Dinner was served quickly, and Chu Ge rushed into the kitchen to help Qiu Wuji serve the dishes, bustling around busily.
Lin Wuyang wanted to help but didn't know how to get involved. Looking at Chu Ge's cheerful, domestic demeanor, he truly felt that his old friend had grown up.
Once upon a time, everyone imagined writers as decadent, dissolute, unkempt, nocturnal, and living in such a mess that even a dog couldn't stand in them…
But Chu Ge was sunny and cheerful, with a strong physique, brimming with youthful energy as if he had returned to a bygone era. The house was elegant and tidy, with roses on the coffee table—who knew how they were kept alive… There were even calligraphy and paintings on the walls.
Then he and his girlfriend were enjoying each other's company, cooking and serving dishes, their eyes filled with tenderness, both of them.
Lin Wuyang, with his professional habit, observed very carefully, but the more he observed, the more he felt like he was being force-fed dog food; he felt full even without eating.
This was clearly a couple deeply in love; even if the King of Heaven himself came, that would be his answer.
Lin Wuyang wondered if he was being a bit of a third wheel, and whether Qiu Wuji's girlfriend would be upset about interrupting their time together…
However, Qiu Wuji showed no displeasure whatsoever. She brought out a large bowl of chicken soup and said with a smile, "I bought some handmade rice noodles today. Try soaking them in chicken soup; it should be quite good."
Chu Ge finished serving the dishes and sat down, smiling, "Let me introduce you. This is my old friend Lin Wuyang, and this is my cousin… well, my girlfriend, Qiu Wuji."
He glanced cautiously at Qiu Wuji, who gave him a sidelong look but didn't object.
Lin Wuyang laughed, "If I'd known she was my sister-in-law, why call her cousin or girlfriend? Who are you trying to fool?"
Qiu Wuji pouted but still didn't object.
Giving him face in front of outsiders, huh… it wasn't the first time she'd been called "sister-in-law."
Lin Wuyang then asked, "When are you having the banquet?"
Chu Ge glanced at Qiu Wuji again; Qiu Wuji remained expressionless. He hurriedly got up to pour wine for Lin Wuyang, then changed the subject: "Wuyang, you seem to be the first in your class to get married?"
"I don't think I was the first, probably in the top three," Lin Wuyang laughed. "I hadn't been a civil servant for long when my family started arranging blind dates for me. This profession is advantageous; blind dates are popular, so I found someone pretty quickly, and it was settled in no time."
"I heard your wife is a teacher? Civil servant and teacher, a perfect match!"
"Yes," Lin Wuyang laughed. "You can consult my family about your children's schooling; she knows everything about the education sector." Chu Ge glanced at Qiu Wuji three times. Qiu Wuji was slowly serving soup to everyone, still expressionless.
Chu Ge coughed: "I didn't send you an invitation back then, wasn't that a bit disloyal?"
Lin Wuyang just smiled: "So you benefited." His relationship with Chu Ge in school was only average; they were roommates, two rooms apart, and didn't interact much. After graduation, they contacted each other even less. These days, invitations are like wedding invitations; sending one to someone like that would probably get you cursed in your heart. Now that their relationship is better, Chu Ge will definitely send him an invitation, and he'll end up having to give a gift, making Chu Ge a pure winner.
Qiu Wuji seemed to understand these gift-giving rules immediately, and finally smiled as she spoke the first sentence: "So, Section Chief Lin, drink some more chicken soup and get a chicken leg, to make up for some of the losses."
Chu Ge looked at her strangely again, and this time Qiu Wuji glared back at him irritably.
Can't you be a little more professional! What are you looking at?!
Chu Ge shrank back, hugging his bowl: "Drinking chicken soup is such a wonderful thing..."
"Using memes will get you fined," Lin Wuyang said. "You're comparing your sister-in-law's chicken soup to toxic chicken soup?"
Chu Ge asked curiously: "Hey, Section Chief Lin, aren't you in cybersecurity? You must spend more time online than anyone else, right?"
"Just this one hobby, occasionally browsing online," Lin Wuyang sighed. "Now it's all gone, all my accounts were banned. I'll transfer to cybersecurity someday, I'll really mess with him..."
Chu Ge chuckled.
But then Lin Wuyang's voice deepened: "I really am thinking of transferring to cybersecurity... Working overtime every day, risking my life on the front lines, even my family received death threats because of the Wang family incident... What are we doing all this for?" Chu Ge was startled: "The Wang family is that audacious?" Lin Wuyang waved his hand: "In the end, nothing happened... I'm just furious. Why should they?" Chu Ge recalled Zhang Qiren's question again.
Two figures, one in light and one in darkness, seemed to overlap.
He silently raised his glass and clinked it against Lin Wuyang's; neither drank much, and the two downed their drinks in one gulp.
