Yan Zhikai led the group through the entire e-sports and gaming club activity room.

The clubroom was way bigger than Shu Yuxin and Peng Xiaoxiao had imagined. Besides the “internet café” room right by the entrance, they also had a console gaming room, plus a VR and motion-gaming room. Even after setting all that up, they still had two rooms left over.

The other rooms weren’t that big on their own, but added together, the space was still impressive. And apparently, this was only a medium-sized activity room they’d applied for. Really, when you had money, you could do whatever you wanted. At least, that was how it looked to Peng Xiaoxiao. She was stunned.

But very soon, something else grabbed her attention.

The last room they entered was the motion gaming room. There were only seven gaming setups inside, but every single one looked absurdly high-end at first glance. They were all motion-sensing racing simulators, complete with steering wheel, pedals, gear shifter, and most importantly, a full simulation driving seat.

Right now, there was only one boy in the room, playing on the machine in the middle. The seat he was sitting in tilted and shifted along with the angle and speed of the sports car on the screen. It felt just like driving a real supercar. The whole thing looked insanely thrilling.

Peng Xiaoxiao was, in fact, a hardcore gamer through and through. And among all the game genres out there, racing games were her absolute favorite. Shu Yuxin saw her playing driving games in the dorm most of the time, which said enough. So the moment Peng Xiaoxiao saw what was in this room and realized what these things were, she instantly lost it.

“Holy shit!! A simulator this awesome?!”

Her face full of excitement, she turned to Yan Zhikai beside her.

“Can I try it right now?!”

Even Yan Zhikai, who had been keeping a serious face the whole time, was a little startled by her reaction. He scratched his hair and waved a hand.

“If you wanna play, go ahead.”

Then he walked over to the boy and lightly patted his shoulder.

“Old Wei, pause for a sec.”

The boy turned to look at him, then paused the game and took off his headphones. Because of the angle of the car in-game, the seat he was in was still tilted by about ten degrees, making the way he sat look a little awkward.

“What? I’m telling you, I’m in the middle of a championship run, you—”

“Who cares what you’re running,” Yan Zhikai cut him off bluntly. Then he pointed at Peng Xiaoxiao behind him. “There’s a girl here who wants you to show her the ropes. You in or not?”

The boy instinctively looked in the direction he pointed. When he saw the three of them standing there, he froze.

Yan Zhikai patted the boy’s seat and introduced him to Peng Xiaoxiao.

“This kid’s Wei Zhanpeng, from our Nanhu College. He comes here every day and only knows how to race. Doesn’t touch anything else. If you’re interested, let him teach you. He’s smoother at this than I am.”

Wei Zhanpeng was still dazed when Peng Xiaoxiao walked right up to him and waved casually.

“Hey, I’m Peng Xiaoxiao, a freshman from Nanhu College.”

“Y-y-y-y-you... hello! I’m Zhan... no, I mean, I’m Wei Zhanpeng. Uh, well, you can call me Zhanpeng too...”

“Just call him Old Wei. He’s basically a limp loser anyway.”

Yan Zhikai suddenly laughed, then went on.

“This guy barely ever talks to girls. The second he does, he turns into this. You’ll get used to it.”

“Fuck off, will you?!”

Having his secret exposed, Old Wei’s face turned red on the spot.

“Will it kill you to shut the hell up for once? So what if I haven’t dealt with girls much? Did I do anything to you?!”

Yan Zhikai shrugged and didn’t answer.

Peng Xiaoxiao, on the other hand, burst out laughing. She climbed onto the machine next to Old Wei and sat down, speaking in her usual carefree way.

“If that doesn’t work, just treat me like one of the guys... I mean, aside from the part where getting naked together might be a little difficult, I’m basically no different from a dude.”

The moment Old Wei’s eyes landed on her again, he lost the ability to talk all over again.

“It’s fine... I’m just a little... ha... uh, that is... you... what do you wanna play?”

“What game are you playing?”

