Truth or Dare, huh?
Zhang Shutong felt that it was one of girls' favorite games to play.
The reason he thought so was that the few of them had played it before back in the day. The questions were nothing more than things like who your crush was, but the problem was that the four of them knew each other far too well. Every time Ruoping raised the idea with soaring enthusiasm, he and Qingyi were clearly lacking in interest. Then she could only tease Du Kang, and later on, even Du Kang grew desensitized to it. In the end, everyone felt it was better to play Monopoly instead.
"It was because there were too few people back then, but we have a crowd this time. I really think it works." That was just how Ruoping was—once again eagerly raising her hand, her eyes sparkling brightly. "Anyway, I'm voting yes first! Oh, and Du Kang's vote—I'm voting on his behalf too."
Du Kang had gone to the restroom.
"Sure," Qingyi said indifferently. "Actually, I'd rather play Ouija."
"What about Shutong?" Ruoping ignored him completely.
"Whatever," Zhang Shutong said. "You know I'm energy-saving..."
"Qinglian, do you want to play?"
Ruoping ignored him once again, and then remembered something:
"Oh, forgot to mention, the rules go like this... It's actually very simple. For example, if I ask you what your favorite fruit is, answer if you want to. If you don't want to, you can... well, like going up to the rooftop in the dark from the classroom and then coming back. It definitely won't be too excessive, like taking a walk in the guys' restroom or something. How about we play a test round first, and if it's boring, we can switch to something else?"
Ruoping patted her chest to guarantee it.
Zhang Shutong, on the other hand, felt that she had a few wicked ideas up her sleeve. She only guaranteed that the dares wouldn't be too out of line, but she hadn't guaranteed the same for the truths.
Ruoping shot him a wink as she spoke, wanting him to act as her accomplice. She really was being a bit naughty.
Zhang Shutong couldn't bear to watch any longer.
In the next second, he nodded at Lu Qinglian with a serious expression:
"It's true."
Lu Qinglian thought about it:
"Okay."
Ruoping flashed a victory sign, smiling like a little fox that had stolen a chicken:
"Then I'll search for some questions on my phone. Let's wait until Qiumian wraps things up on her end. Everyone get ready first—go to the bathroom if you need to, drink water if you need to, but no backing out halfway through!"
After saying that, she trotted off to grab pen and paper.
Zhang Shutong glanced at the fox statue on the window sill. His mind was not on the game. Taking advantage of the free time, he walked out into the hallway. At the doorway of Class 1, students were filing out one after another—perhaps they had finally argued their way to a result.
The singing from Class 2 had vanished as well. Gu Qiumian packed away the camera, mentioning that tonight's video recording would be sent out to everyone a bit later.
Zhang Shutong leaned against the doorframe waiting for her, while looking down the hallway.
"Getting ready to start?"
Whenever he was together with Autumn Rain Mianmian, there was always potential for them to do bad things together.
"Not yet," Zhang Shutong pointed toward Class 4. "Waiting for them to wrap up. Ruoping said we should play a game first."
"Wait for me to pack up my backpack." Gu Qiumian then spoke to the others, "You guys head out first."
Only the two of them remained in the classroom. Gu Qiumian hummed the tune from their rehearsal. Her backpack was still packed to the brim with all kinds of snacks. Zhang Shutong opened a bag of biscuits and ate them slowly—and eating the eldest young lady's biscuits meant helping her out with work.
He opened the windows one by one to ventilate the room, while Gu Qiumian shut down the multimedia equipment properly. Zhang Shutong slung her camera slanting across his back. By the time the two returned to Class 3, everyone was already seated around the desks.
"Eat together."
Gu Qiumian casually dumped the snacks onto the tabletop.
Before her skirt could even touch the surface of the chair:
"Miss."
Amidst the sound of a crowd of students walking downstairs, someone knocked on the doorframe.
The visitor was the driver from Gu Qiumian's family, who took the initiative to explain:
"President Gu wasn't quite at ease, so he had me come up to take a look."
"I already told him about the rehearsal..." Gu Qiumian let out a sigh, then said nonchalantly, "You came at the right time. Take the camera downstairs. Wait for me in the car for a bit, and keep an eye out to see if any other men enter the school gate."
The driver gave a slight nod, slung the backpack and camera onto his back, and left.
Zhang Shutong knew Boss Gu wasn't home these past few days, which was why the security around Gu Qiumian had relaxed slightly, only to return to its original state now.
Now, only the six of them remained inside Class 3's classroom. Zhang Shutong specifically pushed a window open just a crack to keep an eye on the commotion outside. Right now, the lower-grade students hadn't left yet, and their laughter and chatter drifted over from time to time.
Night had fallen, leaving only a single light burning overhead. The wind blew into the classroom from time to time, messing up everyone's hair. Looking out from here was a pitch-black sight, while looking around inside revealed a set of familiar faces. This was the first time the six of them had sat gathered around together.
Ruoping cleared her throat:
"I'll announce the rules first. Whomever the pen points to when spun gets chosen. Then, that person draws a question from the paper slips, and whichever one is drawn gets discarded. If there are no objections, then let's begin—"
Before her words could even land, she had already spun the pen with force. The gel pen spun on the table for quite a while, and finally—
The tip of the pen came to a stop in front of Zhang Shutong.
"Drawing for you!" Ruoping directly snatched a slip of paper.
