Chapter 30: The Student Council Armband
Under the glow of the setting sun, Gu Tang pulled Gu Qinian toward the school gate.
There were plenty of girls in the school walking arm in arm, but it was much less common to see two boys holding hands. And on top of that, the two of them were both strikingly good-looking, strolling openly through campus and attracting plenty of attention.
Gu Tang had sharp eyes and quickly noticed all those curious stares.
A few girls even saw them and immediately leaned together, giggling and whispering, with expressions exactly like Zhu Xu whenever he was gossiping over drama.
Gu Tang: “……”
He suddenly remembered the comments under that trending topic about him and young master Gu earlier today.
A lot of netizens were openly shipping them as a couple.
He had exited quickly enough, otherwise he probably would have seen short fanfiction pieces being written on the spot.
He did not want young master Gu to get caught up in weird rumors.
After thinking about it, Gu Tang quietly let go of young master Gu’s hand.
Feeling the empty space in his palm, Gu Qinian glanced at him. “What’s wrong?”
Gu Tang could not explain the whole people are shipping us thing. For some reason, he felt a little guilty, and without turning to look at young master Gu’s face, he rubbed his palm against his school uniform pants. “It’s a little hot. My hand got sweaty.”
“……”
Gu Qinian said nothing, only frowned slightly, suspicion showing in his eyes.
Gu Tang stiffened his neck and added, “Really! It’s not that I don’t want to hold your hand!”
…Ah! Why did he say it like that?!
[Host, this is bad! The plot sea is turning dark again…]
The system did not even need to remind him.
Young master Gu’s face had already darkened right in front of him. How could he not tell?
Sigh, with such a clingy younger brother, what choice did he have?
To keep the male lead from continuing to darken and skewing the plot, Gu Tang could only, with the spirit of someone bravely sacrificing himself, stuff the hand that had just “wiped away sweat” back into Gu Qinian’s palm.
Fine, hold hands then.
Compared with young master Gu’s mood, what did a few stares or some people shipping them matter?
Some people even shipped Guan Yu and Zhang Fei.
Gu Tang comforted himself with that thought.
And strangely enough, the moment he took Gu Qinian’s hand again, the system informed him that the color of the plot sea had returned to normal.
[Host, you’re amazing! You control the male lead’s emotions so firmly, like a switch!]
A switch represented activation. In the system world, that was the highest form of praise.
The system’s admiration for its host increased several more degrees.
But Gu Tang could not feel happy about it.
When he was little, young master Gu had not liked talking, and he had been awkward and tsundere, but he was not too hard to read. Lately, though, Gu Tang understood him less and less.
[Host, why not take this chance to ask the male lead why his mood keeps changing? Know yourself and know your enemy—]
The system quietly offered a suggestion.
“Alright.”
Gu Tang thought for a moment. “…Let me organize my wording first.”
Stepping on his own shadow as he walked, Gu Tang slowly said, “I have a friend…”
Ugh, what a terrible opening line.
But he forced himself to continue. “His younger brother is about our age, and ever since starting junior high, his mood changes have become especially dramatic and impossible to guess. My friend is really worried about his brother. So do you think… this could be that legendary rebellious phase?”
As he spoke, he secretly glanced at young master Gu.
Only to crash straight into the other boy’s deep black eyes.
Gu Qinian looked at him with a gaze that saw through everything and said flatly, “That friend—isn’t you?”
Gu Tang: “!!!”
“No!”
On instinct, he denied it at once, shaking his little head like a rattling drum.
Gu Qinian worried he would shake himself dizzy, so he raised his free hand and held his head still. “Then who is it? Do you really have some friend I don’t know about?”
Gu Tang blurted out the first name he could think of, tossing the blame away at random. “Jiang Yiwen! He told me not to say!”
Gu Qinian narrowed his eyes, clearly not believing him. “Oh? Besides Jiang Yiyi as his younger sister, he also has a younger brother?”
The Jiang siblings were twins, one boy and one girl. Even if the Jiang family had a second or third child, there was no way they would be in the same grade as them.
Gu Tang stammered, “Ah… it’s a younger sister. I misspoke. My friend’s younger sister.”
Right. In just that short amount of time, he had managed to dump the whole rebellious youth phase problem onto Jiang Yiyi.
