Chapter 29: Lu Mingfei, My Elementary School Classmate

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Lu Mingfei suddenly realized something.

If Qiao Yiran had not pulled that little trick of creating a diversion in one place while making a move somewhere else, then wouldn’t Zhao Menghua have been the one sitting beside Liu Miaomiao?

Could it be that, during their graduation trip in his previous life, the seating arrangement between those two had been exactly the same?

Had they really known each other that early?

Lu Mingfei suddenly felt rather fortunate that Qiao Yiran had switched places with Liu Miaomiao, preventing the two of them from sitting together.

Thank goodness. Thank goodness indeed.

Wait—why was he feeling relieved?

...

Lu Mingfei found it difficult to explain exactly how he felt about Zhao Menghua.

Did he hate him? Certainly. But it had nothing to do with personal jealousy. It was not because Zhao Menghua was his romantic rival and had stolen Chen Wenwen from him.

If he had to put it into words, he probably just disliked the way Zhao Menghua conducted himself.

For instance, there was the fact that Zhao Menghua had flaunted his affection for his current girlfriend right in front of his ex-girlfriend before he had even properly ended things with her. Lu Mingfei simply thought that sort of person was awful.

And then, only a few months after getting together with his current girlfriend, Zhao Menghua had dumped her and gone crawling back to his ex.

In Chen Wenwen’s eyes, that might have counted as a prodigal son returning to the right path. But from Liu Miaomiao’s perspective, Zhao Menghua was an utter scumbag—eating what was in his bowl while eyeing what was in the pot, then licking clean the bowl he had left behind after getting his fill from the pot. He had bounced back and forth between the two women, taking everything he could from both.

A person could love freely, but they should never behave like a scumbag.

Take Caesar, for example, the head of Lu Mingfei’s student council. Beautiful women were always gathered around him. He was a man who truly possessed an entire ocean, yet no one ever criticized him. Why?

Because he treated everyone with the utmost care and consideration. He handled social boundaries perfectly, never overstepping, never neglecting anyone, and never making anyone uncomfortable.

That was a true aristocrat, fundamentally different from nouveau riche brats like Zhao Menghua, who had to show off even a watch on their wrist.

So whenever people called Zhao Menghua “the second Chu Zihang,” Lu Mingfei had always wanted to sneer. His stoic senior was a worthy archenemy even in Caesar’s eyes. Putting Zhao Menghua and that expressionless senior in the same sentence was practically an insult to Chu Zihang.

Chen Wenwen had forgiven Zhao Menghua and hoped that Lu Mingfei would offer his blessings to the two of them.

Lu Mingfei did not know whether Chen Wenwen was merely seeking some sort of emotional reassurance. She wanted his blessing? Fine, then he would bless her. But the blessing he offered was not that Chen Wenwen and Zhao Menghua would find happiness. It was that Chen Wenwen would find happiness.

As he watched Chen Wenwen and Zhao Menghua surrounded by the choir, Lu Mingfei found himself thinking instead of Liu Miaomiao in her long batik dress. He felt rather sorry for her.

First, she had loved Chu Zihang without ever winning his heart. Then she had ended up with a man who did not love her.

That was probably why Lu Mingfei felt so relieved that Zhao Menghua had not been seated beside Liu Miaomiao.

All right. Lu Mingfei had made up his mind. He would add a new mission to his three years of high school: help Liu Miaomiao escape her suffering and prevent her from repeating the mistakes of her previous life.

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Zhao Menghua seemed to notice Qiao Yiran standing beside Lu Mingfei. His expression first showed surprise, then shifted into a smile as he walked over and greeted her.

“What a coincidence. Are you staying at this hotel too?”

As he spoke, he extended his hand.

“Yeah, what a coincidence!” Lu Mingfei stepped forward and seized Zhao Menghua’s hand before he could shake Qiao Yiran’s.

Zhao Menghua froze.

He had been reaching out to shake hands with a beautiful girl, so who exactly was this fellow? Why was he butting in? Were they even that familiar?

“Who are you?” he asked, forcing a polite smile onto his face through the benefit of his excellent upbringing.

“Ah, Zhao Menghua, you don’t recognize me? It’s me, Lu Mingfei, your elementary-school classmate. We sat together for half a semester when we were in third grade. You used to borrow my homework to copy all the time. Once, we were caught whispering during class and Teacher Li made us stand at the front and take slaps on the palms.”

Lu Mingfei spoke with such solemn conviction that one might have thought he was recounting documented history.

In truth, he was making the whole thing up. His household registration had been in a different district from Zhao Menghua’s, so there was no chance they could have attended the same elementary school.

