Chapter 21 Access Control [VIP]

Chapter Summary: "I don't have a curfew" means you can contact me anytime.

Fu Xianyin paused in her haircut.

She slowly turned her head and met Gu Linzhao's gaze.

The other person's voice carried a gentle smile, but there was no hint of joking in their eyes.

He was very serious, and the light in his eyes almost burned Fu Xianyin.

Fu Xianyin hurriedly looked away.

Mice in the shadows always try to avoid animals in the sunlight, fearing that their dirty fur will be burned by the pure, clean light.

Fu Xianyin felt that this was exactly how she felt now.

She was a rat living in the gutter, a lunatic on the verge of going insane like Chen Guimei.

And her deskmate.

He is the most sunny, kind, and warm-hearted person in the world, Gu Banxian.

Gu Banxian stood up, patted the dust off his trousers, and then stretched out his arm towards her.

She grabbed that hand.

It was like giving myself strength, and it was like giving myself hope.

Even a rat in a sewer can have a brief breath of fresh air, right?

She thought.

Fu Xianyin took Gu Banxian to the hotel where they had stayed when they first arrived in Beichuan.

Fu Dongyuan appears to be a VIP at that hotel, and Fu Xianyin guesses that Fu Dongyuan has a long-term room there.

The gambling addict has started a new round of gambling.

But this time, the gambler felt he could win.

She had a fortune teller named Gu by her side, and the power of a fortune teller should not be underestimated.

The gambler, accompanied by a fortune teller, stopped at the hotel reception.

The fortune teller leaned lazily against the front desk, yawning, while the gambling addict wrote Fu Dongyuan's name on a sticky note.

The receptionist smiled and said, "Okay, ma'am, let me check for you."

After a while, the receptionist called the manager, who then called Fu Dongyuan's secretary to verify Fu Xianyin's identity.

After receiving an affirmative answer, the manager smiled and gave Fu Xianyin a room key. Just as he was about to lead her upstairs, Fu Xianyin suddenly said, "No need."

She turned to look at Gu Linzhao and asked, "Are you going home?"

Gu Linzhao: "Just tell me where you want to go."

Fu Xianyin: "..."

She tried a little harder to explain herself: "No, I didn't mean to go anywhere, really. I just wanted to ask if you were going home. If you are, I'll have the hotel receptionist take you home. It's so late, and I'm bothering you for so long..."

Before she could finish speaking, Gu Linzhao interrupted her: "What if you don't go home?"

Fu Xianyin: "I want to eat something."

At the convenience store, Fu Xianyin ate a rice ball and drank the soup from oden, repeatedly confirming that there was no access control at Gu Linzhao's house.

"Really not." Gu Linzhao sighed. "Have you ever thought that if there were access control, I wouldn't even be able to get out?"

He helped Fu Xianyin take out the skewers from the oden and put them away, saying, "I'm a boy, I grew up in Beichuan, and I'm all grown up now. My family won't worry if I go home a little late at night."

Fu Xianyin choked on her soup.

"Slower."

Gu Linzhao reluctantly turned on the water and handed it to her.

Fu Xianyin's feelings were somewhat complicated.

The access control she mentioned seemed to be different from what Gu Linzhao said.

She... never imagined that the main concern about the curfew would be that her family would worry.

A rat in the ditch saw a puppy drinking tap water in the sunlight and worried that the puppy might be scolded for wasting tap water.

The puppy shook its head and said, "No, I'm all grown up. Drinking tap water won't affect my health."

Fu Xianyin ate a total of three rice balls, two servings of oden, and a small cake.

Gu Linzhao: "You really ate dinner tonight?"

Fu Xianyin, biting into a fish ball, said, "Of course."

Even though they all threw up.

But as long as it goes into her mouth and is swallowed, no matter what the outcome, Fu Xianyin considers it as having eaten it.

With her stomach filled with hot food, Fu Xianyin felt better.

She stretched, feeling like she could pretend to be a vibrant high school girl for a while longer.

Gu Linzhao noticed that Fu Xianyin's face had regained a little color and asked, "Where else do you want to go?"

Fu Xianyin glanced at Gu Linzhao with a complicated expression.

The time, the place, and the tone of this guy's voice.

Fu Xianyin felt that he had a strong sense of being willing to risk his life to accompany a gentleman.

She's not a gentleman; she can't afford to risk her life like this.

Fu Xianyin tidied up the trash, threw it away, and said, "If you want to sleep, come back with me and have the hotel staff take you home."

Fu Dongyuan spent so much money, surely he should get some special privileges?

It was almost 1 a.m. when I came out of the convenience store.

It's this late, and it's a holiday again. The usually bustling Beichuan No. 1 Middle School is now only frequented by a few passersby.

The two strolled back, and Fu Xianyin, feeling playful, couldn't resist stepping on the shadows of the treetops along the roadside.

Gu Linzhao looked helplessly at the hopping person, occasionally reaching out to pull her back to prevent her from bumping her head into a tree.

Upon arriving at the hotel, Fu Xianyin asked the doorman to call a car, and only felt relieved after watching Gu Linzhao get into the car.

She clung to the car window, her beautiful cat-like eyes blinking, and said in a clear voice, "Thank you, squad leader. I'll be looking after you tonight."

Stray strands of hair were blown into the car window by the wind. Her eyes were still quite bloodshot, but her gaze had changed from being misty when we first met her at night to having a bit of light in it.

Gu Linzhao curled his lips: "Trouble is a small matter for me, but climbing over the wall into the dormitory is a big deal."

Fu Xianyin: ...

There's just no way to say anything nice to this person.

She turned to leave, but was stopped before she entered the gate.

"Fu Xianyin".

"what."