Gu Qinian let out a short laugh. “And now you want to change my gender too?”
Gu Tang: “……”
Forget it. He could not explain this clearly anymore!
Since childhood, young master Gu had always been beautiful, but he had also always hated it when people said he looked like a girl.
Luckily, after growing taller, Gu Qinian’s body had become more and more slender and distinctly masculine. No one said he looked like a girl anymore. People only thought he was devastatingly handsome.
But if you looked more closely, you would realize just how dazzlingly gorgeous that face really was.
Cold pale skin, long phoenix eyes, starry-black pupils, a delicate high nose bridge, crimson lips…
The only thing he had lost was the babyish bun-face from childhood.
Young master Gu’s exquisite features were set in a palm-sized face, and even Gu Tang, who had been looking at him for over ten years, still found himself staring blankly from time to time.
Who would ever get tired of looking at beauty?
Under the slightly annoyed gaze of the other boy, Gu Tang’s mind still had time to wander elsewhere.
Secretly, he thought that with young master Gu’s looks, if he really had been his little sister, that might not have been bad at all.
And Gu Qinian had looked especially good in a dress!
That had been back in kindergarten, during a class performance.
Their Little Sunflower Class One had drawn the stage play Snow White.
Since it was Snow White, of course they wanted the fairest child in the class to play the role. Gender was not that important anyway. They were all little children—once you put them in a little dress, you could not really tell.
So Gu Qinian, with his outstanding looks and snow-pale skin, stood out immediately.
The whole class voted for him to play Snow White.
Gu Tang had also enthusiastically cast his own precious vote.
From the very first time he saw young master Gu, he had thought the other boy had white skin and red lips, just like the Snow White from fairy tales.
Sadly, Gu Qinian had resisted with all his might. The moment he saw the teacher bring out the skirt, his brows furrowed as if locked shut, and his face was full of refusal.
In order to satisfy his own desire to enjoy the sight, Gu Tang had no choice but to sacrifice himself and trick young master Gu by saying he would wear one too.
Half believing and half doubting, young master Gu had actually agreed.
The final performance went very smoothly, but it also permanently created a dark chapter in their history.
To this day, on the Gu family wall of framed photos, there was still one tucked away in the corner—little Gu Qinian in a puffy Snow White dress, holding a large red apple, while Gu Tang wore a black cloak dress as the evil queen and a hood, with only his little round face showing.
And his smile was sweeter than the apple.
That photo was a treasured favorite of Su Mei and Shen Ningqing.
Every time they saw it, they had to revisit it for a while.
Not just the elders—even Gu Tang himself, whenever he saw the Snow White version of young master Gu, wanted to kiss those little cheeks…
“What are you thinking about?”
Gu Qinian narrowed his long phoenix eyes, the corners of which already carried a faint natural redness.
Gu Tang hurriedly snapped back to reality and shook his head. “Nothing, nothing!”
He definitely could not say that he wanted a little sister who looked like young master Gu, and that he also wanted to hug and kiss and lift that person high in the air…
The two of them kept walking forward. Feeling guilty, Gu Tang did not continue asking young master Gu whether he was in a good mood or not.
Gu Qinian turned his head and stared at the lovely side profile of the boy, feeling blocked up inside.
Gu Tang was even more popular than he had imagined.
School had only just started, and yet along the way, he had already greeted who knew how many teachers and classmates. The boy always wore a sweet smile, like a little candy bean capable of melting people’s hearts.
Who would not like a Gu Tang like that?
Young master Gu frowned irritably.
As for why he felt so irritated, he did not fully understand it either.
So when Gu Tang had asked just now, he had not known how to answer.
“Hey, look at those two. Don’t they kind of resemble us when we were little?”
Their joined hands were suddenly tugged, and Gu Qinian lifted his eyes to look in the direction Gu Tang pointed.
Outside the school gate, not far away, two elementary-school boys were sitting on the bench at a bus stop.
One of them had a round face and was eating a grilled sausage. He would take a bite himself, then feed a bite to the quiet little boy sitting beside him. The two of them happily shared one sausage between them, their lips shiny with grease.
Gu Qinian shook his head. “Not really.”
Gu Tang: “?”
Gu Qinian raised a hand and pointed at the round-faced child holding the sausage. “That round-faced one wasn’t as cute as you were when you were little.”
