Chapter 9

“Lu Ping, how did you know I have several foreign tutors?” Shen Yuze pronounced each word clearly, so clearly that Lu Ping couldn’t pretend he hadn’t heard.

His thin shirt was instantly soaked with cold sweat. Lu Ping didn’t even dare to blink. He was like a little mouse pinned down by its tail by a cat, and this beautiful cat refused to give him a quick end, merely eyeing her prey with a probing gaze—Lu Ping knew that if he said one wrong word, he’d be torn apart and swallowed bones and all.

“I…” Lu Ping thought, damn it, why was his voice trembling? “…I heard about it.”

“From whom?”

“From classmates… Lots of classmates said so.”

The answer caught Shen Yuze off guard. His brows slowly furrowed. “What do you mean by ‘lots of classmates said so’?”

“Just the literal meaning.” Once Lu Ping’s first lie was out, the rest came easier. “You, uh, didn’t you arrive at school that day in a really expensive car? After that, lots of people were talking, saying your family is super rich, that you went to an international school in the Capital, took helicopters to school every day, had blond, blue-eyed foreign butlers at home, and of course private tutors. The maids would say in a British London accent every time you got home: ‘Ay, I help you, sir?’”

Those rumors did exist, but nowhere near as exaggerated as Lu Ping made them sound. To cover up his slip of the tongue, Lu Ping had no choice but to embellish them wildly.

Lu Ping was glad he had such an honest-looking face, which made even his lies seem sincere.

Shen Yuze’s lips curved slightly, though it was unclear if he was amused by the ridiculous rumors or Lu Ping’s heavily accented English. “…So, they spread nonsense, and you believed all of it?”

Lu · Little · Animal · Ping keenly sensed that Shen Yuze’s intimidating aura was softening. He knew his lie had worked again. The fingers of his left hand, hidden in his sleeve, uncurled one by one. Only then did he realize he’d been clenching his fist so tightly that his palm was slick with sweat.

The feeling of escaping by the skin of his teeth was amazing.

“N-Not entirely.” Emboldened, Lu Ping straightened his back a bit. “Some of their rumors were too fake!”

Shen Yuze asked, “Oh? What other rumors?”

“They said you go surfing in Hawaii by boat every winter, and fly to Antarctica to beat the summer heat every year…”

Before Lu Ping finished, Shen Yuze suddenly burst out laughing.

It was the first time Lu Ping had seen Shen Yuze laugh like this. He looked in a great mood, the creases between his brows smoothed out by the sunlight. He was no longer the lofty “male god” but a vibrant seventeen-year-old boy, not so different from Lu Ping.

“Flying to Antarctica to beat the summer heat? They really came up with that.” Shen Yuze shook his head, still laughing.

Lu Ping let out a breath of relief. “Right? That’s what I thought too. It’s all the way on the other side of the planet. How could…”

“Non-research personnel can only land in Antarctica during the Southern Hemisphere summer, from December to February each year—which is winter in the Northern Hemisphere. And you can’t just fly there. Planes can only go as far as Ushuaia in Argentina, where you have to switch to an icebreaker ship. It takes about four days to reach the Antarctic continent.”

Lu Ping: “…”

Lu Ping: “………”

Lu Ping: “………………”

Lu Ping nearly choked on his own saliva. “So… you’ve really been to Antarctica?”

Shen Yuze didn’t answer, but his expression and eyes said it all—he had indeed set foot on that pristine white land.

Lu Ping didn’t know what to say.

Before today, all of Lu Ping’s imaginings of Antarctica came from geography textbooks. It was too distant, a place a boy from a small city could never reach in his lifetime. Lu Ping’s boldest dream was to save up after university entrance exams and take his parents to the Capital to watch a flag-raising ceremony. Yet at the same age, Shen Yuze’s feet had already trod the coldest continent on the planet.

They sat shoulder to shoulder in the same classroom. Lu Ping could reach out and touch Shen Yuze’s shoulder if he wanted. But in that moment, he felt the distance between them widen again.

“Shen Yuze,” Lu Ping gripped his pen so hard his fingertips turned white. He heard himself say, “Did you take photos in Antarctica? I want to see them.”

…

Chen Miaomiao was a student in Class 8 of Grade 2 at Jiaojiang No. 1 Middle School. She harbored a huge secret that only she knew—her favorite blogger idol online had transferred into her class and become her new classmate!

