Chapter 42: No One Can Bully You

“Huh?”

Chen Lu stared at her blankly, confused.

“What are you talking about? I don’t understand.”

He then turned to Liang Zhirou, “Did you understand?”

The girl shook her head again. She really didn’t understand.

Lin Miaomiao couldn’t speak. She inexplicably felt that these two were on the same side, so she just rolled her eyes at Chen Lu and pushed the menu towards Liang Zhirou.

“Just order whatever you want, order lots of your favorites. After all, you’ve helped me a lot.”

In fact, Chen Lu, who had been acting carefree all this time, was the one who had helped the drama club the most, but Lin Miaomiao couldn’t admit it.

She would rather die than see Chen Lu’s smug expression.

As she spoke, she linked her arm with Liang Zhirou’s, “Come on, see what you want to eat! Chen Lu and I will listen to you today.”

Seeing Liang Zhirou studying the menu with some nervousness, Chen Lu found it amusing. Although this silly girl worked part-time at the hotpot restaurant, she definitely wouldn’t be willing to spend her own money for a meal.

He wasn’t in a hurry. He took out his phone and flipped through it casually, waiting for Liang Zhirou to take her time.

Then, he suddenly saw a red dot with the number 99 next to the QQ icon on his desktop. He froze for a moment.

What the heck?

As a person with OCD who couldn’t stand even a single red dot on the screen, he couldn’t bear it.

Out of curiosity, he clicked on it and found that all the messages were friend requests…

Many people even directly cursed in the verification message.

Good heavens, there were several pages of friend requests, all because of Mo Yuqing’s public apology to him.

Chen Lu couldn’t help but think, how stupid are this year’s freshmen? Last year’s juniors weren’t so aggressive.

A bunch of immature lemons, actually doing things only elementary school kids would do.

He smirked and put his phone back on the table.

When the people trying to make you angry are too stupid, you just find it amusing.

At this time, Lin Miaomiao couldn’t wait any longer and asked, “Haven’t you ordered yet? Just order what you want.”

Liang Zhirou clasped her fingers together and said with some hesitation, “I, I’m thinking about what you and Chen Lu like to eat…”

Chen Lu poked Liang Zhirou’s cheek with the tip of his chopsticks and chuckled, “I like to eat what you like to eat. Hurry up, I’m starving.”

“Oh…”

After a while, the silly girl finally finished ordering.

Whether it was Chen Lu or Lin Miaomiao, whenever they casually mentioned their favorite foods in a conversation, she would remember.

Baby bok choy and tripe were Chen Lu’s favorites, lettuce and bean curd sheets were Lin Miaomiao’s favorites.

She just didn’t consider what she liked.

“It seems like there are only hotpot restaurants now. There are no other restaurants,” Lin Miaomiao complained after taking a few bites.

“It’s either hotpot or barbecue, or hotpot buffet or barbecue buffet.”

Liang Zhirou nodded. She also found it strange.

When she came to Hangzhou as a child, she often saw restaurants of various cuisines. Now there were not many left. This city was now called a food desert.

When the silly girl’s gaze fell on Chen Lu, he sighed helplessly and said, “Because the cost of opening a hotpot restaurant is much lower than a regular restaurant.”

“How much different can it be?” Lin Miaomiao asked again in her stupid voice.

Chen Lu was still looking at Liang Zhirou and patiently explained, “Traditional Chinese restaurants have one flavor per store. Even if you’re the owner, you have to rely on the head chef. If he quits, the style of your restaurant’s dishes will change drastically, and you might lose a lot of customers.

Moreover, the training period and salary of chefs are also a problem.”

“Hotpot restaurants are different. You just need to prepare the base soup and anyone can open one. You don’t need a chef. You can focus your energy on training service staff and fancy marketing. Isn’t that how Haidilao became so popular?”

After listening to Chen Lu’s long explanation, Lin Miaomiao stopped arguing with him. She bit down on her straw fiercely and vented her anger with the juice.

She had to admit that Chen Lu was a little bit smarter than her.

A little bit.

The three of them chatted about everything under the sun, as college students do.

Liang Zhirou spoke less, spending most of her time using the public chopsticks to secretly clip meat and vegetables for Chen Lu, occasionally giving Lin Miaomiao a little bit too.

Chen Lu felt that his small bowl never stayed empty.

No matter how fast he ate, there would always be new food in it.

Lin Miaomiao watched silently, thinking that she would find a boyfriend sooner or later.

After a while, Chen Lu couldn’t take it anymore.

“You’ve only eaten so little? I see you’ve been busy clipping food for me.” He took a unused pair of chopsticks from the side and kept poking Liang Zhirou’s cheek.

This time, Chen Lu used a little more force, poking the girl so that she couldn’t help but close her eye on that side, but even so, she didn’t dodge.

“I’ve eaten a lot,” Liang Zhirou argued.

Chen Lu didn’t believe her and continued to bully her. The girl’s cheeks were soft and her skin was good. It was really fun to poke.

She looked so tender, I wonder what it would feel like to kiss her.

“Finally, there’s some meat on your face.”

It seemed like his feeding plan was a success.

He was surprised at first, but then he frowned again and asked in a low voice, “Is your fringe even longer than that night?”

“It was already long enough, why did you grow it even longer?”

Liang Zhirou lowered her head and nibbled on her fingers, saying, “It’s not easy to be bullied…”

Chen Lu wasn’t a girl. The beautiful girls around him were all pampered. Even though he could guess, it was hard to imagine what kind of trouble Liang Zhirou’s beautiful eyes would bring her.

She didn’t deliberately grow her fringe at first. It was just that later, even when she lowered her head, some people would notice that she was beautiful and want to bully her. The strange looks made her feel uncomfortable. Some people would come up to chat her up, and she could only run away.

Every time this happened, she would deliberately grow it a little longer.

Over time, it became what it is now.

She was alone and helpless in this city, and she was the only pillar of support for her family. She could only hide herself and beg not to be bothered by anyone.

It turned out that this worked. Now, few people looked at her with lustful eyes.

Moreover, she now had a boy who would look into her eyes with a smile…

Chen Lu stopped poking her cheek and instead gently pressed her forehead with his chopsticks, reminding her to lift her head.

“It’s okay, I told you before, I’m here.” He chuckled, “No one can bully you, not even Lin Miaomiao.”

“What does it have to do with me?!” Lin Miaomiao was stuffing a large piece of baby bok choy into her mouth, not caring about her manners, and retorted with a mouthful of food.

After she finished, she continued to eat.

Liang Zhirou stared at Chen Lu quietly, her eyes widening slightly, becoming a little watery.

Her whole heart was trembling.