Growing crooked
Zhou Lexing didn't let Li Dagang follow.
He could also see that Li Cheng was dissatisfied with Li Dagang, and he estimated that Li Dagang's words would only have the opposite effect for now.
Li Dagang didn't press the matter, and when he saw Zhou Lexing shake his head, he fell silent.
As for why he brought Gu Jiansheng with him...
"This really has nothing to do with you. Even if you hadn't used this incident to cause trouble today, I think it was pretty much a done deal."
Li Cheng's problem is actually quite simple: the gap between himself and his peers has widened, and the disparity between reality and his ambitions is too great, which he cannot accept.
Although Zhou Lexing considered Gu Jiansheng's words for a while, compared to the earth-shattering possibility of "my little brother falling in love with me," the simple feeling of imbalance that "the boss doesn't help me get rich" seemed easier to accept.
Gu Jiansheng looked up at him, making Zhou Lexing wonder if there was something on his face, before he heard Gu Jiansheng say quietly, "My business is your business, and your business is my business, isn't it?"
Gu Jiansheng lowered his eyes: "I was worried about you... I thought you were too..."
He always spoke very softly.
The village was quite lively during the day, with many people coming and going. Many people pulled up a bench and sat at their doorsteps chatting with their neighbors and basking in the sun. Zhou Lexing greeted many people along the way.
When Gu Jiansheng lowered his voice, Zhou Lexing inevitably missed many details, but those words were not difficult to understand.
Zhou Lexing was so moved that he fell silent and actually let Gu Jiansheng go to Lijia Village with him.
When Li Cheng walked out the door, he saw the person he hated most clinging to his boss's side. Upon seeing him, the person revealed that scheming and timid look again, and kept hiding behind Zhou Lexing.
Li Cheng was seething with anger, which he immediately showed on his face.
Zhou Lexing frowned when he saw the fierce look in Gu Jiansheng's eyes: "Why are you glaring at him?"
Li Cheng gritted his teeth: "He can pretend all he wants, what's wrong with me watching him?!"
Zhou Lexing gave him a cold look, then turned to leave.
Li Cheng immediately realized he had said the wrong thing and quickly tried to stop him: "Brother Le! Didn't you come to see me?"
He knew that Brother Le was willing to take the initiative to come to him, which was already the maximum tolerance. If it were a few years ago, Li Cheng wouldn't even dare to raise his voice to Zhou Lexing, because Zhou Lexing would not only beat up his mentally challenged younger brother, but also show no mercy to them.
But only someone like that deserves the title of leader.
If the boss were still the same as before, he would definitely look down on Gu Jiansheng!
Zhou Lexing didn't speak, but just looked at him coldly, and he had a bit of the sinister look he had back then. Li Cheng immediately felt uneasy, and the last bit of his anger seemed to have been doused with cold water, and he couldn't even get a wisp of smoke out.
"Brother Le, I was wrong. I shouldn't have talked to you like that."
Zhou Lexing responds better to gentle persuasion than force.
Gu Jiansheng immediately looked at Zhou Lexing and saw him rubbing his temples. Although his voice was still a bit harsh, his expression had softened.
“You shouldn’t have lost your temper like that.” Zhou Lexing looked at Li Cheng. “Da Gang and the others are very worried about you.”
Li Cheng's expression changed several times, but in the end he couldn't suppress the twisted logic he had come up with after a long period of contemplation: "They're worried that I'll take their place next to you..."
He didn't finish his sentence because Zhou Lexing's face darkened again.
Zhou Lexing: "What kind of nonsense are you thinking about every day? You call me 'brother' but I'm Zhou Lexing first, and then your brother. Li Cheng, understand that the world doesn't revolve around you. We're people too, not your possessions. No one can accompany anyone forever, and no one is born to accompany anyone. Stop acting like a child, just standing still and getting stuck in a rut. If you don't move, no one can help you."
Zhou Lexing rarely reasoned with them, but Li Cheng's words had already led him astray, and his basic respect for his friends was gradually fading away.
Zhou Lexing could understand his frustration at no longer having close friends to play with at the village entrance, but he couldn't understand why Zhou Lexing would use such malicious thoughts to speculate about his friends.
Li Cheng's lips trembled, feeling as if these words were a slap in the face, both loud and humiliating, not to mention that Gu Jiansheng, that scheming man, was also there, watching him from beside Zhou Lexing.
Those light-colored eyes blinked, revealing that ambiguous smile again.
Li Cheng's face gradually flushed red, and his eyes stung with tears: "Brother Le, what can I do?! You never even considered taking me away from here! I don't want to raise those beasts for the rest of my life! You clearly heard me! But you still took Bobo and Dagang and left! You don't care about me at all! Now you've brought this kid to provoke me! He's up to no good! I think he only left because he was kicked out by the Gu family..."
Li Cheng was so angry that his face turned red and his neck bulged, but under Zhou Lexing's silent gaze, his voice grew weaker and weaker until all that remained was his heavy panting, which he could no longer control.
Seeing his expression of great injustice, Zhou Lexing still spoke up: "You don't want to go down this path, have you talked to your parents? How do you expect me to help you? Take you away without a word? Have you never thought about your parents? It wasn't me who raised you, it was your parents."
The issue of parenthood is indeed an age-old problem, and Zhou Lexing is powerless to solve it.
If Li Cheng were a pitiful little thing who had been abused for a long time, he would help him. But Li Cheng was a little emperor at home, as can be seen from the fact that he followed the original owner of the body and caused trouble everywhere, and fought with Liu Wu to the death.
The original owner would have had a falling out with his family because of this, but Li Cheng never had this problem.
