Chapter 17: Patrick Star's Underwear

"This person sent me so many messages?"

After Zhou Wan left, Ye Qinghe didn't study. Instead, he browsed around online, clicked into the website where he had previously left a comment, and found that the site's inbox was nearly bursting with messages from the person who had posted the problem.

From the day he had answered it to today, there were well over a hundred messages in total, the most recent one sent just thirty minutes ago.

"Please, I'm begging you — check your inbox! If you don't reply soon, my senior brother is going to kill me!"

"Please respond!!!"

"Please..."

The messages were essentially all asking him to reply, or to add the sender's contact information — WeChat, phone number, and so on.

It looks like the answer he gave back then wasn't wrong!

Seeing this, Ye Qinghe understood that his Math Prodigy skill must have gotten the problem right. Otherwise, the person who posted it wouldn't be hunting him down this frantically.

Might as well add them and have a chat.

Without overthinking it, Ye Qinghe added the WeChat account the person had left behind.

"This is Toward the Sun."

When Zhou Shuo saw that message pop up on WeChat, he was lying on his bunk in the dormitory. He leapt straight down from the top bunk.

"The legend finally replied to me!!!! Oh my god!!!"

Standing on the floor, he stared at the friend request notification on his phone with an expression of utter disbelief, shouting in wild excitement.

"What's going on? Zhou Shuo, are you out of your damn mind? You just smashed my soaking basin to pieces!!!"

"Is that the legend who solved the problem for your project? Is it one of the professors from our department?"

"Dude, how did you even get down from there?"

The others in the dorm were drawn away from their games by Zhou Shuo's erratic behaviour, all turning to look.

"It's him — the legend! I thought he was just going to ignore me forever, but I just got his friend request! I have to accept it right now and then go find Senior Brother!"

Zhou Shuo immediately hit accept. Not even stopping to notice he was only wearing a pair of boxers, he stepped out of his roommate's soaking basin, shoved his feet into his slippers, and bolted out the door.

"Hey — Fuck! You owe me a new basin!!!"

"Old Zhou, you're not wearing any clothes!!!"

"He just... left like that?"

"Holy crap, he went out in just his underwear?"

At first the roommate was upset about his basin, but once another roommate pointed it out, they all suddenly realized — Zhou Shuo had charged out the door in nothing but his underwear. They exchanged glances and rushed to the doorway, but by the time they got it open, Zhou Shuo had already thundered down the stairwell. There was no catching him.

Zhou Shuo ran toward the project room, typing a reply to the legend Toward the Sun on his phone as he went.

At this hour, there were bound to be people still in the project room. He couldn't be sure about the others, but Senior Brother Pei Ming was definitely there.

"Wow!"

"That guy!!!"

"This is why Qingmu is Qingmu — you really do find all kinds of characters here!"

"What a sight!"

Strangely, he couldn't figure out whether he'd somehow gotten more handsome today, but a lot of girls on the path were smiling at him, and some were even covering their mouths and snapping photos of him with their phones.

So people really had finally noticed his natural good looks, huh?

Zhou Shuo felt absolutely wonderful about himself.

"My solution unlocked a key step in their project, but didn't finish it — they're hoping I can help them complete it, and they're willing to pay for it?"

On the other side, Ye Qinghe had no idea what the newly added contact — going by the username "Emperor's Bearing" — was currently getting up to. He simply read the message and hesitated.

This wasn't particularly difficult for him. Even though he wasn't a math student, with the Math Prodigy skill, he could work through it step by step without any trouble.

The question was — how much should he charge?

He had no idea.

So Ye Qinghe didn't reply to Emperor's Bearing. Instead, he went online to look into it, trying to find out what the going rate was for this kind of thing.

While he sat there without responding, the sprinting Zhou Shuo grew even more anxious, pushing himself to a speed he didn't know he had as he raced toward the project room. It was perfectly normal for a legend who could solve problems like this not to reply immediately — someone capable of that was surely busy with a thousand other things. He had to find Senior Brother Pei as fast as possible and let him handle the conversation.

The result was that even when someone on the path pointed out that he was running around in just his underwear, he didn't hear a word of it — he even ignored the voice messages his roommates were sending him.

"Senior Brother! I got in touch with the legend — I added him on WeChat! He's online right now!!!"

The project group used a classroom — one large open space with desks arranged like an office, no partitions between them. At this hour, five people were still inside: three women and two men. Pei Ming was indeed there. Zhou Shuo burst in, shoved his phone at Pei Ming, and panted out the news.

"Patrick Star!"

"I didn't know our little junior brother had such a childlike side! Hehe!"

"Right? You couldn't tell before with his clothes on, but little junior brother is quite... well-endowed!"

The laughter from the three senior sisters and their gleeful expressions made Zhou Shuo realize something was off. How did they know he was wearing Patrick Star underwear?

"Ah!!!"

Zhou Shuo instinctively looked down — and then completely fell apart. He crumpled into a ball right there on the floor, squatting down and burying his face in both hands.

How on earth had he walked out like this?!

No wonder all the girls on the path had been laughing at him. No wonder so many people had been taking photos. He'd basically been streaking this whole time!

"Not bad, Zhou Shuo — performance art?"

Pei Ming was also struggling to keep a straight face. This Zhou Shuo — he truly couldn't go a single day without causing some kind of scene.

A few days ago he'd posted their core mathematical calculations online. Today he'd gone and done a naked run.

He genuinely couldn't figure out what their advisor had seen in this kid to let him join the project.

"Um, Senior Brother — could you find me something to wear? I was just so excited that I ran straight over here and completely forgot I hadn't put any clothes on."

Zhou Shuo raised his head cautiously, his face burning with embarrassment.

He could already picture it — Zhou Shuo was about to become famous. Everyone who'd taken photos earlier would definitely post them online. He'd had absolutely nothing covering him, and at one point when someone had their phone out, he'd even flashed them a grin right at the camera.

Once those photos hit the internet, Zhou Shuo was going to be truly viral.

"There should be a lab coat over there — I think it's in the cabinet. Go grab it yourself. Now give me your phone. Are you sure this person is really Toward the Sun?"

Pei Ming shook his head and pointed to a cabinet under a desk not far from Zhou Shuo. He was fairly sure there was an old lab coat in there that hadn't been worn in ages. But right now, the more pressing matter was confirming whether the person who'd added Zhou Shuo was actually Toward the Sun.

"I'm sure!"