Chapter 133: Chapter 127: Competing for Favor Chapter 133: Chapter 127: Competing for Favor The outside noise instantly faded away, and Lu Jingyan’s lips moved but he couldn’t utter a single word.

Her heart was racing so fast, it felt like it might burst out of her chest.

Even her ears felt progressively hotter by the moment.

Sheng Xian’s expression remained calm, unflustered, not seeming to perceive his words as flirtatious. Seeing her silent, he leaned in closer and whispered, “Is that okay?”

The warmth of his breath brushed past her ear, making Lu Jingyan feel a tingling sensation down the side of her body.

She clutched at his trench coat, inconspicuously shifted towards the door a little, and looked at him steadily, “How much?”

Sheng Xian was taken aback, “Hm?”

“Calling only you ‘brother’ is like giving you an exclusive right, isn’t it?” Lu Jingyan attempted to appear nonchalant, deliberately speaking slowly, “How much will you pay me?”

“…”

Sheng Xian caught on to her implication, his throat emitted a short, soft chuckle, “Little Fish, your brother is so good to you, and you still want to charge me?”

Lu Jingyan calmly threw his own words back at him, “Didn’t you just use the phrase ‘give an inch and take a mile’ yourself?”

Sheng Xian laughed again, “So, does that mean it’s not too much to call you ‘brother’ now?”

Lu Jingyan opened her mouth, almost cursed out loud—she had indeed fallen into his trap.

She thought one shouldn’t be too petty. Professor Sheng had kept her company all night; calling him brother was neither painful nor itchy for her, clearly a win for her.

She used to call him that quite easily, and even last night at the bar, she called others the same without any trouble. But in front of him, her mouth was like it was glued shut, she just couldn’t do it.

Lu Jingyan tried several times, then gave up, “Can I call you that some other time?”

Sheng Xian raised an eyebrow, “You want to put it on a tab?”

“…”

“Alright then,” Sheng Xian, appearing very easy-going, didn’t make it tough for her, “Remember to pay your brother some interest later.”

Lu Jingyan responded without changing her expression.

Sheng Xian couldn’t help but laugh again at her awkwardness, then he reached out to tidy her somewhat disheveled hair, gently tucking a stray lock behind her ear, “I have to go to class soon, I need to leave. Go home and have a good breakfast, and if you didn’t sleep well, catch up on some sleep.”

His fingertip accidentally touched her earlobe, cold to the touch.

Lu Jingyan felt a tingling sensation that spread throughout her body from her spine.

She didn’t look at him, her gaze drifting around, and uttered another “oh.”

“If you need anything, call me. I won’t turn off my phone.” Sheng Xian added before pressing the car unlock button, “Go ahead.”

Lu Jingyan placed his jacket on the passenger seat, glanced at him, “Then I’m leaving.”

Sheng Xian hummed a response, not in a hurry to drive away. He tapped his fingers on the steering wheel for a while, then took out his phone and pressed a few buttons.

As soon as Lu Jingyan entered the house, she was caught red-handed by Aunt Sun, “Miss Lu, why are you coming from outside? Still in your pajamas, where have you been?”

“Uh, a friend came by, I went out to see.” Lu Jingyan muddled through, didn’t wait for Aunt Sun to say more, and hurried upstairs.

Once inside, her phone in her hand rang.

Sheng Xian: “It looks like your brother still needs to try harder.”

As Lu Jingyan walked to the bathroom, she asked, “Try harder at what?”

Sheng Xian didn’t reply to her message. She grabbed a toothbrush and squeezed some toothpaste on it.

Halfway through brushing, the phone on the washstand lit up.

Sheng Xian: “What do you think?”

Lu Jingyan, with a mouthful of foam, pursed her lips, Her words said one thing — do professors always speak so ambiguously?

The phone screen lit up again.

Sheng Xian: “Try harder to make sure Little Fish only has one brother — me.”

Lu Jingyan opened her mouth, the next second tossed her toothbrush aside, grabbed a mouthwash cup and wildly took a couple of gulps, then ran to the balcony.

The car outside was gone.

…

Sheng Xian returned home, took a hot shower to wash off the weariness of the night, changed into fresh clothes, and left with various documents.

