Superstar Assistant [GL] - Chapter 8

Chapter 8

This was one of the very few times Zhou Tiantian had ever asked for help in her life. The moment the words left her mouth, she regretted it. Li Ziyu had no real connection to her; they were just classmates. Out of pity, Li Ziyu had bought her lunch a few times, but she was now going too far, asking Li Ziyu to help her solve the problem with the hoodlums. How could that be possible?

So, as soon as she said it, Zhou Tiantian was terrified of herself and quickly shook her head. “No, I just… I don’t need your help, I’ll handle it myself…” She was so scared she didn’t even know how to explain herself.

Li Ziyu rested her head on her hand, looking composed as if she hadn’t heard her explanation. “Oh, who stole your money?”

Zhou Tiantian kept her head down, feeling completely chilled. She whispered, “No one stole my money. I-I was just talking nonsense.”

The smile on Li Ziyu’s face didn’t change, but her voice was much more dangerous than before. “If you don’t tell me, I’m going to hit you.”

Zhou Tiantian’s shoulders instinctively shrunk, and she started crying, completely unable to control herself.

Li Ziyu just watched her cry, thinking, This is what a girl is, right? Like water, tearful and quite adorable. So, she maliciously waited for Zhou Tiantian to stop crying.

Zhou Tiantian was crying for her own weakness. She truly hated herself for being unable to do anything or dare to do anything. She desperately wanted to beat those hoodlums down, and she really hoped Li Ziyu could help her, yet she didn’t even dare to ask for help again.

When students returning from lunch started trickling back into the classroom, they saw Li Ziyu sitting across from Zhou Tiantian, who was sobbing over her desk. They assumed Li Ziyu was bullying Zhou Tiantian. But no one came to Zhou Tiantian’s aid, both because Zhou Tiantian was too weak, and most people didn’t particularly want to be friends with her. More importantly, everyone was afraid to provoke Li Ziyu, as she was known for her bad temper.

Zhou Tiantian noticed the students returning and slowly wiped her tears. She didn’t want so many people to see her cry.

Li Ziyu waited until she stopped crying before asking, “Who exactly is bullying you?”

Zhou Tiantian’s eyes were still misty, making her black and white pupils sparkle. Her slightly downturned lips looked pitiful, which, paired with her fair, tender face, unexpectedly made Li Ziyu feel a surge of protectiveness toward her.

But Zhou Tiantian was now resolute and refused to speak.

Li Ziyu stood up, grabbed Zhou Tiantian’s wrist, and pulled her into the hallway despite her resistance. She then pushed her against the wall, braced her hands on the wall on either side, trapping her in the space. She looked down at the weak and trembling Zhou Tiantian, raised an eyebrow, and said with interest, “Are you going to tell me or not? If you don’t, I won’t let you go back to class. If the teacher comes and asks me what I’m doing with you, I’ll say someone is bullying you. The teacher will definitely want to know the details, and this matter will become very, very big.”

Zhou Tiantian’s pupils widened suddenly. She instinctively reached up and grabbed the hem of Li Ziyu’s shirt. “Don’t tell the teacher! Please, don’t tell the teacher!”

Li Ziyu nodded. “Fine. Then tell me who took your money.”

Telling the teacher meant her stepfather would find out, and Zhou Tiantian was even more afraid. So, she whispered with a trembling voice, “I don’t know their names. I only know they are from Class Eight of the third year.”

Only then did Li Ziyu release her. “Alright, I know. Don’t leave after school today. Wait for me.”

Zhou Tiantian was hesitant. “But…”

Li Ziyu yawned. “If you don’t wait for me, I’ll tell the teacher.” Li Ziyu found this tactic to be far more effective than threatening to hit her.

Sure enough, Zhou Tiantian dared not say anything else and waited obediently in the classroom for Li Ziyu after school.

Li Ziyu packed her things, told Zhou Tiantian to follow her, and led her to an internet cafe near the school.

Zhou Tiantian followed behind her, looking up at her back, which was half a head taller than her. Watching Li Ziyu’s ponytail swing with her steps, she adored her from the bottom of her heart. How wonderful it would be if I could be this cool one day. Then no one would dare to bully me again.

Li Ziyu led her to a private room in the internet cafe and kicked the door open. Bang! The noisy internet cafe instantly fell silent, and everyone’s attention was drawn to them.

Zhou Tiantian instinctively hunched her shoulders, completely terrified.

The people in the private room were playing a game. Hearing the door being kicked open, they instinctively wanted to get angry. But the moment they turned and saw Li Ziyu, they smiled. “Is that you? Isn’t your entrance a bit too dramatic? If anyone else dared to kick my door like that, I would have already gone up and hit them.”

Li Ziyu stepped aside to reveal Zhou Tiantian behind her. She put her arm around Zhou Tiantian’s shoulder, pulled her closer, and looked at the group of people in the private room. “Do you know her?”

The people in the room instantly recognized Zhou Tiantian, and the atmosphere became awkward. The boy who had just spoken stood up, looked at Li Ziyu, and chuckled, “Hey, you know this person?”

Li Ziyu raised her eyebrows noncommittally. “How much money did you take from her? Give it all back to me.”

