Chapter 91: Chapter 91: Want to Eat the Feed

In the end, Lin Ruoxi really did buy a few pieces of lacy lingerie.

Of course, with Xue Xiaying there, it wasn’t up to Xue Rui and Lin Ruoxi to pay.

It just meant Xue Rui’s plan to skip class was ruined.

Xue Xiaying drove the two of them back to school.

"Thank you, miss." Lin Ruoxi got out of the car and headed to her classroom.

She had realized at checkout that Xue Rui had lied to her; the price on the tag was the actual price.

Even though they got a twenty-percent discount in the end, it still cost nearly two thousand yuan.

What’s more, her teacher was the one who had paid, which made her feel terrible.

However, Xue Rui had promised he would pay Xue Xiaying back...

"Auntie, I can’t let you pay for this."

Xue Rui stuffed a roll of cash into the glove compartment on the passenger side.

"Where did you get this money?" Xue Xiaying asked, astonished.

Before getting out of the car, Xue Rui retorted, "Where do *you* get your money?"

With Xue Xiaying’s meager salary, forking over two thousand yuan was already making her hemorrhage money.

To be precise, Xue Xiaying had no savings at all, whereas Lin Ruoxi had over a hundred thousand yuan in her bank account.

The money Lin Ruoxi earned running errands as a day student was more than Xue Xiaying’s entire salary.

Besides, Xue Rui had seen Lin Ruoxi’s project files. The lines of code were so clean and concise; they didn’t look like the work of someone with only half a month of experience.

Xue Rui was confident that with a little more time, if he helped Lin Ruoxi pick a specialty, she would have absolutely no problem taking on freelance projects online.

Worse comes to worst, she could even make money doing graduation projects for some of those lazy-ass college students.

He would handle the design and planning, and Lin Ruoxi would be in charge of the technical aspects.

Although they couldn’t compare to professional teams, their skills were more than enough to meet the current market demands.

But the most crucial thing for now was to make Lin Ruoxi understand how harsh the world could be. Otherwise, if she got duped into taking on an illegal project, they’d be completely screwed.

He could even picture it now: Lin Ruoxi’s slender wrists being shackled in iron cuffs...

The thought was just too heartbreaking.

At lunchtime, Xue Rui and Gu Muxue went to eat.

As he passed by Lin Ruoxi, Xue Rui grinned and gave her a quick look-over. She had certainly "grown up" quite a bit; her chest was no longer flat.

Lin Ruoxi had a good foundation to begin with. As long as she got enough nutrition, she would fill out on her own. She wasn’t like Xue Yao, who lacked that late-stage growth potential.

Standing at the classroom’s back door, Lin Ruoxi stared intently at Xue Rui’s departing figure, a hint of disappointment in her eyes.

A female classmate nudged Lin Ruoxi. "Going to eat? Let’s go together."

"Oh... okay." Lin Ruoxi numbly followed her classmate to the cafeteria.

The current Lin Ruoxi was very popular, not just because she was pretty, but mainly because her whole demeanor was completely different than before.

Xue Rui sat in a corner of the cafeteria.

Gu Muxue, in a rare gesture, picked up a piece of Kung Pao chicken and placed it in Xue Rui’s bowl.

"Finished writing the song?" Xue Rui asked with a smile. Gu Muxue seemed to be in a great mood today.

"I finished it. I’ll put your name down for the composition credit," Gu Muxue said with a smile.

Because of that melody from Xue Rui, her entire musical style had been thrown off course, forcing her to basically scrap everything and start over.

This wasn’t the first song she had ever written, but it was the one she was most satisfied with.

"In that case, I’ll wait for the day you’re a huge star. You can give me an autograph and take a picture with me then," Xue Rui teased.

"You and your smart mouth. I might need you to come to a recording studio in a little while," Gu Muxue said, shooting him a playful glare.

"You’re really going to release a song?" Xue Rui was surprised.

’How did Gu Muxue end up going down the path of music? All because of a whistled tune?’

