CH 9.2

Luckily soon after, Duan Wenzheng quietly accompanied him to the intersection and did not continue to tease him.

After walking out of the mall, Xue Lan’s eyes were suddenly drawn toward a snack shop at one side—

He carried the shopping bags in his arms, eyes fixated on the dazzling lineup of snacks in the shop. As if his feet were rooted, he stopped walking.

Duan Wenzheng had walked ahead. When he saw that Xue Lan didn’t follow, he found the person behind him standing motionless by the road. He followed Xue Lan’s line of sight to see the snack shop on one side. His lips quirked into a half smile.

“Go in if you like it, why are you just standing there?”

Xue Lan then returned to his senses. Embarrassed, he tightened his grip on the shopping bags.

His health was bad in the past, so he naturally could not eat any snacks. When he saw other children eating snacks, he couldn’t help feeling envious. But now…could he also eat these snacks?

Xue Lan’s eyes brightened with this thought.

He was about to go into the snack shop when the person beside him suddenly took the shopping bags from his arms.

“If other people see that I made you carry these, won’t they say I’m bullying a child?”

“I’m not a child…”

Those words made a layer of red appear again on Xue Lan’s thin skin. He quickly turned around and ran inside the shop.

Duan Wenzheng followed behind him.

After Xue Lan chose some snacks that looked decent, he followed Duan Wenzheng out of the shop with content.

To express his gratitude, he handed a lollipop to Duan Wenzheng, but then seemed to be lost in thought as he remembered this section of the plot when Duan Wenzheng entered LGW.

In the original novel, Duan Wenzheng’s family was well-off, but now he left his house. During this period of time, he was cooped up in the internet cafe, he didn’t even have a good place to sleep.

According to the original plot, the recruitment discussion between Wen Yan and Duan Wenzheng today was turned down. Duan Wenzheng had nowhere to go now, but he had the thought of playing professionally. However, he wanted to start from the training camp first and work hard (he wanted to waste time since he did not want to be bound immediately by signing the contract), so he suggested going to the training camp.

And Wen Yan said that, in a few days, they would be participating in a semi-professional invitational tournament with considerable money awards. Besides the usual group mode, this tournament also had the individual competition of survival mode. Although the registration was already closed, he could sign up through LGW if he wanted to participate.

Duan Wenzheng who had left home for a month now did not have much money left.

Therefore, his date to enter the training camp was postponed by two weeks. In these two weeks, to avoid being called “LGW’s teammate”, he didn’t go into the club but chose to continue staying in the internet cafe to join LGW’s remote training.

So that meant…for two weeks, Duan Wenzheng would continue staying in this internet cafe that had no decent place to sleep.

The appearance of Duan Wenzheng from being starved, not wearing warm-enough clothes, and not getting quality sleep came into the mind of the respectful fan Xue Lan.

Xue Lan lowered his head and pondered for a long time. As if he had made a decision, he raised his head to look at Duan Wenzheng.

“Reset, do you want to…stay at my house?”

Duan Wenzheng was stumped for words. Before he could unwrap the candy that was just held between his fingertips, it fell to the ground with a clatter.

“Because I’ll go to the training camp tomorrow to register. You should…be joining the training camp two weeks later, right?” Xue Lan threw the broken candy into the bin and brought out a new one for him. “My house is nearby, you can stay at my house first.”

Duan Wenzheng returned to his senses and put on a thought-provoking smile. He didn’t take that candy and instead inched closer to look at Xue Lan.

“If you’re not home…why should I go?”

With the sudden proximity, Xue Lan retreated backward and smiled. “It’s fine even if I’m not home, if not you’ll keep staying in the internet cafe…”

“You’re still not leaving tonight though?” Duan Wenzheng followed his movements and stepped forward, pulling closer the distance between them again. “Won’t you invite me over?”

Xue Lan retreated again. He had never been so close with anyone before. Duan Wenzheng’s breath brushed his cheeks as he spoke, and it made the tip of his ears red again.

But as he thought about it again, this was nothing inappropriate. Although the original owner and Duan Wenzheng were “love rivals”, now that he was not the original owner, he would not fight over Wen Yan with Duan Wenzheng, so as long as he was good to Duan Wenzheng, they could become…good friends right?!

Besides, earlier they said to look after each other.

With this in mind, his eyes brightened once more. “Okay, I can bring you over.”

Seeing his smiling face that showed no hint of caution, Duan Wenzheng shook his head. He closed the distance between them again.