To keep him from feeling too awkward, Peng Xiaoxiao simply changed the subject.

“It’s not NFS? But it looks pretty fun.”

Once he got used to it, he probably wouldn’t be like this anymore, right?

As soon as the topic shifted into gaming territory, Old Wei’s nerves eased up quite a bit. He laughed and said,

“Of course it’s not NFS. That series has gotten less and less fun with every new release. This is Horizon 3. Anyway, I think it’s way more fun than NFS.”

“Oh.”

Peng Xiaoxiao nodded and started fiddling with the controls on her machine.

“So... how do you use this thing?”

“Press that button to start it.”

Old Wei was no longer in any hurry to get back to his championship run. With some difficulty, he slid down from his crooked seat, came over to Peng Xiaoxiao’s side, and started personally teaching the girl how to race.

“First, like this...”

On the other side, Yan Zhikai looked at the other two newcomers and asked,

“You two wanna try it too? It’s pretty fun. Though it does bounce you around enough to make your butt hurt.”

Shu Yuxin couldn’t help laughing.

“I’ll pass. I just came to take a look this time.”

“Alright, suit yourselves.”

Yan Zhikai paused, then asked again,

“So, now that you’ve seen the whole clubroom, what do you think?”

“Not bad.”

Shu Yuxin nodded.

“I’m pretty interested. Peng Xiaoxiao and I will talk it over later. We’ll probably join.”

Yan Zhikai quietly let out a sigh of relief.

“No need to rush. You can join a club anytime, really. The school notice board has contact info for every club.”

At least all this effort hadn’t been for nothing.

After saying that, he scratched his stomach and said,

“Then that’s it for me. I still need to prepare for a makeup exam, so I’ve gotta head back and study. If you feel like it, you can keep looking around. If you wanna play, go ahead. If there’s anything you don’t get, just ask the people here. They may look kinda sleazy, but they’re actually pretty decent.”

“Wait,” Jiang Zixuan suddenly called out to stop him. “Since we’re interested in joining, shouldn’t you tell us some actual details about the club?”

“What do you want to ask?”

“How many members does this club have at Minghai University? Clubs with fewer than fifty members lose their activity room. And that fifty-person minimum doesn’t include students from Nanhu College. I need to ask that much at least. Otherwise one day the clubroom could be gone and we wouldn’t even know why.”

“You don’t need to worry about that. On the Minghai University side alone, we’ve got over a hundred members. Even if a bunch of seniors leave this year, we’ll still definitely have more than fifty.”

As he said that, Yan Zhikai suddenly let out two strange little laughs.

“And even if our clubroom really did get taken back, we’ve got our own ways.”

Jiang Zixuan nodded.

“One more question. What are this club’s regular activities? Just playing games? What’s the club’s main purpose?”

“Daily entertainment, relaxing, making friends. That’s our regular activity.”

After thinking for a moment, Yan Zhikai continued,

“As for the club’s purpose... if I said we’re preparing for next year’s city e-sports tournament, would you believe me?”

“An e-sports tournament?”

Shu Yuxin froze for a moment.

“Yeah. I’m not even bragging. We got third place in last year’s city tournament. Thirteen grand per person in prize money. Pretty damn awesome.”

Yan Zhikai scratched his stomach again.

“Any other questions?”

Jiang Zixuan smiled.

“That’s all.”

“Alright then, I’m off.”

This time, Yan Zhikai didn’t linger. After saying that, he left the room directly.

Inside the room, Shu Yuxin tilted her head up to look at Jiang Zixuan and complained in a low voice,

“Why were you asking all that stuff?”

Even though his tone had stayed pretty friendly the whole time, those questions still made it sound like he was doubting the club.

Jiang Zixuan met her gaze for a moment with a half-smile.

“If you don’t ask clearly, aren’t you scared you’ll end up joining some weird organization? Or are you the type who’d help count the money after getting sold off? Can you have at least a little sense of caution?”

Shu Yuxin went silent for three seconds, then punched him straight in the face.