Chapter 153: Abs

Chapter 153 Six-Pack Abs

Shi Lv opened it and found it was still that "X."

X had changed to a profile picture characteristic of Blueblue—a backlit silhouette of a side profile. The details of the facial features were unclear, only the vague outline of the side profile could be seen. The contours of the brow bone and nose bridge sketched an elegantly curved silhouette, with warm white light illuminating the fine down on the skin. The overall tone gave off fashion magazine vibes.

This was drop-dead gorgeous at first glance.

A beauty whose obscured features only invited further imagination.

The beauty wore glasses, with tassel-like chains dangling from the frames. The silver-white metal reflected scattered glimmers, exuding a sophisticated yet rakish charm.

The rakish charmer said: "Mind if we chat? Shi, we're in the same city."

Liang Xu was confident that no Blueblue user could resist such an upfront temptation.

Shi Lv stared at the photo for two seconds before shutting it down instantly.

He tossed his phone back onto the desk, thinking, "Give it a rest."

Shi Lv admitted the photo was well-taken—drop-dead gorgeous at first glance—but he wasn’t that easily fooled.

He thought to himself, "Another scammer using internet photos, probably phishing for cash or a hookup."

Shi Lv had attended several scam prevention seminars in college. He wouldn’t fall for this kind of trick.

Almost the moment he hit "reject," Liang Xu’s phone also popped up with a notification.

"Shi has declined your chat invitation~ No hard feelings, there are plenty of fish in the sea~ Try someone else!"

Liang Xu’s fingers, holding the wine glass, paused mid-air as he slightly raised an eyebrow.

In just ten minutes prior, Liang Xu had browsed nearly a hundred profile pictures of Blueblue’s top picks for casual meetups, summarizing their common traits. Their aesthetics were strikingly similar—preferring black, white, and gray as the main palette, with teasingly censored photos. The one he’d chosen undoubtedly hit the sweet spot for most Blueblue users.

But it seemed not to align with Shi Lv’s.

He’d added Shi Lv on a whim, but now, his mild curiosity spiked to genuine intrigue.

Liang Xu then selected trending tags for his bio: "Finance professional, executive at a listed company."

On Blueblue, certain personas and professions were particularly popular. For example, the all-American jock type—their profile pictures usually featured basketball courts paired with calf-high white socks. Then there were the ripped gym bros, known for their exaggerated physiques. And another type—the stoic, suit-clad company executives who never seemed to shed their suits and ties.

On Blueblue, company executives were as common as white-socked sports students. Hell, if Haicheng had only 300 executives in total, Blueblue alone had 3,000.

Liang Xu tried adding again.

He was still soaking in the bathtub, the dense bubbles infused with Damask rose-scented essential oil. The speakers played a soothing serenade, and the bar counter held a chilled glass of Sangiovese wine, its delicate aroma carrying notes of cinnamon and black cherry. But Liang Xu couldn’t care less.

His attention was captured by the small screen, occasionally reaching out from the bath to check his phone.

But for a full two hours, his messages got radio silence—utter silence.

Shi Lv had already logged out of the app.

Zhang Ping was roping him into this, and Shi Lv was the unwilling duck. Tomorrow, he had to take meeting minutes for Liang Xu and compile them into a report.

This should have been a fairly simple task, mainly serving to showcase the big boss’s protégé in front of other executives. Liang Xu bringing him along was essentially telling the other executives, "This intern is my pick, a future elite in my department. Everyone, take care of him." It was a job that required little effort but earned goodwill.

Problem was, Shi Lv needed to grasp what the big shots were saying.

In truth, he had just learned basic financial jargon and couldn’t keep up when the discussion sped up. If even a simple task like meeting minutes went wrong, Shi Lv would be fired, and Zhang Ping, who had recommended him, could also be held accountable.

So, he scoured the web for meeting recordings, trying to catch up with their pace.

The next day, Shi Lv arrived at the company sporting dark circles under his eyes.

During the meeting, Shi Lv sat beside Liang Xu with his laptop. Liang Xu looked up briefly at him, then withdrew his gaze with his expression unreadable before tapping the desk to signal the start.

The topic was an investment stake proposal for a coastal property. From what Shi Lv heard, Liang Xu seemed to approve and wanted to increase investment, while some executives were skeptical and most opposed it. Liang Xu analyzed the pros and cons point by point, debating with the opposition. By the end, most of the undecided had shifted to his side, and a few opponents turned neutral.

The meeting lasted all morning, leaving pages upon pages of dense notes. By the time Shi Lv returned to organize them, he was mentally drained.

Zhang Ping had given him a generous deadline, and the workload wasn’t overwhelming, but after searching online with his notes, Shi Lv was still clueless about drafting the report.

Even after showering and lying in his dorm bed, his mind was still stuck on it.

That’s when he noticed the friend request on BlueBlue.

"Premium match 'X' near you says hello~ His identity is 'Financial Practitioner, Listed Company Executive.'"

Shi Lv thought to himself, *Nowadays, every random nobody claims to be a listed company executive. If a brick fell on BlueBlue’s homepage, it’d kill ten executives.*

But the "Financial Practitioner" part caught his attention.

...Maybe he could ask? Best case, he’d get answers; worst case, it’d just be a distraction.

After a moment's thought, Shi Lv accepted the friend request.

"You and 'X' are now friends~ Start chatting!"

By then, Liang Xu had mostly forgotten about yesterday’s incident. He was busy and wasn't constantly in the mood to tease a junior intern. But just as he finished reviewing reports, a message came through from Shi Lv.

Shi: "You’re a financial practitioner, right?"

Liang Xu ran his thumb along the rim of his wine glass, thinking, *Just as expected—he took the bait.*

Finance majors had stars in their eyes for execs.

