My System Forces Me to Live off Women-Chapter 42 - 40: No Secrets Under the Dinner Table
"Hey~ Guess what?"
Xu Manning pouted, "First rule of renting, no riddlers allowed in this house! Yueyue, tell me about your dream?"
"Ah, well..."
Wu Wenyue stammered, vaguely describing the dream involving Li Peifeng, and during the process, she kicked his shin lightly with her foot, probably to express apology?
Li Peifeng kicked back, refusing to accept it; kicking without wearing black silk is truly insincere.
The two people were ostensibly eating, but underneath the table, their legs were fiercely at odds, indulging in a silly game of kicking and stamping.
"Can you two stop it already?"
Xu Manning held up her bowl, glancing at them, "You think I’m blind?"
"He kicked me first!"
Wu Wenyue blames first.
"So what if he kicked you? I’m gonna hit her!" 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝘦𝓌𝑒𝑏𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝘭.𝒸𝘰𝑚
Without saying much, Li Peifeng kicked again, but this time at Xu Manning: "Why did you get together with me back then?! Don’t act like I forgot about it. Don’t you think you owe me an apology?"
Xu Manning gritted her teeth, "Apologize to you? You... You’re quite brazen, huh?!"
"With someone who takes advantage and still complains, no need to be polite, kick him!" Wu Wenyue laughed, fanning the flames, afraid things wouldn’t get big enough.
"Let’s kick him together!"
"Huh? For real?!"
Initially, the two girls kicked with slippers, but soon the shoes flew off, and they kicked barefoot, shaking the table and chairs with a clamor.
"Haha, keep bragging!"
"Teaming up against me, huh?!"
In the urgency, Li Peifeng could only retaliate, putting down his bowl and reaching blindly, finally grabbing two feet amidst the girls’ exclamations.
One large, one small, one pink and white, one bronze-colored, one for each.
The former smooth as warm jade, like snow competing with frost.
The latter slender without being bony, subtly arched like a crescent moon on the horizon.
"Ah, what are you doing?"
"Let go!"
Li Peifeng clasped them together, his legs squeezing tightly, trapping the two feet, and calmly picked up the bowl, "Stop fooling around, let’s eat!"
Clearly, it’s you, you big perv, causing trouble, right?!
Holding our feet while eating, is this really okay?
Wu Wenyue and Xu Manning instinctively glanced at each other, then simultaneously looked towards Li Peifeng, who was eating heartily—unable to ignore, as their feet were still on his legs.
About ten seconds later, Wu Wenyue was the first to draw her foot back, muttering, "The porridge’s a bit watery."
"It’s alright, I like thin porridge."
Xu Manning surreptitiously withdrew her foot too, as if nothing had happened.
Li Peifeng found it amusing, secretly reaching out with his foot again.
But this time, instead of kicking, he used his foot to caress the others’ feet, or pulled up their pants, stroking their calves.
His left foot caressed Xu Manning’s, the right foot caressed Wu Wenyue’s, multitasking startlingly while also eating—his enjoyment was evident.
Yet, the two girls remained indifferent, eating and chatting as if their lower halves were amputated, numb...
How wonderful this shared living is.
Possible! And it’s harmonious!
At this moment, Mr. Li had already forgotten about the dream, what was there to miss about that broken dream; reality is more fun!
The feet don’t stink, and the food’s delicious.
If every meal had this kind of "Under-the-table romance," Li Peifeng felt he might take off.
Hmm, weight take off.
...
...
After breakfast, Wu Wenyue had to attend a project meeting at school, Xu Manning had to handle house purchasing paperwork with the landlord, and Li Peifeng returned to his room to write.
Wu Wenyue found it puzzling: "You’re not going to school? First day after National Day break, aren’t you having group meetings?"
"If you’ve got enough guts, every day’s summer break."
Li Peifeng sat in front of the computer, responding casually, "Since starting my second year of grad school, I’ve been staying home, occasionally going to the library to browse materials. What’s a group meeting? I, a humanities student, wouldn’t know!"
As the saying goes, science students are to be used for practical purposes, maximize their utility.
Humanities students are to be cultured, refined and rounded.
The postgraduate experience naturally differs between the two fields.
