Jiang Shi’s first thought upon seeing the fan’s request was — worthy calling herself a die-hard fan, someone who understands him completely.
But how could he possibly kiss Xie Xu in front of so many viewers in the live stream?
He wasn’t that shameless!
Jiang Shi coughed, trying to sound serious, “That’s not possible. Pick something else.”
But his viewers weren’t buying his excuse.
[Who was it that said he’d do any request?]
[Why are you chickening out? Weren’t you the one who put ‘kissing Xu’ in the stream title before? Now that you have the chance, you don’t want to take it?]
[Exactly, Xu hasn’t said anything, and now you’re the one getting all prissy.]
[Stop hesitating, just raise your hand, hold Xu’s head steady, and kiss him. Do I need to teach you?]
[If you really can’t, just sit on his lap and kiss him. Surely you can manage to do that, right?]
Jiang Shi couldn’t bear to look at these “instructions” and reluctantly said, “Fine, I never said I wouldn’t do it.”
As soon as he said this, the training room fell into a brief silence. Jiang Lele Flashed in the face of the enemy, and Yuan Yang almost dropped his tablet from a slip of the hand.
Even Xie Xu, sitting beside Jiang Shi, turned to glance at him.
Jiang Shi didn’t dare meet anyone’s eyes. He pointed to Xie Xu’s thermos on his desk, “Captain, can I drink water from your cup?”
Normally, he would pour the water into a separate paper cup to drink. If he drank directly from Xie Xu’s cup, it would be an indirect kiss.
After all, the winner hadn’t specified how they should kiss.
Jiang Shi thought he had a thick enough skin, but he still felt his face heat up after asking.
After all, Xie Xu always remembered to use clean chopsticks even when feeding him wontons.
Would Xie Xu mind?
Had Xie Xu ever kissed anyone before?
Jiang Shi’s mind raced with random thoughts until he finally heard Xie Xu’s response.
“It’s up to you.”
Jiang Shi felt that Xie Xu’s voice seemed a few degrees lower than usual, which made him inexplicably nervous. He hurriedly grabbed the cup and tilted it to drink.
Whether it was a common habit or something else, Jiang Shi felt that he was drinking from the same spot Xie Xu usually did.
This really felt like kissing…
Jiang Shi, with impure thoughts, drank very slowly, tilting his head higher than usual.
From Xie Xu’s angle, he could see Jiang Shi’s neck, which had been hidden under his team uniform all day, now exposed — slender and fair.
Jiang Shi’s pale lips pressed against the bottle’s mouth, whether due to nervousness or something else, they were squeezed into a full curve.
Then, Jiang Shi slowly started swallowing.
Xie Xu lowered his gaze, watching Jiang Shi’s Adam’s apple move up and down lightly, repeatedly.
Jiang Shi sipped the honey water from Xie Xu’s thermos very slowly, little by little, until it was all gone.
[I was going to scold this little idiot for cheating, but why does this scene feel so ambiguous!]
[Is God Xu unaware that he’s on camera? He’s been staring at T Bao the whole time he’s been drinking.]
[It’s just a sip of water, but Time is drinking it so slowly, and Xu is just letting him, quietly watching by the side.]
[Maybe I’m just hallucinating, but I feel like Xu’s eyes are kinda intense.”
[I don’t know about anything else, but I do know that little idiot is making drinking water look very seductive.]
[Baby’s lips are so red, and after drinking, he licked his lips with his tongue!]
[Hehe, can I pretend it’s because Xu kissed them red?]
[Aaaaah! This is so satisfying! I hope the next winner doesn’t let us down.]
The fans were full of expectations, but Jiang Shi didn’t dare to set up any more Q&A or raffles after that. He simply handed out lucky bags, and nothing unusual happened before the stream ended.
After the stream ended, Jiang Shi leaned back in his chair and let out a long sigh.
He had never felt this exhausted after a stream before.
He couldn’t say anything inappropriate, couldn’t fight his viewers, and could only watch as the chat dredged up his past antics, dragging Xu into it as well.