The car started, and the engine's hum drowned out the boy's voice.

But Fu Xianyin still understood what that sentence meant.

"I have no curfew."

Contact me anytime if you need anything.

Senior high school students only have a total of 3 days of National Day holiday.

On Tuesday, the first day of school, Fu Xianyin and Cheng Lingling had just entered the classroom when they heard Lin Anxu wailing:

"Why is school starting so soon? I've been looking forward to the National Day holiday for so long! My long National Day holiday is over already!"

He looked miserable and counted on his fingers: "I only have three days off, and I have a ton of homework. I didn't even get to play much, let alone go out to play."

Gu Linzhao replied indifferently: "Who cares if you play games or not? Have you finished your homework? During the first class today, Sister Gao will check the homework. If you haven't done it, you'll lose points."

Holding the scorebook, he mercilessly added insult to injury for Lin Anxu: "You're not far from needing your parents' help."

Fu Xianyin reached out, tentatively trying to touch the notebook, but Gu Linzhao shoved it directly into her hand.

She didn't stand on ceremony, flipped through the pages, and after a few pages, she realized something was wrong.

"Class monitor, why didn't you deduct points for not doing homework? I remember the class rules say that points are deducted for not doing homework."

Gu Linzhao glanced at her: "If it were deducted, wouldn't your parents have been called in long ago?"

Fu Xianyin rolled her eyes at him.

The biggest downside of sitting next to the class monitor is that you can't escape his notice.

Lin Anxu got up from her seat and explained to her, "That's what the class rules say, but it's senior year, so there's nothing we can do if we can't finish our homework. If we really penalized her like that, Gao Jie wouldn't have to do anything. She could just open her office and wait for parents with open arms."

"So, not doing homework doesn't actually result in a deduction of points?"

Fu Xianyin seized upon the blind spot.

Lin Anxu nodded: "Bingo, actually it can't be called no points deducted, it's called..."

"Call me kind."

Gu Linzhao put away the notebook, rested his arm on the table, turned his head and raised his eyebrows.

"You really know how to flatter yourself."

Fu Xianyin said without any politeness.

Gu Linzhao wasn't angry. He just snorted and turned back.

Cheng Zhaozhao explained to Fu Xianyin, "This gold really has to be pressed on his face. Back then, Sister Gao was super strict with us, checking our homework every day in class, and deducting points if we didn't finish. You can't imagine how harsh the points were deducted every day. It was Gu Linzhao who told Sister Gao that this method of deducting points was not good, and if it continued like this, her parents would be called in every day."

No wonder.

For the past two weeks, Fu Xianyin's mind has been preoccupied with the monthly exams, and she hasn't paid attention to things like the class rules and regulations and the point deduction system. Now that she thinks about it, if the point deductions had been strictly enforced according to the class rules and regulations that Gu Linzhao gave her back then, her parents would have been called in long ago.

Not only that, sometimes she would chat during class or secretly learn other things during morning reading, and Gu Linzhao saw it but didn't make a note of it.

Wait, that's not right.

Fu Xianyin suddenly turned her head and asked, "So the class rules aren't as strict as I imagined? Were you just trying to scare me when I first transferred here?!"

"I didn't."

Gu Linzhao took out his English textbook and said slowly.

Why didn't you have it?

As her memories gradually became clearer, Fu Xianyin couldn't help but count Gu Linzhao's crimes on her fingers: "You scared me by saying I couldn't talk during morning reading, you scared me by saying I would lose points if I didn't finish my homework, and you called on me openly and secretly every day."

“Fu Xianyin.” Gu Linzhao suddenly sighed helplessly, “Tell me yourself, you managed to sneak out of school to skip evening self-study on your very first night here. Who knows what else you might do next?”

"Moreover," he said with a hint of sarcasm, "are skipping class by climbing over the wall and not doing homework really on the same level of severity?"

Fu Xianyin pursed her lips and fell silent.

The silence lasted only two seconds.

A distant memory suddenly flashed through her mind, and she said, "So back when you said Lin Anxu lost 9 points, the one point he lost more than me was because he didn't do his homework, but actually our scores were the same."

“Yeah.” Gu Linzhao lazily ticked a few phrases and said, “Want to thank me? No need to thank me. But if you really did climb over the wall the night before last, then there’s nothing I can do.”

"Try to use VPNs less often in the future, Fu Xianyin."

Gu Linzhao's tone turned serious, "It's not about deducting points, it's about safety."

"You insulted me?"

Fu Xianyin was baffled: "It's one thing to say I lost too many points, but you're indirectly insulting me?"

Gu Linzhao sighed, "Where did I insult you? I'm just curious how you got those points on Chinese reading comprehension sections, with your ability to fabricate understanding out of thin air..."

Fu Xianyin: "You scolded me for being clumsy and inflexible."

Gu Linzhao: ...

Well, this girl really can't take a single kind word.

Everything changed when it came to her.

"Moreover," Fu Xianyin said in shock, "what do you mean by 'if I really climbed over the wall'?"

"There's a solution! Isn't your Beichuan No. 1 Middle School's point deduction system cumulative? It doesn't reset or clear points, does it?"

How can such a perverted system exist in this world?!

She didn't understand.

She didn't understand at all.

"Of course we'll reset it. You really do pick and choose which class rules to follow, don't you?"

“All scores are reset on the first day of school each month. The day before yesterday was last month’s score, so it can’t be reset; it can only be accumulated.”

So it's today.

Fu Xianyin suddenly felt the burden on her shoulders lighten, and she stretched comfortably.

Gu Linzhao couldn't help but smile as he looked at her sly expression.

"It's today."

His voice was clear and pure:

"Fu Xianyin, starting today, your brand new, bright, and promising new life is about to begin."