After finishing his drink, Chu Ge sighed and tried to comfort him, "Wu Yang, you didn't have high hopes yourself, after all, we're old, it's not surprising..."
Lin Wu Yang shook his head: "Age and experience aren't necessarily the main reasons, but they're good as an excuse..."
He pointed upwards: "We don't have anyone."
Chu Ge smiled wryly: "Why think like that, making things difficult for yourself?"
"If they really send a highly skilled and capable person, I'll accept it. But if they send someone who's only ever done political work and has no special abilities, then what makes them qualified?" Lin Wu Yang wasn't persuaded; instead, he became increasingly angry: "They come and do absolutely nothing, just going through the motions..." "The 'ideology' has held several meetings, a bunch of empty talk, who is he sending it to?" Chu Ge asked. "How old are you? Maybe the old man will retire and you'll take over?" Lin Wuyang sneered, "Over forty, plenty of time." Chu Ge: "..." Lin Wuyang said angrily, "Actually, not being promoted isn't a big deal, the key problem is I've become a deputy, a deputy, you know that! This so-called departmental upgrade is just adding a chair for someone else, did they even consider us?" Chu Ge hadn't thought of this before, and after hearing this, he felt there was no way to persuade him. Anyone would be furious.
So he simply stopped trying to persuade him, and just refilled his glass: "Brother, I can't help you with anything else, come on, let's get drunk together!" Lin Wuyang laughed heartily: "That's what I was waiting for! What's there to persuade me about? I'm here to listen to advice, I'm here to drink with you, brother." The idea of trying to cut water with a knife is even more unnecessary now; he's just here to get drunk and vent. As a friend, Chu Ge was content to simply drink with him. Without further ado, he and Lin Wuyang downed their bottles in one gulp: "Bottoms up!" Little was eaten of the dishes on the table. Qiu Wuji ate slowly, tilting her head to watch Chu Ge's hearty drinking.
The old lady had seen too much of the world's harsh realities. While she sighed at Lin Wuyang's plight, she wasn't truly moved. There had been far too many similar incidents…
Chu Ge's behavior, however, amused her.
It was the spirit of the martial world, which actually suited Qiu Wuji's aesthetic. She was a female knight-errant who had fought her way through the martial world, not a female cultivator raised in an ivory tower.
It was just that Chu Ge rarely displayed it, or perhaps this era rarely allowed such displays.
Qiu Wuji knew Chu Ge possessed a martial spirit, but without witnessing it firsthand, it felt incomplete. Now, seeing it for herself, she found it quite fascinating.
Chu Ge buried in her books, racking her brains to weave a story.
Chu Ge rushing into battle, his golden iron fist stopping Rong Fu, slamming into the anvil.
This is Chu Ge, who drinks and laughs, gulping down drinks like a whale, all to help his friend drown his sorrows in alcohol.
His heart is open, his hair stands on end, and in conversation, he's as if life and death are one. That youthful chivalry, hidden beneath his weary work, has never been lost; it's woven into the stories he writes, hidden in every detail, permeating the life of the protagonist, Chu Tiange, and also Qiu Wuji's millennia-long existence.
Qiu Wuji suddenly longs for Chu Ge to come to her world, for the two of them to roam the martial world hand in hand, swords in hand.
Compared to this peaceful and sweet domestic life, wouldn't it be a completely different kind of scenery?
"Fuck the hell..." Lin Wuyang was already drunk: "I'll... I'll endure three more years. If I'm not included next time, I'll just lie down and let whoever wants to do it do it, screw the hell..."
"Bang!" Lin Wuyang collapsed onto the table, passed out drunk.
"I didn't expect him to be such a lightweight. I thought all policemen could drink a lot." Chu Ge sighed as if nothing had happened. "I need to find my sister-in-law and have her come pick him up…" Qiu Wuji chuckled, "You two have already drunk a whole case in such a short time, and you haven't even had any snacks… It's not that he's a lightweight, it's that your constitution is different. Don't you know that?" Chu Ge was stunned. He realized it was true… He drank half a case of beer and didn't feel anything, like drinking water. He used to have a decent alcohol tolerance, but never this extreme. It seems that after all this cultivation, he might not know about other things, but at least he's gained a lot in terms of alcohol tolerance?
"Hey, speaking of which… you're not upset that I'm drinking like this with others and getting completely drunk?"
"As long as you're not drunk, I'm confident." Qiu Wuji smiled slightly. "You're under a lot of pressure too. It's good to relieve stress occasionally. It satisfies your friends' need to vent and also satisfies your own sense of loyalty. It's a win-win situation." A win-win situation… Chu Ge looked down at Lin Wuyang, who was slurring his words, and whispered, "I think Nanjiang lost this round."