Cheng Si · Chat

The 10:00 AM sunlight sliced diagonally through the floor-to-ceiling window, splitting the dark grey carpet in Dorm 405 into a clear boundary of light and shadow. Cheng Si was the only one in the dorm, half-sunk into the sofa with his long legs casually resting on the edge of the coffee table. The glow from his phone screen reflected off his jawline, his choppy bangs hanging down to obscure half of his eyes. He skipped class again. The professor for the Finance Department's Practices of Mergers and Acquisitions had probably gotten used to that blank spot on the attendance sheet, and Xie Jinyan had likely made up another "feeling unwell" excuse for him. Cheng Si didn't care—what he cared about was the trending debate on his phone screen between "cold-faced cutie" and "warm-faced shameless." He stared at the two phrases for three seconds, suddenly finding the internet quite amusing for breaking human personality quirks down into three-character tags and tossing them into the traffic pool to soak. The tips of his light-golden wolf cut brushed against the back of the sofa as he shifted into an even lazier posture. Switching to WeChat, he opened the pinned group chat "Mickey's Clubhouse (5)" and quickly typed: "Brothers, 'cold-faced cutie' and 'warm-faced shameless' are trending big online. Which one do you guys think I am?" About half a minute after sending the message, his phone buzzed. Xie Jinyan: "What's wrong with you...?" About ten seconds later, messages popped up rapidly on the screen. Chi Shu: "Front face is ugly." Pei Xia: "Side profile is tragic." Xu Yang: "Back of the head is flat." Cheng Si stared at those words for five full seconds. He then held his phone up high, snapped a photo of the back of his head—showing only a mess of light-golden hair and an ear wearing three earrings—and sent it to the group: "Flat?" Less than five seconds after the message went out, the screen started buzzing wildly again. Chi Shu: "Ugly without self-awareness." Pei Xia: "Tragic without self-reflection." Xu Yang: "Flat without self-assessment." Xie Jinyan: "...I suggest getting your head checked over here."