Chapter 5: Actually, I'm From 2024
"You jerk! I hinted so much! You were sitting by the back door of Class Two, so I could see you on the way to the restroom."
Mei Lili was trembling with anger. Gu Muxue was her perfect goddess, and Xue Rui's vulgar words sullied Gu Muxue's image.
Xue Rui was very off today. Not only did he laugh and make sarcastic remarks, but he also made fun of her goddess, Gu Muxue. It was too much.
"You mean Gu Muxue was peeking at me?" Xue Rui thought Mei Lili had taken the wrong medicine. She'd just gone to the restroom a few times, and she'd already fantasized an entire romance novel in her head.
Girls this age were too scattered in their thoughts; he couldn't quite keep up.
"Let's eat together later. I'll ask her directly," Xue Rui muttered to himself.
Mei Lili thought Xue Rui realized his mistake. She crossed her arms and said triumphantly, "Too late~ You made Muxue angry, so she went home early today."
A look of reminiscence flashed in Xue Rui's eyes. He remembered that Gu Muxue was a day student who went home after evening self-study every day. The fact that she didn't even attend evening self-study today meant she was probably truly angry.
The reason he could remember these things was simple: after evening self-study every day, many couples would secretly hold hands under the cover of night, meeting in various hidden corners of the campus.
Perhaps out of jealousy, Xue Rui often pretended to be a dean's office teacher with a powerful flashlight, teasing these young boys and girls for fun. Watching couples 'scatter like birds facing a great disaster,' he couldn't have been happier.
Watching Xue Rui lost in thought, Mei Lili assumed he was deeply reflecting. She walked grandly towards the back door of Class Two with her hands behind her back, taking large steps but moving very slowly.
Mei Lili was waiting for Xue Rui to stop her, to beg her to say a few good words for him to Gu Muxue.
Suddenly, she felt a weight on her head. Her braid was grabbed by a large hand.
"Hehe, just wiping my nose." Xue Rui smoothed his hand along the thick braid, rubbing his nose while pretending to wipe his hands. He hadn't forgotten how Mei Lili had startled him earlier.
Mei Lili's small face visibly turned red.
Of course, it wasn't shyness, but she had entered 'overheat' mode.
She took a deep breath, and Xue Rui quickly covered his ears.
"Ah!!!!"
The scream was as sharp, explosive, and deafening as a steam train's whistle.
The explosive scream silenced the hallway for three seconds, but it quickly returned to its original noisy atmosphere. After all, such things were quite common in a high school campus.
"I'm definitely telling Gu Muxue tomorrow!" Mei Lili stormed off, but not before grabbing a book from Qiu Mengze's desk and throwing it hard at Xue Rui.
"Shorty, you motherf...%...&&"
The biggest victim appeared. Qiu Mengze had half a page of an English book cover stuck to his face, and he stuck his head out the window, cursing like a fishwife.
He had been sleeping soundly when Mei Lili's long shriek nearly scared him to death. His heart hadn't recovered yet, and the veins on his forehead were still throbbing wildly.
August in Hedong City was unusually hot. Sweat, like glue, stuck the book to Qiu Mengze's acne-scarred face. When he woke with a start and looked up, he ripped off the book cover.
He touched his face, tearing off half a page of the book cover.
"Stay away from me," Xue Rui said with a look of disgust.
"If you hadn't teased her, would she have screamed like that?" Qiu Mengze was displeased. Although he didn't know the exact details, he had a good guess.
He looked up at the clock hanging at the back of the classroom, then remembered something and raised an eyebrow, saying,
"Going tonight? A new internet cafe just opened in Guomao. The beautiful girl at the front desk is really..."
"Is she as pretty as Gu Muxue? Would she even look at you?" Xue Rui interrupted.
"You're being boring. You're a full man who doesn't know the hunger of an empty one. Being with a goddess of that level every day, everyone else seems ordinary to you."
Qiu Mengze rubbed his face. Xue Rui always liked to interrupt his beautiful fantasies.
"Idiot, you'll understand later how precious, pure, and naturally beautiful high school girls are. How can those flashy women outside compare?" Xue Rui sneered.
Men, they were always like this. When young, they liked mature women;
When they got older, they preferred young girls who were 'three years and up'.
Young men don't appreciate high school girls, mistakenly transplanting their youth.
