Heartthrob, Your Image is Crumbling!

Chapter 418: Li Qiang and Lu Hui

"Ah?" Zhou Yuwen was somewhat interested in the situation between Li Qiang and Lu Hui, but unfortunately, Chang Hao knew very little about it as well. Chang Hao mentioned that Li Qiang was acting completely neurotic every day and was barely ever in the dormitory.He only knew that Li Qiang muttered about Sister Hui from morning until night.

Chang Hao had actually spoken to Li Qiang about it a few times, telling him that Lu Hui was not a good woman. If she were a good woman, she would not be dating Liu Shuo while simultaneously stringing him along.

However, Li Qiang retorted sharply every time.

Li Qiang repeated the same few sentences over and over, roaring at Chang Hao, "What do you know!"

"None of you understand Sister Hui at all!"

Chang Hao truly did not understand Lu Hui, but Li Qiang did. After learning that Lu Hui had been kicked out by Liu Shuo, all Li Qiang could think about was how this was the moment Sister Hui needed him the most, and he absolutely had to be by her side.

All of Li Qiang's contact methods had been deleted by Lu Hui. Although he had sent countless messages, Lu Hui could not receive any of them.

Li Qiang was worried that Lu Hui would have nowhere to go after being kicked out by Liu Shuo, and he feared she would not have enough to eat. At the thought of Lu Hui sleeping on the streets, Li Qiang could hardly hold back his tears. He begged Lu Yuhang to lend him his phone so he could call her.

Chang Hao pointed out that she was not a child, so how could she possibly end up homeless and starving on the streets.

"What do you know?"

Li Qiang simply repeated that phrase. He firmly believed in his heart that Lu Hui was a girl deprived of affection. The reason she cheated on a partner while being with Liu Shuo was not because of any flaw in Lu Hui, but because Liu Shuo had not given her enough love.

Li Qiang declared that the dark-skinned fatty thought giving Sister Hui money was enough.

"But is money what Sister Hui wants?"

"Sister Hui does not want money at all. That dark-skinned fatty is nothing but Old Zhou's lackey, just blindly following him around all day! He merely treats Sister Hui as a toy. He has no idea what love is; only I do."

As Li Qiang spoke, he picked up the phone to call Lu Hui.

The phone rang twice before it connected.

Lu Hui's slightly indifferent voice came through the receiver, "Hello?"

"Sister Hui!"

Li Qiang instantly became overwhelmed with excitement, but before he could even finish half a sentence...

Lu Hui abruptly hung up the phone.

With that, the newly kindled flames of hope were extinguished once again.

Chang Hao sighed, "Just let it go, Qiangzi. You see other people's situations so clearly, so why are you so blind when it comes to your own affairs?"

Li Qiang ignored Chang Hao. Instead, he gripped Lu Yuhang's phone and began frantically texting Lu Hui.

The messages read: Sister Hui, please do not hang up on me!

I just want to know how you are doing right now.

I heard that dark-skinned fatty kicked you out. Did he hit you?

Sister Hui, I am different from that dark-skinned pig. I truly love you!

I admit that I lied to you. I am not from Jingcheng.

But my love for you is real!

"Sister Hui, I am begging you, please just give me a chance, okay?"

"I really love you. You must be in desperate need of help right now, right?"

Li Qiang sent one message after another, completely blind to Chang Hao's attempts to dissuade him. In truth, Chang Hao found it incredibly difficult to understand Li Qiang's current behavior. In his impression, although Li Qiang often said unpleasant things, he had always been very rational. He used to frequently point out that spending money on Zheng Yanyan was the behavior of a total fool.

But now?

The other party had rejected him so explicitly, yet he was still scrambling to fawn over her just as before.

Ultimately, at the core of it all, Li Qiang felt profoundly inferior.

Coming from a small rural area, he had suddenly been thrust into the dazzling, overwhelming world of Jinling.

From initially failing to find his place.

To finally realizing the truth about himself, Li Qiang discovered that he belonged to the absolute bottom of society. Not a single girl would ever like him.

He had foolishly added every single girl in their class as a contact and sent them "good morning" messages every day, fully convinced that no matter what, he would eventually reel one in.

Yet he never expected that such behavior would turn him into the laughingstock of the girls during their free time.

Only Sister Hui was different.

To Li Qiang, Lu Hui was the sole ray of sunshine in his life.

He ignored the fact that he had fed Lu Hui false information. He only remembered that Lu Hui was different from the other girls. Every time he sent a message, Lu Hui would reply with several sentences, and those words carried the whining affection and playful charm of a young woman.

While chatting with Lu Hui, Li Qiang gained a sense of self-respect that he could not find anywhere else.