He got into the car, checked the traffic, and surprisingly there was no jam today. He roughly estimated the time and decided it was feasible to make a trip to Zhuang Chen’s place. He grabbed his phone and called Zhuang Chen, “Are you at home?”

“Yeah.” By the sound of it, Zhuang Chen still hadn’t woken up.

Sheng Xian simply hung up the phone.

Twenty minutes later, he rang the doorbell at Zhuang Chen’s house.

After a good five minutes, Zhuang Chen, yawning incessantly, opened the door, “What’s up? So early in the morning, disturbing my sweet dreams. If I had a woman here, you’d be in even bigger trouble, ruining my good time.”

Sheng Xian ignored Zhuang Chen, took a new pair of slippers that he had brought back from a hotel from the shoe cabinet, put them on, and then sat down on the sofa, “Five minutes to brush your teeth, then we need to chat.”

“Damn it…” Zhuang Chen cursed as he went into the master bedroom.

In less than four minutes, Zhuang Chen came out irritable, holding two bottles of mineral water, threw one at Sheng Xian, unscrewed the cap, tilted his head back, and guzzled most of the bottle, then nonchalantly pulled up a chair, sat down in front of Sheng Xian, and said, “Speak up, the sooner you finish, the sooner I can get back to sleep.”

“…”

Three minutes later, Zhuang Chen, facing Sheng Xian’s continuing silence, got angry, “Speak up!”

“…”

Five minutes later, Zhuang Chen clearly lost his patience, “Fuck, Sheng Xian, did you come here just to pick a fight? Get out, I want to sleep, I want to sleep!”

“…”

Ten minutes later, Zhuang Chen was almost about to kneel, “Please say something, bro, dear brother.”

Sheng Xian cleared his throat, “Have you ever chased a girl?”

“What?” Zhuang Chen was shocked, “What are you asking me? Have I ever chased girls? You come here not for a face-to-face consultation but to ask if I’ve chased girls? No, Sheng Xian, are we even friends? We shared a dorm for four years in college, four years, and every night I told you about my glorious pursuits of girls, where the hell were you listening?”

Sheng Xian: “…”

“Who are you after? Hair?”

Sheng Xian didn’t speak.

The way he was silent seemed like an admission, and Zhuang Chen instantly perked up, “Fuck, wait for me, I’m not sleeping anymore, I’ll grab some food from the fridge, we can eat and talk.”

Sheng Xian: “…”

Zhuang Chen dumped bread, sausages, pickles, noodles, and raw eggs all on the table, “Let’s go, am I ready or what.”

Sheng Xian glanced at the pickles, raw eggs, and noodles, turned his head away, and said blandly, “I think she’s been kind of cold to me recently.”

Zhuang Chen: “How cold?”

“She no longer flirts with me or calls me ‘brother’ anymore. She used to love the noodles I cooked, but last night when I asked her out for noodles, she didn’t agree.” Sheng Xian looked rather troubled as he rubbed his temples, “I might be losing favor.”

Zhuang Chen burst out laughing, “Were you ever in favor? ”

Sheng Xian thought for a moment, “I think I was quite favored before.”

She came every day to change his bandages when he was injured.

She approached him proactively in his social media circles to remind him not to wet the stitch lines after surgery.

Sheng Xian added another line, “And not just ordinarily favored.”

“Then why did you lose favor? You don’t look like you should have, unless Hair found someone new?”

Quiet for a few seconds, Sheng Xian reluctantly admitted, “Probably, there might be five.”

Zhuang Chen choked, covering his chest as he coughed, disbelievingly exclaiming, “Five?”

“Yeah,” Sheng Xian dragged out his words thoughtfully for a second, then remembered the last one from last night he failed to get contact details from, “Should be four.”

“…” Zhuang Chen steadied himself, “So what now?”

After a while, Sheng Xian finally spoke, “So, I was wondering if you have any good tips on how I can compete for some favor.”

…

Meanwhile, down at the coffee shop beneath Song Xian’s company building, Song Xian had been discussing Lu Jingyan for half an hour already.

“After Valentine’s Day, I thought he didn’t like me anymore, but now, I feel like he might actually like me. Song Xian, do you think he likes me or not?”

“He has a sister, not related by blood, and he told me he wants to work on it so I call only him ‘brother.’ He wouldn’t be trying to get another non-blood-related sister, right?”

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