It was true that Gu Muxue loved to sing. Her performance was always the most anticipated event at any school gala.

Still, with her face and figure, Xue Rui thought she was better suited for acting.

’But... the arts and entertainment scenes are all a mess. Newcomers get bullied, especially nobodies with no connections.’

Outside of Hedong City, her family’s influence would be drastically reduced.

He didn’t really want Gu Muxue to go down this path.

But since Gu Muxue was showing such passion for it, Xue Rui felt it was time for him to step up his game and start making some serious money.

In those circles, the power of capital was absolute. No matter how big of a star you were, you still had to kneel and surrender to the investors.

"Muxue is definitely going to be famous. When she is, you’ll only be able to look up to her. You’re not worthy of her at all," Mei Lili said with disdain.

She thought Xue Rui was looking down on Gu Muxue.

"Xiaorui, what university are you thinking of attending?" Gu Muxue asked, feigning nonchalance.

"Me?" Xue Rui paused.

He hadn’t really thought about it. If he could, he’d prefer to go back to school in Chang’an, a place he was more familiar with.

Mei Lili scoffed, "With his grades? The best he can hope for is some diploma mill. Or maybe Stay-at-Home University."

Gu Muxue frowned. Mei Lili was telling the truth; Xue Rui’s grades were ridiculously bad.

It was basically impossible for her and Xue Rui to attend the same university.

Xue Rui had to admit Mei Lili had a point. With his current grades, it didn’t seem like he could get in anywhere.

However, he threw a jab back, "What about you, Mei Lili? Do you think you can get into the same school as Muxue?"

"I..." Mei Lili stammered.

Her grades were only in the upper-middle range, a far cry from Gu Muxue’s.

The thought that in two years, she wouldn’t be able to attend the same school as Gu Muxue made her a little sad.

"Never mind me. What about you?" Mei Lili retorted with a cold snort.

"Doesn’t matter to me. Wherever Muxue goes, I’ll just apply to be a security guard there. You can apply to be the dorm mother, and we can be colleagues," Xue Rui said with a laugh.

Mei Lili was taken aback for a second. She actually thought it was a great idea and shot Xue Rui an admiring glance.

Xue Rui’s mouth twitched. ’It seems Mei Lili actually took me seriously.’

"Just eat!" Gu Muxue said, her face dark.

"Okay..."

These two were getting more ridiculous by the minute.

Gu Muxue knew Xue Rui was joking about becoming a security guard, but she couldn’t help feeling happy inside.

Done with his bickering with Mei Lili, Xue Rui fell into deep thought.

’The college entrance exams are still a year and a half away. That should be enough time.’

’After all, I studied hard in my last life. Reviewing is much easier than learning everything from scratch.’

’A year and a half should be enough to reconstruct my knowledge base. Getting into an undergraduate program shouldn’t be a huge problem.’

In reality, all Xue Rui cared about was the college experience and the conveniences that came with being a college student.

As for actually learning anything? Or the diploma?

To someone like him, a diploma was completely meaningless.

College was just a pig farm, and the diploma was the inspection stamp on the pork.

Pork from different farms sold at different prices.

With that stamp, you could prove to potential employers that your meat was qualified—better than the rest—and thus sell yourself for a good price.

Xue Rui had no intention of becoming a corporate drone, so whether he had the stamp or not was irrelevant. He just wanted to eat the feed.

「In the blink of an eye, it was Friday again.」

Xue Rui and Lin Ruoxi had arranged in advance to go out and do a little business today.

"Miss, my stomach hurts..."

Xue Rui pulled his old trick, trying to get out of class early again.

His classmates merely glanced at him, not paying it much mind.

They knew Xue Rui did this to avoid Chen Tingting, so he always left school early around this time every week.

This time, however, it wasn’t just Xue Rui. Lin Ruoxi was joining him.

Lin Ruoxi copied Xue Rui’s example and said to the teacher at the front of the room:

"Miss, I... my stomach hurts..."