Jiang Shi had already been unsure of how to face Xie Xu lately, and after this livestream, he felt even more embarrassed.
If he were Xie Xu, he would definitely think he was a pervert with ulterior motives.
But Xie Xu was surprisingly calm.
Maybe it was because he now saw Jiang Shi as part of TLG, and as the captain, didn’t want to hold it against him?
Did Xie Xu really have no other feelings for him?
Jiang Shi absentmindedly tapped random keys on his keyboard, occasionally glancing at the thermos on his desk, looking uninterested.
“Hey, why do you look so down, Little White Hair?” Jiang Lele noticed him fiddling with the keyboard and asked, “What, didn’t get enough out of streaming? Now you’re venting through typing?”
Jiang Shi’s melancholy was completely shattered. He looked up and said with a blank expression, “Jiang Lele, I’ve just ended my stream.”
Jiang Lele hadn’t processed this yet. “Huh?”
Jiang Shi took his hands off the keyboard and said seriously, “I think you could be the target of my venting.”
Jiang Lele shrank back, immediately falling silent.
Jiang Shi didn’t know how much frustration he had bottled up during that live stream, but he wasn’t going to be the scapegoat.
Yuan Yang, used to the two of them bantering, didn’t pay much attention. “Tonight was a close call, but despite your fans always being unpredictable, the live stream went pretty well. You gained nearly 50,000 followers, and the number is still climbing.”
He smiled at Jiang Shi, “Even after you ended the stream, there are still a lot of people in your chat, posting comments!
Jiang Shi knew exactly what those people were saying, asking why he ended the stream so quickly and if he actually went off to kiss Xu.
He looked at the smile on Yuan Yang’s face and tentatively asked, “Yang-ge, didn’t you think there was anything wrong with today’s stream?”
“Like, the boundaries?”
Yuan Yang was perceptive and immediately understood Jiang Shi’s point. “You mean the viewers making jokes about you and Xu, right?”
“I expected that a long time ago.”
After all, before Jiang Shi’s identity was revealed, he had always acted like this. Even though he had toned it down now, his fans wouldn’t change that easily.
“Don’t take those jokes to heart. It’s normal for CP fans to appear within the team, just like Yu Hui and Jiang Lele — they even have their own CP super topic. I’m used to it by now,” Yuan Yang continued explaining. “To be blunt, Xu even had CP fans with An before!”
Once, fans openly shipped the two in Xie Xu’s live stream. But at that time, Xie Xu wasn’t as tolerant as he is now, and he directly stated that he didn’t like fans talking about that, effectively putting an end to the speculation.
“But today’s request for a kiss definitely crossed the line. Luckily, you were smart and drank Xie Xu’s water to smooth things over.”
To Yuan Yang, it was normal for guys to drink from each other’s cups.
He originally worried that Jiang Shi might be too straightforward and tried to comfort him. But after he finished speaking, he noticed Jiang Shi visibly deflated.
Xu and An even had CP fans! What does that make him?
He had been secretly pleased with Xie Xu’s tolerance today, thinking there was a good chance to take things further.
But now…
Yuan Yang had said so much, yet Xie Xu didn’t comment at all—he just kept looking at his phone.
He probably agreed, or maybe he just didn’t care.
Jiang Shi felt like Xie Xu saw him as nothing more than an ordinary teammate or maybe just a younger kid to look after.
He bit his lip in frustration, forgetting that he had a mouth ulcer, and the pain from biting down on it made him angrier. He pushed against the sore spot with his tongue.
Damn ulcer!
Xie Xu had been chatting with Sun when he heard a sharp intake of breath from beside him. He glanced over and saw Jiang Shi frowning, his tongue pressing against his cheek, making his face puff out like an angry, fluffed-up little hamster.
Jiang Shi knew Xie Xu was looking at him but didn’t raise his head. Instead, he grabbed the cup on the table, “I’m going to wash the cup.”
With that, he hurried out of the training room.
