In Wucheng, inside an e-commerce park.
Cheng Zhu came out of the live streaming room where a hostess was selling products and returned to his office.
He dropped himself into the chair, skillfully placed a cigarette in his mouth, and took the Dupont lighter from his desk. With a movement of his thumb, he opened the lighter's lid, producing a crisp "ding" sound.
This Dupont lighter he had cost officially 13,200 yuan. In his opinion, he bought it just to hear that sound.
In his office, Cheng Zhu smoked without worries, with his feet on the desk. He took his phone, opened Douyin, and the first thing he saw was his hostess, working hard selling products.
Cheng Zhu watched her for half a minute before swiping to the next video.
"I fully trust Yiyi's commercial skills," he said. Yiyi was the star hostess of his company, whom he had trained himself. She alone generated almost 8 figures for him a year.
Although there was a difference with the top live sales hosts, it was already enough for Cheng Zhu to make a lot of money.
Cheng Zhu treated her well, and as a reward, they occasionally discussed big multi-million yuan projects in five-star hotel suites. There was no other choice, the president is Cheng Zhu, and Yiyi had matured early.
The next video on Douyin he saw was one of those interactive ones. In the image appeared a phrase:
"If you had the chance to be reborn and return to the past, would you take it?"
This video had over two thousand comments. Bored, Cheng Zhu decided to take a look, and indeed, most people said yes.
Some wanted to make up for lost love, others wanted to return to the past to get rich, and others wanted to study well... there was everything.
Smoking his cigarette, Cheng Zhu wrote a comment:
"I don't want to".
And attached an image. It was a capture of the balance of one of his bank accounts, showing over six million.
"I am successful since young, I have over six million in an account! Reborn to be a poor devil again? No way!"
Among his group of friends, Cheng Zhu was known as the king of ostentation. Although showing off was common among most, he really knew how to do it. He lived in a carefree and slightly rebellious way, unlike some of his friends who needed to find indirect ways to show off.
His comment undoubtedly stood out among the thousands. It didn't take long before he received several replies:
"Where did you get such a real image?"
"I will always consider pixelated images fake."
"If in real life you have six million on a card, I'd call you boss, but on Douyin, you're lacking a lot."
"Damn it, he pulled it off!"
"Delete that, let me post it!"
"I have a thousand images like that in my album!"
Cheng Zhu put out the cigarette in the ashtray, smiled carelessly, and didn't bother replying to those comments.
When the fire of the cigarette was completely extinguished, he suddenly felt that everything was spinning.
The next moment, he lost consciousness completely.
***
"Cheng Zhu! Cheng Zhu!"
A female voice began to sound in his ears.
His vision began to recover gradually and he saw a girl with long light brown hair, standing in front of him with an annoyed expression. On the ground there were scattered cigarettes.
The scene before him seemed familiar, but he couldn't remember it completely.
Around him, there were two boys and a girl.
One of the boys said:
"Cheng Zhu, are you acting the melancholic? Smoking is harmful to health, and you shouldn't talk to Li Xinyue like that".
At that moment, Cheng Zhu felt a blow to his head and many memories that were previously blurry began to clear up. Damn it, the blurry memories started attacking me!
He remembered it was the summer of 2014, the summer after graduating from high school. He confirmed his relationship with the girl in front of him, Li Xinyue, and had his first love.
At that time, it was the first big fight between the two, and Li Xinyue suggested breaking up.
As a teenager in full puberty, a bit immature and unconventional, Cheng Zhu, hurt, started smoking, partly as a way to show Li Xinyue his pain.
It was something like when girls get drunk after a breakup and call their exes to show them their suffering.
Later, thinking about how he started smoking, indirectly contributing to the country's military expenditure, he only felt like a fool.
The boy who had scolded him was the class president, Li Rui. He was a good student, from a well-off family, with a father who drove a Mercedes S350, although in reality it was an S300 whose badge had been changed.
Li Rui had always been in love with Li Xinyue. Their families were from the same village and they knew each other since childhood.
But, how was it said? Childhood cannot compete with the accidental.
Li Rui was neither tall nor handsome, unlike Cheng Zhu, who was 1.82m tall and had a slightly rough attractiveness.
In that first love, what annoyed Cheng Zhu the most was Li Rui. He used the excuse of being childhood friends to talk to Li Xinyue every day. Every time the couple argued, he ran to console her, inviting her out to dinner or to the movies, always under the pretext of having grown up together.
Every time he had the chance, he strove to show how attentive and considerate he was, like a real Prince Charming.
However, Li Xinyue at that time still focused more on appearance than on money.
The memories kept attacking Cheng Zhu. He remembered that after that big fight, he went again to apologize to Li Xinyue.
Although the fight started because of how demanding she was, for the Cheng Zhu of that time, every time she mentioned the word "breakup", he foolishly gave in.
Of course, in the end, the two made peace, and Li Rui, like a pawn, consoled Li Xinyue for three days before being relegated with a "Good brother" message.
In those days, among students it was still popular to have "brothers" and "sisters".
Like Vae still sang in his songs: "She is just my sister~~"
At that moment, Li Rui, seeing that Cheng Zhu still said nothing, couldn't help but say:
"Cheng Zhu, smoking is bad, can't you see how angry Xinyue is?"
Among the two boys and the girl standing to the side, a boy with acne and dark skin said:
"Cheng Zhu, better not smoke, it really is bad for your health."
Cheng Zhu looked at this boy named Wang Anquan, with a softer look.
Wang Anquan's father was a firefighter, and following the motto "safety comes first", he gave that name to his son.
He was Cheng Zhu's desk mate in high school, they lived in the same neighborhood, and were inseparable friends in those times.
As for the girl next to Wang Anquan, she was called Chen Rongrong, Li Xinyue's best friend.
Although both told Cheng Zhu to stop smoking, Li Rui did it to discredit him, while Wang Anquan really worried about him.
Cheng Zhu looked at Li Rui, observing the class president who always looked for opportunities to take his place, and smiled narrowing his eyes:
"Do you know one thing? The nice guy is even worse than a bootlicker."
Who do you think you are to try to take my girl away?
On the scale of relevance, the nice guy was even behind the guy who humbles himself for love.
Even if this time he really didn't reconcile with Li Xinyue, it wouldn't be your turn either, naive sheep.
Although, in those days there wasn't so much awareness about this, and the term "nice guy" still had positive connotations.
Although Li Rui didn't fully understand the meaning of Cheng Zhu's words, anyone with a bit of sense knew he was insulting him.
"Cheng Zhu, that... That..."
In front of Li Xinyue, he couldn't even say "you, damn...", maintaining his supposed gentlemanly demeanor and his nice guy image.
In the end, he could only raise his voice a bit and say:
"What do you mean by that!?"
"What do I mean? Does it need to be asked?" Cheng Zhu raised an eyebrow slightly.
He smiled and said:
"Normally I don't say things that humiliate a person, but if I say them..."
Cheng Zhu paused, and his smile became brighter:
"It's because I really want to humiliate you"