Chu Nan readily agreed, as he hadn't eaten all day; if it weren't for his good stamina, he'd have been dazed from hunger by now.
He hurriedly followed Mashouzi out of the dorm, noticing the guy sneakily taking out a pack of cigarettes before darting into the floor supervisor's office.
It wasn't long before Mashouzi emerged grinning ear to ear, then strutted over to unlock the back door of the dorm building, waving at Chu Nan, who was taken aback but quickly followed, thinking to himself that this kid had some real clout!
Just out the door, before Chu Nan could even ask, Mashouzi could hardly contain his pride and said to Chu Nan, "Don't worry, I've been in cahoots with our floor supervisor for a while now. I just went to ask him to help out with your audit procedures! He's already agreed. All the good cigarettes and liquor I've been treating him to, certainly come in handy at crucial times!"
"Then I really owe you one!"
Upon hearing this, Chu Nan immediately felt delighted; this Mashouzi really was something else. Originally, he thought Mashouzi was just bribing the guy for the key to the back door, but he'd managed to take care of the audit student matter too.
"Thanks for what! Look at my sales tonight, they've increased several fold. I'm counting on you staying here for good!"
Mashouzi waved his hand, speaking nonchalantly.
Old-style dorm buildings were constructed along the street, so every evening numerous vendors set up stalls behind the back door, which would require a long detour through the campus if not for direct access from the back door.
Mashouzi, who knew the area like the back of his hand, led Chu Nan to a barbecue restaurant and as soon as they sat down, he ordered a huge pile of lamb skewers and beer.
"Ordering so much? You're not going to drink up all your earnings for the night, are you?"
Staring at the table filled with enticing skewers, Chu Nan's mouth watered, but he felt too embarrassed to dig in immediately.
"Oh, come on, what's the point of making money if not to spend it? Eat up, and don't be shy around me, with our relationship!"
Mashouzi casually opened two bottles of beer, handed one to Chu Nan, and started stuffing lamb skewers into his mouth.
"Uh!"
Chu Nan quickly grabbed them, fearing he'd pierce his mouth if he wasn't careful!
No longer standing on ceremony, having not eaten all day, he wolfed down his food with great relish. While the taste wasn't quite authentic, it probably wouldn't kill him, still much better than eating raw meat in the Middle East.
The two clinked glasses, and Chu Nan casually inquired, "By the way, that Lin Xuerou seems to be quite popular at school, she must have a lot of admirers, right?"
"Of course! She's one of the campus beauties, often surrounded by plenty of rich young masters! Boy, you've set your sights on Lin the campus beauty—that's no small feat!"
Mashouzi munched on his skewers while speaking somewhat indistinctly.
"Do you have a way to get close to her?"
Chu Nan snorted, thinking it made sense, for how could Lin Xuerou, with her unfriendly temperament, not be difficult to approach?
But then again, canceling the engagement with her should be relatively easy!
"You're asking the right person! The simplest way is to take a class with her!"
Mashouzi tossed aside the bamboo stick in his hand and took a big swig of beer.
Chu Nan was surprised, finding this to be a great idea, and asked curiously, "What kind of courses does she take? Since I'm an audit student, I should be able to sit in on any course, right?"
"Then I don't know, she is a high-achieving student in the English department, not in the same department as me; we don't have classes together either!"
Mashouzi put down his beer, revealing a mysterious grin, "But don't be disappointed. There's a political thought class in the lecture hall that the freshmen take together, and she'll be there with our major! Wait a sec, let me check the class schedule!"
After saying that, Mashouzi took out his phone from his pocket, quickly scanned through it, and pointing at the screen said, "Got it, there's this class tomorrow morning, if you come with me, you'll meet her!"
"Alright, then tomorrow it is!"
Chu Nan readily agreed and then asked, "Do you know anything about her family?"
"Wow, you're something else! Even know how to take a roundabout approach, starting with her family background. I thought you were just a simpleton, but you turn out to be pretty experienced!"
Mashouzi slapped the table in astonishment.
Chu Nan felt a little embarrassed and touched the table, which seemed poorer in quality than a bicycle; hopefully, it wouldn't fall apart, causing him to owe money!
However, he couldn't explain why he had asked that question and simply pretended not to hear it.
Actually, asking about Lin Xuerou's family was Chu Nan's way of looking for clues to judge whether she was indeed Hua Hua, his intended fiancée whom he was trying to find.
"But you did ask the right person!"
Mashouzi proudly grinned at Chu Nan after downing a glass of beer and wiping the foam from his lips, "Her family lives near the school, in the urban-rural fringe area. Look, just a few hundred meters ahead."
Chu Nan followed the direction Mashouzi pointed and saw a cluster of old residential houses quietly standing at the end of a snack street, too dark to make out if anyone actually lived there.
"It's just that her family has also been quite unlucky!"
Mashouzi shook his head and clucked his tongue in pity, "When Ming City University expanded, they drew the demolition red line right up to her house. All her former neighbors made a fortune from the compensation and moved into high-rises and started driving luxury cars, but her family remained poor!"
"Oh? Couldn't they continue farming?"
Chu Nan looked again and noticed that every household still had some fields in front of their doors, but those fields seemed long neglected, overgrown with weeds and desolate.
"Farming?"
Mashouzi replied helplessly, "As you see, her house faces the pedestrian street, stretching from this snack street all the way to the back gate of Ming City University, always smoky and bustling. Besides, those vendors aren't careful; they dump waste and used oil into the ground every day. That place is almost turning into saline-alkali soil, it can't grow a damn thing!"
"This…"
Hearing Mashouzi say this, Chu Nan was somewhat speechless. Lin Xuerou's family situation seemed quite pitiful. After thinking a bit, he asked, "Then what do her parents do? How do they make a living? Surely they don't just starve because they can't farm!"
"Oh, I heard her father was once a high-ranking executive at the well-known local Yueronghua Corporation, and her mother was an accountant there."
Mashouzi frowned, thinking, and then said, "But later, I think they were framed by someone, lost a big sum of money and fell from grace, leaving nothing but an empty house. That's why they moved to this godforsaken place!"
"The Yueronghua Corporation..."
Chu Nan silently repeated the name, which sounded vaguely familiar. That's right!
He had seen it on the big screen advertisements at the train station—it seemed like a pretty impressive company!