Xie Xu took off his headphones and looked at Yuan Yang.
“Hey, what do you mean by that?” Yuan Yang was speechless, “I didn’t say anything to him!”
With Jiang Shi’s skill and looks, he could very well become TLG’s second star player after Xie Xu. Today’s numbers indicated that trend, and Jiang Shi had played well, followed instructions, and didn’t say anything inappropriate in the live stream. He was well-behaved — how could he have been reprimanded!
Jiang Lele stepped in to help, “Captain, it’s really not Yang-ge’s fault this time. Little White Hair is just jealous of you and An! Maybe he’s also upset that you kept playing on your phone and didn’t pay him any attention, haha…”
Xie Xu’s phone was still buzzing.
[Sun: Are you feeling a bit off today? Spending 100,000 in your little AD’s livestream to stake your claim?]
[Sun: And you two even shared a cup. Do you really not care, or are you just pretending?]
[Sun: What are you really thinking, you old fox? You didn’t act like this when An first joined the team.]
But Xie Xu hadn’t responded to him at all, leaving him hanging.
[Sun: Say something!]
[Xu: Stop mentioning An.]
After sending that, Xie Xu muted Sun’s messages.
He first went to the entrance to pick up a delivery, then headed to the restroom on the second floor to find someone.
He searched around and eventually found Jiang Shi in the restroom farthest from the training room.
Before he even entered, he heard the clanging of cups and the sound of scrubbing.
Jiang Shi was furiously scrubbing the thermos, with foam splattering everywhere — not only on the mirror in front of the sink but also on his face.
Jiang Shi had left the training room with a lot of pent-up frustration.
As he scrubbed, he muttered to himself, “If I’d known, I shouldn’t have ended the game so early today, and let that idiot An take advantage of me.”
He should have been more ruthless, trapping him in the fountain and beating him down, with Xie Xu watching from the sidelines.
Who is good and who is bad will be clear at a glance!
But after a few sentences, Jiang Shi’s angry tone became dejected again. He let out a long sigh, “How many people do I have to compete with for Xie Xu…”
First, there was Juzi and Sun from Lion Team, then the former AD An, who had been around for three years.
Why was Xie Xu so good at attracting people?
Look at him, clean and pure, not like Xu, who’s surrounded by rotten peach blossoms.
Jiang Shi angrily slapped the water, only to end up splashing it back onto his face.
He was already used to the splashes, so he just wiped his face with his sleeve. But as he lifted his arm, he caught a glimpse of a figure in the mirror.
Jiang Shi turned around in surprise, “Captain?”
When did Xie Xu get here?
“I just got here,” Xie Xu said, his gaze drifting past Jiang Shi’s shoulder to the thermos cup that had been scrubbed until it gleamed. After a moment of silence, he remarked, “The paint has come off.”
Jiang Shi hastily fished the cup out of the sink and noticed that he had scrubbed so hard in some spots that the gray stainless steel beneath was faintly visible, with scratches crisscrossing all over, clearly showing how much it had been mistreated.
He quickly shoved the thermos back into the water, and as a few bubbles gurgled up from the opening, he defended himself, “It’s just that this brush is too hard, I didn’t even use much force!”
But his exaggerated movements only caused more water to splash onto his face.
Xie Xu reached out naturally and wiped the foam off the tip of Jiang Shi’s nose, “It’s fine. The insulation wasn’t great on this one anyway, I’ll get a new one.”
Jiang Shi immediately offered, “Then I’ll buy it for you, since I was the one who ruined it.”
Xie Xu didn’t refuse.
Only then did Jiang Shi retrieve the thermos from the bottom of the sink and rinse it clean with fresh water. As he rinsed, he asked Xie Xu, “Captain, why did you come here?”
He had purposely chosen the restroom farthest from the training room.
Xie Xu lifted the plastic bag he had been holding in his left hand, “I came to find you.”
Jiang Shi looked down and saw a bag full of medicine. He instantly got nervous, “Captain, are you sick? Did you come to get the thermos for making some medicine?”
