A night of celebration

The metal door opened to reveal complete and utter chaos within the hall pulsing to the rhythm of the loud, blaring music while multi-colored strobe lights flashed overhead to reveal the mass of writhing bodies inside. The smell of alcohol mingled with the odor of sweat permeated the air, but the man dressed in black sweaters and inky-blue jeans didn't look affected by the somewhat unbearable stench.😎

In fact, this person should have blended perfectly into the dimly lit surroundings, not only as a courtesy to his get-up but also owing to his dark hair and pitch-black eyes. But instead, he stood out from the crowd while he moved through them looking like sin personified– men staring with admiration and envy while women couldn't resist raking their eyes over his tall frame.

"Handsome… care for a drink?"

Guo Shen maneuvered his way around the buxom beauty who drunkenly tried to cling to him without changing the assured yet distant smirk on his face and deftly stepped over what looked like spilled drinks to walk towards the stairs. It took him another minute or two to climb the dimly lit stairs to reach the sparsely populated upper floor, which looked like a whole different world from the frenzied ground floor teeming with hundreds of clubbers.

He knocked twice on a door marked as VIP before opening it to reveal the sight of a group of young men in varying degrees of inebriatedness accompanied by a handful of beautiful women, whose figures were perfectly proportioned and whose faces looked to be out of the same mould such that one would have a hard time distinguishing between each of them.

"Hey, Look who's here… We thought your lordship wouldn't be joining us!"

Guo Shen hid his frown of distaste and walked forward to sit down in the vacant place beside Su He who was smiling gently and languidly propped his legs over the low table in front of him, uncaring of the glasses and bottles that crashed to the ground en masse. In the jarring silence that followed he grinned directly at the youngster holding a woman at his side and who was sporting a particularly sour frown on his rather ordinary-looking face.

"Look at this… it looks like our young master Li finally managed to snag a woman for himself. Good thing I came or I wouldn't have known about this ah!"

Someone in the room coughed to hide their laughter while the aforementioned young master Li flushed red in embarrassed anger. Guo Shen continued without mercy. "I mean– this alone is worthy enough for celebration!"

"Guo Shen!"

"Drinks are on me tonight!"

Li Wen stood up with a bang, pushing his companion to the side which made her nearly topple down to the floor, while his face turned purple with rage. Seeing him about to depart, Guo Shen's expression gradually turned into one of freezing cold from the amicable smile from earlier while he planted his raised legs onto the ground to stand up to a full height of six feet plus two inches.

"Did I tell you that you can go?" Guo Shen murmured, his voice a silken menace. Li Wen's throat spasmed and he plopped down on his earlier seating position while trying to tamp down his sudden fear; this fucker– how can he change his face so fast!?

"And here I was thinking that the two of us could celebrate our success together– what a letdown!" Guo Shen menacing expression turned into one of utter dejection in a flash– which made not a few people in the room twitch their lips and roll their eyes in annoyance at the two-faced nature of this person.

'Shameless!' they protested inside, but on the outside, each and every one of them was wearing an expression tinged with an appropriate amount of amusement. They can't afford to offend this guy– but it's not like they can go and directly laugh at Li Wen either. They're not the young masters of K city upper circle for nothing; knowing best when to push and when to pull.

"Anyway old Guo, your last comic is even going to be adopted into a film eh?"One young man of short stature with still visible baby fat on his face spoke out jovially, an expression of envy on his face. "You're gonna be even more rich and famous ah!"

"What's this? Don't act like you guys don't have any money!" Guo Shen accepted the glass of martini and took a sip disinterestedly.

"Aww! Come on now… That's our family money ne. We don't earn anything by ourselves like you."

Seeing how the brow of the recipient of this well-timed praise smoothed out hearing it, others cursed the shameless bootlicking of this little fatty– how sneaky! They momentarily forgot what a narcissistic personality this guy, Guo Shen had.

Su He barely refrained from rolling his eyes at the antics of this rowdy bunch who were practically falling over each other to deliver their praises to old first, each word sounding more flowery than the last.

[Don't they have nothing better to do?] But then, turning around to see the increasingly smug expression on his friend's face, and then catching a glimpse of the increasingly disgruntled and disgusted look of Li Wen, he sighed and decided not to interfere; it seemed that the ones praising and the one being praised are both enjoying their act, so why should he become a stumbling block in their mutual enjoyment? Look at what happened to Li Wen! Wanting to leave but can't leave– how pitiful...

Time passed in an enjoyable manner for everyone in the room, except perhaps for the fuming Li Wen and his poor, bedraggled companion. By the time Guo Shen stood up from the comfortable leather chair, it was nearing midnight and many of the people in the room had fallen asleep. Even Li Wen had drunk himself into a stupor while cradling an empty bottle and mumbling about how he was going to catch a big beauty soon. Su He shook his head to get rid of the dizziness and waited while his friend settled the bill and followed him outside, wondering glumly how the other could look so sober even after finishing a considerable amount of alcohol that could have easily toppled a man with a sturdier physique.

The night air was fresh and chilly and seemed to reduce a little bit of his intoxication and with the sobriety, the unsettling feeling in his stomach became more obvious. Guo Shen shot a glance at him and started walking towards the car park before speaking.

"Want to grab a bite? I didn't have dinner."

"Ok– I also didn't have dinner. Your car or mine?"

"I came by taxi. I presume that you brought your driver along?"

Su He hummed and drew his coat closer to ward off the chill; it appears that winter is closing in on K city, even if it still looked like it was autumn. The two of them hastily got into the waiting car in the parking lot, which then set off in search of a nearby restaurant that is still open at this hour.

"Ah Jin's dad didn't let him come, right?" Guo Shen asked watching the sparse traffic on the road passing by; a digital billboard on the roadside displayed the time as 23.55 pm.

"Apparently, he failed another subject! This guy is really bad at studying–"

Hearing this, Guo Shen shook his head and chuckled but declined to comment. Wang Jin's failure in his studies had always been an eternal source of amusement for their small friend circle; that guy had been like that since he was a primary schooler. To be able to attend a prestigious college like H university can be fully credited to his family connections, the merits of his ancestors, not to mention that bit of luck that fools seemed to process inherently from birth. But, what many people didn't know was that this silly guy had a keen sense of business acumen that's almost intuitive.

"Oh, by the way, did you meet your girlfriend recently?" He asked blithely and Su He almost tripped on his own feet while getting out of the car. Seeing his friend glare at him accusingly, Guo Shen directly stared back at him with his face a mask of innocence, which elicited a resigned sigh from the other person who then started to walk towards the entrance of the high-end restaurant in front.

"Don't mention her. And she's not my girlfriend–"

"Oh come on! You can be already considered half married by now. What are you getting shy for?"

"..."

"What?"

"You know she's my old man's choice– not mine, right?" Su He looked over the menu while wondering about what to select. Since his stomach is a bit uncomfortable, should he order a casserole? "Besides, she's rather… dull."

"..."

"What now?"

"Such an uninteresting person like you calling someone dull– I can't imagine how boring your girlfriend– I mean fiancee is…"

Su He stared at Guo Shen for a minute or two, wondering how this guy managed to stay alive up until now without offending someone he shouldn't, with his nasty speaking habits. Probably a fluke of luck? Aai… lucky people have everything happening according to their preferences; even the heavens seem to be on their side.

"...Just eat your food already!"