She wanted to print the shocking news on a banner and hang it at the school gate for everyone to see!

But she couldn’t do that, because the idol classmate had privately messaged her, asking her to keep it a secret.

Faced with her idol’s request, Chen Miaomiao agreed.

Come on, wasn’t that cool?

Compared to this, the sadness of her parents confiscating her phone didn’t seem so bad.

Ever since starting Grade 2, Chen Mama had confiscated her daughter’s phone under the pretext of “not wanting to affect her studies,” strictly limiting her to one hour of screen time per week. Every Friday after school, Chen Miaomiao would race home at top speed, retrieve her phone from her mom, and begin her blissful journey.

Twenty minutes for games and small tasks, twenty minutes on Penguin chat to say hi to her girlfriends, and the final twenty minutes all for the hottest social app right now—Partner.

As soon as she logged into Partner, a system notification popped up.

[System Message: Your favorite blogger @fake-diaond has updated!]

Chen Miaomiao eagerly clicked his avatar and jumped to his page.

During the week she’d been offline, @fake-diaond had posted several updates, with the latest one just half an hour ago.

@fake-diaond: Missing the snow in Antarctica. [Shared photos]

This time, @fake-diaond had uploaded four photos at once!

In the first photo, the blogger—no, Shen Yuze himself—stood on an endless ice sheet blanketed in white snow. Not far behind him, in a shallow bay, a landing craft was moored.

He wore a bright red parka, his pant legs tucked into snow boots, hands gripping ski poles, looking light and agile. A thick snow hat and mask covered him, revealing only a pair of starry eyes. If you zoomed in on the photo, you could even see the tiny ice crystals on his eyelashes.

The following photos showed translucent blue icebergs, flocks of penguins, and even a whale passing close to a cruise ship.

Chen Miaomiao clutched her phone, speechless.

Her! Classmate! Had! Been! To! Antarctica!!

Though the photos had only been up for half an hour, the comments had already exploded.

“Is it that I have no eye for talent? I thought the blogger was a looks-focused account, but this is clearly a flexing wealth account!”

“I just looked it up—only 79 ships worldwide have permits to land in Antarctica, half of which are research vessels. The cheapest public tickets are for six-person cabins at $6,000 USD each, and that’s just from Ushuaia to the Antarctic continent. Getting to Ushuaia is extra…”

“The gap between people is bigger than between people and dogs, woof!”

“Daily question: Blogger so rich, can you share some with me?”

“I heard Antarctica has zero pollution—boogers come out clear. Blogger, true?”

“Just back from the zoo—now I’ve seen penguins like the blogger!”

The more Chen Miaomiao read, the wider her mouth gaped.

Kids this age always had a bit of subtle competitiveness. Chen Miaomiao’s family was actually quite well-off. Jiaojiang was a famous “city of handicrafts.” Her dad ran a shoelace factory—don’t underestimate a single shoelace. Even if the profit per lace was just pennies, what about hundreds of thousands, millions? And if exported overseas?

So from childhood, Chen Miaomiao had the best clothes, food, and gadgets among her classmates. Of the “white, rich, beauty” trio, she had the most important one: rich.

Before, she’d followed @fake-diaond purely to admire a handsome guy. Later, when the handsome guy became her classmate, a corner of her heart began fantasizing about fairy tales. But now, all those romantic thoughts vanished in smoke. Her mind was filled with one thing—someone in this world actually flexed wealth better than her?

With that thought, Chen Miaomiao bolted from her bedroom to the kitchen.

In the kitchen, Chen Mama was directing the nanny’s cooking. Seeing her daughter, she glanced at the wall clock and said in surprise, “What’s this? You’re being so proactive today? Not even an hour in, and you’re handing over the phone?”

Chen Miaomiao obediently surrendered her phone, then hugged her mom’s arm and wheedled, “Mom, I figured out where I want to go for my birthday~”

Her birthday was coming up soon, and Chen Mama had already promised to take her to nearby cities for fun.

While instructing the nanny to cut the meat finer, Chen Mama asked casually, “Where do you want to go?”

Chen Miaomiao: “Antarctica!”

Chen Mama froze and stared at her daughter in shock. “…What did you say?”