The boy was about to say something, but another person in the room sneered with a very adolescent, rebellious attitude. “There’s no rule about giving back stolen money. Otherwise, how would we maintain our reputation around here?”

Li Ziyu took her hand off Zhou Tiantian, shoved her backpack into Zhou Tiantian’s arms, and walked into the private room one step at a time, looking completely intimidating and ruthless. “Oh, then how about we fight instead?”

The person started to back down. Li Ziyu was notoriously fierce in fights at their school. She always fought as if she had nothing to lose. Many people in their school said that even if you got into a gang fight with boys, you should never fight Li Ziyu, whether in a group or one-on-one.

The boy who spoke first immediately tried to mediate. “It’s all a misunderstanding, a misunderstanding! If we had known she was under your protection, Ziyu, we wouldn’t have robbed her at all.”

With that, the boy began rummaging through his bag, took out several hundred yuan, and handed it to Zhou Tiantian.

Zhou Tiantian’s blood was frozen throughout the entire process, and her heart was pounding in her chest as if it were about to jump out of her throat. Every pore of her body screamed fear—fear that Li Ziyu and these people would fight, fear that others in the internet cafe would report them to the teacher, and most of all, fear that she would drag Li Ziyu down. However, the boys admitted defeat first.

Her fingers, cold and trembling, reached out for the several hundred yuan. After taking it and looking at it for a few seconds, she pulled out 200 yuan and offered it back, her voice as faint as a mosquito. “It wasn’t this much. Here’s the rest back to you.”

Li Ziyu chuckled at her words, snatched the 200 yuan from her hand, threw it into the boy’s lap, and then pulled Zhou Tiantian close with force. She said to the boys in the room, “If she ever gets bullied again, I’m coming for you.”

The boy who gave the money quickly asked, “What if someone else bullies her?”

Li Ziyu shrugged like a ruffian. “I don’t care about that. If she gets bullied, I’ll still come for you. Why? Because you bullied her before. You have a record, don’t you?”

Li Ziyu’s statement was equivalent to putting Zhou Tiantian under complete protection. The hoodlums around every school were limited in number, and their circles were not very large.

The news of Li Ziyu getting Zhou Tiantian’s money back quickly spread, and by the next day, everyone in the circle knew: that little girl named Zhou Tiantian might look soft and easy to bully, but absolutely do not mess with her, because she belongs to Li Ziyu.

Following this, Zhou Tiantian finally had money to eat lunch, but she missed out on the dedicated private time with Li Ziyu during the lunch break. However, Zhou Tiantian usually didn’t dare to disturb Li Ziyu; she would just secretly look at her, and the more she looked, the more she admired and liked her.

How could there be a girl like this in the world? So beautiful, completely unpretentious, with a free and easy personality, good grades, and lots of friends. From that moment on, Zhou Tiantian enshrined Li Ziyu in the deepest part of her heart like a goddess.

“Zhou Tiantian, what are you thinking about?” her roommate, a production staff member who had moved into the standard room after Yang Ruoyun left, asked her curiously. She saw Zhou Tiantian staring blankly at the phone box in her hands after returning to the room and called out to her twice.

Zhou Tiantian was pulled out of her memories. The way Li Ziyu gave her the phone today was too similar to the way she had tossed the bun into her arms years ago, so she couldn’t help but reminisce after returning to the room.

Looking at the new phone in her hand, a slight, almost imperceptible smile surfaced on her lips. She took out the phone, carefully placing the empty box in her suitcase, and said to her roommate, “I’m fine. Just thinking about random things.”

The roommate looked at her phone, sounding somewhat envious. “The new model, right? I heard it just came out. You celebrity assistants are so rich! People like us, doing odd jobs on the crew, can’t even buy a phone like this with a month’s salary.”

Zhou Tiantian gently stroked the phone and said to her roommate, “I didn’t buy it myself. Ziyu gave it to me.”

The roommate was even more envious. “Wow, you assistants get benefits like this!”

Zhou Tiantian’s smile did not fade. “She said my old phone was too old and embarrassing for her.”

The roommate continued to smile and say she was envious.

When she arrived on set the next day, Yangyang also saw her new phone and said with a hint of envy, “I really want to switch to this model, but I only bought my phone less than a year ago. It feels like a waste to switch now.”

Chong Ying slowly walked over and said with a light chuckle, “You got a new phone, huh? So now you can take pictures of me and post them on Weibo, right?”

Zhou Tiantian felt a slight psychological shadow from Chong Ying. After a moment of thought, she replied very cautiously, “I can, but I just registered a Weibo account, and a brand new account has no followers. I also don’t know any marketing accounts that can help you repost.”

Chong Ying rolled her eyes. “Do you really think I care about you posting on Weibo for me? I’d be worried about you trying to use my popularity.”

Li Ziyu walked over at this moment. “What are you talking about on Weibo?”

Chong Ying’s lips immediately curved into a smile. “I was just joking with your assistant. Since she has a new phone, I told her to take a picture of me and post it on Weibo. She still remembers the incident at the airport and unhappily told me that she doesn’t have Weibo, and even if she registered one, she wouldn’t have followers. I was just making a joke, but she rejected me so seriously, acting as if I was desperately begging her.”