Chapter 21

Jing Huan examined the newly acquired ring a few more times. With such excellent attributes, this ring could easily fetch a high price—truly a generous gift.

He didn’t like taking things from others for free and had initially planned to pay for it. But then it occurred to him—what was his purpose for playing this game?

Wasn’t it precisely to scam Xiangwangzhi?

Just deceiving feelings isn’t fun – he’ll take his money too! He wants this scumbag to lose both love and fortune! To regret it for life! To never dare mess around with young girls online again!!

With this thought, his guilt lessened somewhat.

He applied an item lock to the ring and equipped it. His game character’s hand immediately adorned a shimmering light-blue lotus ring, gleaming brilliantly—quite striking indeed.

This was one of Nine Heroes’ signature features: all equipped gear would display corresponding physical appearances to satisfy big spenders’ bragging needs.

Jing Huan stared at his character for a long moment before suddenly remembering that this account had quite a few outfits.

The biggest selling point of this account was actually its wardrobe—it had every limited-edition outfit in Nine Heroes, all of them bound and no longer available. Unlike cultivation skills that could be trained anytime, these outfits would retain their value when selling the account later. This had been the main reason he’d chosen to buy this account in the first place.

He opened the wardrobe and picked out a blue, out-of-print little dress to change into.

Looking at his character, he clicked his tongue and shook his head.

Who wouldn’t want to have a passionate online romance with such an adorable and mature lady?

He casually took a screenshot of the character, hid the game ID, and sent it to their dorm’s group chat.

Xiao Jing Ya: [Image]

Lu Wenhao: …I checked the group name a few times. Why did you even send this?

Xiao Jing: Oh, I saw it while scrolling through my feed. Pretty or not?

Lu Wenhao opened the photo and glanced at it, muttering, “This outfit is so outdated, the ugliest limited-edition dress ever…”

Lu Wenhao: Who is this?

Xiao Jing: Why are you asking so many questions?

Xiaojingya: My goddess when I played Nine Heroes, isn’t she beautiful?

Lu Wenhao: Graceful and elegant, like a fairy descended to earth, stunningly beautiful.

Satisfied, Jing Huan sent a thumbs-up emoji.

Focused on chatting, he didn’t notice that several familiar characters were standing beside his in-game avatar, blocked by the WeChat dialog box over the game interface.

Xian Mengmeng and her team happened to pass by while doing a quest. Upon spotting Little Sweet Scene, she immediately stopped in her tracks.

Her teammates in the squad quickly caught on as well.

[Team] Ji Xiaonian: So unlucky, no matter what we do, we always run into her! And that outfit of hers is just hideous! [vomiting emoji]

[Team] Ji Xiaonian: Wait a minute, look at what she’s holding—is that the Ninefold Lotus?? Could it be…

In the game, when players obtain high-value items during quests, the system broadcasts it to the world channel, so all online players knew that Heart’s Yearning got a purple ring from an event.

[Team] Love Is Sharing With You: It’s alright. Although it’s not very pretty, at least this dress is limited edition.

[Team] Love Is Sharing With You: Let’s go do the quest. If we don’t do it now, it’ll be too late.

[Team] Ji Xiaonian: What? Can’t stand us talking about your friend?

[Team] Love Is Sharing With You: …What do you mean?

[Team] Fairy Cutie: Weren’t you just running dungeons with her?

[Team] Ji Xiaonian: Yeah, same as before. We agreed to mess with her together, but you chickened out in the end and left me to play the villain alone.

The other two guys in the team didn’t want to get involved in this matter and immediately went AFK pretending to be offline.

Love Is Sharing With You finally understood—no wonder these two had been deliberately ignoring her lately, and no one had spoken in their small group chat anymore.

[Team] Love Is Sharing With You: I just think we shouldn’t intentionally ruin someone else’s gaming experience when we’re not even sure.

[Team] Ji Xiaonian: Wasn’t it you who said you disliked her in the first place?

[Team] Love Is Sharing With You: Yes, I disliked her for acting cutesy, but she didn’t bother me or do anything terrible. She even saved me in a dungeon. I realized I was wrong, so I apologized to her. Is there a problem with that?

[Team]Ji Xiaonian: So you’re saying I’m the problem?

[Team]LoveIsSharingWithYou: …That’s not what I meant.

[Team]Ji Xiaonian: Then do you think it’s okay for her to act all cutesy with Xianxian’s husband? She’s seducing him, she’s a homewrecker!

[Team]LoveIsSharingWithYou: I think Heart’sYearning can at most be considered Xianxian’s ex-boyfriend.

[Team]Xian Mengmeng: Enough, have you said your piece?

[Team]Xian Mengmeng: So you’re saying you’re siding with Little Sweet Scene, not me, is that it?

[Team]Love is Sharing with You: When did I ever side with Little Sweet Scene? Haven’t I been speaking up for you all along? Back when you posted about Heart’s Yearning on the forum, I even used my main account to curse at them dozens of times for you.

[Team]Xian Mengmeng: Well then, thank you for having helped me in the past.

[Team] Xian Mengmeng: But there’s something I need to make clear – I never actually broke up with Heart’s Yearning. We just had a fight, and he wasn’t willing to apologize, so in a moment of anger I tried to use public opinion to pressure him. It wasn’t really over. So Little Sweet Scenery is nothing but a homewrecker who seduced someone else’s husband, understand?

………

Jing Huan continued chatting in the group for a while, having Gao Zixiang save him a seat for tomorrow’s class before finally closing WeChat.

