Chased by My Heartless Ex - Chapter 18

Perhaps Li Rui didn’t notice Xu You approaching, or perhaps it was intentional, but with her headphones on, she made no effort to lower her voice. Every word she spoke clearly reached Xu You at the opposite workstation. Fortunately, the office wasn’t crowded, and everyone was busy with their own tasks, so no one paid her any attention.

Xu You couldn’t figure out what she had done wrong to provoke Li Rui into using such filthy names and curses to berate and attack her. She remembered that their relationship hadn’t always been like this.

That summer when she first arrived in Beicheng, they were both the purest, sunniest versions of themselves. Li Rui rarely wore revealing clothes or heavy makeup that didn’t suit her age. Though they didn’t live in the same dormitory, they occasionally had overlapping classes and would greet each other, sometimes even exchanging a few words about their studies.

The turning point came in the early winter of that same year. After all the exams were over and the professors had uploaded the grades, Xu You, who had never stood out before, achieved a perfect GPA and became the undisputed top student in the department. Li Rui, trailing by a mere 0.1 points, became the forgotten second place.

When the winter break began, Xiao Fu drove Zhou Siyu’s Porsche to pick her up. The scene of her getting into the car was captured by someone with ill intentions and uploaded to the campus forum and confession wall. By the time the slow-to-realize Xu You became aware of it, her image as a gold-digging, promiscuous student had already taken root among her peers.

After that, she gained certain “privileges.”

For instance, in crowded classrooms, the moment she appeared, the surrounding area would clear out. She no longer needed to arrive early to secure a seat, nor did she have to participate in various bizarre activities. She heard swear words she had never encountered before and witnessed real-life bullying for the first time.

Li Rui also underwent a drastic change, wearing increasingly skimpy outfits and frequently skipping classes under the guise of taking leave.

That winter, she experienced her first heavy snowfall, but the chill that seeped from her bones was something only she could feel.

As her desktop screen lit up, Xu You stopped caring about who Li Rui was talking to or how much she was badmouthing her. After a half-hour break, her inspiration was soaring. Seizing the moment, she hurriedly sketched out the line art for the two character designs requested by Team Leader Qian.

The Classic of Mountains and Seas records nearly five hundred mythical beasts. Famous ones like the Vermilion Bird and the Black Tortoise had already been adapted and incorporated into the game. After briefly flipping through the e-book, Xu You settled on a mythical beast named Huan as the prototype for her design.

According to the original text, Huan resembles a fox, with one eye and three tails, capable of warding off evil and malevolence. Connecting her usual drawing tablet, she quickly brought to life on her screen a fierce, crouching beast baring its sharp fangs, based on her imagination of this mythical creature.

The style of the initial draft differed somewhat from the game’s aesthetic. With only one afternoon to work, she couldn’t devote all her energy to a single image. Xu You planned to design all sixteen non-standard player characters first and then make uniform adjustments later.

Immersed in her work, time flew by.

At exactly six o’clock, Team Leader Qian sent a message in their three-person group chat, asking about their progress. Li Rui was the first to reply, stating that she had already completed her task and sent it privately. Xu You was in the middle of adjusting the character’s clothing. Before starting, she hadn’t noticed that the entire game uniformly used Warring States period attire, and she had drawn Han clothing influenced by Hu styles. Hastily deleting the layer, she distractedly replied “almost done” and resumed working, her stylus moving so fast it nearly sparked against the tablet.

Feeling smug about being one step ahead of Xu You, Li Rui shut down her computer, grabbed her bag, and left. As she passed by, she couldn’t resist taunting her, commenting on her inefficiency.

Team Leader Qian finished her work and had no intention of staying overtime waiting for Xu You’s submission. After bidding farewell to her colleagues, she clocked out and left. The already spacious office grew emptier as several people departed one after another, leaving only Xu You buried in her work at the computer.

The winter night arrived abruptly. The dusky yellow sky shifted colors in an instant, and the city was enveloped in darkness, with a bright moon hanging high above, gazing down upon the world.

The subway felt like a massive sardine can, packed with office workers eager to get home, pressed tightly against one another. When the doors opened, no one got off; instead, an invisible force squeezed everyone even closer.

Qian Doudou didn’t know whether the man in a suit in front of her or the athletic student beside her had stepped on her foot, but the sharp pain made her eyes blaze with anger. Her phone vibrated in her pocket, and fearing it might be a message from the company, she struggled to retrieve it from the cramped space.

[Xu You: Sorry, Team Leader Qian, for making you wait so long.]

Facial recognition unlocked the screen, revealing a message from the new intern, Xu You. Qian’s already furrowed brows tightened even further. She decided not to reply for the moment and pressed the power button with her thumb. Just then, the man in front shifted backward, crushing her other foot under his weight. Her phone slammed into her chest.

Her anger boiled over, and she let out an irritated “tsk” to express her frustration. The space was so cramped that turning around was impossible, let alone moving. The man, realizing he had stepped on both her feet, apologized sincerely without turning to face her.

An apology couldn’t change the fact that she was hurt. Qian straightened her phone and was about to lock the screen and put it away when she noticed that Xu You’s message had been pushed up by two images she had just sent.

The black bezel of her phone reflected her face. Her tightly knit brows suddenly relaxed, and without realizing it, her expression softened, the irritation and anger completely vanishing.

She painstakingly enlarged the two design drafts Xu You had sent. Though they weren’t yet up to the standard for formal submission, the mythical beasts and character designs were highly consistent with Otherworld: Mountains and Seas. The choice of mythical beasts was innovative, and the character, a little girl not among the original sixteen, had an innocent, lively appearance with a fierce, ruthless glint in her eyes that fit the game’s backdrop. The character’s personality description and design inspiration were neatly written in regular script in one corner. With a few tweaks, it would be perfectly suitable for a smaller IP.

In contrast, Li Rui’s design fell short in every aspect, from the choice of mythical beasts to the player character design, and even the art style and technique. The mythical beast she depicted was a common white tiger, pieced together from online references and the game’s existing imagery, lacking any standout appeal. The player character was almost a copy-paste of one of the original designs, and the choice of a silk half-sleeved Hanfu outfit neither aligned with the game’s setting nor offered any innovation. The two characters stood stiffly on the screen, barely passable on their own but clearly inferior when placed alongside Xu You’s work.

After sending the images, Xu You stretched her arms high above her head with a big yawn. Having sat all afternoon, her shoulders ached, and her joints cracked as she moved.

She was debating whether to contact Zhou Siyu to ask if they could head home together when she felt a firm but not harsh pressure kneading her trapezius muscles twice.

Is there a pervert in the office?

Remembering the creepy man she had encountered during her interview, Xu You shuddered, her body tensing up and stiffening like a block of wood. In the few seconds it took for the person to make another move, her mind had already conjured over a dozen scenes of murder and body disposal.

Assault then murder? Murder then assault? Neither, it’s too disgusting, it makes me want to vomit.

I hope it’s just about money. I could scrape together a few million from my card, and if that’s not enough, I can contact my sister to transfer more immediately.

“What are you thinking about?”

Xu You’s tense nerves snapped at the familiar voice. Swiveling her chair, she buried her face against Zhou Siyu’s lower abdomen, nuzzling against her with a fluffy head of hair.

“You startled me,” she murmured, her voice slightly hoarse.

Zhou Siyu pinched her earlobe, causing Xu You to spring back abruptly, her wary gaze darting around the office.

“What are you afraid of?” Zhou Siyu said calmly, continuing to knead the soft flesh of her cheeks.