The moment Shen Li finishes speaking, Ke Jiujiu’s face immediately flushes red.
She never expected someone who looks as proper as Shen Li to say something so improper in front of the camera.
She did not provoke him, did she?
She had clearly been very polite to him, giving him emotional validation and expressing her admiration. She had not even been this attentive toward her own ex-husband. Who knew which sentence had offended him enough to make him this aggressive and embarrass her so badly!
Could it be…
Li Weiwei is his ex-wife?
Ke Jiujiu remembers Li Weiwei leaving the team for no apparent reason, abruptly giving the opportunity to Shen Li, and being extremely certain that Shen Li’s “shooting champion” title was not some meaningless amateur prize. It really is possible they knew each other before!
So could it be that after Li Weiwei returned, she told Shen Li about the argument in the forest, and Shen Li is now defending his ex-wife?
The more Ke Jiujiu thinks, the more indignant she becomes, and the more her face shows it. Her watery eyes blink twice, already on the verge of tears, and even her voice carries a faint sob. “Shen Li, if you talk like that, I really will feel a little hurt.”
A completely inexplicable sentence.
Shen Li blinks. His long brows lift slightly in confusion, and for a moment he almost wants to find someone who can translate Chinese into Chinese for him.
Does this person really just say whatever line she dreams up next?
What exactly does she want?
Shen Li wets his lips, genuinely unsure how to continue. Then Ke Jiujiu turns around in obvious resentment, pouting her glossy red lips. The large bow on her head bounces as she stomps away in a huff toward Kris, who is waiting in the distance.
Lin Xu had already been following behind her. He glances at Shen Li now, says nothing, and walks away carrying the two guns.
Shen Li finally breathes a sigh of relief. Money is hard to earn and shit is hard to eat; suffering this kind of mental pollution is what he deserves for taking the money. Once he thinks of it that way, all his resentment and frustration vanish. Even his mood while going down the mountain becomes fairly relaxed, and he comforts himself as he walks:
Actually, this job is pretty good. They let him sleep, let him touch guns, and pay three hundred thousand a day.
Once the show ends and the three million is transferred to his account, it will not only be enough to repay the loan he took out to establish the school, but also leave at least three years of additional operating expenses.
Very nice.
No wonder everyone sharpens their heads and racks their brains trying to squeeze into the entertainment industry. People die for money, birds die for food.
Shen Li sighs and lowers his eyes slightly toward the mountain path underfoot. Suddenly he feels only that the road ahead is obstructed and long.
Around him, there are still so many people who can only afford obsolete smartphones from more than ten years ago and still think fifty yuan per device is expensive; there are still so many people fighting themselves to death, working more than ten hours every day, yet in two full years cannot earn what he makes by coasting through a single day of this appearance fee…
The more Shen Li thinks, the more stifled he feels. His long lashes cast faint shadows beneath his eyes, adding an extra touch of melancholy and stillness to that excessively perfect face.
On the way up there had been a time limit, he had been rushing toward the forest, and Yang Zhiqi had been chattering endlessly in his ear, so the road had not seemed particularly difficult.
On the way down, his strength is exhausted, his injured leg aches from overuse, the other guests have already walked ahead, and only one follow-camera operator remains, aggressively filming his entire body…
Thinking that his former comrades and acquaintances will see this, including his mother, Shen Li tries his best to support himself and keep his steps from looking too pathetic.
Unfortunately, reality refuses to cooperate. With an injury at his level, it is impossible not to look lame.
No matter how straight he keeps his back or how tightly he grits his teeth, such close filming inevitably reveals three or four parts pitifulness.
Forget it.
Shen Li closes his eyes briefly, refuses to think further, and keeps gritting his teeth as he walks down. At this exact moment—
a low, magnetic voice comes unhurriedly from behind him:
“Shen Li?”
Shen Li turns around.
He sees a man around 1.8 meters tall, muscular and upright, with a crew cut and square face. He wears sportswear and carries a gun on his back, looking efficient and handsome. A pair of sunglasses conceals his eyes, but Shen Li already remembers his features.
Jiang Nan.
Compared with the other guests, this man clearly has a low sense of presence. Yet what left a particularly deep impression on Shen Li is that he has an extraordinarily sharp pair of eyes, and he looks vaguely familiar, as though Shen Li has seen him somewhere before.
Only…
Shen Li has seen far too many people. Especially while handling cases in the past, when screening suspects often meant looking through thousands of household-registration photos. Perhaps he had once seen Jiang Nan’s photo in some case. So when Shen Li first thought Jiang Nan looked familiar, he did not pay much attention.
Shen Li slows slightly and waits for the other man to catch up.
