22: Think about it - 1

After playing Valorant all night, Jiang Ye put down his mouse with satisfaction, rubbing his slightly sore wrist.

Outside the window, the sky had completely darkened. Inside the room, only a desk lamp was lit, illuminating his teammates on the computer screen who were gathered around a cute female player calling her 'mommy'.

He stretched comfortably, feeling that not having to go to work was just too damn good.

As he relaxed, hunger crept in.

Jiang Ye glanced at his phone. WeChat showed several unread messages, all from 'Yaoyao'.

Yaoyao: [Brother Ye, are you busy? Have you eaten?]

Yaoyao: [The lounge is so boring, I really wish you'd come play~]

Yaoyao: [Brother Ye, Brother Ye, what are you doing? (cat peeking.jpg)]

Yaoyao: [Wah wah, there's an Assessment in the lounge tomorrow. Everyone has to complete a Streaming Task, I'm a bit nervous...]

Yaoyao: [Brother Ye, do you have time to come see me in the lounge tomorrow?]

Yaoyao: [(Voice message 5″)]

Yaoyao: [Brother Ye... please talk to me...]

After reading through it all, the keyword extraction result: zero.

No 'milk tea', no 'red envelope', and certainly no 'takeout'.

It was all empty greetings and full of schemes, not a shred of substantial 'sincerity' to be seen.

"Tsk."

Jiang Ye clicked his tongue in disappointment, then casually opened Meituan and began fishing in the ocean of food for tonight's prey.

His finger scrolled past barbecue, fried chicken, spicy hot pot, foot massage parlors, ramen, milk tea... finally stopping at a 'Jiao Ai Boiled Fish' restaurant located in Joy City.

The picture showed a bubbling red oil, bright chili peppers, snow-white fish slices faintly visible, with abundant side dishes. Just looking at it made one's mouth water.

In the middle of winter, having a steaming hot, spicy and fragrant pot of boiled fish, paired with two bowls of rice and a bottle of ice-cold cola, while watching a binge-worthy variety show... that would be a heavenly life.

Unfortunately, after adding it to the cart, the high price of 140 instantly extinguished the little flame in Jiang Ye's heart.

He silently glanced at the pitiful 780 yuan in his WeChat, decisively exited the page, and re-entered 'Lanzhou Ramen' in the search bar.

Beef ramen, extra portion 14 yuan, regular portion 10 yuan.

Jiang Ye didn't even think before choosing the basic 10-yuan option, then skillfully typed a line in the order notes:

[Boss, may you have a good life! Please add more noodles, thank you boss!]

This, is the wisdom of life!

Based on his years of 'noodle-scrounging' experience, this trick had about a fifty-fifty success rate, entirely depending on the boss's current mood.

Hmm... if this shop really adds extra noodles, once his 'soft rice' career takes off, he must come back to repay the favor!

Order a hundred bowls of ramen at once, then boldly note: [No noodles, no meat, no soup! Just have the delivery person bring me the plastic bags, I'm out of trash bags.]

Just imagining that scene made Jiang Ye break out in goosebumps.

Order placed successfully. While waiting for the delivery, he opened JD.com again and plunged into the ocean of stockings.

Twenty minutes later, the door was knocked, the delivery had arrived.

Taking the bag, Jiang Ye habitually weighed it in his hand.

Hmm... it feels a bit heavier than usual?

Opening it up, the ratio of broth to beef was quite generous, and the noodles were piled higher than usual.

He immediately took out his phone, opened Meituan, and directly gave a five-star review: [Noodles are chewy, broth is delicious, beef is generous! Boss is honest, will come again!]

Good merchant! Once my 'soft rice' career succeeds, I will repay you handsomely!

Pouring the noodles into his own big bowl and setting up his chopsticks, Jiang Ye slurped the steaming hot noodles while opening WeChat, finding Ye Cheng's chat window, and sending over all the links for those four to five hundred yuan stockings he had just picked out on JD.com.

[JD.com link: XXXXX High-end open-toe lace...]

[JD.com link: XXXXX Ultra-thin breathable...]

[JD.com link: XXXXX Compression slimming...]

He didn't add a single word, focusing on 'silence speaks louder than words,' letting Ye Cheng herself understand his current 'urgent' need for 'warmth' and 'quality.'

Sure enough, less than ten seconds after sending the messages, Ye Cheng's replies came crashing down like a storm, the screen filled with question marks and various emojis expressing shock and speechlessness.

A Very Big Orange: [?]

A Very Big Orange: [???]

A Very Big Orange: [Jiang Ye, are you okay?]

A Very Big Orange: [Why are you sending me so many stocking links? Is this sexual harassment?]

A Very Big Orange: [Have you upgraded from Pervert? From hinting to outright stating it?]

A Very Big Orange: [Talk! Are you playing dead?]

Facing Ye Cheng's rapid-fire questions, Jiang Ye calmly slurped his noodles, not replying with a single word.

Of course, he couldn't reply anyway.

Let her guess. As she said, this was already outright stating it. It just depended on when she couldn't take it anymore and would grace him with a pair.

He swiped his finger, switching to Yaoyao's chat interface.

After sending messages to Ye Cheng, looking back at the seven or eight messages Yaoyao had sent earlier, Jiang Ye suddenly sensed something.

The messages this woman sent seemed to have a similar effect to his own operation just now?

Both were trying to make the other feel their 'urgent' need through dense information bombardment.

Except he sent abstract stocking links, while Yaoyao sent concrete emotional texts.

He thought for a moment, then sent a simple question mark back.

Yaoyao: [Brother, you finally replied to me! Were you busy just now?]

Jiang Ye: [Yeah, eating.]

Yaoyao: [Oh oh, what are you eating? I don't have a shift tonight, so bored. Want to play games together? Or we can watch a movie while on call~]

Jiang Ye didn't take up her offer. Instead, he scrolled up through the chat history and directly dialed a voice call.

"Beep... beep..."

"Hello... hello? Brother~"

After ringing a few times, the call was answered. Yaoyao's voice carried a hint of panting, slightly more genuine than during her streams.

"Su... ahem, Yaoyao, what's that Assessment you mentioned in your messages earlier? What is it? Sounds pretty serious?"

Yaoyao on the other end seemed not to have expected him to ask this directly, pausing slightly before her tone became somewhat downcast and helpless:

"Sigh, our lounge is newly opened, right? The Guild has streaming Assessments for us. Tomorrow is Sunday, Assessment day. Everyone has to complete their own Streaming Task. If we don't complete it... not only is it embarrassing for ourselves, but it also affects the whole lounge's rating, dragging down other sisters so they can't get good recommendation resources. But, but I don't have any fixed brothers right now, that's why..."

Her voice grew softer as she spoke, carrying a hint of caution, sounding pitiful and easily evoking a protective urge.

But Jiang Ye's attention wasn't on the other's emotions at all, instead weirdly drifting off... He keenly caught the faint sound of clothes rustling in the background of the call, and Yaoyao's somewhat unnatural, faint panting as she spoke.

Holy shit?

What's this woman panting for?

This noise... this tone... she couldn't be 'working' while answering the call, could she?

Did I just passively experience a cuckold scenario?

"Yaoyao, what are you doing? Why are you panting while talking?"

"Ah? I'm jogging, brother. I go out for a night jog every evening."

Jiang Ye immediately had three black lines on his forehead.

Damn! It's this excuse again!

If it's not jogging, it's working out. If the noise gets louder, it's probably twisting an ankle or bumping a leg!

Can't these people have a bit more creativity?