During these past few days of separation from Lu Hui, Li Qiang had been plagued by sleepless nights. Whenever he drifted off, he would suddenly jolt awake and instinctively check his phone, desperately hoping that Lu Hui had sent him a reply.

Generally, the more inferior a boy felt, the more empathy he would project onto a girl.

A normal romantic relationship should involve mutual attraction and affection, leading to shared happiness after becoming lovers. But for someone like Li Qiang, who had never encountered a better girl in life, he chose to blindly trust Lu Hui.

For instance, during their brief online romance, Lu Hui would talk about her original family. She spoke of her parents' divorce, her mother remarrying and taking her along, and how her stepfather used to peek at her while she bathed when she was little.

At those moments, Li Qiang felt that Lu Hui had lived a deeply tragic life. His profound empathy made him believe that he was the only one who could save Lu Hui from her sea of suffering, and that he was the only one who truly loved her.

In reality, Lu Hui had mentioned Liu Shuo to Li Qiang before, but in their conversations, this Liu Shuo had naturally been framed as Lu Hui's ex-boyfriend.

This allowed Lu Hui to freely complain to Li Qiang about how utterly unromantic Liu Shuo was.

And how he had used the convenience of his position to forcefully monopolize her.

Lu Hui told Li Qiang that she actually did not like Liu Shuo at all, but because she was young and naive at the time, he had managed to get his hands on her.

After hearing this, Li Qiang felt even more fiercely that he needed to treat Lu Hui perfectly.

Thus, Li Qiang sank step by step into a fairy tale world of his own weaving.

The truth was that the current Lu Hui had long since moved on. It was only Li Qiang who remained trapped in his fragile male ego, forever convinced that he alone could truly redeem Lu Hui.

Chang Hao told Li Qiang, "Honestly, you aren't even ugly. If you took this stubborn dedication you have for chasing Lu Hui and applied it elsewhere, what girl couldn't you win over?"

Yet no matter how much Chang Hao spoke, Li Qiang was completely deaf to his words.

That was until Lu Yuhang's phone pinged again.

Li Qiang hurriedly lifted the phone to check.

"Sister Hui!"

It was a message from Lu Hui. Li Qiang was instantly overjoyed, only to see that Lu Hui had sent him the location of a small budget hotel.

Li Qiang quickly typed back, "I am heading over right now, Sister Hui! Wait for me!"

"Oh, and Sister Hui, please take me off your blacklist. You have to take me off!"

After sending that message, Li Qiang did not even say a word of farewell. He hastily threw on a jacket and turned to leave. On the bustling snack street, various merchant stalls lined both sides. The thick white smoke from grilling lamb skewers and deep-frying squid tentacles billowed straight into the night sky, drifting past the tangled mess of power lines overhead.

One after another, multi-story buildings from the last century displayed colorful neon signs hanging outside their windows, spelling out: Hotel.

This was the typical snack street found near any university town. Broke students would wander this street on a Friday night, casually ordering some delicious skewers before taking their girlfriends by the hand and shyly ducking into the nearby cheap hotels.

Though the hygiene standards were difficult to guarantee.

They were undeniably cheap.

Many female students had left their first times behind in small budget hotels exactly like these.

Only to be married off to someone else years later with a bride price of 188,000 RMB.

At this moment, Lu Hui was indeed feeling utterly confused. She had lost her job and been kicked out by Liu Shuo. For the past few months, life had been far too smooth, and Lu Hui had suddenly mistaken Zhou Yuwen's success for her own capability.

In other words, because her work at Zhou Yuwen's company had been smooth sailing, she genuinely believed her abilities were perfectly matched to a monthly salary of 4,000 RMB plus a 2,000 RMB bonus.

It was not until the moment she was fired by Zhou Yuwen and returned to this small hotel that cost fifty RMB a day that Lu Hui suddenly remembered how incredibly difficult it had been to find a job right after graduation.

She had browsed through countless job postings online, only to discover that positions requiring a Junior College degree barely offered a salary of over 2,000 RMB, and they even demanded prior work experience.

Lu Hui had grown accustomed to being provided for by Liu Shuo and lacked any sense of saving money. Right now, she only had a little over 3,000 RMB to her name. If she wanted to rent an apartment, even a cheap single room in a residential house for 400 RMB a month would require three months' rent plus a one-month deposit upfront—over a thousand RMB right there, not to mention daily living expenses.

Lu Hui knew that this 3,000 RMB would not last her very long.

And she would not be able to find a suitable job anytime soon.

So there she sat in the cheap hotel, eating a three-and-a-half RMB cup of instant noodles.

Twenty-six-year-old Lu Hui wore a face full of misery, suddenly overwhelmed by a deep wave of anxiety.

It was right at this moment that she received Li Qiang's phone call.

Initially, upon seeing an unknown number, Lu Hui thought it was a response to a resume she had submitted.