Gu Tang: “……”
What kind of detail was that to focus on?!
When the sausage was finished, the round-faced little boy hopped off the bench and waved at the quiet little boy next to him. “I finished eating! I’m going home now!”
Gu Tang and Gu Qinian exchanged a glance.
They were not even going the same way?
He had specifically waited with the other child for the bus just to feed him sausage?
Just as the round-faced little boy was about to leave, the quiet little boy suddenly grabbed him.
“You only fed sausage to me. Does that mean I’m your favorite?”
Faced with his little friend’s question, the round-faced boy tilted his head, thought for a moment, then nodded. “Mm!”
The quiet little boy let out a sigh of relief, then continued, “Then… then don’t play with Huahua, and not Linlin either. Only play with me, okay?”
The round-faced little boy looked confused. “We can all play together with them.”
The quiet one immediately shook his head. “No. I only like playing with you.”
Hearing that, Gu Qinian’s brow twitched slightly.
He suddenly seemed to understand why he had been in such a bad mood lately.
Compared to school, being at home had been better. It had only been him and Gu Tang there. Gu Tang only played with him and only smiled at him.
As for all those other people constantly circling around in front of Gu Tang, young master Gu found them unbearably bothersome.
Was he the only one who cared about this?
Gu Qinian stopped Gu Tang. “Since you and I aren’t in the same class, have you had trouble adjusting to anything?”
“N—”
Gu Tang had only just started to answer when he saw the faint expectation in young master Gu’s eyes turn dark and gloomy. His eyes darted once, and he hurriedly changed his answer. “Yes!”
Gu Qinian said coldly, “I heard you. You said no.”
Gu Tang forced himself on. “You heard wrong!”
After saying that, he glanced around to make sure no one was nearby, then grabbed young master Gu’s arm and shook it, shamelessly blinking at him.
Unfortunately, once young master Gu’s heart had gone cold, it was not easy to warm it back up.
“No acting cute,” Gu Qinian said coldly, turning his gaze aside to avoid being bewitched.
Over at the bus stop, those two little boys were also tugging each other around.
The quiet little boy pulled a toy racing car out of his backpack and held it in front of the round-faced one. “Here, this is for you. No one else has one. So will you only play with me?”
The round-faced little boy hugged the little car fondly, hesitated, then nodded. “Okay.”
Only then did the quiet one finally smile. “Then let’s play together forever and ever.”
The little round-face nodded rapidly. “Mm-hmm, mm-hmm, mm-hmm!”
Gu Qinian, observing from the side: Learned it.
Giving gifts could make someone stay.
[Ding————]
The system suddenly gave a notification sound for no reason at all.
Gu Tang froze. “Are you having a bad connection or something?”
Why was it making random noises?
[Host, congratulations on completing the achievement ‘Lure the male lead into the trap of consumerism’! Reward: 5 plot coins!]
Gu Tang: “???”
No, really, this time he had genuinely done nothing at all!
Gu Tang suspected the system was broken and was randomly announcing mission rewards, but the plot coins had genuinely been added.
Which made it very strange.
Since childhood, young master Gu had always had few desires and little interest in material things. Gu Tang simply could not imagine what the other boy would suddenly want to buy.
That was, until they were picking up food from the butler. He heard young master Gu ask Butler Uncle about the prices of several luxury car brands and ask how old someone had to be to get a driver’s license. When he learned that he could only drive after adulthood, young master Gu even sighed in disappointment.
Gu Tang: “?”
As expected of the male lead.
Already thinking about getting a driver’s license in junior high!
Such advanced awareness…
Completely unaware that what Gu Qinian was really thinking at that moment was: if he had to wait until eighteen to give Gu Tang a car, then wouldn’t that mean… he had to wait until adulthood before Gu Tang would only play with him alone?
Young master Gu: So annoying!
After hearing Gu Tang say that his classmates really liked the Gu family’s food, the butler had specially packed a huge amount of delicious things from home this time for Gu Tang to share with his roommates.
Worried that the two children would have trouble carrying everything, he wanted to follow them into campus to help.
But then he saw that their young master had taken three or four food bags in each hand and had not left even one for the good little child.
