156. Time Flows Like Water
==============================
The Maid Café just opened and sparked quite the buzz among students. On the way back to the dormitory, Lin Nan overheard a bunch of passing students chatting about the café.
But let’s be real, calling it a café is a stretch—it’s more of a hybrid between a restaurant and a café. I mean, it’s a school, not some posh hangout. Still, the prices were eye-wateringly high!
Three people downed coffee worth over a hundred bucks… and I bet the coffee itself cost about ten. Most of that cash was for the maid experience!
If every maid bowed and called me “Master” like Lilith does, I wouldn’t feel so ripped off, but it was clear that the maids there were just college students treating it like any old job. Zero maidly professionalism!
I even imagined some anime scenarios before going in…
With a painful expression, Lin Nan opened Alipay to transfer money to Chen Yao, but then thought better of it. We’re such good friends—Chen Yao wouldn’t mind covering this little expense, right?
He glanced at Chen Yao sitting ahead and quietly shoved his phone back into his pocket. Better to wait for him to bring it up later.
Thirty bucks is enough for two meals, especially since my family stopped sending me money. I feel the pinch if I spend over ten bucks!
Should I just go work at that café as a maid? A couple of hundred bucks a day…
The thought flashed through his mind, but he quickly shoved it aside.
He sighed, feeling off-kilter. Although he was getting used to this random way of thinking that didn’t belong to him, he recalled Li Na saying that Lilith barely affected him anymore.
Could this really be my own thought?
Lin Nan couldn’t believe he would think such a thing—it was clearly all Lilith’s fault!
When he got back to the dorm, Chen Yao noticed Lin Nan’s earlier gloomy expression back at the café right away. He watched as Lin Nan relaxed the moment they left.
It seemed there was something or someone in that café that made Lin Nan uneasy.
Meanwhile, Tu Junhui came back from the café, practically bouncing over to other dorms to share his experience, turning the plain-looking maids into breathtaking beauties and hailing Lilith as a celestial goddess!
“When’s Xiong Da coming back?”
Lin Nan propped his chin on his hand, feeling like something was missing ever since someone left the dorm.
“Probably this weekend? At most he’ll skip a week. If he skips more, Zhen Dao will find out and Xiong Da might just be a goner!” Chen Yao leaned against Lin Nan’s wardrobe, yawning and glancing around for Tu Junhui, then quickly changed topics. “What was up with your expression back there?”
Lin Nan blinked, looking confused. “Huh?”
Chen Yao had no clue whether Lin Nan was playing dumb or not. He sighed helplessly, “Just keep an eye out, okay?”
“Sure.” Ever since Lin Nan got a bit more feminine, he had been acting dumb nonstop, and he’d gotten pretty good at it. Even if Chen Yao seemed to have given up on questioning, he still wore a puzzled look.
Not sensing any cracks in the façade, Chen Yao switched subjects: “Need a monitor? I was gonna buy a 144Hz one since this one’s pretty shabby.”
“Free?” Lin Nan perked up.
Chen Yao intended to sell it to Lin Nan for two hundred, but when he looked down and saw Lin Nan’s eager eyes staring up at him, he softened and instinctively said, “Sure…”
As soon as he said it, he snapped back to reality, trying to rescind his offer—but Lin Nan was already eagerly reaching to unplug his computer!
“Hey! My new monitor hasn’t even arrived yet!” Chen Yao hurried to stop Lin Nan. “Wait, my new monitor will get here tomorrow.”
“Alright then…” Lin Nan sighed deeply.
Ever since losing in PUBG because the screen was too small to see anything, he had been itching to get a new monitor. Yet, given that it wasn’t exactly a necessity, he had just stopped playing.
Tomorrow, he could finally use Chen Yao’s monitor. Oh yeah.
The thrill of saving some cash felt pretty good.
Back at his seat, he suddenly felt bad about always mooching, so he pulled out his phone to ask Chen Yao, “Wanna get some milk tea? My treat.”
“Nah, I just had coffee.”
Chen Yao felt a bit guilty about letting Lin Nan pay after already agreeing to give him the monitor for free, especially since that monitor was just a second-hand purchase, barely over four hundred bucks, and lasted him a year without breaking.
He sat back down, staring at his phone, but then suddenly realized neither Lin Nan nor Tu Junhui had paid him back for that coffee.
“Lin Nan?” He looked up. “You’re not gonna owe me for the coffee, are you?”
“Of course not?!” Lin Nan sheepishly sent him the money then dramatically flopped face down on the desk.
The dorm fell into a tense silence—only the sound of Chen Yao furiously typing away broke the quiet.
Thanks to Xiong Da’s successful online romance, the rest of the dorm’s bunch of virgin boys seemed a bit restless. Chen Yao was fine, but Tu Junhui had already downloaded some social app, posting pictures of some muscular guy from the internet, trying to charm girls daily.
But Tu Junhui’s taste was honestly inscrutable, no wonder the girl he chased last semester wouldn’t even mention him now. He must have freaked her out after she finally started liking him and then suddenly thought he was totally tasteless.
This Tuesday afternoon, the school was surprisingly devoid of activities, with only the usual health inspections. Though Lin Nan’s dorm was a bit messy, they never fell short on cleanliness. Lin Nan simply couldn’t stand the chaos, while his roomies were too lazy to lift a finger. So, he usually ended up doing the cleaning himself.
Back in the days at home, he was the only one taking care of their two-bedroom apartment, and cleaning up in the dorm was way easier than that!
Lin Nan rested his forehead on the cool desk—summer’s end brought stuffy air, and by afternoon, it made him irresistibly drowsy.
In about a month, Li Na would be ready.
He opened his computer’s calendar, calculating the time.
Once Li Na was set, he could start working on unlocking new magic, and by mid-January when school was out, he’d finally become a girl.
Deep down, he felt a wave of sadness. He hadn’t even gotten the chance to be a guy properly, and now he had to turn into a girl?
But there was no resisting it. He didn’t want to just be some in-between freak.
Time passed like a blink—and looking back, he realized the once short, shy boy had been completely washed away by the river of time.
In his place stood a strange creature, with a girl’s appearance and figure, yet still clinging to a tiny trace of boyhood—totally unidentifiable.