"You talk as if you have so much experience? You haven't dated anyone either?" Qiu Mengze retorted a few times, then his face filled with yearning again:
"Anyway, when I get to college, I'm definitely going to have a passionate romance! And spend my life with the one I love."
Xue Rui was speechless. In his previous life, under his influence, Qiu Mengze also studied diligently and eventually got into a second-tier university;
However, when he graduated, Qiu Mengze still couldn't find a partner. Instead, he was scammed out of a lot of money by various older and younger female students.
"Finding a partner in college? Girls in college are more goal-oriented. Those who make it to the end are often the ones who got together in high school." Xue Rui spoke very tactfully, not wanting to discourage Qiu Mengze too much. The true reality was even more hurtful.
Firstly, college classmates came from all over the country. Upon graduation, they would face a lifetime of long-distance relationships, or one party would voluntarily give up their hometown. The result was that graduation season became breakup season;
But couples who got together in high school were already from the same city. Even if they had conflicts during college due to long-distance or other reasons, as long as they returned to their hometown after college graduation, with their existing emotional foundation, marriage was almost a natural progression.
Secondly, the content of comparisons in college and high school was completely different. In high school, everyone wore uniforms and ate in the cafeteria, so there were very few things to compare, mostly shoes and phones, which were not a heavy burden for a family, and few classmates cared about their romantic partner's family background;
But college students were more realistic. In college, there were classmates who drove BMWs to class. For many male students from ordinary families, this was undoubtedly a dimension-reducing blow.
Qiu Mengze's family was average. His parents sold fish at the wet market. Supporting him through college was definitely not a problem, but he had high standards. The girls he liked were all 'gold-swallowers'. For Qiu Mengze's family to compete with these, they were still far too short.
As for finding a girlfriend based on personal charm? If Qiu Mengze had personal charm, would he still be single now?
In short, generally speaking, those who had partners in college also had partners in high school;
Those who didn't have partners in high school would most likely spend four years in college hugging computer games.
Moreover, as girls grew older, their intelligence also rose sharply, making them less easy to fool.
"The male-to-female ratio in popular majors is often two extremes: some are parched to death, others are drowned."
"How do you know so much?"
"Actually, I'm from 2024."
"Oh? This script is new. Tell me more."
"Actually, I'm 29 this year."
"Why don't you say you're 92 this year?"
...
The two bantered for a while.
"Also, it's not that I can't find a girlfriend, I just don't want to settle," Xue Rui added calmly.
Qiu Mengze didn't refute that statement, because bragging didn't hurt, but the truth was a sharp knife.
Even though everyone knew Xue Rui was pursuing Gu Muxue, occasionally, young girls would still write him love letters.
Whenever Qiu Mengze saw a girl with a red face, twisting and turning, coming to him, he would first be delighted, thinking she was infatuated with his dashing figure;
Until she pulled out a love letter and said, "Please give this to Xue Rui," his heart felt as if it had been violently thrown to the ground and stomped on a few times. He couldn't describe how awful it felt.
But, he did whatever Xue Rui did. Xue Rui smoked, he smoked. Xue Rui played basketball, he played basketball... The two of them did almost exactly the same things, so why did those girls only look at Xue Rui and not him?
Xue Rui was only a little taller and a tiny bit more handsome than him, that's all.
Thinking of this, Qiu Mengze's teeth ached with envy. He gave Xue Rui a deep look: "Rui Ge! Please teach your little brother a few tricks!"
"First, quit smoking. Some people smoke like Leslie Cheung, some people smoke like Liu Huaqiang..."
Qiu Mengze listened intently to the 'senior's' earnest teachings, but the more he listened, the more he felt something was off. It was all unhelpful advice like "read more books, read more newspapers, eat fewer snacks, sleep more," with no killer secrets whatsoever.
"You're holding out, that's not brotherly!" Qiu Mengze slapped the table, making a 'clap clap' sound.
"Finding a partner is a huge deal. Tell me, when have I ever lied to you about important matters?" Xue Rui said with a serious expression.
Qiu Mengze thought carefully. Every time he encountered something he couldn't handle, his good brother helped him. Seeing Xue Rui's expression, he really wasn't sure anymore.
"Let's continue our previous topic. In more than ten years, I'll be worth tens of millions, with..."
Qiu Mengze had a premonition that Xue Rui's bragging would go on for a while, so he interrupted, "Tell me about me first."
"You? You'll be delivering takeout during the day, cursing at security guards, and at night, you'll be a security guard, cursing at takeout drivers..."