Since his hands were already full, young master Gu simply gave the good little child a look, and the good little child obediently grabbed the hem of his clothes with one hand while waving at the butler with the other. “Bye-bye, Butler Uncle.”
“Alright, bye-bye, bye-bye! Walk slowly!”
The butler looked at the backs of the two boys and felt utterly reassured.
The good little child still held onto young master Gu’s clothes, just like when he was small!
There was absolutely no way he would get lost.
The autumn sun set quickly.
When they came out, there had still been traces of the evening light, but by the time they were walking back, the sky had already gone fully dark, and the temperature had dropped too.
Gu Tang pulled up the little hood attached to the back of his school hoodie, and his hand moved from the hem of young master Gu’s shirt to the other boy’s arm.
Even though young master Gu looked thin, when the muscles in his arm tensed, they felt hard.
Gu Tang pinched him. “It’s dark now. Niannian, don’t be scared.”
Gu Qinian: “……”
He had not been scared in the first place.
It was just that when he was young, he still remembered the experience of being locked in solitary confinement at the orphanage, so he had some aversion to darkness. After Gu Tang discovered that he hated dark places, the little milk dumpling always remembered to comfort him whenever the two of them were in the dark.
The half-cold heart of young master Gu finally warmed up a little.
The corners of his lips lifted slightly.
Thinking that the other boy could not see clearly in the dark, he gently moved his arm, signaling for Gu Tang to link arms with him instead.
That way the two of them could stay a little closer.
Gu Tang was more than happy to do so.
The little alley was pitch-black, and honestly, he was a little creeped out inside.
“Yo! Little lovebirds!”
Suddenly, a hoarse, horrible voice rang out—one of those voices that sounded like it belonged to a lifelong smoker.
Gu Tang and Gu Qinian both turned toward the source of the sound.
In the darkness stood several blurry figures, each with a point of glowing red light—just a bunch of smoking hoodlums.
“Students from Jiang City No. 1, huh? Impressive. Dating early, hahaha!”
The thug who spoke swayed out, cigarette in hand. “Is your girlfriend pretty? Let me take a look for you.”
Gu Tang and Gu Qinian exchanged glances, both looking confused.
What was this guy even talking about?
They genuinely did not understand.
The thug walked closer and finally saw the two of them clearly in the dim light. He froze for a moment. He had never seen people this good-looking before—even movie stars weren’t this good-looking!
But in the next moment, he recoiled backward in disgust and swore loudly. “Damn! Two guys holding hands?! I thought the short one was a girl!”
Gu Tang had a slender build, had not had his big growth spurt yet, and with the hood on, he really did kind of look like a girl from behind.
But hearing that, he instantly got annoyed.
Who was he calling short?!
Once the thug realized they were both boys, he immediately lost interest in them and waved dismissively. “Scram, scram, get out of here. Don’t ruin my good time.”
After saying that, he turned and walked back into the darkness.
Gu Tang found it very strange and asked young master Gu, “Do you think that was normal?”
“No.”
Gu Qinian gave a short reply.
These thugs had been causing trouble around the school for a long time. Now that they had cornered Gu Tang and Gu Qinian alone in a dark deserted alley, how could it be possible that they neither robbed them of money nor their phones and just let them leave intact?
Unless…the thugs had something even more important to do!
By this point, Gu Tang’s eyes had adjusted a little to the dimness.
He narrowed them and looked toward the dark area where the thugs had gathered.
Through the gaps between their bodies, he caught sight of a piece of their school’s uniform skirt fabric.
—A girl!
“Stop!”
Gu Tang shouted and rushed forward.
There were five or six thugs holding down a girl. One even had a hand over her mouth, not allowing her to make a sound. Her hair had come loose, and terror poured from her eyes as she stared desperately at Gu Tang for help.
“Let her go!”
Gu Tang felt blood rush straight to his head.
Damn it, these thugs were no longer satisfied with stealing money—they were trying to do something even more vile!
The thug from before saw how thin and slight Gu Tang looked and mocked, “What, little chick? What’d you come over here for? Looking for a beating?”
Gu Tang gritted his teeth and clenched his fists.
The next second, his wrist was seized.
The white jade little gourd on his wrist lightly knocked against the green jade gourd on the other boy’s, making a crisp sound.
—It was young master Gu.
