Chapter 55 (100 collections plus bonus)...
The special thing about childhood sweethearts is that——
Even though the world has turned upside down, we still have a shared childhood. And now, this bond has become the sweetest trouble.
*
What was miscalculated was He Kanzhao's confession.
His thoughts were in a tangle, and the person who had caused this continued to cause trouble, making it difficult for Lin Qingxu to calmly and completely think about how to reject this sudden change.
He Jia disagreed with Lin Qingxu's dilemma. She rejected people she disliked directly, and she was straightforward in breaking up with her exes. "If I don't like you, I'll just reject you. It's not a big deal."
As for others, Lin Qingxu also quickly refused, said sorry and stayed away.
But for Kan Zhao...
She seemed completely unable to treat him as coldly as she treated others.
"If you like each other, then let's be together." He Jia said.
Forget it.
Perhaps influenced by his childhood, Lin Qingxu has always been pessimistic about the outcome of love.
The parents of the two families have a very good relationship and they even spend the Chinese New Year together.
If one day the other person were to leave for love, it would not only create a rift between the two of them, but also between their parents. Lin Qingxu was not willing to take the risk.
"Maybe he's sure you can't be cruel."
He Jia felt helpless after hearing this and sighed, "Forget it, let it be."
In the end there was no good solution.
But if you can't afford to offend, you can still avoid it.
It was a shame to move out just a few days after agreeing to live with Kan Zhao. This would definitely cause Gao Luo and the others to worry, and might even lead to Kan Zhao getting scolded by Kan Zhenzhong. Thinking of this possibility, Lin Qingxu completely gave up the idea of moving back to the dormitory.
So she had to leave early and return late, trying to avoid Kan Zhao's activities. When she got home, she would quickly shower and return to her bedroom, even eating out in the restaurant or cafeteria. The rest of her time was spent in the school library, getting up early even if it wasn't 8 a.m. to bring books.
After a few days, Kan Zhao could tell that Lin Qingxu was avoiding him. Since he couldn't find her at home, he could only wait for her in the classroom.
When Kan Zhao arrived, class hadn't started yet. He'd gone early, so there were only a few people there.
A boy handed Lin Qingxu a gift, his face red and he was stumbling over something.
You can tell what the other person is doing at a glance.
Kan Zhao took two or three steps forward.
It was a lecture hall, and Lin Qingxu sat near the back. Walking over, Kan Zhao glanced at the boy, then sat down next to Lin Qingxu, his expression relaxed. Without saying a word, he took her scratch paper and pen and began scribbling idly.
Such a familiar gesture startled the boy standing next to her, and he couldn't even say what he had prepared in his mind.
*
Lin Qingxu clearly remembered that she had never received a love letter in high school, but after entering college, she had more suitors.
Sometimes after finishing her professional classes, students from other majors would take advantage of the break to confess their love to her and give her gifts.
Lin Qingxu was already very familiar with this kind of situation. He would thank her gently and then refuse without leaving any room for negotiation.
She didn't want to delay others before completely dealing with the problem with Kan Zhao.
It’s not that I haven’t thought about pretending to agree to deceive Kan Zhao, but it’s unfair to that person after all.
Kan Zhao sat next to her and seemed in a good mood.
They say that strong women are afraid of clinging men, and there's some truth to that. Lin Qingxu was helpless. She couldn't afford to provoke him, and she couldn't avoid him. She explicitly refused, but it was of little use.
"Your aunt Fang said she was afraid that I would abuse you, so she said she would conduct a surprise inspection at night. Shall we go shopping for groceries together later?" Kan Zhao stopped writing and said to her.
It seems like an irresistible reason.
After class they went to a large shopping mall near the school.
After visiting the snack and daily necessities areas, the only things left are fruits and vegetables.
After picking up a bunch of things like fruit cake and steak, Kan Zhao stopped pushing his shopping cart as he passed the aquaculture tank. He asked the aquaculture attendant to weigh the items, who then helped him scrape the scales, cut the fish into pieces, and remove the internal organs. Finally, he put the items into a black bag and stuffed it with two ice packs.
