LWDC Chapter 88

Chapter 88 – Performing a Show of Affection

Chapter 88 – Performing a Show of Affection

Chapter 88 – Performing a Show of Affection

The summer vacation of senior year in high school was only two weeks long, and it passed in the blink of an eye.

Nothing major happened during these two weeks. The only thing worth mentioning was that Ji Yuechi found out about Ning Fei and Duan Yunhong. This wasn’t too surprising, after all, Ning Fei didn’t hide the fact that he was going to Duan Yunhong’s home in Shenzhen to “spend the summer vacation.” It was only a matter of time before Ji Yuechi ran into them.

Ji Yuechi was shocked and then questioned Duan Yunhong, trying to use it to gain some leverage. Unexpectedly, Duan Yunhong didn’t care at all. Ji Yuechi said he would tell his family, and Duan Yunhong said, “Do as you please.” As a result, when this news was revealed within the Ji family, its power was not that great.

Ji Zhenwei’s father was no longer alive, only his mother was. Although this mother’s surname was Duan, she would nag that Duan Yunhong would have no descendants and would cut off the Duan family’s line. But Duan Yunhong turned a deaf ear. No, he simply didn’t listen to his mother’s nagging. When Ji Zhenwei wanted to talk to him, he wouldn’t see him, wouldn’t answer the phone, and even stopped discussing business matters with Ji Zhenwei for a while. His focus wasn’t in Nan City, Ji Zhenwei couldn’t threaten him, nor could he possibly threaten him—otherwise, the Ji family would be cutting off their own arm. Therefore, this discussion about Duan Yunhong’s sexual orientation was all thunder and no rain, and the Ji family couldn’t do anything about him.

As for Ning Fei, his resume was too perfect. Although he had some past disagreements with the Ji family, it wasn’t a fundamental conflict. The Ji family couldn’t use “Then at least find a better partner” to attack Duan Yunhong. Most importantly, Duan Yunhong warned the entire Ji Zhenwei family in front of them, “Don’t mess with Ning Fei, don’t harass Ning Fei.” Ji Zhenwei felt it wasn’t necessary to alienate his own people over this matter, so he stopped caring about who Duan Yunhong’s partner was.

Tang Huilan even “casually” chatted with Ji Xingzhe in private, saying that if Duan Yunhong had no descendants in the future, then his share of the assets would only be inherited by Ji Zhenwei’s children. This wasn’t a bad thing for their family, so there was no need to be too opposed to Duan Yunhong’s preferences. On the contrary, the two brothers, Ji Yuechi and Ji Xingzhe, could act even closer to Duan Yunhong, so that when Duan Yunhong got old, he would only treat these two brothers as his own children.

Ji Xingzhe reluctantly pretended to agree on the surface, but in his heart, he was frantically rejecting it, feeling like the sky was about to fall.

He was the only one who found it difficult to accept that Duan Yunhong and Ning Fei were actually “together.” Ever since these two met, Ji Xingzhe had been worried all day long that they would “exchange information” to push Lin Shengjia back into the Ji family. Now that their relationship could actually be even closer, it was difficult for Ji Xingzhe not to imagine what they were plotting behind his back.

Moreover, in Ji Xingzhe’s view, Ning Fei and Duan Yunhong had met at his birthday party, which meant that he himself was the matchmaker for them. This kind of “digging your own grave” behavior made him very uncomfortable.

What made him even more uncomfortable was that when Ji Xingzhe tried to find out something from Duan Yunhong, Duan Yunhong leisurely said a very “terrifying” thing: “We’ll talk about everything after your exams.”

Ji Xingzhe: “…”

From then on, Ji Xingzhe never dared to talk to Duan Yunhong again, and even didn’t dare to meet his eyes.

“He definitely took that sentence as a ‘death sentence’,” Ning Fei said on the phone after hearing Duan Yunhong’s retelling, “That sentence only means one thing to him: that you will reveal Lin Shengjia’s background after the college entrance examination.”

“That’s exactly what I want it to mean, so he won’t always say those things in front of me that he thinks are subtle and clever, but are actually all nonsense,” Duan Yunhong said. “He originally didn’t dare to bother me anymore, but in order to find out what we were doing, he started to wander around in front of me again, as annoying as a pest that can’t be eradicated.”

“What, did he think we got together to plot to expose his background?” Ning Fei turned a page of the teacher’s edition of the exercise materials in front of him and laughed, “Ji Yuechi even saw us kissing by the car, could that have been specially staged?”

“Ji Yuechi wouldn’t specifically describe that scene,” Duan Yunhong paused and said in a seemingly calm tone, “But he said we were together, and I didn’t explain too much. I can’t exactly say we’re just fuck buddies.”

“Oh, okay, that’s what I said to Lin Shengjia anyway. Saves trouble,” Ning Fei said casually, seemingly not caring about the topic, and then switched back to the previous topic. “But if you say that to Ji Xingzhe, it might motivate him to do something unfavorable to Lin Shengjia within this year. You’ve really given me a big hidden danger.”

Duan Yunhong didn’t care. “He can’t find anyone to help him anymore, what else can he do? Just impotent rage.”

“That’s not necessarily true, a cornered dog will jump over a wall,” Ning Fei replied. “He’s capable of breaking his own leg, so he’s capable of doing even more ruthless things to others. It’s not impossible for him to risk his life. I have to remind Lin Shengjia to stay away from this lunatic. Sometimes, retreating isn’t because you’re a coward, it’s because you don’t want to be dragged down by the other person.”

