, looking puzzled.

To be honest, Sun Zhicheng was a bit dumbfounded.

He wondered to himself: was he the abnormal one, or had the world gone topsy-turvy into a shape he couldn't understand?

Oh my god, that was a girl with a boyfriend.

So what's the problem? You tell me what's the problem!

Chat about what? Chat about how many times they swap with each other at night?

Of course, that wasn't a topic that couldn't be discussed — after all, the only one who broke down was that dumb dog Yang Qiming.

"No, Dong-ge, you— how do I even chat with this?" He was a bit baffled. "I want QQ numbers of single girls, not girls who already have someone."

Lin Dong stared at Sun Zhicheng, sizing him up from head to toe for a while, and after a long pause popped out one line.

"Are you worthy?"

Sun Zhicheng broke down on the spot, unable to speak for a long time.

"I—"

One sentence, and he froze his teammate stiff — the corpse had already gone cold.

Sun Zhicheng's tender young heart was punched to smithereens by Lin Dong, going from full of confidence to a face full of dejection in an instant. From the clouds into the gutter, and then into the sewer.

"Someone like me — do I really not deserve to have love?"

Watching Sun Zhicheng's spirit completely collapse, about to swing from one extreme to the other.

Lin Dong spoke up to comfort him. "It's not like that, A-Cheng. You still don't get it?"

"Get what?"

"QQ! The path to salvation lies within it!" Lin Dong put a hand on his shoulder and said earnestly, "Don't forget, I've walked this road before."

Hearing this, Sun Zhicheng suddenly woke up to the truth.

When it came to playing QQ Space and chatting online like this, you still needed a veteran of the Qing dynasty like Lin Dong.

According to Lin the Heavenly Emperor himself, he'd been chatting with people on QQ since he was six. He'd opened all the crowns, yellow diamonds, green diamonds — playing with every kind of dress-up, max-level cool.

This is what an authority, an expert, a people's artist looks like.

"Bro, what's the play?" Sun Zhicheng ultimately chose to believe first, and question later.

"You're being thick-headed, A-Cheng." Lin Dong shook his head. "You chase single girls, and your rivals might be three, four, five of them. Better to change your approach."

"Chase girls who have boyfriends, and your rival is always only one."

Sun Zhicheng: "."

He just knew Lin Dong was about to spout that kind of BS. The problem was, fooling other people was one thing — how could he use it to fool his own brother?

Sounds nice, but isn't this just being a toy for those bad women?

After he laid out all the doubts in his heart.

Lin Dong merely smiled faintly and patted him on the shoulder three times.

"Do you want to learn?"

Two evening self-study periods passed, and Jiang Nian looked up during the break to stretch his shoulders.

Sometimes he couldn't help thinking — exhausted every day like a beast of burden. If he really wanted a rest, he'd have to wait for the college entrance exam, and the break around New Year's.

Normally speaking, New Year's might only give a two-week holiday.

Twelve days or eleven days — not really enough time to sign up and practice driving. The best way to unwind was still to go out, take a trip somewhere else, wander around, and come back.

Then what about practicing driving?

Once he was an adult, he'd need a car to play with. He didn't have much money now. If he bought a car, it would wipe out half his savings on the spot, but in the future he'd definitely have more than just this much in the bank.

Maybe by the time of the college entrance exam, he'd already have several million in his pocket.

When that time came, he'd definitely prioritize the car.

A house — that kind of thing was too far off, and he'd heard you shouldn't touch it without at least six million. Unless it was for marriage, but he wasn't really keen on getting married at all.

In fact, he had a bit of a small shadow over it.

After all, the system's curse hung over his head — at thirty, the tribulation would begin. Who wouldn't panic at that? How could anyone not be superstitious and still jump into the fire pit?

Future matters for the future. The most important thing right now was to get a driver's license. Normal people's approach was basically to wait until after the college entrance exam and then practice driving in a crowd.

But that was inevitably a bit too slow.

Thinking of this, he turned his head to look at Li Qingrong, sneaking a peek.

"Class monitor, are you of age yet?"

Hearing this, Li Qingrong couldn't help but set down her brush and looked up at him.

"Still a few months short."

"Oh oh, what a shame then."