Gu Qinian put the meal bags aside first—this was Gu Tang’s dinner for tonight, so they absolutely could not be knocked over. After placing them safely away, he turned and pulled Gu Tang back.
Then he raised his other hand and pointed upward.
Everyone followed the direction of his finger.
High above, on a utility pole, there was a tiny red light blinking on and off—
Gu Lin had moved quickly. That new batch of surveillance cameras had already been installed.
“There are many newly installed cameras around the school. Every move you make is being monitored. These devices are also connected to an alert system.”
Young master Gu stated this calmly, as though the evil act before him had nothing to do with him and he was simply giving the thugs a reminder that there was a camera nearby.
It almost even made it seem as though he wanted to use that reminder to bargain for a chance for himself and his companion to leave safely.
The thugs burst out laughing. “Coward.”
Originally, Gu Tang and Gu Qinian had not been their targets anyway. After cursing them a few times with foul language, the thugs threw the two of them aside and dragged the girl into a camera blind spot.
The girl struggled helplessly and screamed for help.
The thugs only grew more excited.
“Go on, scream. Scream your throat raw and nobody’ll come save you—AUGH!!!”
The thug speaking suddenly let out a miserable scream.
Someone had smashed a heavy stick into him from behind.
The thug turned around dizzily and saw that the skinny little boy from before was holding a club at least as thick as a baseball bat.
That blow had been delivered with absolutely full force. There had been no holding back.
The thug felt something hot trickling down his forehead. In his vision, the little boy became two, then the two became four. Before he could finish counting, he collapsed with a thud and passed out.
Gu Tang quickly threw away the stick and waved his little hand. “Ah, violence is bad.”
The other thugs finally realized their boss had been knocked unconscious. Forgetting all about the girl, they roared curses and charged toward Gu Tang.
“Motherf—! Kill him!”
Faced with several thugs who were much bigger than him, Gu Tang did not dodge at all.
He simply stood in place and raised his hands.
Then firmly covered his own eyes.
The very next second, a gust of wind rushed past his ear.
Young master Gu had charged in.
What followed was a series of loud bang bang thud thud sounds, the dull smack of fists hitting flesh, mixed in with all kinds of howls, curses, and screams of pain.
Yikes…
Young master Gu really was not going easy on them.
It was a good thing the alley was deep, otherwise innocent passersby might have been frightened.
After a while, Gu Qinian’s cool voice rang out—
“Alright. Open your eyes now.”
Only then did Gu Tang lower the hands covering his eyes.
All the thugs were sprawled on the ground. One especially unlucky one had been pinned by young master Gu’s shoe onto a manhole cover.
Clicking his tongue, Gu Tang shook his head. “I told you. Violence is bad.”
The thug under young master Gu’s shoe struggled and suddenly tried to reason with them. “You’re… students… fighting outside… aren’t you… scared… scared of getting expelled?!”
Gu Tang smiled.
[Host, that smile of yours really looks like a villain’s! It’s awesome!]
The system applauded enthusiastically.
Gu Tang curved his eyes and grinned wickedly. “Then why do you think we told you about the camera just now?”
“Obviously because we needed you to move into a blind spot, so we could beat you up properly.”
As he spoke, he pulled a wet wipe from his pocket and handed it to young master Gu.
Gu Qinian had severe mysophobia. The thought that there might be the thugs’ blood on his hands disgusted him to no end, so he carefully wiped each finger one by one.
Watching him slowly and methodically clean his fingers brought back the memory of how those very hands had beaten them just now. The thugs looked at him as though he were the King of Hell himself.
“S-save me! Save me—”
The thug under young master Gu’s foot seemed to have had a front tooth knocked out, because his speech leaked horribly. “P-please! Call the police! I w-want to call the police!”
How novel.
This was the first time Gu Tang had ever seen a thug insisting on calling the police.
The cameras had recorded the thugs’ crimes.
Every last thug was caught in one sweep, and the area around the school was finally cleaned up.
The dean was overjoyed and heavily praised Gu Tang and Gu Qinian for their contribution. “You two students are truly the guardians of our school! The student council is honored because of you! Classmate Gu Tang, I am officially promoting you to staff member. As for classmate Gu Qinian—”
Vice President Cheng Shu, standing nearby, said in a strange tone, “Classmate Gu Qinian is already a staff member, so he can’t exactly be promoted again. It’s not as if we can make him vice president, right?”
