Chapter 58 A Feeling of Déjà Vu
That night was like an impulsive erotic dream. After waking up, the two stared at each other, coughed a few times, and tacitly avoided mentioning it again.
However, when Lu Ming saw Wen Chu covering the marks on her neck with foundation, the atmosphere became slightly awkward and uncomfortable.
The day before the competition, they had to go to the convention center to fill out the competition materials in person and confirm their identities. When Lu Ming and Wen Chu arrived, they happened to see Qi Siyan coming out of the registration hall.
Beside the other person was a blond foreigner with thick-rimmed glasses. They were communicating in English and seemed to be having a pleasant conversation—it seemed that this was the foreign aid that Qi Siyan had hired at a high price.
Just by looking at his aura, you can tell that this foreigner is no ordinary person.
Qi Siyan turned around, stopped talking, and looked at them.
"What a coincidence, Mr. Lu." Qi Siyan only glanced at Lu Ming for a second, gave a perfunctory greeting, and then turned her gaze to Wen Chu, putting on a sunny and friendly smile: "Long time no see, Wen Chu."
Wen Chu wanted to say that it hadn't been that long, and she glanced at Lu Ming somewhat guiltily.
Qi Siyan had talked to her two or three times in the past two weeks, but it seemed like she had some kind of bad luck; every time they talked, Lu Ming would run into her.
Once, they were eating at a Western restaurant. She and Lu Ming were in a harmonious atmosphere, but the food at that restaurant was really not good. They were complaining to each other about who was pickier and counting who ate less food when her phone lit up. Qi Siyan shared a funny video with her.
She smiled and flipped her phone over, but could clearly sense that the person on the other end of the line was acting strangely.
One time, during work hours, she was busy all afternoon—not only with the competition organized by the Academy of Sciences, but also with her research project in the real world. Qi Siyan sent her a message in the middle of the afternoon, a food sharing post. She read it and was indeed convinced, thinking that she would go eat there with Lu Ming next time. So she stopped her work, chatted with the person for a few minutes, and asked where the person had eaten.
Then Lu Ming, who might not even come to her office once a day, pushed open the door to talk to her. He then saw her sitting leisurely in her chair, her feet tapping the ground, turning around and casually replying to text messages. The crucial point is that she was startled and subconsciously closed the chat interface, making it seem like she was trying to cover something up.
...
Caught red-handed in just two weeks, Wen Chu felt wronged and aggrieved. She could only try to appease him. However, Lu Ming was not hard to coax, but he was just stubborn. Even though he was jealous, he wouldn't say it and would ignore her. She had to say some sweet words like "I only like you" and "I like you the most" before his expression would improve.
Wen Chu thought it was quite cute.
However, to avoid such a recurrence, Wen Chu simply smiled at Qi Siyan and spoke very tactfully, only asking, "Have you finished filling them out?"
"Yes. You two came?" Qi Siyan looked around and only saw the two of them. She couldn't help but wonder if Lu Ming was going to participate in the competition himself? Or had he not arrived yet?
Lu Ming didn't want to waste words with him, so he grabbed Wen Chu's wrist and said, "We're going in."
Seeing that the person didn't want to say much, Qi Siyan didn't ask any further questions and simply said, "Okay."
He smiled, but the smile didn't reach his eyes. His gaze lowered slightly, landing on Wen Chu's wrist that was being held, and a hint of coldness appeared in his eyes.
"After all this time, you only dare to shake my wrist?" Qi Siyan scoffed.
The foreigner next to me asked, "Is that woman the technical representative of Baiyue?"
Qi Siyan gave a slight twitch of her lips: "No."
They reached the registration desk, and Lu Ming released Wen Chu's hand. Wen Chu peeked at Lu Ming's expression; his face remained unchanged as he spoke with the registration staff. Only then did she breathe a sigh of relief.
"What are you looking at?" Lu Ming asked emotionlessly.
"Huh?" The man said this without looking at her, but at the registrar, who was looking down at her checking their identification information, so he could only be saying it to her.
"I think someone's throwing a tantrum again."
Lu Ming glanced at her sideways, his expression appearing quite arrogant to Wen Chu: "Why would I throw a tantrum?"
Wen Chu shrugged, handed her ID card to the registrar, and said, "How should I know? Anyway, you acted strangely the moment you saw Qi Siyan."
"Since you know, then you should have less contact with him," Lu Ming said coldly.
Oh, so you're not even going to act anymore.
"Who's been in contact with him? We've barely exchanged a few words offline," Wen Chu muttered.
"You two just need to sign this form. The left side is for the company's legal representative, and the right side is for the technical representative of this competition." The female registrar handed the form to the two of them.
Lu Ming glanced at it, found nothing wrong, picked up a pen and signed his name, his handwriting strong and vigorous, then handed it to Wen Chu. Wen Chu picked up a pen and also bowed her head to sign, her handwriting a cursive style she usually used for signing documents, bold and concise.
Looking at it, Lu Ming casually remarked, "You haven't worked much, but you've signed your name quite skillfully."
Wen Chu snorted, then looked down at the names on both sides. She tapped the table with the tip of her pen and teased, "Don't you think these names match quite well?"
In fact, their names had appeared on the same piece of paper more than once. When Wen Chu first joined Baiyue, her signature was still a proper, neat regular script. Later, she would sign the project documents first, and then give them to Lu Ming to sign. When their handwriting was put together, hers looked too immature, like a very unprofessional college student.
