Chapter 133 : Chapter 133
133. Can Band-Aids Compare to Gaming?
“In short, ignore appearances, you can completely treat me as a normal male. As for the conflict between us~ either we fight it out or you call me ‘Dad’ and it’s over. Don’t be so nagging like a woman.”
Yi Ning shook her head slightly, continuing to coax Lu Zheng.
She couldn’t be bothered to dwell on the minor changes in her personality.
After all, it wasn’t a bad change.
Yi Ning slouched in her chair, one hand resting on the back, wearing a cocky smile with a lazy attitude.
If their genders were swapped, this would have been the perfect image of a small-time thug forcibly hitting on a decent woman.
Yi Ning crooked a finger at Lu Zheng with her other hand, the gesture and expression filled with provocation.
“If you really can’t get over it inside…”
“Come, call me Dad, and I’ll forgive you.”
“……”
Lu Zheng fell silent for a moment before asking, “Can I call you Mom instead?”
Yi Ning’s attitude indeed made him feel much more at ease, even to the point of daring to haggle with her.
Unfortunately, this tempting request was vetoed by Yi Ning on the spot.
“No way!”
She made a big X with her arms in front of her chest, then stuck out her pink tongue and arrogantly flipped Lu Zheng off.
“I’m making you call me Dad because I want to humiliate you, to stomp your dignity into the ground and grind it under my feet! If I let you call me Mom, wouldn’t that turn into a reward for you instead?”
“Where in the world would there be such a good deal?”
Afterward, she gave Lu Zheng a “just as I expected” look and fired off waves of mockery.
“I only agreed to step on you before because doing it gave me an intense sense of satisfaction and conquest, letting me trample you! Did you really think I’d be kind enough to let you enjoy a free benefit? No way, no way? A dignified hero having such childish thoughts? Truly a virgin~ low-level virgin~ low-level virgin~”
Yi Ning pressed forward relentlessly, leaving Lu Zheng with no room to resist.
In the end, Lu Zheng had no choice but to lower his head and call out in a stifled voice, “Dad.”
The moment that word came out, paired with Lu Zheng’s helpless expression, Yi Ning’s smile widened uncontrollably. She ended up leaning forward on the table with both hands, deliberately tilting her head to look up at Lu Zheng from below.
While looking at him, she mocked him excitedly.
“This is exactly what I wanted to see! I wanted to see your unwilling yet forced-to-submit expression!”
Such a dramatic display naturally drew many onlookers from around them, but Yi Ning was not the type of woman to be intimidated by attention.
If anything, the more people looked, the more excited she became.
She was practically high from it!
Although Lu Zheng felt a bit embarrassed, he couldn’t bring himself to ask Yi Ning to act more properly. All he could do was smile awkwardly and play along with her.
It wasn’t until the server arrived with dishes that Yi Ning reluctantly pulled back a bit to make space for the plates.
“Sigh~ That’s why you’re still too uptight.”
Yi Ning picked up her chopsticks and put some food into her mouth, then pointed the back end of the chopsticks at Lu Zheng.
“No, I think any normal person would be just as uptight.”
Lu Zheng disagreed.
Seeing Yi Ning start to eat, he picked up his chopsticks and took some food as well.
“No, no, no.”
“I’m not talking about the previous matter, but something before that.”
Yi Ning raised her index finger, holding her chopsticks with her right hand, and wiggled it.
She curled her lips into a smile and waited until Lu Zheng showed the expression she wanted before continuing.
“I’m saying you still subconsciously treat me like a girl, as someone who needs to be treated with tolerance and patience.”
“Let’s change perspective. If the person who acted crazy here before was one of your usual friends you joke around with, what would you have done?”
What would he have done?
Lu Zheng instinctively imagined it and came to a conclusion—
At the very least, he would have pinned the other person’s head to the table and taught him not to act crazy here!
Seeing Lu Zheng’s enlightened expression, Yi Ning nodded slightly.
Now that was teachable.
“There’s no need to be so uptight. We’re at least friends now, and between friends, there’s no need to hide your true self. Always rigid, avoiding, tolerating, how boring is that?”
This wasn’t the Lu Zheng she wanted.
As one of Yi Ning’s greatest sources of fun during work, if her arch-enemy Pixel Mask became uptight due to all sorts of strange reasons, then the traps she set to capture him and their battles of wits and courage would become completely uninteresting.
At the very least, he should be able to catch her references when she made jokes!
Unfortunately, it seemed that her previous excessive letting loose had made Lu Zheng uncomfortable, making him hesitant about her proposal.
Mainly, he wasn’t sure where the limits of this “freedom” lay.
“Sigh~ That’s why you... even if it’s with the level of freedom you had when you gave me the Band-Aid before, it’s fine.”
Seeing Lu Zheng’s unresponsive attitude, Yi Ning felt a bit helpless.
Wasn’t it exhausting to overthink social interactions like this?
Couldn’t he learn from her?
Turning Xia An into a girl when she felt like it, beating them up when she wanted until they couldn’t get out of bed, using them to raise the flag whenever she wanted.
She sighed faintly, lamenting—
Not teachable after all!
But Lu Zheng also had his reasons.
Yi Ning’s situation? Victim. Now, what about him, Lu Zheng?
He didn’t have that ability, understand?
She now said it was fine to have the same level of freedom as when he gave her a Band-Aid, but what happened when he let loose before? He got beaten with a folding chair.
How was he supposed to explain that?
“When I say it’s fine, it’s fine!”
Yi Ning crossed her arms at her chest, looking extremely domineering.
“It’s like when you’re gaming, you constantly take my minions under the pretext of ganking and deliberately steal my pentakill. After the game, of course, we’d have a real-life fight, but afterward, everything goes back to normal, and it doesn’t affect our relationship. These small things are just the seasoning of daily life.”
“You’re telling me wearing a Band-Aid can be compared to stealing last hits in a game?”
Hearing Lu Zheng’s retort, Yi Ning seemed to realize there was something off about what she said. She paused to think, then nodded thoughtfully.
“To be fair, that’s true.”
“If you pulled that on me while we were gaming, I’d send you a real-life duel request halfway through the game, and it wouldn’t be a 1v1 unarmed fight either. It would be you soloing me plus a gang of underworld clones.”
So minions and pentakills were more important than wearing a Band-Aid?
“Of course!”
As if she had guessed Lu Zheng’s thoughts, Yi Ning nodded solemnly.
Gaming was obviously more important!
“After all, it’s not like I haven’t worn just a Band-Aid before.”
Lu Zheng: “?”