Chapter 569: Childhood Friend
Chapter 569: Childhood Friend
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Violence was not the best way to solve one’s problems, but it was the simplest and most effective method. It was also one of the ways Zhang Lisheng was best at. However, this time, when he was grabbing the neck of the person who was snatching his car to pull him out of the car window, he suddenly felt an invisible force grabbing his wrist. It was clear supernatural forces had stopped him.
Although the young man was cautious, there was still an even stronger sense of tyranny in him. Since he was already angry and had already made his move, he would never be willing to leave this matter after that. Turning his head in the direction of the invisible force, he smiled coldly, and when he was about to use his power in his hand, his body suddenly stiffened. With a strange expression on his face, he released his grip.
Sensing that his neck was relaxed now, the young man who was sitting in the co-driver seat in the taxi with his head stretched out, trembling in fear immediately had his face flushed completely red. He bent over the window and panted heavily. At this moment, a young man and woman, who looked like college students of only 18 to 19 years old, and a beautiful bare-faced young woman in her twenties hastily rushed over.
“H-How can you do this? How can you hit a person in broad daylight? You barbaric uncultured...” The young woman’s tears dripped immediately when he came to the taxi. She pointed her finger at Zhang Lisheng’s nose like she wanted to scold him but could not utter a single word, notwithstanding having her mouth trembling. In the end, she snarled with words that she felt was harsh enough and bent down to shake the shoulder of the young man who was still panting heavily before asking anxiously, “Brother Jing Chen, are you okay? Why are you not speaking? Please don’t scare me...”
Compared to the girl, the youth beside her seemed to be calmer. He kneeled on the ground and carefully studied the young man’s face before standing up to push the wide-frame glasses on his nose and said in a genteel manner, “Yujuan, you don’t have to be in such a panic. Senior Brother Song is merely having a respiratory stress spasm. It’s nothing serious.”
“Wang Hongtao, stop spouting academic term in such a time to show off that you’re a medical student in grad school! Hurry up and tell me what’s wrong with Brother Jingchen!”
“He’s just feeling slightly out of the air,” The youth answered, neither slow nor hurried, “Watch out though, you don’t want to shake and fracture his spine.”
“I-I’m alright, Little Juan. I’m alright...” At this moment, Song Jingchen had also started to catch his breath and patted the girl’s hand, as he spoke.
“It’s good that you’re alright. That’s really good...” The girl breathed a sigh of relief and straightened up while pointing at Zhang Lisheng angrily, “Count yourself lucky that my brother is fine. Otherwise, I will call the police to arrest you...”
“What reason are you gonna tell the police then? That I’m merely giving him a taste of his own medicine? Young lady, you and your friends should learn the meaning of the word ‘manner’ before talking to other people again,” Zhang Lisheng frowned and looked at one of the bare-faced girl, who had been staring at him while restraining her excitement, before saying in a way beyond his years, “Oh, Younger Sister Tao, are these your Junior Brothers and Junior Sisters in college? It’s really worrying that our future teachers have such quality.”
Upon hearing his words, the young girl who was so embarrassed that her face had gone wholly flushed and was about to retort back angrily became stunned. It took her some time to point at Zhang Lisheng and asked in shock, “Sister Lulu, you k-know him?”
“He’s my classmate in junior high school,” the bared-faced woman nodded, her tone contained a hint of grumble, anger, and a little dejection, “But we have lost contact for a long time.”
Zhang Lisheng knew that the girl was insinuating that he had broken his promise and had not taken the initiative to contact her even once, so he could only smile and take the initiative to explain, “Younger Sister Tao, you can’t imagine how busy I was in these two to three years time...”
“I’m also very busy, busy with my studies, very busy... but I have still tried to contact you many times,” Tao Lulu interrupted the young man’s sly explanation. Her character had become much stronger now in just within a short span of a few years.
Zhang Lisheng opened his mouth but said nothing. The atmosphere suddenly became a bit awkward, but fortunately, the youth who was wearing broad-rimmed glasses beside them suddenly said, “Senior Sister Tao, since you and this big brother here know each other, let’s go eat together and you two can make up for the lost time too.”
“Hi, brothers and sisters, I don’t care whether you want to make up for the lost time or what, but do you guys still want to go or not? I still need to go for lunch after doing this work, okay? Also, this is a temporary parking point, and you’ll have to pay me later. Oh yeah, I’ll need to make this clear first, I can’t fetch all five of you...” The taxi driver also chimed in like a chatterbox.
“Sorry, Mr. Driver. Let’s go,” Tao Lulu lowered her head and apologized to the driver before telling her Junior Brother and Junior Sister, “Little Wang, Yujuan, Little Song, get in the car and head to the Friendship Hotel and then tell Xuliang that I’ll bring a friend there. We’ll be late since we need to wait for the next taxi. You all can just order the food first if you’re hungry. We’ve completed an important research topic this time, and the harvest can be said as extremely huge, so this meal is on me! Just go ahead and make yourself at home.”
“D-Don’t Sister Lulu, how can I let you treat my meal for the gathering that I asked for? Wouldn’t this just be taking away my honor?” Song Jingchen, who had finally recovered, waved his hand at the girl Shanghai style and cupped his hands on his chest in front of Zhang Lisheng before bowing and said, “Brother, since you’re Sister Lulu’s friend, I can consider you as my blood brother too then. I’m really sorry about just now; I’ll give you a toast as an apology later.”
