But the two girls, separated by a few stall partitions, were still chatting away.
"Oh right, remember to send me the photos."
"What photos?"
"The ones of those guys. Send me everyone except for Song Lin. My bestie over at the School of Finance is always bragging about how many handsome guys are in her department, but I took a look, and they’re all a bunch of duds. Not a single one of them holds a candle to the hotties at our school. What kind of taste does she have?!"
"Haha, you’re going to show them to her? They’re on the school forum, you can just save them yourself."
"No way, the ones I save are all blurry. It might be my phone. Remember to send me the original files, okay?"
’School forum? Photos?’
A strange expression appeared on Jiangg Ning’s face. ’Is this what female students’ daily lives are like?’
’They can get competitive over the quality of the guys at the same school?’
’A bit childish.’
Then again, students wouldn’t be students if they weren’t a little childish. She could understand that.
Jiangg Ning, however, felt that looks weren’t the most important thing. Things that gradually change with time were never worth obsessing over. Instead, one should observe whether a man was sincere, kind, and reserved. Those were the qualities worth discovering and loving.
That was why she never followed celebrities, and neither did Jiangg Yao.
Let alone become a fan of some celebrity who was only famous for their looks.
"How come there are only two? Some are missing!" the girl exclaimed.
"Who’s missing?"
"The president’s photo, and the dozen or so of Chen Yuan. I definitely need that one from the classroom before. Send them all to me. That one’s my favorite."
’Chen Yuan!’
Jiangg Ning alertly perked up her ears.
’To think I’d hear his name even in the women’s restroom. What a surprise.’
"Okay, I sent them on Green Bubble."
"Tsk, tsk, tsk, I absolutely love this one. I’m gonna screenshot it later and make it my phone wallpaper. Won’t that just make my girls from the School of Finance cry with envy?"
It seemed the girl in the stall could already picture the bittersweet scene: her showing it off smugly while her friends’ jaws dropped in their group chat, full of indignation.
Following a RUSTLE, the two girls walked out of their stalls, left the restroom for the hallway, and their footsteps faded into the distance.
Jiangg Ning flushed the toilet, wondering why there would be photos of him on the school forum. ’Could Chen Yuan actually be really popular at school...?’
Back in her office, Jiangg Ning hesitated for a moment. After thinking it over, she decided she had to get to the bottom of this.
’Otherwise, I won’t be able to focus on my work.’
She opened her phone, downloaded the forum app from the app store, and after a series of tedious operations—creating an account, verifying her phone number, and so on—she successfully entered Landa University’s exclusive forum.
As she started browsing, Jiangg Ning didn’t find any photos. There were lost-and-found posts, a post asking about the quality of Instructor Yang from the School of Earth Sciences and Engineering, and various reposts from internet trolls just looking for a laugh.
She scrolled and scrolled until her patience started to wear thin.
Finally, she found a thread titled "Rating the Hotties of Lanjing University."
’This has to be it.’
Jiangg Ning clicked on it and saw that there were indeed photos of many male students.
There were also rating rules: a perfect score was 10, the lowest was 1. A dedicated administrator compiled the statistics, and the averaged scores were pinned to the top.
She couldn’t help but marvel at how creative students were these days. She had never seen anything like this before.
"Student Council President, Fang Tiankuo"
"Pinned: 8.9/10"
"[Photo]"
"[Photo]"
"[Photo]"
"..."
"Song Lin, Sophomore, Art Department"
"Pinned: 7.1/10"
"[Photo]"
"[Photo]"
"..."
Jiangg Ning scrolled down, one after another, without much desire to browse. She recognized some of the students, while others she had no impression of. She felt the scores given were pretty standard and reasonable.
"Qiu Shaofei, Junior, Finance Department"
"Pinned: 9.1/10"
"[Photo]"
"[Photo]"
"[Photo]"
"..."
"Qu Zongcheng, Junior, Astronomy Department"
"Pinned: 6.1/10"
"[Photo]"
"..."
Jiangg Ning kept scrolling, reaching the middle of the thread.
A familiar name appeared.
Her expression immediately turned serious.
’I found Chen Yuan!’
"Chen Yuan, Freshman, Physics Department"
"Pinned: 9.8/10 (Tied for First Place)"
"[Photo]"
"[Photo]"
"[Photo]"
"[Photo]"
"[Photo]"
"..."
Jiangg Ning was stunned. Other guys had three or four photos at most, with the most popular having seven or eight.
But Chen Yuan had over twenty photos, from all sorts of angles and in different settings!
Eating in the cafeteria, in the study hall, running on the track, walking with textbooks in his arms...
Almost every photo had dozens of comments underneath, and the number of likes on those comments was also very high. The section was bustling with activity.
Jiangg Ning read them carefully, her lovely brows furrowing.
"Post more, I love seeing these!"
"My hand was already heading for my belly button when I remembered it’s that time of the month. I’ll save this for next time!"
"The sister in the post above is wild..."
"The world is a bleak and lonely place, but this Landa hottie is seducing me (drools)."
"Dated him. Wouldn’t let me touch his ass. We broke up."
"Damn! I just had an idea. Take a picture hugging Chen Yuan but only showing my own hand, then post it to my feed with the caption ’New manicure.’ That would be epic."
These highly-liked comments were a bizarre collection of vulgarities, leaving Jiangg Ning speechless.
’So brazen...’
Especially the comment about the manicure—it had tons of replies, all variations of "Sis, you get it," "YES YES YES," and "OMG I’m dying just imagining it AHHHH!"
Jiangg Ning thought for a few seconds, admitting to herself that the idea really did strike a chord, tapping into that desire for a subtle flex.
She propped her chin on her hand, holding her phone and scrolling with her slender fingers.
She tapped on a photo, zoomed in, and observed it closely...
Then she tapped another, zoomed in, and observed it closely...
’These girls are actually really good at taking photos.’ They had managed to showcase Chen Yuan from every possible angle.