“Lin Shengjia’s parents are picking him up and dropping him off from school, what else can he do?” Duan Yunhong replied. “Ji Xingzhe can’t beat him one-on-one, and he doesn’t have the guts to hire someone to hurt him. You don’t have to worry about it. Do you really think he’s a child who needs all-around protection? He’s an adult on the inside, he should have been independent long ago.”

“But he told me that recently, Xie Baolin told his mother that he could help pick him up and drop him off,” Ning Fei paused his writing and drawing, propped his chin up, and looked at the phone playing on speakerphone next to him. “What exactly is Xie Baolin staying for? He hasn’t made a move in a long time, and suddenly he’s willing to help proactively. Something’s up. He wouldn’t want to help Ji Xingzhe mess with Lin Shengjia, would he? Anyway, Lin Shengjia’s goal is to stay away from the Ji family and get into a good university. If he messes with Lin Shengjia so that he can’t get into university, wouldn’t that also be considered ruining his goal?”

“I don’t know what he’s staying for, and I’m not interested. If you’re worried about him interfering, then tell Lin Shengjia not to trust him and to still ask his parents to pick him up and drop him off,” Duan Yunhong said. “If you really let him pick him up and drop him off, he could definitely pull a sliding tackle with the person and the car near the exam.”

“Yeah. He doesn’t care whether he lives or dies, but if something happens to Lin Shengjia, it’ll be troublesome,” Ning Fei clicked his tongue. “Can’t you just squeeze him out directly? Don’t you gangsters have something like ‘territorial awareness’?”

“If you have to say it, we do, but conflicts may not break out at any time,” Duan Yunhong said. “We might try to force the other person out of the world from the beginning, or we might drag it out until the end. Just like you debt collectors might call your colleagues for reinforcements, Wanderers may also team up temporarily and help each other. Only when it’s time to extract the luck do we start to compete against each other, the goal is to grab more luck.”

“So he didn’t squeeze you out at the beginning because he wanted to cooperate with you?”

“Impossible, it’s impossible for me to cooperate with him,” Duan Yunhong actually probably guessed that Xie Baolin wanted to watch the show and try to take advantage of it. But he didn’t want to discuss that guy too much, so he said, “If you’re really worried, then I’ll have someone drive Lin Shengjia to and from school every day. Just say they’re sending you and giving Lin Shengjia a ride.”

“According to your scenario, I’ll have to put on a show of affection with you?” Ning Fei disliked the trouble. “Can’t you just kick him out directly? Duan Yunhong, don’t tell me you can’t do it.”

“I can, but why should I waste this effort and resources?” Duan Yunhong replied. “I am helping you, but don’t expect me to spend extra luck.”

“Tsk, whatever you want,” Ning Fei thought to himself, this man spent so much luck to change his persona as soon as he entered the world, what is he pretending to be frugal now? But he didn’t have any position to force others to spend effort to drive people away, so he could only say, “But if Xie Baolin causes any major impact later, then I’ll hold you accountable.”

Duan Yunhong said, “Isn’t it your job to predict and prevent accidents? Are you pushing the responsibility to me?”

“Well, I arranged for you to kick him out, but you didn’t want to do it, so isn’t it your responsibility?” Ning Fei replied righteously. “Also, since we’re going to put on a show of affection, then are you coming to the Lin family for dinner this Saturday? We can put on a show while we’re at it.”

Duan Yunhong chuckled. “Perform? Alright, how far do you want to go with this show?”

“What, you want to mess with me? Sure, I’ll ‘risk my life to accompany you’ no matter how far you want to play,” Ning Fei also laughed.

“Anyway, at most Xie Baolin will go around advertising it among you gangsters, it’s not me who’s losing face.”

*

Saturday, the Lin family, Ning Fei, Duan Yunhong, and Xie Baolin, all three “non-locals” were present.

Seeing that Xie Baolin was really there, Duan Yunhong knew that this was probably intentional by Ning Fei, just to make him embarrassed and humiliated. But Duan Yunhong had already prepared himself and started his acting in front of everyone.

He didn’t start showing affection right away, but instead, he “attacked” Ning Fei’s teaching job first.

Long working hours, a lot of content, exhausting, high pressure, and low wages at the same time. Duan Yunhong said that Ning Fei was wasting his ability and his life in this position, and it would be better to go to Shenzhen with him to make a name for himself. The Lin family couple were worried that Ning Fei was about to resign immediately. After all, Lin Shengjia’s English had finally climbed back up, thanks to Ning Fei’s efforts, and he must not resign and leave Nan City now.

Ning Fei quickly guessed Duan Yunhong’s idea and argued with him half-truthfully, saying that he would definitely not resign. The two of them were exchanging barbs, and if you said the atmosphere was tense, there was indeed a bit of a confrontation; if you said they were showing affection, if you thought about it carefully, this really did sound like what couples argue about.

At the end of their argument, Duan Yunhong pretended to give in. “Alright, I’ll give you three more years. I want to see what else you can accomplish in this school. But at the rate you’re going, you might not even lead a few classes of students before you collapse yourself. I’ll find someone to drive you to and from school, don’t ride that broken bike of yours anymore.”

Ning Fei glanced at him and said coldly, “None of your business. Lin Shengjia also rides his bicycle back and forth every day, I’m not that much more useless than my student.”

Duan Yunhong: “What are you comparing yourself to a vigorous high school student for… OK, fine, then Lin Shengjia can ride with you to and from school as well, so he won’t be stubborn with me anymore, alright?”

Lin Shengjia, who had been watching the whole time without saying a word: “…Huh?”

–Wait, am I a part of your play?