Mu Yiran applied lip balm for the third time today.

She looked at herself in the full-length mirror on her desk and saw that her lips, which looked like they were covered in a layer of lard, had several broken skins.

"Is it because the capital is too dry..." Mu Yiran murmured to herself, turning on the humidifier next to her.

Lately, not only have my lips been dry and chapped, but I also sometimes get red rashes all over my body.

"Mr. Cheng, this is the website traffic breakdown for this week."

Ai Ni, who was playing games on the sofa, put down her phone, looked up, and scanned Chen Yiting with her eyes.

Chen Yiting placed the document in front of her and noticed a touch of red on the woman's collarbone.

Chen Yiting blinked to make sure she wasn't seeing things. She pinched the rabbit fur on her chest and still asked, "Mr. Cheng, your neck..."

Mu Yiran frantically flipped through the documents, trying to find the place where she needed to sign.

"Ouch, I got bitten by a mosquito." She raised her hand and scratched it again, making the red mark even more noticeable.

Mosquitoes...

It's not even June yet, the capital city hasn't even started to warm up, and there's no rainy season yet, so how could there be mosquitoes?

That's clearly...

Chen Yiting wanted to say something, but the woman behind the desk had already signed her name quickly, admired it proudly for a few moments, and then handed it to her.

"..."

Mu Yiran took out a graphics tablet, connected it to the computer, and started drawing.

The woman's expression was focused, the light and shadow of the computer screen reflected in her pupils.

Chen Yiting saw the handsome face on the computer screen through the standing mirror next to her.

The short video counting down to the college entrance exam garnered over ten million views, and the boy featured on the cover caused a huge stir online. Chen Yiting originally intended to report this to Cheng Ran, but seeing the tenderness in the woman's eyes, a dark corner of her heart, long buried, began to twist.

"Mr. Cheng, shall I make you a cup of coffee?"

"Okay, two cups, please. Thank you, Yiting."

"……good."

Mu Yiran didn't even look up, so she naturally didn't see the gloom that flashed across Chen Yiting's face. She unconsciously glanced at Ai Ni with disdain, but Ai Ni saw right through her.

Chen Yiting gave her a stiff smile. "Miss Ai, would you like both candy and milk?"

"I'd be content to be the same as Madam."

After Chen Yiting left, Ai Ni stood up, took out a small box from her pocket, and pulled out a thin silver needle.

Then he watched the office door with bated breath.

Mu Yiran was completely oblivious to the commotion between the two; she was focused on editing Shi Youxi's picture.

Su Yi sent her more than 500 photos.

All of them were photos of Shi Youxi, so many that Mu Yiran suspected that Su Yi had been pressing the shutter button the whole time.

She spent the last few days deleting and selecting, and finally deleted one.

There was no way around it; Shi Youxi's face was flawless from every angle, and even if it were a distorted image, Mu Yiran would still find it pleasing to the eye.

With each page, Mu Yiran would zoom in and out, savoring Shi Youxi's good looks.

Su Yi has photos of Guan Shiyan from childhood to adulthood, and has even compiled them into an album.

Photo albums can never compare to digital photos.

Mu Yiran couldn't help but feel envious of Guan Shiyan, who had been with her since childhood. Especially when she saw Guan Shiyan still wearing open-crotch pants, her mind was filled with Shi Youxi, who was chewing on a teething toy and showing a slit in his buttocks.

Damn, just thinking about it is so cute!

After learning that Guan Shiyan's photo albums were specially commissioned by Su Yi, Mu Yiran asked the commissioner to also commission 16 photo albums for her.

"16 books? That many?"

Su Yi was surprised because Cheng Ran didn't have any photos of Shi Youxi when she was a child; she couldn't possibly print out all 500-plus photos.

"Oh, so I'm saving it to make one every year."

Su Yi laughed, "Then you can just order a custom one every year from now on, why rush to do it all at once?"

"It's nothing, maybe we'll run out of them in a year while we're filming."

Mu Yiran didn't say much, but asked Su Yi to order 16 photo albums for her.

Photos of Shi Youxi from before are extremely rare.

Mu Yiran had seen a few family photos in Libya before, but then there were none. After he turned ten, he had no photos other than his school ID photo.

These 16 books aren't meant to be kept for future use.

Mu Yiran wants to fill these 16 photo albums before Shi Youxi's 16th birthday.

She also asked Uncle Lin to look through some scraps of Shi Youxi's childhood photos. Since there were no photos, she used photos of his various certificates instead.

Uncle Lin collected them very well, and it was easy to fill several photo albums.

She doesn't care; whatever other kids have, her little beauty has to have too!

Mu Yiran was editing Shi Youxi's photos with great interest.

Meanwhile, in the tea room on the other side.

Chen Yiting was putting sugar cubes into two cups when she paused, looking at the ice cubes submerged in the coffee.

"Are you going to drink all this sugar yourself?"

"ah!"

