If I Can’t Get the Male Lead, I’ll Just Be a Salted Fish Chapter 15

The weather had cooled these days. Xie Lanzhi wore a dark blue hoodie and black casual pants, one hand carrying beer, the other holding his phone, standing beneath the warm glow of a streetlamp. He wasn’t deliberately posing, but just standing there looked like a retro photoshoot.

The moment Qin Shu saw him, his beauty-defense system completely collapsed.

D*mn, isn’t this cheating! How can there still be people who look better in real life than in photos?

Here’s a scary story for you: Xie Lanzhi… doesn’t photograph well.

They looked at each other for a few seconds before Xie Lanzhi lowered his phone and walked toward him. Qin Shu’s first reaction was to hide the duck neck behind his back. But then he realized—since Lanzhi had already asked him if the duck neck was tasty, he had obviously seen everything. What was the point of hiding it?

Xie Lanzhi stopped in front of him, teasing: “So exhausted you’re a salted fish, but still have the strength to come out for duck neck? Must be true love.”

Qin Shu, guilty: “It’s because I’m so salted fish that I need duck neck to restore my HP.”

“Duck neck can restore HP, but my hot pot can’t?”

Xie Lanzhi’s tone was faintly cold. Qin Shu was baffled. Surely he wasn’t upset just because Qin Shu didn’t go to his place for hot pot?

He was probably overthinking. Xie Lanzhi’s whole persona was supposed to be polite and distant. Still, if Qin Shu put himself in those shoes—if he invited a junior over to eat, the junior said he was too tired, then he turned around and saw him buying duck neck instead… Yeah, it’d sting a little.

Qin Shu scratched his head. “Uh, let me explain.”

“I’m listening,” Xie Lanzhi said. “But you need to look at me while explaining.”

Fine, Mr. Xie, you win. “I lay on my bed for an hour before I managed to get up.” Qin Shu met his eyes, his voice unconsciously going soft and light. “And I struggled for ages. I really was exhausted.”

Xie Lanzhi’s expression eased slightly. He glanced at the duck neck in Qin Shu’s hand. “Why did it take so long to buy?”

That set Qin Shu off again. “D*mn, do you know how conniving that auntie at the duck neck shop is?”

He angrily recounted the story, vowing: “If I ever buy duck neck there again, every ult I cast in-game will be a whiff!”

Xie Lanzhi chuckled. “That ruthless?”

“Pissed me off big time.”

“Then you should go more often.”

Qin Shu glared. “Do I look like an idiot to you?”

“You do.”

“…”

Before Qin Shu could blow up, Xie Lanzhi asked: “Besides duck neck, what else is true love?”

A question mark popped up over Qin Shu’s head. “What?”

“What else do you like to eat?” Xie Lanzhi said. “That this shop sells.”

“Oh… duck collarbones.”

Xie Lanzhi walked up to the shop window. “Fifty yuan of duck collarbones, please.”

The auntie clerk quickly packed and weighed them. “Seventy-four in total, I’ll just give you all of it.”

Qin Shu shot Xie Lanzhi a “See, didn’t I tell you?” look. Xie Lanzhi raised his phone, scanned the payment code, and the shop’s speaker chimed: “WeChat payment received, 50 yuan.”

The auntie’s expression was a whole opera mask show. Qin Shu felt utterly vindicated. He tugged at Xie Lanzhi’s sleeve, gave him a thumbs up, and mouthed: “Awesome.”

Xie Lanzhi looked down at the tug on his sleeve, puzzled: do normal guys do this kind of thing?

The auntie grumbled, “It’s just a little left, what’s the point of not taking all of it. If you bought it all I could get off work early.”

“The 50 is already transferred,” Xie Lanzhi said politely. “If you want to give me more I don’t mind—my junior can finish it anyway.”

The auntie’s face darkened as she dumped the excess back, muttering, “All these years in business, the customers I hate most are the unreasonable ones like you.”

Xie Lanzhi turned to Qin Shu and asked, “Do you like the flavor here?”

Qin Shu hesitated for a moment, then nodded honestly.

“Could you eat it every day?”

“Eh? Eating it every day would get boring.”

“Then three times a week?”

Qin Shu had no idea what Xie Lanzhi was getting at. “That should be fine.”

Xie Lanzhi said to the auntie behind the counter, “Sorry, but I’m afraid you’ll be seeing me quite often from now on—at least three times a week. I’ll always pay this way. I hope you can get used to it.”

A minute later, Qin Shu was left holding duck necks in his left hand and duck clavicles in his right, utterly disoriented in the wind.

“Why are we still buying from here,” Qin Shu said, baffled, “aren’t we just helping their sales?”

Xie Lanzhi replied, “Don’t you like eating it?”

“Well, yes…” From the sound of it, was Xie Lanzhi basically contracting out all of his future duck necks and duck clavicles? This… this was some seriously weird domineering-CEO behavior.

“Heading back to the dorm?” Xie Lanzhi asked.

Qin Shu nodded. He had only wanted to buy some duck necks in the first place.

Xie Lanzhi checked the time. “Curfew’s still a while off. Want to come to my place? Chu Cheng and Lu Rulu are there.”