Chen Miaomiao: “Antarctica! I wanna see penguins!”

Chen Mama stared for two seconds before asking, “Do I look like Antarctica to you?”

Chen Miaomiao: “…”

Chen Mama tapped her daughter’s forehead hard. “Miaomiao, oh Miaomiao, you got fourth from last in the class last monthly exam. I went to the parent-teacher conference and couldn’t hold my head up. If you really want to see penguins that bad, why don’t you quit school? Mom’ll get you a job at a zoo sweeping cages—you can look at penguins for the rest of your life!!”

Chen Miaomiao: “Wah wah wah.”

“Fake crying!” Chen Mama said with a fierce face. “Saturday, come with me to the Library Tower. Monthly exams next week—I’ll buy you a few more practice sets!”

…

While Chen Miaomiao mourned her lost freedom, her idol @fake-diaond was in his bedroom—less than ten square meters—replying to fans’ comments.

Lu Ping sat at his desk, the bright desk lamp shining on his open textbook, but he wasn’t studying. He was openly slacking off on his phone. Cracks spiderwebbed across the screen—ugly, sure, but it didn’t slow down his internet.

Before school let out that day, he’d shamelessly asked Shen Yuze for the Antarctica photos, and Shen happened to have them on his phone.

Lu Ping carefully picked a few scenic ones, then casually added one with Shen Yuze in it, and Bluetooth-transferred them all to his own phone.

He lied through his teeth: “The Antarctic scenery is too beautiful. I want to save them as phone wallpapers.”

Shen Yuze wasn’t so easily fooled: “Then why pick a photo of me? For wallpaper too?”

What could Lu Ping do? He nodded stiffly and gritted out, “Yeah, I want to set your photo as my wallpaper to motivate myself to learn from you, so one day I can land in Antarctica too.”

Shen Yuze: “…”

In that instant, Shen Yuze’s expression was particularly complex. He seemed to want to say something but held back, as if the words just wouldn’t come out.

Lu Ping was crying rivers inside. He guessed that in Shen Yuze’s eyes, his new desk mate was either a pervert or a simp… Of course, the biggest possibility was that he was both a pervert and a simp.

But there was no turning back from a drawn bow. To cover up one lie, he had no choice but to pile on more lies. Under Shen Yuze’s watchful gaze, Lu Ping really set that photo of Shen Yuze as his phone wallpaper.

Not bad… it actually looked pretty good.

The photo was incredibly eye-catching: the entire frame was a vast expanse of snow, and the bright red jacket on the young man stood out as the most striking presence amid the boundless white. He was radiant like fire, brilliant like the sun. Lu Ping’s finger silently traced over the young man’s eyes in the photo, and for a fleeting moment, he felt like the person standing amid the glacier and snowfields had become himself.

After getting the photos from Shen Yuze, Lu Ping picked an auspicious moment and posted his four carefully selected shots to the @fake-diaond account.

As expected, the photos drew countless comments almost immediately.

The fans were mesmerized by Antarctica’s stunning scenery and marveled at the lavish, colorful life of @fake-diaond.

Lu Ping refreshed the rainbow farts from his fans over and over. He knew full well that it was all fake—the person they admired, envied, and idolized wasn’t really him—but he still sank deep into those praises.

The feeling of being affirmed by others was just too good.

It was like a strange addiction; he couldn’t quit it.

Just as Lu Ping was excitedly scrolling through the fan comments, his phone suddenly buzzed a few times, and a call popped up out of nowhere.

Lu Ping jumped at the sudden call—because the name on the screen was Shen Yuze!

Guilty as a thief, Lu Ping nearly dropped his phone.

He fumbled to hit the answer button, his shaky hands missing a few times before finally connecting on the third try.

“Sh-Sh-Shen Yuze,” Lu Ping stammered, “Wh-What’s up so late?”

“Mm.” Shen Yuze’s voice came through the speaker, slightly distorted but still as curt as ever. “Are you free tomorrow?”

“Huh??”

Lu Ping was a bit surprised: From the sound of it, Shen Yuze wouldn’t be asking him out, would he?

Sure enough, Shen Yuze didn’t beat around the bush and extended the invitation directly: “We’ve got midterms next week. I want to go to the Library Tower to buy some reference books. Come with me.”