Chapter 149: The Proper Way to Bring a Girl Home for the New Year

As the semester drew to a close, subject teachers began outlining exam key points for the students. Attendance was much higher than usual.

After all, no one wanted to fail a subject right before the New Year.

At that moment, Feng Siruo held a pen delicately between her slender fingers. Her right arm pressed down on her own notebook, while her left arm pressed against Jiang Zhou’s.

She was making two copies of the exam notes, each line crooked and wobbly.

It wasn’t that she couldn’t draw a straight line. It was because Jiang Zhou sat right beside her, staring at her eyelashes and silently counting them.

That made her so nervous she could barely focus on the page.

“D-don’t look at me anymore, okay…?”

Jiang Zhou coughed lightly. “Come to my house for New Year’s.”

Feng Siruo’s face flushed crimson. “No, I can’t…”

“Why not?”

“My family wouldn’t allow it.”

“You’re a homebody. No matter where you celebrate, it’s still New Year’s. You could at least ask, couldn’t you?”

“Ask who?” she looked at him blankly.

He tapped his watch. “Ask your aunt. Maybe she’ll say yes.”

“I don’t dare…”

“You have to muster up the courage to take the first step.”

“I don’t have the courage…”

“Then forget it. I’ll just take some other girl home for New Year’s.”

Feng Siruo pouted unhappily, but she didn’t answer. She only focused harder on the two books under her arms.

Just then, Ding Yue slid her seat closer and looked at Jiang Zhou as if she had something important to say.

“What’s wrong? Why are you staring at me?”

“If you want to invite a girl home for New Year’s, you have to personally go and fetch her. That’s the rule before marriage.”

Jiang Zhou blinked wide. “Which lonely single dog came up with that rule?!”

Ding Yue huffed. “It’s been like this since ancient times. Girls before marriage must uphold modesty.”

“So I have to go to Feng Siruo’s house and fetch her back to mine?”

“Yes, and it can’t be done secretly. You must have her family’s approval.”

“You’re making this up, aren’t you?”

Ding Yue’s expression turned serious. “If a girl sneaks off to a boy’s house before marriage, how do you think it sounds when people gossip? She’d lose face!”

Jiang Zhou frowned slightly. “Who would dare look down on a little rich lady like Feng Siruo?”

“That’s true, but whatever privileges other girls get, our Siruo should have too.”

“So my dream of holding her while watching the Spring Festival Gala won’t come true?”

Feng Siruo, who had been eavesdropping, suddenly pictured the scene in her mind.

Her cheeks grew hot, and she jabbed him lightly with her elbow in protest.

Although her aunt had secretly expressed support for her and Jiang Zhou, Feng Siruo still hadn’t officially accepted his confession.

For someone with social anxiety, such a step required a lot of mental preparation.

“You’re thinking too far ahead. My Siruo is still a single little cutie,” Ding Yue teased.

“Really? I thought we were already together,” Jiang Zhou replied.

Feng Siruo shook her head firmly, refusing to admit to the vague relationship.

Most importantly, Jiang Zhou himself hadn’t properly confessed.

He sighed deeply. “Then I guess Feng Siruo will just have to wait a few more years for me.”

“Tch. Knew it. You don’t have the guts,” Ding Yue said.

“Mainly because I can’t face the Feng family just yet.”

“That’s fair. If you steal their princess away now, they’d skin you alive.”

“But then in a few years, the Spring Festival Gala will be boring! At least now we’ve still got Uncle Zhao to hold it together.”

At that moment, Huang Qi leaned over. “I can replace Feng Siruo and let you hold me while watching the Gala!”

Jiang Zhou’s eyes lit up. “That’s a great idea.”

“Right? And we can add Han Rou too. The three of us can stay up in the living room!”

“And then sneak into my bedroom to discuss some pleasant topics!”

Feng Siruo raised her head. “N-no, absolutely not.”

Huang Qi blinked. “Don’t be so stingy, Siruo.”

“No means no…”

“But we’re good friends!”

Ding Yue gave Huang Qi a sharp look. “What’s so good about this scumbag?”

Huang Qi fluttered her eyes. “You don’t understand. Only scumbags truly know a woman’s heart.”

“You… you’re already a woman?!”

“I’m a girl! Ding Yue, what’s in that head of yours?”

Flustered, Ding Yue muttered, “It’s full of studying!”

Huang Qi sighed helplessly. “Could you stop reading all those ridiculous novels?”

“I can’t find a boyfriend, and now I can’t even read novels?”

“If all you do is read novels and scratch your feet, you’ll never find one.”

Jiang Zhou finally cut them off. “Alright, enough nonsense. The teacher’s watching us.”

The two girls quickly looked up, and sure enough, the teacher on the podium was staring their way.

Though they were now college freshmen, the fear of being watched like in high school came rushing back. They immediately retreated.

The class passed uneventfully, and soon the bell rang at noon.

Students filed out of the classroom.

Jiang Zhou took Feng Siruo to the cafeteria.

After lunch, they strolled around campus before returning to their dorms.

But while passing the School of Information, they stumbled on a small scene.

An enforcement vehicle was parked downstairs, surrounded by a crowd of students.

The road was completely blocked.

A pimply-faced guy was being carried out by several staff members.

“I’m innocent! I didn’t do anything!” he wailed. “I’ve been wronged! I want to appeal!”

Jiang Zhou squeezed through the crowd for a look.

Hey, wasn’t that the programmer kid who helped build the food delivery website?

What had happened? Got caught hacking?

The programmer was nearly in tears as he shouted at the heavens, “It was my master who taught me everything! He showed me what real front-end development is! He revealed the true meaning of internet traffic! He gave me the keys to its secrets!”

Jiang Zhou sipped his soy milk and nudged the guy next to him. “What’s his deal? What did he do?”

“Oh, I heard he made a pirated movie-sharing site.”

“Really? What’s it called?”

“Movie Heaven.”

Jiang Zhou’s eyes widened.

So that notorious pirated torrent site was his programmer’s doing?

But wait. Was enforcement against piracy this strict in this era? Why were officers coming to school to arrest him?

Just then, the programmer spotted Jiang Zhou in the crowd.

“Master, I’ve been wronged!”

Jiang Zhou froze. “Since when am I your master?”

Tears streamed down the programmer’s face. “You’re the one who taught me to use pretty-girl pictures for website traffic!”

“What the! Don’t tell me you used that trick on your site?”

“Of course! I put loads of girl pictures on it, way more risqué than yours!”

Jiang Zhou couldn’t help but admire him. “Truly the student surpasses the master.”

“Surpasses my ass! They’re saying I illegally spread obscene content!” the programmer cried.

“What kind of pictures did you use for traffic?”

“I upgraded! Not static ones but animated ones! What’s wrong with that?!”

“What’s wrong? You basically went full ‘cars racing, arrows whistling, wheels flying, crushing faces’ mode!”

“What… what does that even mean?!”

Before he could get an answer, the staff dragged him into the vehicle.

Watching the scene, Jiang Zhou fell silent.

Reborns like him carried too much future knowledge. Tricks like sexy pop-up ads might be effective, but they didn’t belong in this era.

He’d have to be careful not to cause disruptions in history.

A pity. The real Movie Heaven site had endured for years without falling.

Now, thanks to plastering it with racy images, it had been taken down almost instantly.

What a shame.