It’s hard to refuse when you’ve taken someone’s stuff, and harder still when you’ve eaten it. Qin Shu felt the heft of the 50-yuan bag of duck clavicles in his hand and really couldn’t bring himself to say no. “Alright.” He consoled himself—he’d just treat it as going deep into enemy territory to gather intel.

Xie Lanzhi brought Qin Shu back to his apartment. Along the way, no matter how fancy the facilities of the compound were, Qin Shu wore a “not impressed” expression the whole time. When they arrived, Chu Cheng and Lu Rulu were on the sofa playing PS4, with a fluffy ball curled up next to them.

Hearing the door open, both turned around. “Brother Lan’s back!”

Spotting Qin Shu behind him, Lu Rulu blurted out in surprise, “Little Love Letter too…? Weren’t you supposed to be flatlining in the dorm?”

Xie Lanzhi said, “I caught him red-handed buying duck necks outside.”

Qin Shu gave an awkward but polite smile, raising the two bags in his hands. “Want some duck necks and duck clavicles?”

Guys around twenty have bottomless stomachs—able to eat hot pot and then keep going with late-night snacks. The two paused their game, pulled on disposable gloves, and joined Qin Shu in eating duck necks and clavicles with beer. Lu Rulu put on a talent-show variety program and enthusiastically promoted one female contestant, swearing she was his future Mrs. Lu—only for Xie Lanzhi to mercilessly change the channel to the evening news.

The duck necks and clavicles even attracted the aloof little cat. She stood on the floor, front paws braced against Qin Shu’s knee, sniffing curiously at the duck clavicles in his hand.

“She can’t eat it, too salty,” Xie Lanzhi said.

“I know.” Qin Shu used his bare hand to stroke the cat’s head. “What’s her name again?”

“Snowball.”

Qin Shu tilted his mouth. “What an ordinary name. Not distinctive at all.”

Chu Cheng sneered, “Still better than you naming a goldfish ‘Little Red Riding Hood.’”

Lu Rulu was floored. “The h*ll, your dorm’s goldfish actually has a name?”

Qin Shu bristled. “The goldfish is all white except for a red spot on its head. Isn’t ‘Little Red Riding Hood’ perfectly fitting?”

Xie Lanzhi beckoned Snowball over. The cat leapt gracefully into his lap. “My advice—get Little Red Riding Hood a few companions. Otherwise it won’t last long.”

“…Why does that sound exactly like some elementary school kid talking? Qin Shu seriously suspected Xie Lanzhi really did see him as an idiot.

“Brother Lan, why aren’t you eating?” Chu Cheng asked. “Don’t like it?”

Xie Lanzhi sipped his water. “If I’m full, why would I keep eating.”

The three exchanged looks, and had no rebuttal.

Once the duck necks and clavicles were demolished, Lu Rulu clamored to play another round of battle royale. Qin Shu reminded him, “Brother Lu, weren’t you supposed to be working on your project?”

Lu Rulu rubbed his full belly contentedly. “It’s rare to hang out at Brother Lan’s place, who cares about a project. Right, Brother Lan?”

Xie Lanzhi had long since given up on his roommates. “Come on.”

The four lined up on the sofa, just enough to squad up. Chu Cheng was reckless and gun-happy, always the first to charge in and die, then shouting “one hit left, just a sliver” to bait Lu Rulu into trying to finish the kill—only for Lu Rulu to get killed instead. Qin Shu, to put it nicely, played cautiously; to put it bluntly, he was a coward. He could have pinched the enemy with Xie Lanzhi, but instead chickened out, jumped on a little motorbike, and sped off, nearly dooming Xie Lanzhi. Even he couldn’t carry the three of them, and they scraped out a third-place finish.

The moment Xie Lanzhi went down, Chu Cheng said eagerly, “Again, again! This time I’ll definitely carry us to chicken dinner!”

The three stayed at Xie Lanzhi’s until 10:30. Any later and they’d miss curfew. Lu Rulu said wistfully, “Brother Lan, my dear roommate, can I crash at your place tonight?”

“No spare bed,” Xie Lanzhi replied coldly.

Lu Rulu wailed, “Liar! You obviously have five bedrooms—I counted!”

“Even if there were fifty, none of them would be yours. Pack it up, get back to the dorm.”

Chu Cheng asked, “Brother Lan, do you have any trash to take out? I can bring it down for you.”

“No need. The cleaning lady comes tomorrow.”

“Oh. Then can I use your bathroom?”

“Straight ahead, turn right.”

“I’ll go too,” Lu Rulu said. “Cheng, let’s hit the bathroom together.”

“H*ll no, who’d go with you,” Chu Cheng swore.

The two walked off shoulder to shoulder, leaving only Xie Lanzhi, Qin Shu, and Snowball in the living room.

The apartment’s floor-to-ceiling windows were huge, curtains rattling in the wind. Snowball was curled up in her bed, snoring loud enough for a little lady cat to be ashamed of. Qin Shu crouched by her, fiddling with her pink little paws, half-tempted to lean in and sniff them.

Xie Lanzhi watched him for a while, then said, “There’s something I’m really curious about.”

Qin Shu turned his head. “Hm?”

“Why do you treat me so hot and cold,” Xie Lanzhi paused, “Little Love Letter?”