Students like Wu Wenyue, in the sciences, are generally not relaxed, burdened with daily experiments, pushed harder by their advisors. Missing lab work for a few days means the entire research progress lags, possibly losing valuable data and wasted efforts.
Students like Li Peifeng, an arts major postgraduate, don’t need to conduct experiments, rarely have these routine tasks, mostly helping with advisor’s projects, looking up info, compiling books, spending most of their time reading and writing their own pieces.
If a student wants to slack off or lacks exceptional abilities, advisors might just let them be. Do your own thing—vacationing, traveling, relaxing, partying, dating—whatever you wish, just stay out of sight and get the thesis right at graduation.
"Didn’t you write a new article? Submitted it yet?"
"Not yet, I’m planning to revise it."
"Oh."
Wu Wenyue understood the differences between humanities and sciences in postgrad, but was more concerned about Li Peifeng slacking off, not switching to doctoral studies, so asked about his academic progress, suggesting two things and one requirement.
"Firstly, it’s critical to understand the rapid development phase of graduate education in our country, drastically reducing the master’s degree value, and employment pressure escalating exponentially. So whether for the lifelong responsibility towards our nation and people, or for your future growth, raise your academic qualifications as the trend demands. Pursuing a doctorate needs to be treated as an important and urgent task, seized quickly."
"Secondly, be resolute in pursuing doctoral studies, unwavering in doctoral belief, all else is low-grade, doctoral pursuit reigns supreme. PhD, PhD, and more PhD. Weather the storm on the path, strengthen your will, share ups and downs for half a year, creating brilliance. Study hard, progress daily, feel no slack whatsoever. Unify doctoral aspirations in mind and body as the decision unfolds, with a high regard for the nation and people’s responsibility, diligently commit to every study session, striving for motivation without pressure, tension without anxiety, swift without chaos."
Li Peifeng was simply astonished: "You practice your essay writing on me?"
Wu Wenyue solemnly: "I offer you a small goal here, called ’Five reads, five studies, and one write’, hoping you’ll conscientiously implement it."
"What do you mean?"
"’Five reads, five studies, and one write’ means reading five books a week, studying five papers a week, writing an essay every month, and submitting it to SSCI, CSSCI... or other major Chinese core journals, the higher journal level the better, the more articles the better."
Li Peifeng felt a lingering vexation: "If you’re hoping I drop dead, just be upfront about it, no need to torture me like this."
"How is this torture?"
Wu Wenyue urged kindly, "Without this, how will you pursue your doctoral degree? Without this, how can you advance, Xiaofeng, don’t be complacent."
"Recently, there’s been a splendid saying: Water ebbs, yet steadily flows. You must steadily go forward..."
"Who cares about water going forward."
Li Peifeng retorted, "Water benefits all things without contention, as Laozi stated. Just one suggestion: lie flat!"
"You two quit clowning here."
Newly made-up Xu Manning came to the doorway, placing a hand on Wu Wenyue’s shoulder, smiling, "If you’re free, join me while handling the paperwork. We’ll be done by 3 PM, then Yueyue and I will go together shopping and get some new clothes."
Li Peifeng said casually, "Shopping is cool, paperwork’s a pass. Not like my name’s on the house."
Xu Manning nodded, "What you said is okay... Hmm, shall we put this house in all three of our names?"
"Hmm?"
Li Peifeng looked at her surprised, swearing that his earlier words held no hidden meaning!
Wu Wenyue snickered, "Don’t listen to his jokes, come on, time’s getting tight."
"Then see you this afternoon!"
"Bye~"
After saying goodbye, the two girls stepped out the door, entering the elevator.
Amidst the small space, they stood side by side, silent, no sound aside from the elevator’s faint hum.
Wu Wenyue suddenly recalled yesterday after Li Peifeng left, their open chat, and the heartfelt conversations whispered deep in the night blankets.
Wu Wenyue spoke, "So this is technically the first day of shared renting, how does it feel, is it what you wanted?"
"Like an earthquake."
Xu Manning replied seemingly without a beginning or end.
What does love feel like? An earthquake apparently.
Wu Wenyue chuckled, "Then you bought a condemned house, huh."
...
