It was the evening of the first friday after the start of the new semester at Yangcheng Lingnan Institute of Engineering, on February 21st.
Inside 305 Dormitory of Building 10, Ye Su, a junior, was lying on his bed, a worried expression on his face, staring at his phone, lost in thought.
"Holy crap! This year, there are over 12 million graduates, and over 13 million people are preparing for the college entrance exam! In the next ten years, an estimated 120 million college students will graduate!"
Suddenly, a wail from below the opposite bed interrupted Ye Su's thoughts.
Turning his head, he saw the words "Matching" on Fang Zewei's screen; he was clearly scrolling through short videos in the brief interval of restarting a game.
A single stone stirred up a thousand ripples.
Fang Zewei's words instantly made the other two roommates also wail.
"So after graduation, I'll have to fight for food with so many people until I'm 35!"
"Fang Zewei! If you're going to play games, then play games! Why are you looking at such filthy stuff!"
"Oh, my Lord! I'm innocent! Who is this? Who put this video on my phone!"
"You admit this is your phone then!"
Listening to the three drama kings start their usual banter, Ye Su's inner worries eased a little.
On the bunk next to him, Jiang Zhibin, who regarded Cao Dahua, the "Tiger of the Serious Crime Unit," as his lifelong idol, began to fantasize:
"I really hope that as soon as I graduate, some female entrepreneur with keen insight will recognize my talent at a glance, recruit me into her group. Then I'll do nothing all day but watch her meetings. How happy would that be!"
"And then she'll assign you to the most dangerous department in the group, right?"
"Give it a rest. You should go look in the mirror in the bathroom. To be the group's tiger, you'd at least need Boss Ye's pretty boy physique and good looks."
Boss Ye's family owned a small factory, so his three roommates often called him "Boss Ye."
As for the good looks Fang Zewei mentioned, Ye Su was indeed not bad.
To say he was as handsome as Daniel Wu or Edison Chen would be an exaggeration, but among men, Ye Su could be considered above average.
At one meter eighty tall, and always tidily dressed when he went out, he was the type of boy who received love letters in school.
Seeing the topic shift to himself, Ye Su could only do a sit-up and play along with his three roommates:
"You're too kind, honestly, when I was little, my dad took me to a fortune teller, and the fortune teller said I was destined to be a kept man."
"What a coincidence, isn't it? When I was little, my dad also took me to a fortune teller, and that person also said it would be a pity if I didn't become a kept man later."
"What? Do you two have the same dad?"
Fang Zewei, the instigator of this big drama, immediately turned his head upon hearing this: "Isn't that me?"
Ye Su and Jiang Zhibin said in unison: "Get lost!"
Just then, the game matching succeeded, and after Fang Zewei gave a signal, he started to play the next game.
"No, I still need to learn a few more tricks from the Grandmaster to prepare for the future!"
Saying that, Jiang Zhibin also picked up his phone again and opened the short video platform.
【First solve the quantity problem, then solve the quality problem.】
【I can give my heart, but not my money.】
【Money is for women to see, not for women to spend.】
The old Jiang Zhibin would scoff, but the current him was studying frame by frame.
"Tomorrow is the first weekend after school starts. How about we go clubbing at House Bar tomorrow night?" After selecting his hero, Fang Zewei suddenly suggested.
"I have things to do these two days, so I won't go."
Before the other two could speak, Ye Su had already answered first: "You guys go, I have things to do these two days."
"Alright then."
Ye Su never liked the noisy and complicated environments of bars. In his two and a half years of college, the number of times he went to such places with the three of them was very few, and Fang Zewei just assumed Ye Su was making an excuse for that reason.
But only Ye Su knew that his refusal was not only for that reason, but also because of the changes that happened at home at the end of last year.
That was, their family's factory, which had been open for twenty years, finally couldn't hold on and closed down.
Actually, in earlier years, Ye Su's family relied on this factory for hundreds of thousands of yuan in income each year, which was considered a well-off family in the county town.
Until "those three years" came, the factory's situation worsened day by day, with continuous deficits. Plus, Boss Ye was a conscientious boss; not only did he not make money, but he also put a lot of money into it.
After much hardship, they finally survived "those three years" and thought things would finally get better, but unexpectedly, things went against their wishes.
Until November of last year, the changes in the downstream factory became the last straw that broke the camel's back.
Although they packed and sold all the factory equipment, those old machines couldn't fetch a good price, not even enough to cover the workers' wages and compensation.
His family didn't tell Ye Su the specific situation, but Ye Su also knew that his family was now at least hundreds of thousands of yuan in debt, and his dad had switched to driving a ride-sharing car.
The only comfort was that his family hadn't fallen apart because of this; his mother, besides managing the household, had always silently supported his father, not putting any pressure on him.
Before Ye Su went home for the winter break, his mother even called specifically to remind Ye Su not to mention these things in front of his dad.
But when Ye Su returned home and saw his father, whom he hadn't seen for only a few months, with frosted white hair at his temples, his heart still felt heavy.
It turned out that his parents truly wouldn't wait for him to be fully prepared before they started to age.
In this situation, if he were to use his family's money to sing "Father" at KTV or order those dozens of yuan a bottle of beer, Ye Su would slap himself.
The other two roommates lost interest when they heard Ye Su wasn't going to the bar, and the impromptu suggestion was dropped.
Ye Su, on the other hand, began to calculate how much money he had left.
With the factory closed, perhaps fearing that their family would borrow money, the New Year this year was noticeably quieter.
However, the red envelopes from his aunt and uncle were much thicker than in previous years, resulting in Ye Su's red envelopes exceeding the 8,000 yuan mark for the first time after the New Year.
Adding the few thousand yuan of pocket money he had left before, Ye Su's total assets were nearly 12,000 yuan, which was considered a large sum.
"This semester's living expenses and next year's tuition for senior year are covered. As long as I do some part-time work on weekends and a summer job during the summer, I should be able to save enough for senior year's living expenses and money for internships."
Given his family's situation, it was difficult for Ye Su to comfortably ask for money. He could only find ways to minimize his family's burden and, after graduating from college and finding a job, share the family's debt with his older brother and two older sisters.
But as soon as he thought of the "number of graduates" that Fang Zewei had just mentioned, Ye Su felt the pressure double.
"Sigh—"
Ye Su sighed deeply in his heart, unable to help but start fantasizing unrealistically:
"It would be great if I had a system or something right now. I really want a system!"
【Ding!】
Suddenly, an electronic sound rang out, interrupting Ye Su's fantasy.
【Detection successful, system loading...】
【Daily Intelligence System is about to bind, host, are you willing to bind?】
【Yes \ No?】
For a moment, Ye Su thought one of his roommates was listening to an audio novel.
But when an electronic screen truly appeared before his eyes, Ye Su finally became clear that he had truly become the chosen one!
"The system is here already? Is this like Long Aotian, where sincerity is enough?"
Ye Su hadn't thought that he could bind a system without having to "stumble upon good luck" outdoors!
【Countdown ten seconds. Host, please confirm whether to bind the system. If the time limit is exceeded, it will be considered as giving up the binding.】
【Ten.】