Chapter 123 — A Father and His Son of the Zhong Family [Monthly Tickets — Can I Have Some, Please? A New Chapter Is Up! Tang Zhi Asks: Got Any Monthly Tickets...]

Wei Zhao, though it did not hurt much, still smiled bitterly. Tang Zhi apparently found him deeply disagreeable. That morning he had been dreaming of cultivating a pure and innocent romance... and it had shattered so quickly.

It looked like Tang Zhi was more or less out of the question. That left only Shen Yushu, and even she seemed rather unlikely...

"Boss, how come Tang Zhi looks so full of resentment toward you?" Kang Xiaofeng had never been able to figure it out. Wei Zhao and Tang Zhi had not known each other before, so why had Tang Zhi been glaring at Wei Zhao from the very moment they met?

"If I knew, wouldn't that solve the problem?" Wei Zhao explained, somewhat speechless.

"True enough. Hey? Boss, do you think it could be that Tang Zhi likes you?" Kang Xiaofeng said suddenly.

"Huh? Likes me? What makes you say that?" Wei Zhao started, staring at Kang Xiaofeng in astonishment.

"I heard about a brother in one of the upper years at school. There was this girl who was the academic rep in his class, and she liked him, so she was always picking on him. Whenever he skipped class or something, he'd get a proper dressing-down from her..." Kang Xiaofeng said. "What do you say, could Tang Zhi be the same?"

Wei Zhao rolled his eyes. Can we stick to the facts here?

"That business you mentioned, sure, it's possible. But Tang Zhi has known me for two and a half days, and she already likes me? Is that likely?" Wei Zhao shook his head. If you put it that way, the young lady back home was always finding me disagreeable and giving me grief too—so does that mean she likes me as well?

"That's a fair point..." Kang Xiaofeng gave a dry laugh, and he and Wei Zhao walked on toward the school.

When they were nearly at the school gate, Kang Xiaofeng suddenly pointed at somewhere not far ahead. "Boss, look, it's Gu Mengyao and Shen Yushu..."

"Oh..." Wei Zhao had been keeping an eye on Gu Mengyao and Shen Yushu out of the corner of his vision the whole time, so he was not surprised.

"Huh? Boss, look at the car they're sitting in—it looks like the very same one you were just in!" Kang Xiaofeng's talent for spotting things was formidable indeed.

"Is that so? Must be a different one, no?" Wei Zhao gave a laugh. "Come on, let's not bother with them."

"True enough. Too far out of our reach—not exactly realistic." Kang Xiaofeng heaved a sigh heavy with the weariness of the world. "That feeling of rich folk sitting up high and mighty—I know it only too well..."

Wei Zhao had no idea why Kang Xiaofeng would suddenly wax so sentimental. But judging from these past few days together, Kang Xiaofeng's family circumstances, if not especially good, were hardly bad either—middling, at most. So what did that remark of his mean...?

Still, to keep Kang Xiaofeng from dwelling too much on the car, Wei Zhao asked no more, and quickened his pace alongside him into the school grounds.

A Mercedes-Benz S600L pulled up not far from the school gate, some distance from Uncle Qing's Bentley, though it did not draw any closer.

"That old devil Li Fu's car is up ahead, so we won't go over. Now, did you remember what I told you?" Zhong Fabai shot his son in the passenger seat a glare and scolded him in the tone of a man despairing of his son's worth.

"I remembered... Dad." Zhong Yongliang answered cautiously. "I won't go meddling in other people's business anymore..."

The "other people's business" he spoke of naturally referred to the matter of Wei Zhao. He dared not say that he had been out to make trouble for Wei Zhao; instead he laid the blame for seeking out Wei Zhao at Zhang Naipao's feet—Zhang Naipao had been stepped on by Wei Zhao, and so he had gone to settle the score. This way he could shed a little of the responsibility himself.

