Chapter 6: The First Pot of Gold

"Your skin is delicate, so this toner will do. Although this brand is only a second-tier one, their 'Young Girl Series' skincare products are quite good."

"Jiaojiao, how do you know so much?"

"Uh... I have a friend who likes to research this kind of stuff."

...

"Jiaojiao, quick, help me see if this dress suits me?"

"It suits your mom, but not you. Sister Aiyan, come try this dress on."

"A little black dress? But I've never worn anything like this before."

"Just try it on and you'll know."

...

Xu Qi, who had fallen from the status of original boyfriend or cousin to that of a porter, followed behind the two girls lugging various shopping bags with a miserable expression. He had an ominous premonition in his heart; he felt like the small secret fund he had saved up over the years was about to be squandered by these two girls.

After this shopping spree, Xu Qi gained a profound new understanding of his cousin. His once dull and introverted cousin had become incredibly cunning—a light, casual sentence like, "I'm so envious, I haven't even received a gift from my cousin yet," was enough to entice Zhang Aiyan into paying out of her own pocket to give a gift. As her boyfriend, how could he let his girlfriend pay for this? Thus, one gift led to a second, from skincare to clothes to shoes, until she was almost armed to the teeth.

"Jiaojiao, let's hang out together again next time."

In the subway, Zhang Aiyan called out to Sheng Jiaoyang as she walked out of the station.

Sheng Jiaoyang turned her head and winked at Zhang Aiyan, then walked off carrying the large and small bags.

"That girl! We bought her so many things and she didn't even say goodbye!" Xu Qi gnashed his teeth.

Zhang Aiyan hugged Xu Qi's arm and said with a smile, "Your cousin is quite interesting. Her taste is excellent; she knows international brands like the back of her hand, as if she's experienced them herself. You can tell she's put a lot of effort into this area. Most impressively, she even managed to get into a key university. She's truly amazing!"

This wasn't just "amazing"—she was clearly a little fox!

Having had his bottom line trampled upon and nearly half of his secret fund squandered, Xu Qi felt an incomparable heartache. He had originally planned to buy a small car worth about a hundred thousand to get around, but now that his wallet had shrunk severely, the matter of buying a car had to be postponed.

This cousin was fine when she was oblivious, but once she woke up, she was deathly shrewd.

By the time Sheng Jiaoyang returned home, the sun had already set.

She was startled the moment she entered the room. The poorly lit low-rent housing was dim, and the person sitting by the dining table directly facing the door looked like a ghost in her eyes, given her high degree of myopia.

*As soon as I have money, the first thing I'm doing is getting vision correction!* Sheng Jiaoyang turned on the light and saw it was Xu Qing, which made her breathe a sigh of relief. At the same time, she made up her mind to correct her vision. Even though this body was healthy, being scared like this frequently would eventually lead to heart failure.

Xu Qing was also startled. Looking at the shopping bags her daughter had brought into the room, she asked nervously, "Jiaojiao, why did you buy so many things?"

"These are graduation gifts from my cousin."

"Qi Qi?" Xu Qing was very surprised; the two cousins were usually not close.

"Did you manage to borrow the money?" Sheng Jiaoyang didn't want Xu Qing to know too many details, so she deliberately changed the subject.

The expression on Xu Qing's face turned sorrowful again.

One look at that expression and it was clear there had been no result. Sheng Jiaoyang patiently offered a few words of comfort, then used the newly bought skincare products to give Xu Qing a facial SPA. She even used the professional massage techniques she had learned from her grandfather's former masseuse to help soothe Xu Qing's tense emotions.

At night, Xu Qing slept very deeply.

This was naturally what Sheng Jiaoyang wanted. Firstly, she didn't want to be startled awake in the middle of the night again; secondly, since she had become Xu Jiaojiao, she would take over the responsibilities Xu Jiaojiao had to bear and do them even better.

Having enjoyed her daughter's thoughtful care, Xu Qing woke up the next morning in a much brighter mood. After making breakfast early in the morning, she went out to look for work.

Sheng Jiaoyang did not stop Xu Qing from looking for a job; in fact, she was the one who encouraged her. She didn't have much time to accompany Xu Qing afterward. Rather than letting this soft-natured woman wallow in self-pity alone in this dark room, finding a job was indeed the best way to help Xu Qing pull herself together immediately.

After finishing the poached egg noodles Xu Qing had cooked, Sheng Jiaoyang also got ready to set out.

She couldn't just sit and consume resources while the mountain of wealth ran dry—and in fact, the mountain was already empty. She also couldn't rely on a competition with an unknown outcome.

In truth, after encouraging Xu Qing to look for work last night, she had thought about many things. Previously, she had possessed great wealth and could easily do whatever she wanted. She had co-founded a brand with Mei Niu, held her own art exhibitions, and even turned the money from her paintings into a dream-building fund. She had done many things that others could not achieve in a lifetime, but all of that relied on her grandfather's help. Without her grandfather as a pillar, she had no money to invest and no connections to hold art exhibitions. Her paintings might be worthless, and she wouldn't be able to help anyone, because at that time, she was just a poor little thing whose mother died early, whose father was neglectful, whose grandparents didn't care, and who was bullied by a stepmother.

Now that she had nothing, she could only rely on her own abilities to meet her material needs; she could no longer get things just by opening her mouth or reaching out her hand.