So she spent a long time practicing on paper before she changed her signature style to one similar to Lu Ming's.
Upon hearing this, Lu Ming glanced at the names on the two forms again. Something flashed through his mind, but he couldn't quite grasp it.
Wen Chu gave the form to the registrar, who then gave them a competition integrity commitment letter, which they had to sign again.
The same action repeated itself. This time, Wen Chu signed first, and Lu Ming took it. Looking at the girl's handwriting, his brow furrowed almost imperceptibly before he also put pen to paper.
The third one, still the same.
Lu Ming slowed down his hand speed.
He suddenly felt that the scene was familiar.
It seems like they did this a long time ago; he would sign documents that had a girl's signature, and it seems like this has happened many times before.
Wen Chu noticed the thoughtful look on the man's face, narrowed her eyes, and asked, "What's wrong? You want to back out now that you've signed halfway?"
Lu Ming finished the last stroke and composed himself. It's not uncommon for people to have the illusion that they've done something before or experienced a scene before.
He put down his pen and said calmly, "I never regret the decisions I've made."
The Academy of Sciences chose the computer room in the convention center as the venue for the competition. The computer room was brightly lit, spacious, and equipped with new equipment. At the front was a giant screen for displaying real-time results, and 120 high-spec computers, corresponding to the 120 participating companies.
Apart from the participants, everyone else will be assigned to different locations in the waiting hall or tea restaurant to watch the live broadcast.
On the day of the competition, Lao Chen drove, and Wen Chu and Lu Ming got out of the back seat, accompanied by Jiang Xing and Yang Binshi. People from other companies also arrived one after another. Wen Chu's eyes darted around, like a curious child, looking at who the seeded players from each side were.
At first, she was excitedly chatting and joking with Lu Ming, but when she saw the people dressed in Kemin Group clothes arrive, her smile froze. The man in the white casual clothes at the head of the group was surrounded by three or four people and gradually revealed his true appearance.
Wen Chu stared, her eyes widening in surprise. If Lu Ming hadn't been there, her jaw would have dropped.
Cousin...cousin?
The person in the distance looked exactly like her uncle's son in real life. He was six years older than her and was the closest to her among all the children born to her aunts and uncles. They grew up teasing each other and their interactions weren't limited to the Lunar New Year. They would bicker online, play games together, and occasionally meet up for meals offline.
Although there is a significant age difference, the other person is handsome and youthful, with a young mindset. He loves hanging out with young people, and there is no generation gap when they talk. Sometimes Wen Chu even feels that the other person is the childish one.
And he has always been very good to her.
Wait, why did the system transfer his character settings over as well?
She quickly asked the system what his identity was, and as she expected, the other party turned out to be her older brother Wen Heng, who was always away on business trips... and the name was the same.
She was speechless. She only had a few important relatives, and they were almost all arriving.
Fortunately, she had met Wen Xue before, but she wasn't someone she knew; otherwise, it would have been too terrifying.
Just as Lu Ming was about to look in that direction, Wen Chu grabbed his arm and turned him so that he had his back against Wen Heng, while also using Lu Ming's body to shield her.
What's going on?! She clearly asked her dad before, and he said her family wasn't participating, right??
But judging from this situation, that's clearly not the case.
But thinking too much now is useless. The main quest issued by the system must be completed, otherwise there will be punishment. She has to help Lu Ming complete the competition no matter what. In order to avoid any complications and being caught as a traitor before the start of the competition, Wen Chu plans to go directly to the competition hall and sit down to wait for the competition to begin.
Given the system's tendency to replicate her personality one-to-one, she could even imagine Wen Heng's sarcastic and irritating expression when he saw her.
Normally, Lu Ming would have been able to keenly observe changes in his surroundings, keeping track of who came and went in his peripheral vision. But at this moment, his mind was entirely focused on Wen Chu, and he didn't notice the arrival of the Kemin personnel. Instead, noticing the woman's unusual expression, he asked in a low voice, "Nervous?"
"A little bit, I guess," Wen Chu said absentmindedly, but her body was subtly shifting to block her older brother's gaze.
"Let's go to the lounge. It's weird to be stared at by these people." Well-known companies have VIP lounges.
Many companies present were not there to win, but to watch the showdown between the leading companies. Lu Ming's position inevitably attracted a lot of scrutinizing glances. Everyone was curious about who Baiyue's representative was, while some were secretly watching the show and predicting its failure.
Lu Ming nodded, his tone relatively calm: "Don't be nervous. If you do the process well, the result isn't that important."
Wen Chu pulled him into the VIP room, thinking that this was a misconception; she only cared about the result, not the process. It was rare to hear someone comforting her, but her anxious heart received no relief whatsoever. She had confidently told Lu Ming that her family wouldn't participate.
Was the system deliberately messing with her? Could it be that her brother took her away as a traitor after she finished the competition?
Never mind! The arrow is on the bowstring and must be released. Today, whoever comes will be trampled under her feet! What's done is done, and she'll get her face back no matter what.
Thinking this, Wen Chu's fighting spirit was reignited, and her expression became even more impatient: "I'll just go to the bathroom and go straight in. You just stay here and watch your sister do her thing!"
Lu Ming was about to say something, but seeing the other person's reaction, he swallowed his words and nodded: "Go ahead."
Wen Chu had just entered the arena when Qi Siyan and Wen Shiyang arrived.
After the host finished his opening remarks, the time was exactly nine o'clock in the morning.
The competition has officially begun.
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