But the second she heard Li Qiang's voice, Lu Hui did not even hesitate; she hung up the phone immediately.

That was until she saw the incredibly earnest and heartfelt messages Li Qiang sent afterward.

Lu Hui pondered for a brief moment.

She felt that her fall to this wretched state today was entirely Li Qiang's fault.

So, now that she was in trouble, having Li Qiang help her out was perfectly unobjectionable.

However, she couldn't be bothered to speak softly to him.

She simply sent Li Qiang her location and did not say a single extra word.

And sure enough, about ten minutes later, Li Qiang arrived outside Lu Hui's room.

"Knock, knock!"

A knock on the door.

The door swung open.

Lu Hui, looking incredibly haggard, stood by the doorway with an expressionless face.

"Sister Hui," Li Qiang's heart ached the moment he saw her. When he had come upstairs just now, he had seen the front desk clerk on the first floor picking their feet, and he had heard the faint, chaotic noises coming from the other rooms.

Now, following Lu Hui into the room, he took in the narrow 1.8-meter single bed, the cramped space, and the empty cup of instant noodles that she had not yet had the chance to throw away.

Lu Hui still did not give Li Qiang a pleasant look. Without any emotion, she opened the door for him, then sat down on the edge of the bed by herself and asked coldly, "Why did you come here?"

Li Qiang's eyes were filled with heartache as he gazed at her. "Sister Hui, how can you live in a place like this?"

Lu Hui scoffed coldly, speaking with heavy disdain, "If I don't live here, where else am I supposed to live?"

In reality, if Li Qiang were by himself, he would likely consider living in a place like this a matter of course. Yet for some reason, he simply could not accept Lu Hui staying here. Deep in his heart, he felt an overwhelming need to provide Lu Hui with a higher quality of life.

So, without a second thought, Li Qiang grabbed Lu Hui's hand. "Come with me!"

With that, ignoring Lu Hui's protests, he pulled her out of the cheap hotel.

During the previous semester, Li Qiang had consistently worked part-time jobs. Since he was not the type of boy who liked to spend money, he had managed to save up quite a bit. At the very least, he could easily pull out seven or eight thousand RMB.

Back then, Li Qiang had mercilessly mocked Chang Hao for spending money on Zheng Yanyan.

That was because Li Qiang felt that since Zheng Yanyan was already Zhou Yuwen's girlfriend, Chang Hao spending money on another man's woman made him an absolute fool.

He preferred to save his money carefully so he could spend it on his future wife.

It wasn't that Li Qiang was unwilling to spend money on women; rather, he wanted to spend it on a woman who actually had him in her heart.

And in Li Qiang's eyes, Lu Hui was exactly that kind of woman.

Therefore, he was perfectly willing to spend his money on her.

He contacted an agency and found a decent one-bedroom apartment near the university.

The rent was 1,500 RMB. In truth, if one had the patience to search, 1,200 RMB would have been more than enough to rent a similar one-bedroom apartment. However, since he was in a rush to get Lu Hui settled, Li Qiang made a grand gesture, paying for three months' rent upfront and handing over a 700 RMB agency fee.

Everything was finalized right under Lu Hui's watchful eyes.

Li Qiang just wanted to prove to Lu Hui that he was fully capable of providing for her!

Lu Hui, however, did not even bat an eyelid at the display.

"Sister Hui, just settle down here for now. There is no need to rush into finding a job. The money I have right now is enough to support you for a while. In a bit, we will go to the hotel to grab your luggage," Li Qiang declared after the agent left.

Lu Hui leaned expressionlessly against the balcony, staring out at the pitch-black night without uttering a single word.

She knew that the rent here was definitely not worth 1,500 RMB. There were absolutely no amenities downstairs, and it was quite a distance from the subway station. It was far inferior to Zhonghai Garden, but what did that matter?

It wasn't like she was the one paying for it anyway.

At least she was more or less settled.

Lu Hui thought to herself, 'Since Li Qiang is perfectly willing to rent a place for me, I might as well let him. I can use this time to find a job, and once I am capable, I will just pay him back.'

"Sister Hui."

From behind, looking at Lu Hui leaning against the balcony alone, Li Qiang knew that she must be in a terrible mood. So he didn't say anything further; he merely walked up behind her and silently wrapped his arms around her.

He whispered, "Sister Hui, don't worry. I promise to work incredibly hard from now on. I won't let you live a life of hardship!"

With that, Li Qiang lowered his head, intending to kiss her.

But Lu Hui simply tilted her head to the side and replied faintly, "I am a little tired."

Li Qiang froze in awkwardness for a moment. "Oh, ah, okay. Then... then you rest first, Sister Hui. I'll go to the hotel to bring your things over?"