Startled, Chen Yiting turned her head and saw Li Buhuo standing beside her, his gaze fixed on the coffee cup.

"Assistant Li, no, this is for Mr. Cheng."

"Both cups?"

"And Miss Ai."

Li Bu Huo frowned. He watched as Chen Yiting put another piece of candy in each of the candies, his suspicion deepening.

"Assistant Li, did I do something wrong?"

Chen Yiting was trembling with fear, because Li Bu Huo's gaze was too cold and stern, and she didn't know when Li Bu Huo had started staring at her.

"Has she been drinking coffee like this a lot lately?"

Chen Yiting thought for a moment and said, "I'll drink it whenever someone comes to the company."

Li Bu Huo slightly raised his chin and left the tea room.

Startled by him, Chen Yiting didn't dare to linger. She carried the coffee into the office, and upon hearing the clinking of the ceramic cup, the woman peeked out from behind the computer and smiled at her.

"Thank you for your hard work, Yiting."

Chen Yiting tried to strike up a conversation with Cheng Ran about some business, but Cheng Ran told her to find Li Buhuo after only a few sentences. Chen Yiting was extremely frustrated and had to deal with Ai Ni's suspicious look. Frustrated, she left the company under the pretext of going out on a field trip.

Mu Yiran was completely unaware of Chen Yiting's unusual behavior. She had finished editing today's photos, arranged them, and admired them to her heart's content when she saw Ai Ni circling around two cups of coffee.

"...What are you doing?" Mu Yiran asked, looking closer to see Ai Ni turning the two cups of coffee around.

Are you playing a spot-the-difference game?

“I think it’s a bit strange.” Ai Ni wrinkled her nose and sniffed.

Mu Yiran also took a sniff; besides the bitter coffee smell, there was a faint sweetness of sugar, nothing particularly special.

"What's strange? Do you find it too greasy?"

Ai Ni shook her head with a solemn face, then took out the silver needle and probed the cup.

Mu Yiran was taken aback for a moment, then chuckled: "Are you... testing poison?"

Do you think someone would put something weird in there?

After the coming-of-age ceremony, Ai Ni guarded her even more closely, almost never leaving her side. Seeing her take out another acid-base reagent, Mu Yiran no longer wanted to drink that cup of coffee.

"You're exaggerating, Ai Ni. Even if someone wanted to harm me, they wouldn't be so bold as to do it directly in the company."

Ai Ni saw the disdain in her eyes and scratched her dimples embarrassedly.

"I'm sorry, madam, I just think that girl is a bit strange."

"Yi Ting? You're being too sensitive. She's just a bit socially awkward." Mu Yi Ran took a few sips of coffee, crunching the ice cubes.

The phone buzzed twice, and Mu Yiran tapped to check.

It was lunchtime at Shi Youxi.

His plate contained two meat dishes and one vegetable dish, a moderate amount of food. Compared to the plate opposite him, which looked like a small mountain, one might have thought that Shi Youxi's plate was leftovers.

It suddenly looks shabby!

Mu Yiran scrolled through the chat history again, shaking her head as she read. After thinking for a moment, she sent a message:

[Take a selfie and let me see it. Look at how my young master has been ruined by studying.]

The other party replied instantly:

Does my sister miss me?

Mu Yiran:

I thought about it for a bit, so I quickly took a picture and sent it to you for me to see.

She wanted to coax Shi Youxi into taking more photos so that she could print them out and put them in an album.

The other side replied again:

"I'm different from my sister."

I wasn't thinking about anything else, only about my sister.

Mu Yiran laughed.

Why is it that other people's catchphrases in conversations are always "Are you there, old dog?" or "Your princess has arrived, aren't you going to greet her yet!"

Every time this guy sends a message, the first thing he asks is if I miss him.

Such sweet words come so easily to his lips; I wonder if his future girlfriend will be able to resist them.

Recently, both of them have been going to work and school as usual, and apart from having dinner together at home in the evenings, they have less time to spend together than before. With the college entrance examination approaching, Shi Youxi's pressure is also increasing, and many times Mu Yiran has already gone to sleep before the young man comes out of the study.

Teenage boys change very quickly, almost every week. Sometimes, when facing teenagers, Mu Yiran felt a subtle sense of unfamiliarity.

She felt a little bittersweet, but mostly happy.

Shi Youxi is growing up well.

Unlike before, when he would immediately make a video call, this time Shi Youxi only lingered with her for a few words before saying he had to go to the study room to end the conversation.

Tsk.

It's not easy to get a candid photo of Shi Youxi.

She still has to rely on herself.

Seeing Mu Yiran staring intently at a baby photo, Ai Ni couldn't help but ask:

"Does Madam want to have a child with Mr.?"

"Hmm... Ah?!"

Mu Yiran looked at her in horror, "How could that be... You're overthinking it."

"Then why..."

"I just think they're so cute. Humans at this stage are the cutest."