Liang Xu clicked into Shi Lv’s profile. The original owner had posted many shirtless gym selfies on BlueBlue. He also noticed Shi Lv’s greeting count: 99+.

Meaning Shi Lv had chatted with at least 99 people on BlueBlue.

Liang Xu’s judgment was correct—Shi Lv was indeed a player.

Liang Xu frowned slightly, feeling oddly put off.

Maybe it was because Shi Lv’s fresh, rain-like pheromones had seemed so pure, or because his awkward demeanor that night had seemed so innocent. Now that the truth was laid bare, it left him feeling sour.

Liang Xu lost interest. He suddenly felt that maintaining a strictly business arrangement—employer and pheromone provider—was fine. There was no need to probe further.

So he replied coldly, "Yeah."

Finance was a world where connections and seniority mattered. If Shi Lv could network with a heavyweight, his path would be smoother.

Liang Xu guessed Shi Lv’s next line would be something like, *Which company are you an executive at? What’s your exact position?*

Then would come the standard BlueBlue hookup.

Bored, he was about to set his phone aside when Shi Lv’s next message came through.

"Could you teach me how to write a meeting report?" (A meme of a cute orange tabby kitten rubbing its paws, with big round eyes looking expectantly at the screen.)

—Every time Shi Lv asked his roommate to bring food from the cafeteria, he would send this kind of meme. He had no shame when it came to getting what he wanted—not just using cute expressions when necessary, but even calling his roommate "daddy" if it came to that.

Liang Xu: "...?"

Liang Xu used to like cats, and cats liked him too. Strays at the orphanage would weave around his legs, and he would save scraps of food to feed them. However, Elder Ye was severely allergic to cat fur and despised them. When Liang Xu first arrived at his home, he saw the servants lacing bait with poison to kill strays.

It was winter, with half a foot of snow on the ground. A stray cat, freezing, came under the eaves for warmth, accidentally ate the poisoned bait, and thrashed in the snow until it finally died. Its bloody vomit splattered across the snow. Coincidentally, Liang Xu was being punished for some reason at the time—standing in the snow in thin clothes, his knees numb from the cold, yet not daring to move. Their gazes met across the yard, and for a moment, it felt as if the one struggling and wailing was himself.

This image was seared so deeply into his mind that Liang Xu later stopped liking cats.

Cats are intuitive creatures, able to sense human affection or aversion. By the time Liang Xu took control of the Ye family and began wielding financial power, his demeanor had grown increasingly cold and ruthless. Cats steered clear of him altogether—even if he held dried fish in his hand at the park, none would come near.

When this meme popped up, Liang Xu froze for three seconds before replying, "...Meeting report?"

Shi Lv sent a meme of frantic nodding.

Unable to find relevant information online, X was his only hope.

Shi Lv: "Mhm, mhm."

He gave a quick rundown of the requirements, and the other end fell into an eerie silence.

Liang Xu: "..."

(beat)

—Wasn’t this the meeting they had today?

—Damn. Went straight to the CEO, huh?

—Bold play, Intern.

Liang Xu felt weirdly conflicted. "...I can teach you how to write the report. But what can you give me in return?"

Shi Lv: "Cat thinking jpb."

He alt-tabbed out of BlueBlue and searched in his browser: "How to butter up a BlueBlue user?"

The answers varied wildly. After careful consideration, Shi Lv went for the nuclear option: "I can show you my abs."

The account had no profile details, but X had been so persistent in adding him—there must be something special about it. After much deliberation, Shi Lv concluded it had to be the original owner’s thirst-trap abs pic.

This finance big shot liked his abs.

Being an alpha male, showing off his abs wouldn’t cost him anything. His gym bros slapped his waist all the time anyway. If a faceless thirst pic could secure a report template, Shi Lv saw no issue with it.

Liang Xu: "..."

(beat)

His face did something complicated.

—Were all those abs photos in Shi Lv’s account obtained this way? An abs-for-answers scheme???

Using basically a dating app like an academic forum—classic Shi Lv move.

Liang Xu cringed harder.

There are plenty of alphas like you out there. Their pheromones may not be as appealing as yours, but their abs are just as good. Why would I bother with yours?

But his fingers hovered over the screen, and he typed a single word.

"...Fine."

Shi Lv: "Cat’s honor—deal!"

As promised, he soon sent a photo of himself biting the hem of his shirt. His waist curved in smoothly, his stomach flat and toned, abs unmistakably real—practically begging to be touched.

Liang Xu pulled up the photo but looked away almost immediately, not letting himself stare.

The Ye family ran a tight ship, and even after getting out, Liang Xu maintained a refined, restrained public image. His sole focus had been seizing power and building the company, keeping the old man fooled. He couldn’t risk any personal slip-ups, and since his mind was never on such matters, he had genuinely never paid much attention to an alpha’s abs before.

Shi Lv’s… weren’t bad at all.

Not one for freebies, since the other had delivered so readily, Liang Xu cleared his throat and asked, "What did you want to ask?"

Shi Lv, feeling he’d already offered his "payment," asked without hesitation. Quick on the uptake, and with Liang Xu often mentoring interns at the company—knowing exactly where newcomers tended to struggle—he patiently provided answers. Before long, they’d settled into an easy rhythm.

Seeing that it was getting late, Shi Lv sent a sticker of a little bird holding a flower branch: "Thank you, you’re too kind."

Liang Xu didn’t know what to make of that.

Since taking over Ye Corporation, this was the first time someone had called him "kind."

X replied: "...Go to sleep early."

Shi Lv: "Going, going! Just let me finish organizing this last page!"

The very image of a hard worker.

Before he could stop himself, Liang Xu added, "...If you have questions next time, you can ask me again."

Author's Note:

Blueblue: A next-gen learning app.

President Liang: A new kind of private tutor.