Then, she let out a bored sigh and unfolded the paper slip, holding it out before everyone's eyes.
"What is your most feared animal?"
"Dogs."
Zhang Shutong answered calmly.
"You're afraid of dogs?" His companions were all a bit surprised.
"I was almost bitten by a dog when I was little."
"See? It's just simple questions like this," Ruoping explained in a quiet voice to Lu Qinglian. "Again."
She spun the gel pen again. This time, the tip of the pen... came to a stop in front of Lu Qinglian.
Ruoping picked up another one:
"Favorite food."
Lu Qinglian asked:
"Does 'none' count as an answer?"
"Doesn't count," Ruoping said with iron-fisted impartiality. "If you can't answer, you have to pick a dare."
"Apples," she said nonchalantly.
Zhang Shutong knew it—the game of Truth itself simply didn't work on Lu Qinglian.
Lu Qinglian spun the pen, and after a good while, the tip came to a stop in front of Gu Qiumian.
Gu Qiumian immediately sat up straight.
Ruoping, on the other hand, was much more polite, pushing the pile of paper balls toward Gu Qiumian for her to pick herself. Gu Qiumian hesitated for a moment before extending her finger.
"When was the last time you were angry at someone, and who was it?"
Zhang Shutong was eating a biscuit when he suddenly had an ominous feeling.
"At noon today, Zhang Shutong."
Gu Qiumian generously reported a name.
"Hey."
He turned his head helplessly, but Gu Qiumian didn't look at him at all:
"I'll spin it this time."
With that, the tip of the pen came to a stop in front of Ruoping.
"Who is the person you dislike the most among those present?"
"Uh..."
The corner of Ruoping's eye twitched.
"What kind of question did you write?" Du Kang was amused. "How did you manage to dig a pit for yourself?"
"Du Kang. Next."
The tip of the pen came to a stop in front of Qingyi.
The question was:
"Name a book you've liked recently."
Qingyi reported a book title none of them had heard of before, then spun the pen. The tip pointed at Zhang Shutong again.
He pulled out a slip of paper and was just about to unfold it when Ruoping interrupted:
"The rules are getting an upgrade now—adding an exposure mechanism."
"What do you mean?"
"To prevent anyone from lying during the Truth round and fooling the others, if you're exposed by someone present, then the person who exposed you gets to make you do a certain task instead."
Zhang Shutong nodded casually. He was pretty much immune to these play-house questions, thinking to himself whether the next one would be about his favorite sport.
The question was:
"What is the name of the member of the opposite sex you care about the most in your heart right now? Relatives don't count."
Zhang Shutong was stunned. Meanwhile, some were curious, some picked up their ears, and some maintained plain expressions.
Was this really a question from the very same pile of paper balls? If the paper ball just now was still in kindergarten, the one right before his eyes was fully grown into an adult.
The surroundings instantly went quiet, several pairs of eyes staring at his mouth. Zhang Shutong's face darkened:
"Dare."
"Just tell us," Ruoping pressed further. "Who is it?"
"Dare," Zhang Shutong emphasized once more.
"Aiya, don't be shy, don't be shy! You really want a dare?"
"Positive."
Zhang Shutong reached toward the other pile of paper slips:
"Make eye contact with the person on your left for ten seconds."
Zhang Shutong glanced at Gu Qiumian.
"Ten seconds, you can't go back on your word, Zhang Shutong! You said you wanted to play yourself just now."
Zhang Shutong turned his face. Gu Qiumian, on the other hand, let out a hum. She cast her gaze down from above—at three seconds, her eyes could still show a bit of bravado; at five seconds, Gu Qiumian began to blink; at ten seconds, her ears turned red as she said:
"Alright, next!"
Zhang Shutong spun the tip of the pen, and it came to a stop in front of himself once again.
"There's definitely something wrong with this pen." Zhang Shutong refused to accept it.
"Don't back out!"
Everyone spoke in unison.
"What was the most recent lie you told?"
"Uh..." What kind of ghost question was this? Zhang Shutong's brain worked at high speed as he said, "On Sunday night, when we went with Ruoping to look for the fox statue—when Ruoping's mom came to pick her up, we lied to her mom saying we were just coming out to hang out."
He felt this answer was quite good, since everyone had lied after all.
Everyone instantly revealed disappointed expressions.
"Incorrect."
Suddenly, a calm voice sounded beside his ear.
Zhang Shutong looked at Lu Qinglian as if seeing a ghost, thinking to himself, what was incorrect?
"Classmate Zhang Shutong," her tone was playful, "'It's true.'"
The others were thoroughly confused listening to this, but only Zhang Shutong understood what this woman meant. Not long ago, he had helped Ruoping fool Lu Qinglian once, saying "It's true." Now that Lu Qinglian had realized the truth, the questions for Truth were definitely not as simple as kindergarten level.
This was revenge.
Ruoping's interest was sparked instantly:
"Then what was the most recent lie he told?"
Lu Qinglian shot him a glance:
"Yesterday at the mall..."
Everyone present picked up their ears.
The young girl said nonchalantly:
"Classmate Zhang Shutong told me that as long as you sample something in the tasting area, you have to buy it."
"Shutong, you really are childish enough," Ruoping said, speechlessly. "Why fool her? Oh right, Qinglian, you can designate a task for him to do now..."