The box office for Monkey King: Hero Is Back kept climbing.

Factory sales were going up and up too.

It was as though every good thing had decided to arrive at once.

Saturday was supposed to be a day off, but there were so many orders that the factory had to work an extra day. Since the overtime paid extra, none of the workers complained about it.

Xu Ye, the number two, put in half a day at the factory that morning and then slipped out at noon.

Neither Old Zhang nor Old Xu had work that day, so Xu Ye drove home for lunch first, napped for half an hour, and then, at around one thirty, headed out to Red Leaf Estate on his own.

Chen Qingqing had in fact guessed he would come that day, because the wretch had said last weekend that he wanted her to teach him to swim. She had never said yes, but she knew perfectly well that a rascal like Xu Ye wasn’t going to care whether she had agreed or not.

So when the doorbell rang, she wasn’t the least bit surprised.

The door opened, and it was Chen Qingqing standing there. Xu Ye asked, “Where’s your mom?”

“She went to the office.”

“Your mom’s left?”

“Mm.”

At that Xu Ye immediately puckered his lips and leaned in toward her. Chen Qingqing put a hand over his mouth and said loudly, “What do you think you’re doing?!”

Xu Ye pulled back. “Your mom isn’t even here. What are you scared of?”

Chen Qingqing wasn’t about to listen to that nonsense. She gave a small snort. “From now on, if I haven’t said you can kiss me, you can’t kiss me.”

“That’s pretty bossy of you.”

“Yes.” Chen Qingqing put on such a dead-serious face that Xu Ye badly wanted to laugh.

What he had no way of knowing was that her good roommate Zhang Ruowei had given her another lesson last night. The lesson went like this: for a boy, a relationship is like leveling up in a game. If he jumps straight to max level and beats every boss, the game gets dull for him. So you have to find ways to control how fast he levels up…

Chen Qingqing led him into the living room. She knew perfectly well what the answer was, but she asked anyway. “How come you’re here so early today?”

Xu Ye reached into his pants pocket and pulled out a pair of men’s swim trunks. He even held them open to show her, grinning shamelessly. “Didn’t we agree you’d start teaching me to swim this weekend? I’ve got my trunks ready and everything.”

Chen Qingqing glanced at them and turned her head away, pretending not to care. “Who agreed with you? I never said yes.”

Xu Ye dropped onto the sofa, took hold of her right hand in both of his, and started in on the wheedling…

“Please~”

“Teach me~”

“I really, really want to learn to swim~”

Chen Qingqing muttered, “Ugh, you’re so annoying. Let go of my hand.”

“Is that a yes?”

Chen Qingqing pulled her hand back and leveled a finger at him in warning. “I’ll take you to learn to swim. But you’re not allowed to misbehave.”

Xu Ye cleared his throat, raised two fingers, and said it loud and firm. “I promise!”

“Wait here. I’m going up for my swimsuit.”

“You got it.”

Chen Qingqing went upstairs to her walk-in wardrobe and took out every swimsuit she owned, laying them out on the bed.

Some of them were ones she had worn before. Others were the ones Xu Ye had sent her without asking her first.

Side by side, the two groups could not have been more different in style.

The ones she had worn before were all relatively modest — one-pieces, several of them with a little skirt at the hem.

The ones Xu Ye had sent later were a great deal more “grown-up.”

This was where Chen Qingqing got stuck.

She had trouble making decisions to begin with, and there were an awful lot of options in front of her.

After weighing them against each other, she started working by elimination. First she PASSed on the one with the least fabric, then she PASSed on the most modest one, and after several rounds of cutting one and then another, what remained was a compromise.

It was a dark blue one-piece with white straps. Everything that needed covering was covered, and yet somehow the whole thing looked indescribably sexy.

Never mind.

She’d chosen now.

This would do.

Chen Qingqing put the swimsuit in her bag, swept all the rest into a drawer in the walk-in wardrobe, and only then came back downstairs.

Xu Ye saw her coming and asked with a smile, “What took you so long?”

Chen Qingqing gave a haughty little snort. “None of your business.”

“Can we go to the pool now, then?”

“Follow me.”

Xu Ye followed her out of the villa and along the flagstone path all the way to the residents’ activity center inside the complex.

The amenities in this complex could fairly be called extravagant. There was a free gym, a library, a children’s play area, and an indoor swimming pool too. The pool wasn’t open every day, but to Xu Ye, who still lived somewhere worth three thousand-odd yuan a square meter, the place already counted as paradise.

It was a Saturday, and Xu Ye had assumed the pool would be crowded. To his considerable surprise, apart from one young mother in the water with her daughter and son, there was not another soul there.

Xu Ye found it strange. “Why is there nobody here?”

Chen Qingqing explained. “There aren’t that many people in the complex to begin with, and most of them are as busy with work as my mom and dad. Basically, the ones with jobs don’t have time to come, and the ones without jobs have all gone traveling for the summer break.”

“That explains it.”

Xu Ye could hardly wait. “Where do I go to change?”

Chen Qingqing pointed. “Over there.”

Xu Ye ran straight into the changing room. When he came out, Chen Qingqing was nowhere to be seen. Assuming she had gone to change too, he stood at the edge of the pool and waited.

Before long he became aware of the young mother who had been in the water with her two children. She had come out at some point and sat down on the side, and she was now looking him over with an air of studied casualness.

Xu Ye pretended not to notice and glanced down at his own body.

He was quite pleased with the way it looked these days. In his last life his health had gone to pieces early. Since coming back he had paid attention to it. He drank very little, kept off carbonated drinks and junk food, and ran on the track whenever he had time. Now, if he drew in his stomach even slightly, the muscle definition showed up sharply.

It was more than enough to have the young mother across from him drooling.

Chen Qingqing stayed in the changing room a long time before she came out, and even then she was still wrapped in a bath towel. Not until she reached the poolside did she work up the courage to pull the towel off and drop it onto a lounge chair.

In the swimsuit, Chen Qingqing looked quite extraordinarily lovely…

Her long, soft hair was gathered up into a bun. Two white straps ran over her fine shoulders, setting off her collarbone strikingly. Either the swimsuit was a size too small or it was simply cut that way, but it showed her graceful figure off to the fullest. That pronounced line especially, and the long, pale legs — Xu Ye simply could not drag his eyes away.

Chen Qingqing saw him staring, transfixed. Pleased as she was, she still pushed out her lips and gave a small snort. “Have you looked enough yet?”

“No! How could I possibly have looked enough!”

Hearing that, Chen Qingqing, embarrassed and cross at once, lifted a leg to kick him. Xu Ye dodged backward on instinct — and went straight into the water, throwing up a great sheet of spray…

Xu Ye immediately started thrashing about in the water. “Glub glub… help… help me… I can’t swim!”

Chen Qingqing didn’t hesitate. She entered the pool in a flawless dive, but the moment she reached out and took hold of him, he pulled her into his arms.

Only then did Chen Qingqing realize she had been taken in again.

The water in this pool wasn’t deep. At Xu Ye’s height there was no possibility whatsoever of drowning.

The wretch had been faking it.

At that, Chen Qingqing looked down at the large hand resting against her chest, then went red and said in a lowered voice, “You jerk. Let go of me~”

(End of Chapter 265)