Tiantan City is peaceful and quiet today, too.

The weather’s lovely on Qixi. The sky is a clear, brilliant blue, making it a great day to go out and have fun—though it might be even better with someone you love by your side.

If you’re single, stay home and play games in peace. Don’t go out just to make yourself suffer!

The streets are full of couples, boys and girls walking hand in hand, drowning the whole place in the sickly-sweet smell of young love.

Xia Zhibai and Ruo Xiaoxi took City Bus Route 3 to the Qixi Theme Park. As soon as they got off, they saw the huge entrance; the whole street was decorated in pink, as far as the eye could see.

“Have you had breakfast?” Xia Zhibai asked.

“Huh? No.” Though it wouldn’t really matter if she skipped it.

“Th-then, there’s a crepe stand right by the entrance over there. How about we get one each?” Xia Zhibai took Ruo Xiaoxi by the hand and led her toward the crepe stand.

That soft little hand in her palm—just how tender was it?

And Ruo Xiaoxi was so well-behaved. She let Xia Zhibai hold her hand without a fuss, following wherever she went. She seemed to have no mind of her own, yet she was so sweet that Xia Zhibai couldn’t help wanting to hug her.

“It’s so lively here, Xiaoxi! Where should we go first?” Xia Zhibai was glad she’d finished all her summer homework last week. She could spend the rest of the break taking Ruo Xiaoxi wherever she wanted!

Actually, she was looking forward to spending every remaining day of the holidays glued to Ruo Xiaoxi’s side.

But first, she had to get Ruo Xiaoxi to agree to be her girlfriend.

Ruo Xiaoxi held her crepe in both hands and took tiny bites, like a little hamster.

She glanced around and suddenly spotted the entrance to an arcade. Come to think of it, she’d gone to places like this lots of times when she was little, but later on she’d never really had the chance.

Since it was Qixi and they’d come here to have fun anyway, Ruo Xiaoxi kind of wanted to go in.

“Um… Sister Xia, could we go play in the arcade for a while?”

“The arcade? Oh, that place. Sure.” Xia Zhibai had always thought it was somewhere kids liked to go—and, in fact, it was.

But today, because it was Qixi, lots of people had come to play. Maybe that was its own kind of romance.

They bought tokens at the counter by the entrance, then took a cupful into the arcade to play all kinds of little games. The tickets they won could be exchanged for prizes at the front desk.

Xia Zhibai had never been to places like this before. For a moment, she stood there with her tokens, unsure where to go.

Ruo Xiaoxi, on the other hand, seemed to know her way around. She took the older girl to try all kinds of machines and showed her how to play. She might’ve been tiny, but she was amazing at basketball.

Ruo Xiaoxi glanced at the arcade games. She really wanted to play, but she knew Xia Zhibai probably wouldn’t be any good at them. Then she’d be having fun by herself and leaving Xia Zhibai out, which wouldn’t be much fun. After thinking it over, she decided not to.

One game involved catching golden eggs. The two players stood on opposite sides, each holding a lever. On the screen, each of them had a basket that they moved around to catch the falling eggs.

Their levers kept bumping into each other, and whenever they did, the girls would look at each other and laugh.

“Left, left! There’s a golden egg! Hurry, Sister Xia, catch it!”

“Where? Oh, you dummy! The basket on the left is yours. You catch it!”

“Sister Xia, why do you keep catching bombs? We’re going to lose all our points!”

“Huh? Those are bombs? Why are there bombs in this game? What kind of chicken lays bombs?!” Xia Zhibai grumbled as she pulled a long strip of prize tickets out of the machine and handed it to Ruo Xiaoxi.

Ruo Xiaoxi folded all the tickets and tucked them into her bag. They could see how many they’d collected later. The little prizes at the counter took a lot of tickets to redeem.

“Hehe, we’ve got so many tickets! Let me count. Thirty, fifty, seventy-two!”

Ruo Xiaoxi gave a silly little smile as she carefully put the tickets away, looking as happy as a child.

Xia Zhibai suddenly realized that sometimes, giving could make you happy, too. Seeing how delighted Ruo Xiaoxi was made her want to play more games and collect even more tickets.

At the very least, they should be able to trade them for a little souvenir before they left.

They wandered around the arcade for a long time, trying almost everything. When they started to feel a little tired, Xia Zhibai offered to go buy milk tea.

When she came back, she saw a crowd gathered around a dance machine.

“Look at her! That girl’s so cute, and she dances beautifully.”

“Hey, over there! That girl’s gorgeous. Wanna go take a look?”

“Is she in middle school? That’s amazing—her score is so high!”

Curious, Xia Zhibai squeezed her way through the crowd.

She found Ruo Xiaoxi bouncing around energetically on the dance machine.

Following the prompts on the screen, Ruo Xiaoxi hit almost every step right on time.

Her neat ponytail bobbed up and down incessantly, and the pair of well-developed, soft mounds on her chest swayed seductively beneath her light, fluttering clothes; because her top was so short, a corner of her pink bra was visible from time to time.

Xia Zhibai thought Ruo Xiaoxi was adorable, but she also felt a little jealous.

She wanted to blindfold everyone watching. Hearing people praise Ruo Xiaoxi for being pretty made her feel both happy and uncomfortable. The girls were one thing, but the boys…

Those awful boys had to be looking at Ruo Xiaoxi’s cuteness with thoughts that deserved a thousand deaths.

When Ruo Xiaoxi finished dancing, she saw Xia Zhibai struggling with a claw machine nearby. She was glistening with sweat, so she wiped her forehead with a tissue and ran over.

“Here, this one’s yours.” Xia Zhibai handed her a cold drink, its cup already covered in beads of condensation.

“Hehe, thanks, Sister Xia. I went to try the dance machine over there.”

“Mm, I saw. You danced really well.”

“Really? I thought it was pretty average this time. My score wasn’t as high as before.” Ruo Xiaoxi said with a modest smile as she poked a straw through the lid of her milk tea.

“Are you trying to win a plushie, Sister Xia?”

“Yeah. There’s this plushie that looks really cute, but no matter how many times I try, I can’t grab it! Ugh, this claw machine is so weak! It barely has any strength—did it skip dinner?”

Ruo Xiaoxi couldn’t help giggling. “Pfft… The claw machine isn’t a guy.”