Compared to Xue Rui’s masterful performance, Lin Ruoxi’s attempt seemed incredibly fake.

Her eyes were darting about, and she even stuttered.

Especially since she had a big backpack slung over her shoulder.

No matter how you looked at it, she clearly looked like she was trying to skip class.

After all, who brings their backpack with them to the bathroom?

The other students stifled their laughter, choosing not to expose Lin Ruoxi’s clumsy performance.

Lin Ruoxi was extremely nervous. She could tell everyone had seen through her lie.

’But how can Xue Rui act so naturally?’

The English teacher gave Lin Ruoxi a surprised look. "You... are you not feeling well?"

The students were speechless. It was obvious Lin Ruoxi just wanted to leave early; there was nothing wrong with her.

Lin Ruoxi didn’t say anything, because that was the only line Xue Rui had taught her.

Faced with the English teacher’s question, she didn’t know what to say to get out of the classroom.

"Hurry to the school nurse and get yourself checked out. Do you want a classmate to go with you?" the English teacher asked with concern.

"No, it’s fine... I can go on my own, miss." Lin Ruoxi walked out of the classroom with her backpack, her heart pounding like a drum.

’Lying is so scary,’ she thought.

’But... I still have to get past the security guard.’

’Our PE class got out early...’

Lin Ruoxi silently rehearsed the line Xue Rui had taught her, hoping she wouldn’t stutter so much when it was time to talk to the guard.

Meanwhile, Xue Rui was skillfully crawling out of a hole in the wall.

"Made it out?" Chen Shen said with a grin.

Xue Rui shook his head, exasperated. Chen Shen was like an NPC with a fixed spawn point, waiting by this hole every weekend.

This time, however, he was the one who had asked Chen Shen to come.

"Here’s the stuff you wanted. Don’t go doing anything bad with it, you hear?"

Chen Shen added a word of caution as he handed Xue Rui a paper bag.

"Uncle Chen, do I really seem like that kind of guy?" Xue Rui replied with a grin.

He was taking Lin Ruoxi to do a bit of business today—or more accurately, to set up a street stall.

Selling things was secondary. The main goal was to let Lin Ruoxi experience what it felt like to deceive someone, and to understand why there were so many scammers in the world.

He had asked Chen Shen to get him some small props.

"You know, Tingting has really grown up. She actually cooked a meal for me last week," Chen Shen remarked with a sigh.

Last weekend, Chen Tingting had been at home, painstakingly practicing her cooking.

Even though it didn’t taste good and he was basically her guinea pig, Chen Shen was still quite moved.

And the reason for all this? Because Xue Rui had once said, "I like girls who know how to cook."

In truth, it was just Xue Rui being difficult on purpose.

Whatever Chen Tingting lacked, whatever she couldn’t do, that’s exactly what Xue Rui would demand.

His goal was simple: to endlessly drain Chen Tingting’s energy.

Of course, Xue Rui didn’t forget to steer her toward positive skills in the process.

Chen Shen knew, of course, that this change in his daughter was definitely because of Xue Rui.

That was why he wouldn’t refuse a small request from the boy.

"It’s always good to have a few extra skills," Xue Rui commented.

Once Chen Tingting mastered cooking, Xue Rui planned to move on to, "I like girls who can fix cars."

"Uncle Chen, I gotta go. My classmate is here." Xue Rui waved at Lin Ruoxi, who was approaching on the side of the road.

From a distance, Lin Ruoxi saw Xue Rui standing next to a police car, an officer’s arm slung around his shoulder.

Lin Ruoxi trotted over, her face filled with panic. "Officer, Xue Rui... he didn’t do anything wrong."

Xue Rui was stunned. ’Where did her imagination run off to?’

"It’s too late. Don’t wait for me for dinner tonight," Xue Rui said, deliberately putting on a woeful expression to tease her.

"I... I skipped class too! Arrest me too!" Lin Ruoxi was so frantic she was on the verge of tears.