"Counterfeiting?"
Liu Chen was still a bit dazed upon seeing those two words in QQ.
But then she realized. Right, her lucky cards, six of them, could be exchanged for a thousand yuan. For counterfeiters, this was an easy way to recoup their costs.
But...
Were they really so confident that she wouldn't notice?
At this moment in QQ, Yu Bing had already sent her the duplicate winning codes and her Weibo account. Reading on a phone was always troublesome, so Liu Chen immediately got up and walked back to the master bedroom, sitting down in front of the computer.
Just as she opened her laptop, before she could even press the power button, she heard a knock on the door outside the room.
Liu Chen hesitated for a moment, then closed the laptop, sat back in her chair, and turned to face the door.
"Come in."
The door opened, revealing Ren Yu's smiling face. However, when his eyes landed on Liu Chen's seated position, his smile slightly diminished.
"Did something happen?"
Ren Yu didn't ask why Liu Chen was sitting in front of the computer, but directly inquired about what had happened. After all, he had personally witnessed her cry out in pain from a headache.
"Yu Bing said that some people are counterfeiting lucky cards now, so she's stopped verifying for netizens I've @'d on Weibo."
"Mm, just this matter?" Ren Yu said as he walked into the room and approached Liu Chen. He placed his hands on the chair Liu Chen was sitting in and rotated it halfway, positioning her back towards the laptop.
"I..."
Before Liu Chen could finish speaking, she felt something slightly hard press against the back of her head. Then, Ren Yu's left hand rested on the desk over her left shoulder, while his right hand reached over her right shoulder and single-handedly opened the laptop screen.
Warm breath from his nose tickled her head. Liu Chen was still lost in thought when she felt a slight vibration from the firm chest against her head.
"Log into your QQ."
"Oh..."
Liu Chen obediently logged into her QQ account as Ren Yu instructed, then forwarded all the screenshots Yu Bing had sent her to Ren Yu one by one.
After completing this, Ren Yu placed one hand on the back of the chair for support, straightened his upper body, and then took a step back.
"Leave this matter to me. Today is our first date, you should start picking out clothes."
With that, he lightly patted Liu Chen's shoulder to reassure her, then left the room, closing the door behind him.
Liu Chen sat in her chair for a long time before murmuring blankly,
"Does this count as making good use of people?"
If it were usual, Liu Chen would genuinely have been unwilling to let Ren Yu interfere in her business. But now, even a slight thought about how to proceed caused a warning pain in her head. Liu Chen could only feel fortunate that she had already accepted Ren Yu's confession, allowing her to "enslave" him for free. Otherwise, she didn't know who she would have entrusted this matter to.
At this moment, Ren Yu, now worth a billion, sat in a chair in the guest room, his fingers flying across the keyboard. Soon, the real information behind those Weibo user accounts appeared on the screen.
Some were photos Ren Yu had directly blacked out from their screens, while others were photos from their QQ spaces logged in on their computers.
Very quickly, this "pulling radishes" had unearthed the entire root.
The screen showed that the IP addresses associated with these highly repetitive lucky card codes were mostly from H Province, a neighboring province to S Province.
Liu Chen was wearing a white knit dress, cinched at the waist with a Chanel necklace, and a sky-blue long down jacket that covered her from head to toe. She stood at the door, tying her scarf.
"H Province? We don't have any distributors for our "Beautiful Brand" in H Province, so there shouldn't be any supply going there. Furthermore, due to the New Year, all logistics were halted and only resumed a few days ago. But the total number of orders shipped to H Province from our online store hasn't even reached ten boxes."
As soon as she finished speaking, Liu Chen felt a weight on her head. Her newly fluffed bangs were flattened by a knitted hat.
"Still sneaking a peek at the online store backend data? You need to rest well during this period, otherwise what will you do when school starts?"
Ren Yu chided, his gaze scanning Liu Chen's attire from head to toe. He then turned and retrieved a pair of red wool gloves, putting them on Liu Chen.
"Alright, let's go."
Although they called it a date, Xia Tian and Dong Dong still accompanied them. However, to create some atmosphere, the two of them sat at a table diagonally opposite Liu Chen.
Having been seriously ill and with her hands still weak, Liu Chen hadn't applied much makeup. As she entered the restaurant and took off her down jacket, revealing her slender waist accentuated by the necklace worn as a belt, coupled with her gauntly beautiful face, she exuded an aura of fragile sorrow.
Beautiful women always attract attention wherever they go.
Soon, photos of Liu Chen and Ren Yu eating appeared on Weibo. This time, however, the resolution of the photos was almost ultra-clear compared to the usual quality.
Therefore, everyone quickly noticed.
'Why has the goddess suddenly become so frail?'
'Damn it, even when frail, the goddess is still so beautiful.'
'Holy crap, Senior Sister's waist is really thin. Isn't that a Chanel necklace?'
'Why does Senior Scholar seem so thin she's unrecognizable?'
'What happened to Senior Sister?'
At this moment, those Weibo users who usually commented that Liu Chen was a sugar baby started to chime in.
'What happened? Looks like she had a miscarriage.'
'I wanted to say that too, but I was afraid of being scolded.'
'Really?'
At this moment, Liu Chen was unaware of everything happening online. She was meticulously cutting the aged steak that had just been served, and without missing a beat, she began to explain the characteristics of the aged steak she had ordered.
"Aged steak is when the steak is placed in a warehouse with specific temperature and humidity, allowing the outer layer of meat to decompose. After it's taken out, the decomposed outer layer is cut off, leaving the inner, undecomposed meat. This process results in a texture that melts in your mouth."
Perhaps due to her weak hands, Liu Chen had been cutting for a long time without making much progress. Just as she was feeling a little dejected, the "progress" in front of her was suddenly whisked away.
Liu Chen looked up at the hand that had taken her plate and saw Ren Yu placing a perfectly cut steak in front of her.
"See if my skills have deteriorated."
Relieved from the battle with the steak, Liu Chen let out a long sigh. She then picked up a piece from Ren Yu's perfectly cut steak and offered it to Ren Yu, who was slightly hunched over and earnestly cutting his own steak.
"Try it."
Ren Yu looked at the slightly pink, fragrant piece of beef in front of him. He put down his knife, then gently held Liu Chen's hand, leaning forward slightly and bringing the beef to his mouth.
Only then did he release Liu Chen's hand, his eyes seeming to hold the entire galaxy.
"Very tender."
Liu Chen withdrew her hand, her cheeks burning. She instinctively started searching for a topic to mask her own irrepressible flutter of emotion.
"Since you know those counterfeiters are all in cahoots, let's just hand them over to the police. After all, it involves money."
"No need. I'll handle it. We have to teach them a lesson, don't we? These people who like to gossip about you."
Hearing this, Liu Chen looked up at Ren Yu, sitting opposite her, with a hint of surprise.