Xie Xu sighed a little, “The medicine is for you. Don’t you have a mouth ulcer?”
Staying up late was normal for them, and with Jiang Shi recently experiencing internal heat, if he didn’t take care, he’d suffer for a long time.
Jiang Shi shook the water off his hands and accepted the medicine, “Why did you buy so much?”
There were lozenges, sprays, solutions — every kind of medicine there was for ulcers.
Xie Xu originally intended for Jiang Shi to pick whichever one he got used to, but recalling how Jiang Shi had aggravated his sore after the stream, he pulled out the spray from the bag, “I didn’t think much when I bought them, but I just looked it up, and the spray seems to work best.”
“I’ll use this one, then,” Jiang Shi said without a second thought, “Good thing there’s a mirror here.”
After rinsing his mouth, he opened it in front of the mirror, but because of the angle, he kept missing the spot and ended up tasting the bitter medicine.
His tongue curled up tightly, and he didn’t dare move it at all.
Just as he was contemplating whether to lie and say he had applied the spray properly, the spray bottle was taken from his hand.
“I’ll do it.”
Xie Xu held his chin, and seeing Jiang Shi staring blankly at him, he reminded him, “Open your mouth.”
Jiang Shi opened his mouth a bit wider and mumbled, “I think I have a sharp canine tooth here. I sometimes accidentally bite the skin when I eat, but I couldn’t find where it is in the mirror.”
Xie Xu acknowledged with a hum. “I’ll take a look later.”
Then, he inserted the spray into Jiang Shi’s mouth.
Jiang Shi could feel the clear powder accurately landing on his sore spot.
But after Xie Xu finished applying the spray, he still held onto Jiang Shi’s chin, leaving Jiang Shi no choice but to wait with his mouth open until Xie Xu let go.
“Are you jealous that I have CP fans with An?”
Xie Xu suddenly asked, his voice calm, revealing no emotion.
The question took Jiang Shi by complete surprise. He raised his eyes in shock and met a pair of dark eyes, serene yet carrying an undercurrent of pressure.
In this position, Jiang Shi’s heartbeat shamefully quickened.
Their height difference put him at a natural disadvantage, and with Xie Xu’s hand holding his chin in a restrictive manner, he didn’t dare make a single move. The only response he could muster was a swallow.
Jiang Shi didn’t even know why he was so nervous. Amid his excitement, he felt a sense of danger, like prey encountering a predator.
Xie Xu looked down at the person in front of him, obediently holding his mouth open.
Jiang Shi’s lips had been roughly treated by his own careless application of the spray, making them turn an unnatural shade of red.
This time, Xie Xu could clearly see Jiang Shi’s moist lips and the bobbing Adam’s apple.
The small restroom fell into a brief silence.
Jiang Shi felt uneasy.
As a fan, it should be normal for him to be jealous of the CP between Xu and An, right? Or did Xie Xu think he shouldn’t be so possessive and want him all to himself?
Or maybe Xie Xu overheard him secretly cursing An in the restroom earlier?
Jiang Shi’s expression fluctuated between shock, confusion, and finally a hint of grievance, as if he was heartbroken that Xie Xu would confront him because of An.
No matter what the reason, there was no sign of resistance.
Jiang Shi appeared completely harmless in front of Xie Xu, with a few remaining foam spots on his face from the water splashes earlier, now dried into tiny white patches.
On Jiang Shi’s slightly flushed face, it made him look like a little cat that had gotten itself dirty while playing.
Except, this seemingly innocent and adorable little cat often hissed at others, fiercely so.
With his mouth open for too long, Jiang Shi’s jaw began to ache, and saliva uncontrollably pooled. He secretly swallowed again and naturally closed his mouth slightly, accidentally bumping his teeth against Xie Xu’s fingertips.
Then, he felt someone gently rub against a tooth in the corner of his mouth. “The sharp canine tooth is here.”
Xie Xu chuckled softly, “It’s a bit pointy.”