Although the photo was posted by Su Yi as a picture of Guan Shiyan as a child, in Mu Yiran's eyes it had been replaced with Shi Youxi's facial features.

"It's very cute—"

"Yeah! This is Xiao Guan when he was a child. Compared to now, he hasn't lost his good looks at all."

Ai Ni choked, realizing that she must have misread it at first glance, so she focused on looking at it again.

All right……

She definitely looked much more pleasing to the eye than she does now.

So endearing that Ai Ni didn't want to stomp on him, but rather sit on him and kill him.

"Hiss... By the way, Ai Ni, when did you get inside the Time Gate?"

“When I was very young, my father used to work with my husband. After he passed away unexpectedly, I lived alone in Shimen.”

Shi Men treats loyal subordinates very well. Although Ai Ni lost her family when she was young, she has never gone hungry in Shi Men. Although she did not go to school like a normal person, Shi Men will teach her the necessary knowledge separately. Even if she were to take the college entrance examination now, getting into a top-tier university would be a piece of cake.

Mu Yiran's eyes lit up. "Then you've seen your young master when he was a child?"

Ai Ni nodded.

"I've met him a few times."

"You remember so clearly? Do you have any photos?"

Ai Ni wanted to shake her head, but a fragment of memory flashed through her mind, "It seems like there is..."

"Quick, quick, look for it!"

Ai Ni took out her phone. It didn't even have a password; she unlocked it with a swipe. The desktop was as clean as a new phone, and even the wallpaper was a custom-updated picture of a big-eyed beauty.

She placed her favorite Sokoban game in the center of only one blank page.

Ai Ni opened the photo album and swiped up.

"This was filmed at the boxing club in Shimen, the capital of Libya."

Mu Yiran stared wide-eyed at the screen.

It was a photograph.

The kind of photos displayed in a showcase.

Above is Shi Youxi, dressed in a white martial arts robe. He looks about six or seven years old, with a cold face and a boxing glove bigger than his face. He is mercilessly swinging it at a girl in front of him.

Mu Yiran's double chin appeared from looking at it.

"This... he is cute, but why does he act like a bully, is he harassing a little girl?"

Ai Ni thought back for a moment. She was two years older than Shi Youxi. Back then, Ai Ni would occasionally be Shi Youxi's sparring partner. This girl...

"This girl is a child star. She came to learn boxing that day for filming, and she kept pestering the young master to teach her."

So he's still just a junior coach.

Mu Yiran loved him even more.

She transferred the photo to her phone and wondered, "Is this girl still a celebrity? Has she lost her looks?"

She asked casually, since the photo was facing Shi Youxi and only showed the back of the girl's head.

Ai Ni didn't answer her immediately, stammering until Mu Yiran looked up in confusion, then she mumbled:

"This is Miss Helian, Helian Xin."

"Helian?" Mu Yiran was stunned, then narrowed her eyes. "Is that the Helian family, the family that the Shi family has a long-standing relationship with, and the family that almost married into the Shi family?!"

Ai Ni nodded halfway when the office door was suddenly pushed open.

Li Bu Huo strode in, carrying an iPad.

"Young Master Cheng is in trouble!"

"What's wrong?"

Li Bu Huo placed the iPad in front of her, and several large words immediately popped up on the tablet.

[Shocking! A wealthy heiress's private life has been chaotic, with so many male companions that it rivals a male escort club]

But what shocked Mu Yiran the most were the following collage photos, the one in the center of which was a picture of her and Shi Youxi embracing and dancing on their coming-of-age ceremony.

At the same time.

Guan Shiyan finished his rice gracefully, and looking at Shi Youxi across from him who was about to get up and leave, he secretly took a picture and sent it to Cheng Ran.

"Are you going out again? Are you coming back this afternoon?"

I'm not going back.

Guan Shiyan glanced at the occasional bruises under his sleeves. "Tsk, why are you working so hard lately? Didn't you say that as long as you pass the exam, your father will hand over the Shimen business to you?"

“Not enough,” Shi Youxi said calmly.

The power he gained from attending university was not enough for him to control the Shi family. He needed more. In order to keep his sister by his side, he needed to establish a deeper foothold in the Shi family.

"Tsk... Alright then." Guan Shiyan took out a medicated ointment and handed it to him. "I noticed you haven't dared to video chat with your dear sister lately. Don't say your brother doesn't care about you; this is top-quality wound medicine!"

Guan Shiyan put his hands behind his back and raised an eyebrow: "Apply this, and I guarantee your blood circulation will be excellent, giving you plenty of energy for everything you do!"

Shi Youxi was too lazy to listen to his madness, so he stuffed the medicine into his pocket.

Suddenly, a low gasp came from the surrounding area.

A shadow fell across their table. Shi Youxi looked up and saw a woman in a dress pull down her mask, her face beaming with a bright smile.

"It's been a long time, Shi Youxi. I am Helian Xin."