Chapter 246: Seeing Wangchuan Grain Pancake Shop Again
So, they had to act as if everything was normal.
Of course, that made it hard for the two of them to keep a straight face.
Many classmates had asked them when the show they recorded would air.
They wanted to watch…
Putting those worrying thoughts aside,
the three of them were, for now, effectively free.
They had met up today just to clear their heads,
and to casually talk about plans for the future.
Although the three were meeting at a café in the city,
none of them actually went inside to drink coffee — they walked side by side down the street, chatting as they went.
“Ke Bei, are you still planning to go into Alice Apartment?” Xiao Q asked.
Their formation at the time: Xiao Peng in the middle, Xiao Q and Ke Bei on either side.
Ke Bei said, “Of course I’m going in. My lifelong goal is to find out what happened to my father. I won’t give up until I accomplish that.”
The determination in his voice was as resolute as a man who vows to move two mountains.
Xiao Q said, “I’m wondering if it’s possible your father isn’t in Alice Apartment anymore either — that he, like us, might have escaped?”
Ke Bei shook his head. “If he had escaped, why would he have never contacted me for so long?”
Xiao Peng interjected, “Maybe… he had to go into hiding and couldn’t contact you. Maybe he had no choice.”
Ke Bei sighed.
At this point Xiao Peng said, “Ke Bei, to be honest, I might have to apologize to you. If you insist on going back into that hellhole, I’m not going with you. I really don’t have the courage to go back in.”
“Thinking about it now, we were lucky to end up in Su Mi’s hands. Although we were treated like dogs and locked up, at least we’re alive. If we’d fallen into the hands of those other deranged criminals, we probably wouldn’t be here today.”
Hearing that, Xiao Q — who hoped to become a criminal investigator in the future — felt a chill and shuddered at the thought.
That apartment was full of deranged criminals, serial killers with twisted minds.
They’d only tangled with a few of them,
and already they’d nearly been finished.
If they’d stayed longer and met more of them, they might have died without even knowing how.
To say nothing of it, any one of those twisted killers, taken out on the street, would be a huge catch for the authorities.
That alone showed how terrifying the people inside were.
Ke Bei looked at the two whose faces kept changing and offered a smile:
“Don’t worry. I’ll go in by myself. I never planned to drag you into that danger — it’s not your business.”
Xiao Q and Xiao Peng scratched their heads awkwardly,
feeling a little guilty toward Ke Bei.
But they really didn’t want to go back into that place.
Not unless it became absolutely unavoidable.
Just then,
Xiao Q suddenly pointed ahead. “Xiao Peng, isn’t that your ex, Xiao Hua?”
“And… Wang Ju?”
Xiao Peng looked forward.
At the front of a milk tea shop called Mixue Bingcheng,
two men and two women were buying drinks.
The two women were Xiao Peng’s ex, Xiao Hua, and Wang Ju — the girl who the tall male student had sought revenge for.
The two men beside them were the boyfriend of Wang Ju and the boyfriend of Xiao Hua.
Yes.
After being dumped by Xiao Peng, Xiao Hua still liked him,
but time changes people.
She eventually moved on.
Especially after Xiao Peng stopped replying to her messages,
she resolved to find a new boyfriend.
At that moment, Xiao Q and the others spotted the group of four.
Xiao Hua and Wang Ju naturally noticed them too,
but both parties pretended to be strangers with perfect synchrony.
Ten minutes after they passed each other,
Xiao Q teased Xiao Peng: now that your ex is someone else’s girlfriend, how do you feel?
Xiao Peng, straightforward as ever, didn’t bother pretending. He said bluntly, “I already slept with her, so no loss. I don’t care.”
That shut Xiao Q up instantly.
A loudspeaker voice suddenly cut into their conversation.
“Wangchuan Grain Pancakes! To thank new and old customers, we’re running a promotion!”
“Buy one standard pancake for ten yuan and get a raffle ticket for free!”
“Use the raffle ticket to enter the draw! Prizes are as follows!”
“One grand prize: a seven-day trip to the Macedonian Island in the Pacific!”
“Two second prizes: a JACK car worth 100,000 yuan each!”
“Three third prizes: a JACK electric bike worth 3,999 yuan each!”
“One hundred fourth prizes: 100-yuan Wangchuan Grain Pancake shop vouchers!”
“Come buy pancakes, everyone!!!”
As they drew closer, the three of them could hear the announcement more clearly.
They reached the front and discovered Wangchuan Grain Pancake Shop was holding a buy-and-draw event.
No kidding — a crowd had already formed and the line stretched long.
This Wangchuan Grain Pancake Shop was located right in the city center.
Both Xiao Q and Xiao Peng had bought pancakes from this shop before.
And to be honest, the pancakes were tasty and reasonably priced — not outrageously expensive where ordinary people couldn’t afford them.
Seeing the shop’s promotion and smelling the aroma wafting from inside,
Xiao Peng licked his lips involuntarily and wiped his mouth.
He turned to Xiao Q and Ke Bei: “Let’s go. Buy grain pancakes and try our luck in the draw.”
Xiao Q nodded. “Sure. It’s been a while since I ate these pancakes.”
Ke Bei, unlike the other two, had come to the city center before and passed this pancake shop many times,
but he had never bought anything here.
At first he planned to refuse since the line was so long — if you want grain pancakes, there were other places to get them.
But seeing the other two eager to queue, he didn’t protest and joined them.
Whether by cursed fate or whatnot,
after only a few minutes in line,
they again saw Xiao Hua, Wang Ju, and their boyfriends approaching, each holding a drink from Mixue Bingcheng.
Wang Ju’s boyfriend said, “Hey, look — they’re doing a pancake draw over here. Let’s go try! These pancakes are pretty good, too!”
Xiao Hua’s boyfriend agreed. Both guys wanted to buy some.
Originally Xiao Hua and Wang Ju were about to say yes,
but when they saw Xiao Q and the others in the line,
their expressions changed instantly.
Xiao Hua and Wang Ju’s boyfriends were from the same university as them, but they didn’t know Xiao Q or Xiao Peng personally.
So why did Xiao Hua and Wang Ju act like strangers toward them?
Was it that after a breakup you just couldn’t be friends anymore?
Or did they not want their new boyfriends to know they had ties to Xiao Peng and the others?
No — there was another layer to it.
Xiao Q had always said he was only Xiao Peng’s friend.
They had only met Xiao Hua and the others because of what happened at Alice Apartment.
So the current hostility between them had nothing to do with him.
Xiao Peng was different — he used to hang around with the others a lot.
After escaping Alice Apartment and returning to normal life,
he publicly called out Wang Ju, who had dumped the tall male student and then found someone else.
He criticized her in front of everyone,
and their relationship deteriorated rapidly.
Plus, Xiao Peng and Xiao Hua were bound by that “exes curse,”
and their relationship was no better.
Otherwise, if they had bumped into each other on the street, they wouldn’t have pretended not to know one another.