Chapter 30

82 1 0
                                    

"Were you satisfied with that performance?"
The entirety of Team DG had come out on stage to take a photo with the audience. They were departing through the passageway reserved for players now. Coach Fang caught sight of the smile curving Lu Zhe's lips and coldly threw out that question.

Lu Zhe seemed to think it over for a moment before he answered truthfully, "It was fine. The main issue was that my words were too euphemistic. I worry people didn't understand-"

Qian Bao lifted her own hands to her own throat, gagging and miming that she was about to throw up.

Er-Hua and Old Wo had despair written all over their faces.

Only Coach Fang let out a cold laugh. He took out his phone and showed Lu Zhe a collection of real-time comments that the event organizers had collected very efficiently. "No need to worry," he said. "You've already succeeded."

Lu Zhe lifted his gaze to the cell phone. The bullet comments were already painting a dense rainbow across the screen-

[HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!]

[Dog Lu, you're being condemned by the masses right now, do you know that?]

[You have the balls to try to make our Wolf Cub call you 'beloved'?!]

[I just want to ask whether or not you've been beaten to death yet. Will I be able to see you at your next game? @LuZhe]

[Fans of both of you are so conflicted right now. Not sure which one of you we should consider our rival in love.]

[Their fan bases have already set up a new camp. They're fighting over whether their ship should be called WolfDog or LiuShen. Watching that mess has got me laughing so hard I could puke.]

Lu Zhe swiftly skimmed those comments, then gave a satisfied nod. He took out his own cell phone and lowered his head as he said, "These fans are pretty efficient. Not bad. I'm going to take a look and see if I can find this 'camp'."

Coach Fang was silent.

Clearly he'd made a mistake. He'd overestimated Lu Zhe's ability to feel shame.

Shen Qiao listened on from the side with a haughty and disinterested expression, as though this matter didn't concern him in the slightest.

It was just that-

He was walking very close to Lu Zhe. He'd inadvertently glanced over and caught sight of Lu Zhe's Weibo page. After pursing his lips, he looked away again, acting like he'd seen absolutely nothing.

......

On the trip back to HQ, the interior of the van was very dark. The ones who listened to music listened to music, the ones who played around on their phones played around on their phones. Some even dozed off. Everyone in the van minded their own business, basking in the faint glimmer from outside.

Lu Zhe and Shen Qiao sat in the back row, each sticking to one side of the van. Shen Qiao was playing minesweeper on his phone. Hard mode. Because there were many little squares, he brought his head closer and closer to the screen as he played, until his nose was practically buried in his phone.

Suddenly-

A certain warmth pressed up against his forehead, accompanied by a gust of cedarwood. As the scent filled his nose, Shen Qiao's hands froze. His head was lifted a considerable amount by Lu Zhe.

"You'll go near-sighted if you keep that up."

Lu Zhe's voice fell upon his ears from a very close distance.

Shen Qiao glanced to the side, only to find that this person had somehow, at some point, scooted over from the seat on the other side of the van.

The glowing light from the streetlamps they passed drifted in through the windows, falling past Lu Zhe's profile. His eyes seemed to twinkle like stars in that flickering light, somehow enticing a person and eliciting the desire to pry into his deeper thoughts.

When an Alpha is Marked  by One of His Own KindWhere stories live. Discover now