YMI Chapter 6

Ten minutes later, the door opened again, and Qin Lang was stunned.

Tao Ruoxiang was wearing an ordinary floral-print dress, revealing a section of her fair, jade-like legs. On her feet was a pair of beige high-heeled sandals. Her long hair hung loosely over her shoulders. Although she was dressed casually, it couldn’t hide her alluring charm. The light of the setting sun streamed in through the balcony, making her seem like the most beautiful flower blooming in the twilight.

So, without her work uniform, Tao Ruoxiang was actually this breathtaking!

Qin Lang couldn’t help but secretly admire his own taste. It seemed Tao Ruoxiang was not only the kind of beauty that makes your heart skip a beat at first sight—she was the kind you could look at again and again, each time finding her even more captivating.

“What are you staring at? Never seen a beauty before?”

Tao Ruoxiang gave a light hum, the corners of her mouth curving upward, her sexiness laced with a hint of playfulness.

The moment she said this, she realized it wasn’t very fitting for a teacher. But her troubles had lifted, and she was in an unusually cheerful mood, which was why she spoke so freely.

“I’ve seen plenty of beauties,” Qin Lang smiled, “but a beauty like Auntie Tao is truly rare in this world.”

“Stop talking nonsense!” Tao Ruoxiang huffed. “And don’t call me Auntie Tao. I was joking with you before. You’d better call me Teacher Tao.”

“How could that work!” Qin Lang said seriously. “The whole class already knows you’re my little aunt. Since the lie has already become ‘truth,’ there’s no point clarifying or changing it now.”

“Suit yourself,” Tao Ruoxiang said. “You did me a big favor today. What do you want for dinner tonight?”

Qin Lang thought to himself, I just want to eat you, but of course he didn’t dare say it out loud. Instead, he just said, “Anything’s fine.”

Tao Ruoxiang actually wanted to send Qin Lang away early. Not because she truly disliked him, but because, as a stunning beauty constantly pursued by men, she had an instinctive sense that being alone with Qin Lang felt… “dangerous.” Especially today—though they had only just met, they’d become comfortable with each other far too quickly. That familiarity was a bit too much, and she felt it was necessary to create some distance to avoid trouble.

But Qin Lang didn’t think so at all. To him, his risky gamble today had paid off. Whether Teacher Tao’s impression of him was good or bad, she would definitely remember him. Next, he just needed to seize the opportunity over dinner to make a good show of himself and strike while the iron was hot.

Perhaps things had gone too smoothly today, because fate decided to throw some bad luck his way.

Just as they stepped downstairs one after the other, the English teacher and homeroom teacher, Sun Bo, came in—holding a small bouquet of flowers.

Seeing this, Qin Lang cursed silently, Damn it!

It looked like dinner was about to get complicated.

Sun Bo was in a suit, his hair slicked so shiny it looked like it had been polished. Standing over 1.8 meters tall, and able to throw out a few fashionable English phrases, he did have a certain appeal to girls. Qin Lang had heard from Zhao Kan that some girls in Seventh High secretly had crushes on this Teacher Sun—some had even written him love letters. But, according to Zhao Kan, all these girls belonged to the same era: the Jurassic Period.

A rival had suddenly appeared. Even though Sun Bo was his new homeroom teacher, Qin Lang had no intention of backing down.

As the saying goes, the hatred of killing one’s father and the hatred of stealing one’s wife cannot both exist under the same sky. In Qin Lang’s mind, Tao Ruoxiang was already his “designated” wife. Forget about Sun Bo being just a teacher—even if it were the Emperor himself, it wouldn’t do!

What Qin Lang didn’t realize was that, in Sun Bo’s eyes, he was the third wheel.

“Teacher Sun, that’s a nice bouquet of roses you’ve got there,” Qin Lang said with a smile. “You didn’t happen to pick them from the little garden by the teachers’ building, did you? We just passed by and heard an old man cursing, saying whoever cut his roses would grow sores on their head, pus on their feet, have no descendants, and die a terrible death… Teacher Sun, that wasn’t you, was it?”

Originally, Sun Bo hadn’t paid much attention to Qin Lang, but hearing him speak so venomously, he felt the words were aimed straight at him. Still, in front of Tao Ruoxiang, he kept up the image of being broad-minded, smiling as he said, “You must be the new student, Qin Lang. What a joke. How could I steal flowers? If I gave Teacher Tao stolen flowers, that would be an insult to beauty.”

Then Sun Bo switched to English: “Teacher Tao, you are as beautiful as a flower! Please accept this bouquet.”

“Teacher Sun… what did you say? My English is too poor, I don’t understand,” Tao Ruoxiang said suddenly, leaving Sun Bo embarrassed.

Qin Lang silently praised Tao Ruoxiang for her cleverness—undercutting someone without leaving a mark. Sun Bo prided himself on his English skills, and Tao had just said she didn’t understand foreign words. How was he supposed to continue without looking thick-skinned?

But Qin Lang underestimated Sun Bo’s persistence in pursuing women. After a moment of awkwardness, Sun Bo smiled and said, “Teacher Tao, you really know how to joke. Flowers for a beautiful lady—you wouldn’t be so cruel as to refuse me again, would you?”

“These flowers are beautiful!” Qin Lang chimed in. “It’s just a shame Teacher Tao’s room is too small, and there’s no vase. But Teacher Tao, since Teacher Sun is so sincere, you should accept them. If you don’t have a place to put them, our classroom has a vase. I can help you place them there, and you can see them whenever you come to teach.”

Sun Bo seethed inside. Who do you think you are? I’m giving flowers to someone—do I need you to arrange where they go? But in front of Tao Ruoxiang, he couldn’t lash out. I’ll deal with you later.

“That’s a good idea, Qin Lang,” Tao Ruoxiang said. “Such a nice bouquet—what a waste to keep it hidden. Good things should be shared. Putting them in the classroom will make the air fresher. Very nice.”

Before Sun Bo could respond, Qin Lang had already taken the flowers, lifted them to his nose, and sniffed. “They really do smell good!”

“Well then, hurry and take them to the classroom before they wilt,” Sun Bo said through gritted teeth, eager to get the boy out of the way.

Thinking he had successfully driven Qin Lang off, Sun Bo turned to Tao Ruoxiang and said, “Ruoxiang, I know you haven’t had dinner yet. Would you do me the honor of dining with me? You’ve turned me down the last few times—you wouldn’t be so heartless as to refuse me again today, would you?”

It seemed Sun Bo was quite thick-skinned, already addressing her as “Ruoxiang.”

In truth, Tao Ruoxiang was perfectly capable of refusing Sun Bo. But Qin Lang reacted even faster: “Teacher Sun, you may be the homeroom teacher, but everything should go in order of who got here first, right?”

Tao Ruoxiang, finding this amusing, said nothing. She wanted to see how Qin Lang would “deal with” Sun Bo.

“What do you mean, ‘first come, first served’?” Sun Bo asked, surprised. “Don’t tell me you plan to eat with Teacher Tao?”

“Why else do you think I’m standing here? You think I’m just here to be your third wheel?” Qin Lang said loudly.

Tao Ruoxiang couldn’t help laughing. Qin Lang noticed that when she laughed, the curve of her lips was beautiful—and tempting.