So Wen Yang hadn’t gone on a date, and the novel’s opening scene never happened. Did that mean everything that came after wouldn’t happen either?

Ning Chu followed behind his three roommates, head bowed as he watched his toes and turned the question over in his mind.

It probably would still happen. After all, it was an erotic novel made up of a series of short stories, and there wasn’t much connection between them.

Still, he had to try.

He let out a worried sigh.

After living with Wen Yang in the dorm for so long, it was hard for Ning Chu to imagine him turning into a womanizing scumbag. He also really didn’t want to accept that Zhang Shaoqing would become the villain in the book.

Worse, Ning Chu’s role in the book seemed to be a woman—and the kind who got pinned beneath someone.

Even if he thought he was just scaring himself, he was a perfectly ordinary man right now. Sure, he was a little short, but there was no way he’d suddenly turn into a girl, right?

“How about this Sichuan restaurant?”

Ning Chu’s vision went black. He walked straight into Zhang Shaoqing’s back, clutched his nose, and stumbled two steps backward.

Zhang Shaoqing didn’t budge. He turned around in confusion. “Why’d you bump into me?”

“...”

“You’re paying, so you can eat whatever you want,” Wang Jie said, asking, “Is this Sichuan place any good?”

“No idea. Doesn’t it say here that you get a case of liquor if you spend over two hundred?”

Ning Chu rubbed his sore, reddened nose and silently complained about how generous—and unusually thrifty—Zhang Shaoqing was.

He followed his three roommates into a private dining room, then sat down with his chin in one hand, absentmindedly staring at a painting on the wall.

“Spacing out again. Who knows what he thinks about all day?” Zhang Shaoqing glanced at Ning Chu, who was sitting there in a daze, then picked up the menu and called out, “Order, order! Don’t try to save me money.”

Wen Yang and Wang Jie knew the guy had money to spare, but they still tried to order the cheaper dishes.

By the time they were waiting for the food, they’d already opened a case of liquor.

Someone nudged Ning Chu, jolting him out of his daze. Wen Yang was sitting beside him, and his glass was already full.

“Want a drink? Don’t keep spacing out and shutting yourself off from everyone.”

“Sure.”

He casually pushed the glass back. “I’m allergic to alcohol. I’ll have a Coke.”

In a world this dangerous, with both the male lead and the villain right beside him, how could he dare drink? What if a plot point involving him came early!

Ning Chu went to the fridge for a bottle of Coke. When he came back and sat down, he turned to look at Wen Yang with a hint of suspicion.

Why does this guy keep staring at me?

He’d always been sensitive to people’s gazes, and he could feel Wen Yang’s eyes on him.

From the moment he got up and left the private room to the moment he came back with his Coke, Wen Yang’s gaze had stayed on him.

“What?”

“You look like you’ve put on weight,” Wen Yang muttered, turning his eyes away.

Put on weight?

Ning Chu scratched his head and looked down at himself.

He was sitting in a relaxed position, but his stomach didn’t have an ounce of extra fat. If anything, he was on the skinny side. He certainly didn’t look like he’d put on weight.

Where was he fat?

His gaze moved from his stomach to his bare legs in his shorts, then to his slender arms and chest.

Nothing looked unusual.

“Military training starts tomorrow,” Wen Yang complained, leaning aside to make room for the server carrying the dishes. “My friends don’t have to do theirs until after Golden Week. Why do we have to start so early?”

“How the hell would I know? Ask those dumbass school administrators.”

Once all the dishes were on the table, everyone dug in and passed drinks around. Ning Chu had plenty on his mind, but when it came to eating, he could hold his own.

Why think so much? He’d fill his stomach first.

Even if he really was the girl in the book who was destined to get pinned beneath one of her roommates, that wasn’t something he needed to worry about right now.

The four roommates left a little after six and didn’t finish eating until a little after eight.

Wen Yang was the first to get up. He glanced at Wang Jie, who was sprawled over the table and out cold, then at Zhang Shaoqing, who was hugging an empty bottle and trying to pour air into his mouth. With a helpless sigh, he said, “I knew those two would get drunk again.”

“Come on, let’s—” He turned to look at Ning Chu’s slight frame, then shook his head as if resigning himself to it. “I’ll take them back.”

“I’ll help you hold them up.”

Happy to take it easy, Ning Chu got up and helped drape Wang Jie and Zhang Shaoqing over Wen Yang’s shoulders, one on each side.

With a drunk hanging off each shoulder, Wen Yang stood up and took a step forward. He swayed from side to side and nearly fell over.

“This won’t work...” Ning Chu frowned, then hurried out of the private room. “Put them down and wait for me!”

“Where are you going?”

Wen Yang was a little worried, but all he saw was Ning Chu darting out through the door.

His expression turned a little strange. After setting the two drunks down, he muttered to himself, puzzled, “Why does Ning Chu’s back look like a girl’s?”

A few minutes later, Ning Chu came back into the room pulling a little cart. He grinned proudly. “I borrowed a cart from the restaurant kitchen. It’s a little dirty, but I don’t think they’ll care.”

It was a small four-wheeled cart the restaurant used to move ingredients. It wasn’t very big.

“Not bad!” Wen Yang looked impressed.

He’d always thought his roommate was pretty withdrawn. He hadn’t expected Ning Chu to talk things over with the restaurant and borrow a cart in just a few minutes.

At least Zhang Shaoqing was still awake. He obediently sat on the cart, hugged his knees, and curled up as small as he could.

Wang Jie managed to squeeze onto it too. The two grown men huddled together on a cart less than a square meter in size, looking like a pair of miserable two-hundred-pound kids.

“If they go back to school like this, their reputations will be ruined by tomorrow.” Wen Yang laughed as he pushed the cart. When he turned around, he saw Ning Chu flinch and quickly hide the phone he’d just raised behind his back.

“It’s fine. Take some pictures of their embarrassing moments and send me a couple when we get back to the dorm.”

With Wen Yang’s approval, Ning Chu’s eyes lit up. He snapped pictures of the two drunks from every angle without holding back, saving their disgrace to his phone.

Watching Ning Chu act so lively, unlike his usual self, and seeing the slender, snow-white calves peeking out from his shorts, Wen Yang smiled until his eyes narrowed. But there was a hint of hesitation in his expression.

“What do you want to ask?” Ning Chu noticed his strange expression and explained, “I’ve had some trouble at home lately, so I haven’t been in a good mood or felt like talking. That’s why I’ve seemed so withdrawn and antisocial.”

“No, I was going to say, you...”

“Yeah?”

Wen Yang’s gaze quietly swept over Ning Chu’s waist, legs, and hips. He couldn’t figure out how to put it, so he said, “Never mind.”

“You’re something else. You start saying something, then leave me hanging.”

Ning Chu turned around and glared at Wen Yang, a little annoyed.

Even with anger in them, his bright, dewy eyes made him look more like a girl pouting coquettishly.

“Come on, spit it out! What’s the problem?”

“Uh... What body wash do you use? I noticed it at dinner. It smells pretty nice.”

He froze, then lowered his head and sniffed his forearm. Confused, he looked at Wen Yang again. “What smell? I’m sweating like crazy. I probably just stink.”

“You think so?”

Ning Chu’s expression darkened at once. “What else would it be?”

More and more signs were making him realize that the role he played in this world might really be the woman in the novel who hid in the boys’ dorm and got pinned beneath Wen Yang.

This was ridiculous!

Other people who got transmigrated either became the protagonist and made a name for themselves, or, at worst, became the villain and did whatever they pleased.

Only he had ended up as one of the smut novel’s male lead’s sexual partners?