But the next instant, Jiang Nan does something Shen Li never expected at all.
The man, half a head taller than Shen Li, decisively inserts himself between Shen Li and the cameraman. In his exceptionally pleasant voice, he politely and appropriately asks the camera operator, “Teacher Cameraman—can I walk here? I’d like to talk with Teacher Shen.”
The mountain path is narrow, allowing only two people to walk side by side.
If Jiang Nan walks beside Shen Li, the camera cannot film them from the side.
The cameraman scratches his head, unable to reasonably refuse. He says okay, then moves ahead of them and walks backward to film their faces.
But the mountain path is steep, and the camera operator also seems to realize that this will not work. He can only move behind them instead and film their backs.
Shen Li frowns sensitively and glances back.
With the cameraman filming from behind, the lens should now only capture Jiang Nan’s full body and half of Shen Li’s. It will therefore be difficult to capture Shen Li’s awkward limping steps, because the man half a head taller deliberately walks half a step behind Shen Li, cleverly blocking his feet from view.
Shen Li’s brows tighten further. He is mainly surprised by the action and cannot yet judge whether Jiang Nan did it intentionally or by coincidence, but he does feel more gratitude than anything else.
At this moment, the man’s pleasant voice continues. “Teacher Shen, I heard you hunted almost a hundred jin of prey? Is that true?”
Shen Li nods. “Mm.”
“That’s amazing. Thank you,” Jiang Nan continues casually. “Otherwise none of us would have had dinner.”
Shen Li answers politely, “It was what I should do.”
Then the man asks with a trace of familiarity, “Ahem, I heard tonight is a one-on-one dating segment. Does Teacher Shen have any thoughts?”
Hearing a question like this, Shen Li’s ink-dark pupils contract. He instinctively thinks of Qian Xingzhi watching. His survival instinct, which has not worked effectively in years, suddenly sounds every alarm:
A question like this has to be answered carefully, or somewhere in front of a screen there may soon be a big golden retriever with a cold face sulking.
And Shen Li might spend a year coaxing him without success.
After thinking for a moment, Shen Li answers coolly:
“Ahem. No thoughts.”
The response is indeed rather cold.
Jiang Nan’s tone carries a knowing smile. “I don’t mean anything else. I only wanted to say that if Teacher Shen doesn’t currently have another choice, you could consider choosing me. I’d really like to make you a friend.”
“Why?”
Shen Li asks whatever comes to mind.
“Your shooting is excellent.” Jiang Nan shrugs unsurprisingly and explains, “What I mean is, if both of us end up without partners, we could pair up for a ‘friendship round.’ Of course, if Teacher Shen has someone else you prefer, that’s perfectly fine too.”
What Jiang Nan says sounds exceptionally reasonable, and he emphasizes three words that strike exactly where Shen Li cares.
A friendship round?
That sounds extremely safe. So Shen Li does not beat around the bush and says what he thinks. “Mm. A friendship round is worth considering.”
Seeing how straightforward he is, Jiang Nan laughs openly too. “Then it’s settled. If neither of us has somewhere better to go, we’ll go together?”
Shen Li is not sure what the exact date-selection rules are, but he is grateful that Jiang Nan helped block the camera. He thinks there is no harm in agreeing. Qian Xingzhi is not inside the house anyway. A date is a date no matter who it is with. The man in front of him is thoughtful and presumably smart, so at minimum communicating with him should not be too troublesome.
“Sure,” Shen Li agrees. The moment his answer lands, Jiang Nan makes a seemingly casual movement with one hand.
He steps closer to Shen Li’s right shoulder and drapes an arm over the railing on Shen Li’s side, brushing against him.
A perfectly ordinary movement, just a pat against his shoulder—if not for the faint, almost imperceptible contact at his waist immediately afterward.
Shen Li’s dark pupils contract vigilantly. He lowers his gaze toward Jiang Nan’s hand, but Jiang Nan has already withdrawn it.
Everything that just happened seems almost imaginary.
Shen Li’s expression darkens, but he says nothing more.
There is a car waiting to carry them from the forest down the mountain back to the house. Shen Li is tired, so he pretends to fall asleep and conveniently refuses all conversation.
The ten-minute drive passes quickly. Before they even enter the house, an extravagantly theatrical mechanical voice comes through the loudspeaker, humming a tune in a deliberately goofy manner:
“What a pity it wasn’t you~ who stayed with me to the end~ we once walked together but lost each other at the crossroads~
“After a full day of hard work, you all~ finally have dinner to eat~
“Starting now, you may tell this Housekeeper who you want to date tonight—
“This Housekeeper will present every successfully matched pair of guests with a carefully prepared candlelit dinner!
“And so, nighttime dating begins~”