She Said She’d ‘End It’… I Had a Bad Feeling

Getting a casual selfie of Kaori at home was definitely lucky.

But after the excitement faded, only questions remained.

What exactly did the idiot send that made Kaori actually take a selfie for me?

He even deleted the sent message, keeping it all mysterious.

“Hey, what exactly did you send?”

“Hehe, curious?”

“A little.”

I knew the idiot was good with words.

Not just that, his social skills, communication skills, and expressiveness were all maxed out.

He could naturally strike up a conversation with a stranger. With his outgoing personality, he could get familiar with someone in ten minutes and be calling them “bro” in twenty.

It was worlds apart from my shut-in, homebody social skills.

Maybe it was because he’d been groomed since childhood to inherit the family business. After years of immersion, even if he didn’t want to learn, it just became second nature.

Even I could tell that the idiot was an excellent leader—the textbook definition of a domineering CEO.

He had all the qualities a leader should have. Even his “scumbag” tendencies could be described as “not being swayed by personal emotions.”

So sometimes I was puzzled. Why did this amazing guy act like an idiot, coming to my place every day to freeload food, drinks, and games…

Wouldn’t it be better to go be your domineering CEO self, Li Enhe? Why come here to be a freeloading idiot, Li Erhuo?

I narrowed my eyes at him. Since I rarely asked him for anything or sought his help, now that I was curious about something, he was getting cocky.

“Oh ho! This is rare, bro. Super rare. I never thought you’d ask me about something like this. Tsk, tsk, tsk, tsk…”

I gave him a look.

“Hehe, even you, bro, can’t figure out what I sent?”

“I have some simple analysis, but I can’t reach a conclusion.”

Precisely because I had analyzed it, I couldn’t understand.

Because this had little to do with conversational skill.

Those skills usually worked best in face-to-face interactions.

When you combine language, expressions, gestures, even voice, eye contact, appearance, presence, and environment, that’s when you can truly convince someone.

I doubted you could persuade someone with just a few lines of text.

Even if the idiot was a charmer that all women liked, he was using my phone. Kaori would only think she was talking to me.

Meaning, no matter what he sent, ultimately, Kaori sent the selfie because she trusted me.

The key question was, what message did he send that made Kaori willing to send me a selfie?

It baffled me.

The idiot didn’t keep me in suspense. Having the answer was enough for him to gloat.

“I just used a principle you taught me before.”

“Huh? What did I teach you?”

I didn’t remember teaching him any advanced textual communication skills.

Even I, in a pinch, had just written a 200-character explanation.

When it came to typing, the idiot was definitely worse than me.

That meant he’d achieved his goal of getting a selfie with just a few sentences, and Kaori didn’t seem to mind at all.

It was really weird. Was this the gap between someone with experience with women and someone without…? orz

He looked down at me, smiling.

“If you forgot, then consider it my secret technique. Sorry, bro, can’t share the secret.”

“Secret technique, my foot…”

Tch, who cares.

I could just ask Kaori later.

After sending the long explanatory text I’d written to Kaori, I opened the selfie again and asked the idiot.

“Anyway, now that you’ve seen the selfie, is she the one you were supposed to meet today?”

The idiot rubbed his chin.

“Hmm… The face is the same, but the hair color is different. Is this Photoshopped? Or is she wearing a wig?”

That meant the photo he saw showed Kaori before her hair turned white.

Suddenly, I understood.

Why Kaori was out late at night looking for rope to dye her hair herself. She had to dye it.

She was about to meet a blind date. Her family must have pressured her to dye her hair black immediately, but they wouldn’t let her go out during the day. So she had to find a way to dye it herself.

And since her family wouldn’t help, she had to figure it out on her own… What did her family even see her as…

To the point she wouldn’t even tell someone her last name…

“What are you thinking about, bro?”

“Her hair is natural.”

“Huh? Albinism?”

“I don’t know. She said it turned white later. Like overnight greying.”

“Oh? A white-haired lady? Does that really happen in real life?”

“Who knows. It might not be ‘overnight.'”

Prolonged depression, unhappiness, high stress, overwork—all these could turn hair from black to white.

If she’d been in that state for a while, it wasn’t impossible for her hair to turn completely white.

“So this is why you fell for her… I see. White hair.”

The idiot gave me a knowing look.

He was aware of my preferences. I really had no resistance to white-haired beauties.