Zhao Menghua had initially stared at this suddenly appearing brother with a mixture of surprise and suspicion, certain that he had no memory of the man whatsoever.

But when Lu Mingfei gave his name and claimed they had been elementary-school classmates, Zhao Menghua suddenly found himself unable to say with certainty that he had never seen him before.

Then Lu Mingfei accurately described several of the “glorious deeds” they had supposedly shared in elementary school, and Zhao Menghua completely accepted that Lu Mingfei was some long-forgotten classmate.

Because, strangely enough, he really did seem to have a vague impression of those events.

“Oh, right, right! It’s you, Lu Mingfei.”

Zhao Menghua enthusiastically extended his other hand, not forgetting to reveal his Rolex Green Submariner “by accident.”

“If you hadn’t told me your name, I really wouldn’t have recognized you. You’ve changed completely since elementary school. You look so much more pathetic—er, handsome now.”

“You too, you too. I remember you had a runny nose every day back then. Looks like you’ve finally gotten over that?”

Zhao Menghua’s expression changed.

He silently cursed Lu Mingfei for bringing up the one thing he least wanted mentioned, while becoming even more certain that Lu Mingfei was indeed his long-lost elementary-school classmate.

Zhao Menghua had suffered from allergic rhinitis as a child. Every spring and autumn, his nose would run incessantly. It had only improved after he entered middle school. Anyone who knew about that embarrassing habit had to be an elementary-school classmate.

Zhao Menghua glanced at the beauty beside Lu Mingfei and decided to change the subject in order to preserve his dignity.

“Anyway, let’s not bring up the past. It’s been a long time since we were in touch, hasn’t it? Which middle school did you attend again?”

“Shilan Middle School, the city’s top school.”

“What a coincidence. I put Shilan Middle School down as my high-school preference too.”

“That really is a coincidence. Maybe we’ll even end up in the same class again.”

“Hahaha, maybe we will.”

Zhao Menghua abruptly shifted the conversation. Looking past Lu Mingfei toward Qiao Yiran and the others, he asked with feigned surprise, “By the way, what are you all doing here?”

“Oh, we just graduated from middle school, so our classmates decided to take a trip to the capital together.”

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“What a coincidence. Our class is doing the same.” Zhao Menghua gestured toward the classmates behind him. “Why don’t we introduce everyone to one another?”

Menghua’s introduction was aimed at the class beauty.

“Introductions? Sure, sure, but let’s do it later. Everyone just got off the plane and needs to rest first.” Lu Mingfei turned to Qiao Yiran. “Right?”

“Ah... yes, that’s right. Everyone’s exhausted. We should all take a little time to recover first.” Qiao Yiran immediately played along.

“Oh... all right, then. See you later.”

After saying goodbye, the two of them finally released each other’s hands. Zhao Menghua turned around and hurried back toward his class, rubbing his palm furtively as he went.

Why was that guy’s grip so strong? He had squeezed his hand white.

Qiao Yiran lightly patted Lu Mingfei on the shoulder.

“Hey, Lu Mingfei, was Zhao Menghua really your elementary-school classmate?”

Lu Mingfei spread his hands and answered with an innocent expression, “No.”

“Then why did you make everything sound so convincing? The part about him borrowing your homework, and the two of you getting caught talking in class and being slapped on the palms...”

“You just don’t understand. Copying homework and whispering in class are shared memories belonging to students across the entire country. Didn’t you ever copy homework in elementary school? Weren’t you ever caught whispering by a teacher?”

“What about that Teacher Li?”

“There are more than a hundred million people surnamed Li in this country. Which elementary school doesn’t have at least a few teachers named Li?”

Qiao Yiran was left utterly stunned by Lu Mingfei’s performance. After a thousand words formed in her mind and collapsed, all she managed to say was, “...You’re impressive.”

Then she immediately asked, “If you don’t know him, why did you pretend that you did and deliberately provoke him? When he came over to say hello, couldn’t we simply have ignored him?”

Why? He certainly could not tell her that he was trying to prevent Zhao Menghua from finding an opportunity to seduce Liu Miaomiao.

“Someone wants to treat us to a meal. Why would we refuse? Anyone who turns down a free meal is a fool!”

“...That’s a twisted bit of logic.”

Hmph. What did she know? Lu Mingfei muttered inwardly.

He was doing all this for Liu Miaomiao’s lifelong happiness, wasn’t he? She did not want Liu Miaomiao to be hurt by a scumbag either, did she?

At that moment, Lu Mingfei felt like Seiya from an animated series, standing guard over the goddess Athena with utmost caution, never leaving her side for a single step in order to prevent her from falling into the clutches of some evil power.

The Saint Seiya Lu Mingfei: The Liu Miaomiao Protection Arc was officially beginning!