Kan Zhao moved decisively and quickly, and even Lin Qingxu had no time to stop him.
When Fang Yun was busy with work when Gao Luo was not around, she would take Kan Zhao and Lin Qingxu to school and eat in the cafeteria at noon.
When Kan Zhao grew up a little, Kan Zhenzhong felt that he could not spoil him, so he did not hire a nanny and let Kan Zhao learn to do things by himself.
Kan Zhao, who was still a junior high school student at the time, challenged himself to cook fish at the beginning. Since his parents were not at home, Lin Qingxu from next door became the guinea pig for his experiment.
Raw, bitter, fishy. Makes me want to vomit.
But in order not to undermine the beginner's confidence, Lin Qingxu lied to his sense of taste and swallowed the wasted fish meat, "It's not bad."
Although Kan Zhao’s cooking skills were indeed good afterwards, but... he still had some psychological trauma.
Because I had made a list, I moved quickly. I bought two large bags of groceries and drove back to the apartment before it was completely dark.
Lin Qingxu entered his fingerprint to open the door. Kan Zhao carried his things in, put them on the floor at the entrance, and changed his shoes.
The journey back and forth consumed some energy. Lin Qingxu squatted down and took out two bags of thick yogurt he had bought from the plastic bag. He drank one bag himself and handed the other bag to Kan Zhao.
Kan Zhao bent down and bit it directly, took off his coat and put it in the dirty clothes basket in the bathroom, then returned to the bedroom to change into a set of home clothes.
Drinking yogurt, he walked over, unzipped the bag, put on his apron, and took out the processed and sealed fish from the bag and asked her, "Steamed or braised or boiled with tomatoes?"
"Which one is simpler?" Lin Qingxu asked hesitantly.
If the process is complicated, it will be the stomachs of both people that will suffer.
Kan Zhao seemed to laugh out of anger, "Don't look down on me, okay?"
"Then let's have tomato fish." Lin Qingxu had no choice but to reply.
Kan Zhao said "hmm" without saying anything, poured the fish into the sink, washed it again, and sliced it.
After Lin Qingxu put some of the things she bought into the refrigerator, she saw him busy and asked, "Do you need any help?"
Kan Zhao added the cleaned fish fillets, onion, ginger, pepper, starch and other ingredients and mixed them evenly. "No need..."
Thinking of something, he replied, "Or maybe help me test the new game?"
His tone was casual, as if he was just asking her for a favor.
Last semester, Kan Zhao developed a game with his friends. Lin Qingxu also knew a little about it. When Kan Zhao asked, she provided some advice on art.
I didn't expect it to be finished so quickly? Very fast. Lin Qingxu thought so and asked by the way.
"No, I made this one unilaterally. You try it first."
Lin Qingxu opened the main interface. The first thing that came into view was the game name Ltsuki.
The game starts off very ordinary -
The protagonist wakes up in an unfamiliar room. There is a countdown on the lower left side of the screen, which probably means that there is a limited time to complete a task.
But there is no hint of what to do.
Lin Qingxu began to look around the room. Something about it looked familiar. The neatly arranged dolls on the headboard, the picture frames on the wall, the transparent cabinet filled with trophies, the sliding glass door to the balcony, even the pot of succulents on the desk seemed familiar.
The game is surrounded by locked doors and scattered clues.
Lin Qingxu guessed that this was probably a puzzle game. She controlled the character to move around the room.
On the desk sits an old radio, tuned to 92.7MHz. Hanging on the wall is a jigsaw puzzle, missing a crucial piece. The books on the shelves are arranged in an odd order. The bedside table drawer has a four-digit combination lock. This is the information we've discovered so far.
Lin Qingxu checked the radio first, and when he tuned in, he suddenly heard a familiar melody, a song they often hummed when they were young.
A pop-up window came over——
Clue 1: Frequency numbers may be part of the code
Lin Qingxu continued to look for clues.