From his words and actions, it was hard to imagine that he was only a student who was still in school.
“Enough, enough! If you want to be polite, you can be polite however you want later during the meal. Let’s go now, can we?” When his words left his mouth, the anxious taxi driver urged again. Li Yujuan, who was standing outside the car and was about to say something, could only enter the vehicle gloomily with Wang Hongtao and left together.
In just a blink of an eye, only two people, Zhang Lisheng and Tao Lulu, were left outside the bus station. The young man smiled at the girl awkwardly with his heart slightly touched, before waving his hand to stop a taxi while trying to find a topic, “Younger Sister Tao, you must be a postgraduate student now, right? Is the one named Song Jingchen also a student from your Beijing Normal University? He doesn’t look like somebody who is going to become a teacher in the future.”
“We don’t necessarily need to become a teacher just because we study in Beijing Normal University,” Tao Lulu was still regretting over the fact that she had spoken too rash just now, so when she heard her childhood friend’s question, her tone changed as she explained gently and reservedly, “Of course, Little Song is indeed a special case. He studies marketing and has even worked two months of direct sales last summer, so that’s why he’s...”
“Is the Normal University affiliated with a business school too?” The young man deliberately revealed an astonished expression as he asked, “Oh yeah, that young man called Wang Hongtao is even from a medical school. Don’t tell me that he’s also from Beijing Normal School too. He’s young but prudent, capable, and well-mannered. He looks quite like a serious college student.”
Actually, Zhang Lisheng only wanted to know the answer to the second question. Before he liberated his mind, his sharp intuition could only produce subtle predictions about powerful characters and threatening traps.
Now that he had a clear understanding of himself and had removed the last obstacle on the road to becoming a true god, that intuition had become even more acute, he could sense the energy fluctuations in the body of an ordinary supernatural being.
However, what was strange just now was that there was obviously an invisible force preventing the young man from pulling Song Jingchen out of the window. However, in his perceptions, both women and a man who knew Song Jingchen, including his childhood friend Tao Lulu, were all completely ordinary people.
There were only two possibilities for this kind of situation, one, a supernatural being had just so happened to pass by and had decided to help the weak one when he saw how Zhang Lisheng had Song Jingchen in his grasp; two, one of Song Jingchen’s three friends had a profound, unpredictable ability that even the Wizard Li’s god could not detect.
In comparison, the probability of the second possibility was minuscule. After all, Zhang Lisheng and Tao Lulu knew each other from a young age, and the last time they met was two to three years ago. Even the most imaginative person could not imagine that she could obtain a power that even a god could not detect in such a short period.
As for that rude and unreasonable Li Yujuan, she did not look like a powerful person. She could not even pretend or act.
In that case, the only possibility was that refined, elegant, calm youth Wang Hongtao. It was because of this that Zhang Lisheng would beat around the bush and try to bring the topic to him.
“Lisheng, you studied in the university in the US, so you don’t know that the Normal Universities in China are all a comprehensive university, which is divided into ‘normal teacher students’ and ‘non-teachers.’ It’s not just a business school or medical school. An agricultural school would soon be established in our university, too,” Tao Lulu naturally did not know Zhang Lisheng’s intention, so she casually replied while waving her hand at a taxi that abruptly passed by. However, she could only watch the car speeding away.
“I really don’t understand why Beijing’s taxi doesn’t allow passengers to increase their fares. In New York, whenever you stick out three fingers to stop the car and say that you are willing to pay three times the fare, you’ll always be able to get what you want very fast,” The young man waved his hand in imitation and pretended to sigh, “And the education system here too. An education university can actually produce doctors too. This is really, really...”
Before he could finish his words, a taxi suddenly turned at the intersection and flashed its car signal to stop in front of him. Extending his head, the driver stuttered in English, “Mister, triple. Get in.”
“Oh, okay,” Zhang Lisheng was stunned, before bursting out in a chuckle and helped Tao Lulu to open the door.
When the driver saw that the girl getting into the car, his eyes suddenly turned wide, “Y-You two are together?”
“Yes, Mr. Driver. Please go to the Friendship Hotel in Xujialou at 3rd Ring Road,” The girl nodded and said.
“3rd Ring Road...” The taxi driver’s face became gloomy and angrily glared at Zhang Lisheng, who had gotten into the car. Starting the car engine, he turned his steering wheel and turned the car into the road that had a stream of vehicles, “Sigh, this is so unlucky. It’s a long way to go, and I just sacrificed my lunch for nothing.”
“But I’ll make sure that you’ll be happy with the pay, Mr. Driver. It’s better to drive happily, so please concentrate on driving more,” Upon seeing the driver’s frowning face, the young man said casually.
“You’re willing to give triple the pay, but you’re not going to pay me here, then call me in to report me later, right?”
“Of course not, what a strange thought you have, Mr. Driver,” The young man shrugged and replied, “Besides, it’s not you who asked for higher pay but me who took the initiative to raise the price coz I’m in a rush, so why would I call in to report you?”
“Oh, brother, erm I mean, boss, deal! You have an excellent manner!” The driver’s expression lit up as he answered.