Having gotten past the initial sense of helplessness, thinking this way actually felt quite exhilarating. "Starting a career from scratch through one's own skill"—just thinking about it made her blood boil.

Sheng Jiaoyang detoured to a stationery store near the school to buy a small drawing board, white paper, and simple brushes. Carrying the remaining twenty-odd yuan, she went to the most prosperous commercial center in the old town. This area was close to the university town; several old campuses of various universities were not far from here, only a ten to twenty-minute bus ride away.

【Starting from ten yuan, no upper limit】

Sheng Jiaoyang sat by a flower bed, placed the paper with writing in front of her feet, and began to doodle with her drawing board in her lap.

What started as simple doodling gradually, bit by bit, revealed the facial features of a person: handsome and dashing eyes, a straight nose, well-defined lips...

Only after finishing the last stroke did Sheng Jiaoyang realize what she had drawn.

Her finger brushed against those eyes and brows as she murmured, "Lin Yan..."

"Is this handsome guy a real person?" A sudden voice nearby startled her.

Sheng Jiaoyang blinked and turned her head to see a girl standing beside her, wearing a ponytail and sipping soy milk through a straw, staring at the drawing in her hand with great interest.

"Hey beautiful, is this handsome guy your boyfriend?" The girl blinked and asked curiously.

"Unfortunately, no." Sheng Jiaoyang regained her calm expression.

"Then he must be your crush!"

Sheng Jiaoyang's calm expression cracked.

Having exposed the truth in a single sentence, the girl took a sip of soy milk and said with a beaming smile, "If I had someone this handsome by my side, I would have a crush on him too."

*What an era of looks!* Sheng Jiaoyang smiled. The girl's bluntness made her unable to help but think of her younger self. How had she fallen in love with Lin Yan in the first place? It seemed she had fallen in love at first sight with that peerless beauty...

"Ahem," Sheng Jiaoyang said seriously, "Do you want a sketch?"

"What do you mean by 'no upper limit'?"

"As long as it's not less than ten yuan, you can give as much as you want."

The girl tilted her head and said readily, "Then draw one for me. Draw me in this pose." As she spoke, the girl leaned toward the flowering branches in the flower bed, posing as if she were smelling the fragrance.

"Please hold for ten seconds." The brush in Sheng Jiaoyang's hand began to move rapidly.

"Ten seconds?" The girl thought she had misheard and turned her head to confirm.

"Don't move. Ten seconds is enough."

Ten, nine, eight... three, two.

"One." The girl finished counting and walked excitedly back to Sheng Jiaoyang's side. Seeing the initial outlines appearing on the paper, her eyes widened in surprise. Looking at Sheng Jiaoyang, who no longer had a model but could still move her brush like flowing water without any hesitation, the girl was filled with immense admiration.

In this era where information is as vast as the sea but brain capacity is as small as a bean, many people forget what they said the previous second. Remembering a few numbers feels like solving a world-class puzzle. It was hard to imagine that a person could remember another person in just ten seconds and sketch them from memory; this wasn't just skill, it was talent—a talent that others could only envy.

"So amazing!" Several bystanders who had witnessed the whole process gathered around to watch the excitement.

Sheng Jiaoyang finished the last stroke and habitually signed her name in the bottom right corner. Just as she finished, she heard the girl beside her asking a question.

"Your artistic signature is so beautifully designed. It's the two characters 'Jiaoyang,' right? Did you design it? Can you design one for me?"

"You're asking so many questions; which one do you want me to answer?" Sheng Jiaoyang looked at the girl speechlessly. With such a large sketch, she was actually praising the signature in the corner. Should she laugh or cry?

"Uh, help me design a signature. As long as it looks good, I'll pay extra." The girl blinked, feigning cuteness.

As the eldest Miss Sheng, who had no choice but to learn from street artists to earn her startup capital, she certainly wouldn't miss any opportunity to make money. She had the girl write her name on the white paper, asked for the girl's ideas, and then with a few quick strokes next to the girl's name, she drew an artistic version of it.

"Are you satisfied, Student Liu Lu?" Sheng Jiaoyang's finger tapped the artistic signature.

Liu Lu's character 'Lu' had many strokes, but under Sheng Jiaoyang's brush, it became simple and full of artistry, carrying a fresh and stylish aesthetic.

"Satisfied, super satisfied!" The girl named Liu Lu grinned from ear to ear. She willingly pulled a "rich man gold" banknote from her wallet and handed it to Sheng Jiaoyang.

Although it couldn't be compared at all to the money she used to make from selling paintings, this was the first time she had earned money from selling a work while setting aside her status and position. This single, thin banknote became precious in Sheng Jiaoyang's eyes. At this moment, she truly stepped out of the state of treating money as mere numbers and entered the world of ordinary people.

"Ah, I forgot to tell you, the person you drew is much more beautiful than I actually am." Holding the two pieces of paper, Liu Lu took out her phone to snap a few photos of her sketch and the artistic signature, saying to Sheng Jiaoyang while posting them to her Moments.

Hearing this, the corners of Sheng Jiaoyang's mouth curled up slightly: "I drew the you that exists in my eyes."

Liu Lu froze for a moment. The short-haired girl in front of her looked even younger than her, but those curved eyes were filled with starlight, making her exceptionally captivating.