She went to the bookshelf, where there were seven books, with the numbers on the spines shuffled.
3 | 5 | 2 | 1 | 4 | 7 | 6
The Little Prince was opened, revealing a page with an illustration I had never seen before, probably drawn by Kan Zhao himself. The Little Prince touched a rose. There were words on the back.
Only and Only, my Rose is rare.
Lin Qingxu was thinking about what they had in common. This kind of technique was often the key to solving puzzle games.
But the computer suddenly shut down.
She then remembered that she seemed to have forgotten to plug in the power cord.
Lin Qingxu stood up and went to the kitchen to ask Kan Zhao where the charger was.
Kan Zhao, however, didn't take it seriously, saying dinner was almost ready. He'd send the link to the four-person group chat later, telling them to just download it and brainstorm ideas for improvements.
He came out with a bowl, and the rich smell of tomatoes hit his face. He asked Lin Qingxu to come over and wash his hands and eat.
*
Fang Yun's call came as expected in the evening, but it was quite late, around nine or ten o'clock. Lin Qingxu had just finished taking a shower and was sitting on the sofa drying his hair.
There was a escape room variety show on TV, but this episode was not as scary as the previous ones. Kan Zhao was lazily leaning on the sofa playing games.
The phone suddenly vibrated. Kan Zhao glanced at the caller ID, raised his eyebrows, shook the phone, and said to Lin Qingxu, "Ms. Fang."
Connected.
Fang Yun's face appeared on the screen, with the blue sea and blue sky behind her. Kan Zhao had seen her circle of friends posting about her trip to Maldives yesterday, and was forced to like it.
The tone was still asking for a beating: "If you call me any later, I'll be falling asleep."
"You little brat, what's your attitude?" Kan Zhenzhong's voice came from the other end of the phone.
Fang Yun asked a few simple questions, a little puzzled: "Where's Qingxu? Isn't he with you?"
The camera turned and Kan Zhao pointed the phone at Lin Qingxu.
Lin Qingxu put down the comb and greeted Fang Yun obediently.
"Oh, Qingxu." Fang Yun's expression changed instantly, and she smiled brightly. "How are you doing recently? Are you used to university?"
Kan Zhao was speechless: "Mom, we are both sophomores."
"Shut up." Fang Yun's expression suddenly became serious. She felt something was wrong. "Why is Qingxu sitting so far away?"
She narrowed her eyes and asked loudly: "Kan Zhao, are you bullying me again?"
Kan Zhao: "How dare I?"
"Shut up." Fang Yun interrupted him rudely, then said gently to Lin Qingxu, "Qingxu, tell Aunt Fang if that brat bullied you. If he dares to make you angry, I'll go back and deal with him."
Lin Qingxu shook his head: "No, Kan Zhao treats me very well."
"Did you hear that?" Kan Zhao replied to Fang Yun.
Kan Zhenzhong's voice came again: "You little bastard, are you lawless? How dare you talk to your mother?"
Fang Yun asked: "Then why is Qingxu so far away from you?"
Kan Zhao stood up, walked towards Lin Qingxu, sat beside her, put his arm around her shoulders, and said to Fang Yun, "Are we close enough now?"
The sudden close contact made Lin Qingxu stunned for a few seconds, then she reacted and remained in her original position. Fearing that her parents would worry, she did not reject Kan Zhao's sudden approach.
Fang Yun casually expressed her concern.
"What did you have for dinner?"
Kan Zhao listed a few of them casually.
“Takeout or homemade?”
“I made it myself.”
"Yo. It's not easy."
"Who cooks your meals?"
"I."
However, Lin Qingxu had been deliberately coming home late these days. He'd just come back from dinner, exhausted, and ready to go to bed. Kan Zhao was too lazy to cook for him, so he just ordered takeout.
"Who washed the dishes?"
"dishwasher."
“Who cleans the place?”
"Hourly worker."
"That's about right." Fang Yun said in the video.
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