This might be the reason why he went astray.
If it were the original owner, they should have hit it off immediately, but for Zhou Lexing, such a resentful and blaming worldview was really hard to understand.
"Think about it carefully yourself."
Of course, Li Cheng might use his words as an excuse to exonerate himself, but if Li Cheng can't even understand these words, then there's no point in talking about other principles.
Zhou Lexing has never liked to preach, and this is already his limit.
Seeing that Zhou Lexing was about to leave, Li Cheng, regardless of the meaning behind Zhou Lexing's words, felt from Zhou Lexing's attitude that Zhou Lexing was trying to distance himself from him.
If they part ways like this, he probably won't have the chance to stay by Zhou Lexing's side anymore.
Thinking this, Li Cheng subconsciously reached out to stop him, but before he could touch Zhou Lexing, a hand suddenly cut in from the side and collided with his hand.
When Li Cheng looked up and saw that it was Gu Jiansheng, his anger flared up again. He immediately flung Gu Jiansheng's hand away and slapped the back of Gu Jiansheng's hand.
A crisp snap.
Zhou Lexing's body reacted faster than his brain, and he immediately grabbed Li Cheng's hand and twisted it.
"Ah!" Li Cheng cried out in pain, tears streaming down his face. He shouted, "He was the one who started it!"
Zhou Lexing was completely baffled.
What kind of kindergarten is this?
"Are you alright?" Zhou Lexing asked Gu Jiansheng.
Gu Jiansheng looked down at the back of his hand.
His skin was fair, and a red mark on it made it look ferocious.
Zhou Lexing looked down following Gu Jiansheng's gaze and was about to get angry, but fortunately he still had his senses. He simply pushed Li Cheng forward while he was twisting and pressing him down, and Li Cheng fell directly to the ground.
Li Cheng turned around in disbelief, tears streaming down his face: "Brother Le, you..."
Zhou Lexing not only has a headache now, but also feels uneasy.
This scene looks bizarre no matter how you look at it.
Let's go.
Fortunately, they were talking at the end of an alley not far from Li Cheng's house; otherwise, if there had been onlookers, it would have been really hard to explain what was going on with this feeling of a heartless man.
Exhausted, Zhou Lexing led Gu Jiansheng to leave.
Seeing that his boss was truly so ruthless, Li Cheng trembled uncontrollably, whether from anger or sadness.
"Is it okay to leave him alone?" Gu Jiansheng asked considerately.
Zhou Lexing rubbed his temples: "It's nothing. I guess I'm a big villain in his eyes now, so I'd better not keep him around to cause him trouble." It would also cause trouble for himself.
Zhou Lexing didn't know which part had gone wrong, so he heard Gu Jiansheng hesitate and say something.
"I feel like he's treating me like a rival."
Zhou Lexing looked at him, then at the ground, and kicked a small pebble away: "He treats his friends of so many years as imaginary enemies." Let alone Jian Sheng?
Fighting for a spot? And what spots are there to fight for?
That's absurd.
Gu Jiansheng's gentle words carried an undeniable allure: "He's probably jealous."
Jealous.
Zhou Lexing combined the words with the scene he had just witnessed, and felt goosebumps rise all over his body, but he still forced himself to say, "Friends can be jealous of each other sometimes." Probably.
Gu Jiansheng: "Really? Then you'll get jealous if I'm with other people?"
Zhou Lexing suddenly stopped, but quickly continued forward, feigning composure: "Of course."
Gu Jiansheng lagged behind Zhou Lexing by a step and was momentarily stunned after hearing these words.
So they walked the rest of the way in silence.
.
Does Zhou Lexing like him?
Gu Jiansheng had actually thought about this problem carefully.
It is undeniable that Zhou Lexing is indeed special to him, but this specialness loses its special color when facing his family members who also occupy a certain place in Zhou Lexing's heart.
Gu Jiansheng had personally witnessed how Zhou Lexing treated Zhou Shusheng.
Although Zhou Lexing is a sarcastic person, he is indeed a good older brother in every sense of the word.
Gu Jiansheng saw the shadow of Zhou Lexing's intimacy towards him in those subtle details.
This intimacy naturally stemmed from Zhou Shusheng's unique birth, and thus, the same tenderness and affection shown to him took on another layer of meaning.
It seems that Zhou Lexing really does treat him like a younger brother, a younger brother with a special defect...?
When Gu Jiansheng first figured out the key to the matter, he couldn't accept such a possibility at all.
However, Gu Jiansheng quickly figured it out.
Regardless of his motives or considerations, this intimacy is an advantage for him. And as long as he has this advantage, the image of a weakling that he despises can be amplified infinitely.
"Can you sleep with me tonight?"
On the country road, Gu Jiansheng was the first to break the silence.
Zhou Lexing was taken aback. His first reaction was to refuse, but then he saw Gu Jiansheng raise his head to look at him.
Hmm... he just said that it's normal for friends to be jealous of each other.
If he rejects Jian Sheng now, won't it make Jian Sheng overthink things?
Jian Sheng is a sensitive and thoughtful person by nature, so it wouldn't be good to refuse him without a reason. He has suffered a lot of grievances outside, and it's not right to deny him even this small request. Besides, Jian Sheng encountered quite a few perverts in Zhoujia Village before, so maybe he's afraid of sleeping alone...
"good."
All those fleeting thoughts vanished from Zhou Lexing's mind in the blink of an eye.
Zhou Lexing looked calm and spoke in a neutral tone, but Gu Jiansheng tilted his head slightly to the side and looked at Zhou Lexing seriously.
"……how?"
"It's okay, it's so good that you came to keep me company."
"……oh."
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