Zhong Fabai had moved through the underworld half in the dark and half in the light, so naturally he understood brotherly loyalty. Thus, over Zhong Yongliang getting even for a brother, he did not fly into too great a rage; he merely cursed his son out and told him to stop meddling in other people's affairs.

"Do you have any idea that this time you nearly ruined a good thing of mine? You put my right-hand man, Black Panther, behind bars—and I doubt he'll be out for years. Lucky for us he doesn't know much, otherwise..." Zhong Fabai snorted. "Remember this. Your first and foremost task at school is to hook that little tart Gu Mengyao. Nothing else is to be on your mind. Is that understood?"

"I understand, Dad. I'll do my best," Zhong Yongliang hastily assured him.

"Mm... Once you've got Gu Mengyao in hand, your father won't have to look to your uncle's moods anymore." Zhong Fabai patted Zhong Yongliang on the shoulder. "All right, off you go. Make haste—get the rice cooked before that old fox Gu Pengzhan catches on, or it'll be too late."

Zhong Fabai was no fool. He did have some influence in Songshan City, but compared to Gu Pengzhan, he was far outmatched. If Gu Pengzhan were openly recruiting a son-in-law, he would certainly never take a liking to Zhong Yongliang. So Zhong Fabai told his son to strike first and gain the upper hand.

Zhong Yongliang meekly agreed to his father's words. Though he hated Wei Zhao bitterly in his heart, with his father refusing to support him, Zhong Yongliang truly could not do anything to Wei Zhao on his own. But if his father backed him fully, if he brought a whole squad of security guards from the nightclub, Zhong Yongliang refused to believe that Wei Zhao's two fists could beat four hands—and even if they could beat four, what about ten? Twenty? He refused to believe the man could be beaten to death.

Wei Zhao, I'll let you off for now. Once I've hooked Gu Mengyao and my father is pleased enough to put his men at my disposal, that will be the day you die. Zhong Yongliang thought resentfully...

Unwilling as he was, he could only swallow it down and see if he could devise some small trouble to give Wei Zhao, just to disgust him a little. So long as it was not a direct confrontation, Wei Zhao would never suspect him...

"Yaoyao..." Zhong Yongliang dashed forward a couple of steps and chased after her.

"Yaoyao-jie, the fly's back again... See, I told you—if you'd just flown off together with Chewing Gum Bro sooner, you wouldn't have all this trouble..." Shen Yushu said with a grin, pointing behind her.

Gu Mengyao rolled her eyes and turned around with a hint of exasperation. "Zhong Yongliang, are you deaf?"

Zhong Yongliang was stunned. Why would Gu Mengyao suddenly call him deaf? What was going on? He had been the one calling out to her—why was she saying that about herself?

"Yaoyao... what do you mean? What do you mean, deaf?" Zhong Yongliang was baffled.

"Last time, at the school gate, you called me Yaoyao, and I told you then—don't call me Yaoyao, call me by my full name... So I can only conclude that either there's something wrong with your intelligence and your comprehension is poor, or you really are deaf," Gu Mengyao said.

Being mocked so scornfully by Gu Mengyao, Zhong Yongliang's expression immediately turned ugly. He cursed inwardly: You little wench, so what if you were born a bit prettier and come from a better family? Once I've won you over, heh heh, just you wait and see how I'll deal with you.

But since he hadn't won her over yet, Zhong Yongliang naturally kept his face pleasant and his manner fawning. "Heh heh, isn't my uncle a colleague of Uncle Chu's? That makes us family friends of a sort, so I thought calling you Yaoyao would sound a bit more intimate..."

"Oh, then call me whatever you like..." Gu Mengyao really could not be bothered with him anymore.

Hearing her words, Zhong Yongliang was instantly delighted. Did this mean Gu Mengyao had agreed to let him call her Yaoyao?

But her next words dashed Zhong Yongliang's hopes: "You can call me Yaoyao—I just won't answer."