Chapter 113: Transmigrated as a Fraudulent Male Streamer (37)
“Is Cen Yu coming over to my place to hang out today?”
“Cen Yu…”
He gave the basketball in his hand another light squeeze. “Cen Yu.”
Seeing that Jiang Tuan appeared to have something on his mind, Cen Yu stopped in his tracks, waiting to hear what he had to say.
Right at that moment, however, Jiang Tuan caught sight of Pei Hengyun outside the school grounds… The two exchanged a glance, and Jiang Tuan offered Cen Yu a faint smile. “Next time, once your leg heals, let me know and we’ll play basketball again.”
In that extremely long dream from which he simply couldn’t wake up…
He had always wanted to ask Cen Yu: Pei Hengyun is your best friend, but what about me and He Yongning?
Or rather… what about me?
In that dream, everything had been a blur… But when he opened his eyes upon waking up and spotted Cen Yu in the neighboring hospital bed, a profound sense of relief had swept through his heart.
It was just a pity that the words he hadn’t spoken back then, along with the things he had failed to understand, no longer carried any reason to be brought up again.
Jiang Tuan tossed the toy basketball in his hands over to Cen Yu. “When the time comes, I’ll go over to your city to find you.”
Having said his piece, he turned his eyes toward He Yongning. The man wore a calm, composed expression, stepping forward at an unhurried pace, but the moment their eyes met, He Yongning gave him a slight nod.
Perhaps He Yongning has his own regrets too, Jiang Tuan suddenly thought to himself.
It was just that He Yongning was the type of person who would never voice such an answer out loud.
Cen Yu quietly made his way to the laboratory building.
Leaning on his crutches, he produced a rhythmic thump, thump, thump as he navigated the empty restroom. Reaching the mirror above the sink, he pulled an apple and a small paring knife from his pocket, shut the restroom door, and proceeded to peel the apple skin right in front of the mirror.
Though it wasn’t midnight right now, as long as he went through the motions, the symbolic gesture was met.
Cen Yu thought to himself without a shred of a mental burden, and sure enough, a moment later, he watched as the apple peel he sliced off was picked up by an invisible hand.
Then, Yu Sheng’s figure materialized inside the mirror.
Inside the reflection, Yu Sheng wore a crisp dress shirt and trousers, framed by a pitch-black void behind him. With a subtle flick of his fingers, the apple in Cen Yu’s grip instantly appeared in his own hand inside the mirror.
“What is your wish?”
Cen Yu set the paring knife aside. “…Actually, regarding what you mentioned before, I thought it over.”
“I still don’t really want to stay here,” Cen Yu admitted frankly.
Biting into the apple with an unreadable expression, Yu Sheng didn’t seem surprised by Cen Yu’s answer in the slightest.
Now that he had fully cleared the story, the details regarding Yu Sheng’s background setup naturally surfaced inside Cen Yu’s mind—
As the owner of the tomb underneath the teaching building, Yu Sheng was fundamentally incapable of leaving the grounds of Meiman High School. Although in the previous timelines he had appeared to leave the school and visit the homes of Jiang Tuan and the others, that was purely due to the nature of those events taking place within a “dream.”
Meanwhile, Cen Yu, as the son of Old Cen the security guard, was someone who had lived in the primary school guard post since childhood, which was precisely how he had come to meet Yu Sheng.
When Cen Yu first unlocked this part of the lore, he had immediately screamed at how melodramatic it was!
Back when he was nine years old, while wandering around the deserted teaching building during summer break, a young Cen Yu had spotted Yu Sheng sitting on one of the desks… He had walked over, intending to give the guy a scare, only for the person to whip his head around right before he could draw near, scaring Cen Yu half to death instead.
“You scared the daylights out of me!” Cen Yu had launched a preemptive complaint before glaring at Yu Sheng. “What are you doing here?”
“You’re not allowed inside the school during summer break.”
“Then how did you get in?” Yu Sheng had countered.
Naturally, he knew exactly who the kid standing before him was.
“I live here.”
“I live here too,” Yu Sheng had replied.
“?” Cen Yu had frowned, throwing a glance at Yu Sheng. “…Are you a new gatekeeper?”
“…” Yu Sheng hadn’t expected Cen Yu to come up with that conclusion either.
“Or a new security guard?”
“I’m a ghost,” Yu Sheng had said. “I live underground.”
Cen Yu’s frown had deepened, though whether he failed to grasp the concept or simply didn’t care remained unclear. After pondering for a long while, he had muttered, “…Oh. Well, that’s pretty awesome of you.”