“It’s true he can’t be made vice president.”
The student council president, currently in senior year, suddenly appeared and strode into the office.
The moment Cheng Shu saw the rarely seen president, he broke into a flattering smile. “President, what brings you here today? You’re busy, so you don’t need to worry too much about student council matters. Just leave everything to me—”
“I found someone to help you.”
The president smiled politely at Cheng Shu, then turned and patted Gu Qinian on the shoulder. “Classmate Gu Qinian is brave, responsible, and dependable. I will be stepping down next week, and I am now formally nominating Classmate Gu Qinian to take over my position.”
Cheng Shu stood frozen. Slowly, he removed his glasses, as though he had not understood a single word the other party had just said.
But whether he understood or not no longer mattered.
The student council was about to change its weather.
According to the rules of Jiang City No. 1, the student council president, like the dean, held one nomination vote.
A nominated candidate could break the usual rules and directly enter the election for student council office.
“Of course, whether you can ultimately become president will still depend on the approval of both the teachers and the students. But Classmate Gu, I think very highly of you.”
The president smiled warmly. After explaining the position arrangement, he also took out a silk banner.
“What I said just now was about work.”
“Now… as an older brother, I want to thank you for saving my younger sister.”
“Who would even dare make up a story like this?!”
“Who would believe it! There were only two of you, four hands in total! You took down a whole gang of thugs and even saved the student council president’s little sister!”
Zhu Xu’s voice was so loud he looked like he wanted the entire dorm building to hear the heroic deeds of his roommates.
Xie Qian used his uninjured hand to cover Zhu Xu’s mouth. “Shut up. Remember it properly. The two of them didn’t fight anyone. They just helped call the police.”
Gu Tang nodded. “We don’t advocate violence.”
After saying that, he even winked at young master Gu.
Those thugs had absolutely deserved it. They had walked straight into the wrong two people.
Did they really think young master Gu’s over ten years of martial training had been for nothing?
But the reason they had specifically moved into a camera blind spot before acting was to avoid trouble.
Using violence to stop violence was not something worth promoting. And since the two of them were still students, it was better to stay low-key.
Luckily, the rescued girl would not speak carelessly. As for what those thugs said… who would believe that two harmless-looking junior-high students could beat an entire gang of street punks until they were crawling on the ground?
Knock knock—
There was a light knock on the dorm door.
When the door was opened, it turned out to be the girl they had rescued. According to the student council president, his younger sister was in second year, making her technically their upperclassman.
The girl’s face was bright red, and she was holding two cups of milk tea.
She offered one of them first to Gu Qinian.
Gu Tang looked at the girl, then at young master Gu, and immediately felt as though he were facing a great enemy—
Oh no!
Talented boy, beautiful girl—this was exactly the setup for early romance!
Before he could panic for even one full second, young master Gu said in an icy voice, “I don’t like it.”
Gu Tang let out a sigh of relief.
Very good!
Young master Gu still had not awakened to romance!
“Then do you like it?” The girl turned her blushing face toward Gu Tang and pressed her lips together, waiting for his answer.
Gu Tang had only just relaxed, and his mood was very good. “I like it, I like it.”
Sweet drinks were his favorite!
“That’s great, then both cups are for you!”
The girl blushed even harder. She stepped forward shyly and pulled out a pink little envelope from her pocket. “And this… this is also for you.”
Gu Tang: “…?”
What was going on?
Was this the situation he thought it was?
But before his brain could catch up, the girl’s face suddenly turned deathly pale, as if she had seen a ghost. She stumbled back two steps and waved the pink envelope frantically. “Ah—never mind, it’s nothing, it’s nothing, I’m leaving now.”
Gu Tang: “???”
Now she wasn’t giving it to him after all?
Following the girl’s frightened line of sight, Gu Tang turned around—
Only to see young master Gu somehow produce the student council’s red armband from who-knows-where and carefully, properly start putting it on his arm.
***
Author’s Note:
Tangtang: I report! Someone is abusing authority again!
Gu Niannian: If someone’s going to crack down on early romance, it has to be me.
Update Posting Schedule: Starting next chapter, posting schedule change from posting every day to 3 chapters every Friday~