Glancing at the unsold items still listed on his in-game stall, he couldn’t help muttering: “Business isn’t exactly booming…”

It wasn’t that he needed the money – when he bought this account, it came loaded with random junk items. Though they weren’t worth much, it seemed a waste to discard them, so he idly put them up for sale when he had nothing better to do.

I was just about to pack up and leave when I noticed a little lolita in a pink dress standing nearby, looking very familiar.

The lolita wasn’t setting up a stall or moving. Jing Huan thought for a moment and typed on the keyboard.

[Current] Sweet Scenery: 0.0 Huh.

[Current] Love Is Sharing with You: …So you were here after all.

[Current] Little Sweet Scene: Just got back, were you waiting for me? [Confused]

[Current] Love Is Sharing with You: Ah, no, had a fight with a friend, just standing here spacing out.

[Current] Little Sweet Scene: Fighting isn’t good, you know [Shakes head]

…And who did I do it for, anyway.

Love is Sharing Food with You couldn’t stay angry after seeing the emoji following her words.

[Current] Love is Sharing Food with You: By the way, where did you get that ring on your finger?

[Current] Sweet Little Scene: Ah!

[Current] Sweet Little Scene: [Shy][Wink] You’re so mean~ Don’t you already know? %%

[Current] LoveIsSharing: …How much did you buy it for?

[Current] SweetJing: [Shut up] Big bro gave it to me, didn’t buy it.

LoveIsSharing frowned while typing, wanting to ask if she knew about the situation between HeartYearnsFor and FairyMengmeng.

But halfway through typing, they went back and deleted it.

Forget it, it’s not appropriate to chat about these things in the current channel, and she’s in a bad mood now, so she doesn’t have time to get involved in other people’s business.

[Current] LoveIsSharingWithYou: Oh, I’m going to do the quest now, let’s chat next time when we’re free.

[Current] LittleSweetScenery: Alright, hope you and your friend make up soon! [waves]

    ——

A new week began, and the latest “violation list” was posted on the bulletin board of the male dormitory building. Room 312 made a glorious appearance, topping the chart. The reason stated: “Bringing a pot into the dorm to cook hotpot, repeatedly warned but refusing to correct—utterly outrageous!”

The words “utterly outrageous” were enlarged and bolded, clearly showing how furious the dorm supervisor was.

When Lu Hang told Xiang Huaizhi about this incident, the first person Xiang thought of was the guy he had met at the stairwell that day.

If he remembered correctly, hadn’t that guy mentioned his room number was 312?

“Are you listening, Brother Xiang?” Lu Hang asked again when he didn’t respond.

“Get lost,” Xiang Huaizhi said. “Who are you calling brother?”

“Oh, so Little Sweet Jing can call you that, but I can’t? I get it,” Lu Hang said. “Xiang Xiang, how about we also buy a pot to cook hotpot in the dorm? What do you think?”

Xiang Huai Zhi: “What, trying to compete with Room 312 for the dorm auntie’s favor?”

“So you were listening,” Lu Hang laughed. “Those two juniors really had it rough—apparently they got fined, the pot was confiscated, and they didn’t even get to keep the hotpot base.”

Confiscated again?

Xiang Huaizhi asked, “Do you know them?”

Lu Hang replied, “Yeah, but not well. Everyone in their dorm plays Nine Heroes. We met at the last game meetup—they’re all pretty strong players. Too bad they’re not in our server.”

While logging into the game, Xiang Huaizhi listened to his rambling. As soon as he entered the world of Nine Heroes, a friend notification blinked in the bottom-right corner.

It wasn’t an offline message—someone had been waiting online for him.

[Friend] Fairy Cutie: Brother Xiang, did you give Little Sweet Scene that ring?

[Friend] Heart’s Desire: Mhm.

“Wait, why is she still contacting you and even calling you ‘Brother’…” Lu Hang started complaining before pausing abruptly. “Hold on—you gave that purple-tier equipment to Little Sweet Scene? Damn, that’s some generous spending, Xiang Xiang! Do you have feelings for Little Sweet Scene or something?”

Xiang Huaizhi: “No.”

“I don’t believe it,” Lu Hang said. “Who would give money to someone for no reason?”

“I have no use for it.”

“You could still sell it. Just list it on the exchange, and it’d be snapped up in minutes.”

Xiang Huaizhi replied casually, “It’s just pocket change. Can’t be bothered to list it—withdrawing is too much hassle.”

“Yeah, just moving your fingers to enter a bank card number and withdrawal password could tire you to death,” Lu Hang said. “Hurry up, she replied. See what she says.”

[Friend] Xian Mengmeng: The matter between us hasn’t been cleared up yet, and you’re already fooling around with someone else. Isn’t that a bit inappropriate? [Pouting]

[Friend] Heart’s Desire: It’s been made very clear.

[Friend] Xian Mengmeng: …Fine, you said the account wasn’t being used by you earlier, and I believe that. But you also said you were willing to compensate me, right?

“What? Compensate her for what? What does this have to do with you?” Lu Hang was baffled.

“After all, it happened on my account.” Xiang Huaizhi said calmly.

[Friend] Heart’s Desire: Mm, go ahead.

The reply came extremely fast, as if it had been prepared in advance, without a moment’s hesitation.

[Friend] Xian Mengmeng: Let’s get married.

Xiang Huaizhi slowly types out a “?”

[Friend] Heart Yearns for You: Are you still half-asleep?