Yu Sheng truly couldn’t fathom whether this “awesome” referred to the fact that he was a ghost, or that living underground was inherently cool.
Bored with no playmates during summer break, ever since discovering this mysterious big brother in the school, Cen Yu had spent his days roaming the empty campus every now and then, searching for the mysterious big brother who lived underground.
On occasion, Cen Yu would even invite Yu Sheng to head outside and play with him.
“I can’t go outside,” seeing Cen Yu’s face flushed red from the heat, Yu Sheng would press his palm against Cen Yu’s forehead to help cool him down.
Feeling the refreshing chill on his forehead, Cen Yu had instantly felt that Yu Sheng was beyond awesome—truly deserving of the title of his coolest friend!
To think he could even regulate his own body temperature!
“Why can’t you go out?” Cen Yu had snapped his twin ice pop in half, handing one half over to Yu Sheng.
Yu Sheng had reached out to accept it.
He couldn’t eat it, and he knew Cen Yu had shared it with him primarily so he could act as a human ice pack, keeping the ice pop from melting too quickly in the sweltering summer heat.
“…I don’t know,” Yu Sheng had said.
He truly possessed no means of leaving the boundaries of this campus.
Gnawing on his half of the ice pop, Cen Yu had taken a second to check the half in Yu Sheng’s palm, nodding in satisfaction upon seeing zero signs of melting.
“What’s your name?”
“Yu Sheng.”
“How do you write it?”
Yu Sheng had extended his hand, tracing his name into the palm of Cen Yu’s hand.
Munching on his ice pop, Cen Yu was too embarrassed to admit that he had no idea what characters Yu Sheng had drawn, so he took matters into his own hands and decided to bestow a nickname upon his friend—
“I’ll give you a nickname,” Cen Yu had declared with a nod. “That way it’s easier to write.”
Yu Sheng had guessed that the boy didn’t have the faintest clue how to write those two characters, but chose to humor him anyway. Holding the ice pop in his grip, he had looked at Cen Yu sitting beside him. “What nickname?”
Cen Yu gestured for Yu Sheng to hold out his hand.
Yu Sheng flattened his palm and held it out before Cen Yu—
“Little Yu!” Cen Yu had announced.
“Isn’t that super easy to write!”
Yu and Yu… Yu Sheng felt his own surname was actually easier to write, but he didn’t argue with Cen Yu, merely giving a nod.
“Don’t you worry though,” after finishing the half of the ice pop in his own hand, Cen Yu had naturally reached over for the half in Yu Sheng’s hand. “Once I go off to college in the future, I’ll take you outside to see the world.”
Yu Sheng had found it amusing, yet he replied all the same, “Alright. I’ll wait for you to take me away from here.”
However, near the end of that summer break, Cen Yu had suddenly fallen gravely ill. The locals in the village claimed he had come into contact with something unclean.
After Old Cen took him to complete an exorcism ritual, Yu Sheng prepared to appear before Cen Yu once more to greet him, only to discover that Cen Yu could no longer see him at all.
“…By the way, Cen Yu, I heard you got possessed?” Cen Yu’s friend had asked point-blank when coming over to hang out.
Yu Sheng had watched as Cen Yu frowned in response. “What possession?”
“Ghosts don’t exist in this world!”
Yu Sheng stood right beside Cen Yu, yet from that moment on, Cen Yu could no longer see him.
Recalling this past memory, Cen Yu felt a wave of awkwardness wash over him as he looked at Yu Sheng—
Even though it hadn’t been his intention, no matter how one looked at it, he came across as an unfaithful, promise-breaking scum of a guy.
Cen Yu immediately shifted the topic, “Were those gifts sent in my live stream room from you too?”
Yu Sheng looked back at him. “Mm.”
“…Where did you get the money from?” Cen Yu asked. “Streaming platforms shouldn’t accept hell bank notes, right?”
“I have burial goods.”
Cen Yu: “…”
The atmosphere in the bathroom lapsed into awkwardness once more, until Yu Sheng broke the silence first, “It’s fine if you don’t remember.”
“After all, I’m the only one who remembers it anyway,” he looked at Cen Yu. “Childish words shouldn’t be taken seriously. I know that.”
Damn it! Why did the conversation make him sound more and more like an irresponsible, big-talking scum guy?!
Cen Yu complained internally, but still faced Yu Sheng directly and said, “I’ve made up my mind about my wish.”
He locked eyes with Yu Sheng inside the mirror—
“My wish is to grant Little Yu’s heart’s desire: to take Yu Sheng away from Meiman High School, and go check out the big city outside.”