It used to be limited to 2D, but now Kaori’s existence had broken my limits.

Buzz—

Huh? Another message.

Kaori was replying fast.

[I understand. You have a very good friend.]

[Also, I’ve thought carefully about what you said last night, Ming Qi-san.]

[I want to keep this white hair, so today, I’ll go and settle things.]

Settle things?

Settle what?

Was she talking about the blind date with the idiot?

Hmm… How was she going to settle it?

Stand up to her parents and refuse the date? No, that didn’t seem like something Kaori would do.

Maybe go along silently, attend the date, but refuse to dye her hair.

Either way, neither option was good. Especially since this idiot had come to my place to skip the date.

So, the outcome would be Kaori defying her family, refusing to dye her hair for the date, and the potential match would take one look at her and walk away.

Not good… That scenario would be pretty bad.

My feelings were complicated…

After hesitating for a while, I looked up at the idiot. He was smiling, watching me with amusement.

He was probably waiting for me to speak.

“Hey, idiot, I have a favor to ask.”

“Roger. Happy to oblige.”

“You’re not going to ask what it is?”

“I saw the message too.”

“Hey, don’t snoop on other people’s private messages.”

“Tch, I don’t need to see it to guess.”

“Alright, enough. Anyway, go help her out.”

“This is rare… I’m starting to believe in love.”

“What do you mean?”

“Just an observation. It’s rare for you to ask me for a favor.”

“Is it really that rare?”

“Very much so.”

The idiot nodded seriously, his expression more earnest than I’d ever seen.

I wasn’t used to it. Seeing him so serious felt strange after all his usual antics.

But I knew the idiot was a reliable friend.

“Ah~ what a pain. I was planning to crash at your place today and skip the blind date. I never thought it’d turn out like this…”

“It’s fate.”

“Heh, I guess so. She probably never imagined her blind date would be the best friend of the ‘Ming Qi-san’ who helped her see things clearly.”

“Me? Help her see things clearly? How do you know that?”

“I can tell from her willingness to send a selfie.”

Now I was even more curious.

What exactly did he send?

Damn, my cat-like curiosity was killing me.

The idiot stood up, stretched, and yawned.

“Oh, right. Let me ask first. How much do you want me to help her? Just ‘get through this’? Or ‘permanently’?”

“Go talk to her yourself. Don’t ask me.”

“You’re the one asking me for a favor, though.”

“You should know I’m not the ‘I know what’s best for you’ type. What matters isn’t what I think. It’s what she thinks.”

“Hmm… Good point.”

The idiot nodded in agreement, then immediately put on a mocking look.

“But do you really think someone raised in that kind of environment has a mind of her own?”

“And the women they set me up with are always daughters of powerful families or big corporations.”

“She’s a classic victim. Once she becomes an adult, she’s just a tool. To be blunt…”

“I know.”

I cut him off.

I understood what he was about to say.

Kaori was born into one of those big families. From before she could remember, she’d lost her freedom.

It wasn’t that she was raised as a daughter; it was more like she was raised as livestock, a bargaining chip.

That’s what the idiot was going to say.

“But it’s okay.”

“Huh?”

“Don’t worry about it. Just go ask her what she wants.”

“…What if she still cares about her family? What if she wants to repay them for raising her?”

“Then just come back.”

“Hah… Bro, that puts me in a tough spot. You asked me for help. If it doesn’t end well, I’ll lose face.”

“Don’t assume you know the outcome. You don’t know what she’s thinking.”

“Bro, I’ve played more women than you’ve even met. I’ve seen this type of high-society miss before.”

For all his talk, the idiot was just worried Kaori wouldn’t accept help.

But since I didn’t seem worried, he just scratched his head and muttered.

“A person’s worldview can’t be changed easily. People can’t understand each other… You were the one who taught me that.”

I shrugged noncommittally.

“Anyway, consider this me owing you one.”

“Heh… Forget it. I owe you more than I can ever repay.”

“I never asked you to repay me.”

“Can’t I just want to?”

“After this, we’ll call it even.”

“Come on, it’s just doing a favor. If I weren’t the blind date, you’d probably have handled it yourself, right?”

“How? I don’t have some cheat-like power. I’m just a nobody. No way I could save a high-society miss.”

“You couldn’t save her… but you’d destroy her family.”

“You’re overthinking it.”

The idiot rubbed his nose.

“I hope I am…”