During the first week after Xing Wu left, Qing Ye followed her daily routine of attending classes, working at the factory after school, squeezing in time to help everyone review key exam points and question types, then returning to the inn to wait for Xing Wu's call.
Though Qing Ye had started missing him since the second day he was gone, she could at least count on his call no matter how late it came. His life in Shanghai was even more monotonous than at Zhazha Pavilion—to outsiders, it seemed like he was just playing games, but the intense daily training was relentless and exhausting, continuing day and night. Once he entered training mode, he wouldn't eat or use the bathroom for five or six hours, leaving him utterly drained. Yet no matter how busy, he always set aside half an hour each day to call Qing Ye, though he never mentioned any of this during their conversations.
The club had rented them a studio apartment where he lived with several other players. The place was fairly clean and tidy, but being all grown men, their lifestyle was admittedly rough around the edges.
When Xing Wu missed Qing Ye particularly badly, he'd want to see her. Every time their video call connected, they'd just grin foolishly at each other, unable to speak for the longest time. Simply gazing at one another was enough—neither wanted to look away.
On the weekend morning after Xing Wu's departure, Qing Ye had just woken up when she received a call from Pang Hu urging her to come to the factory immediately—something big had happened.
It was only upon arriving that Qing Ye learned what had transpired. After the recent tasting event concluded, she had playfully recorded a video switching between London, New York, and Indian accents while introducing their products. The previous night, Pang Hu had uploaded this video to his short-form video account.
He had just been lying in bed bored, casually edited the footage, and included a link to their online store. When he woke up in the morning and checked his phone, he was utterly shocked—the video had somehow gone viral overnight, garnering hundreds of thousands of likes. Countless comments demanded they "find this young lady's complete information within three minutes."
Thinking he was seeing things, Pang Hu immediately called Du Qiyan, waking her from her dreams, to ask if there had been any activity on their online store.
By this point, Qing Ye had already rushed over to Du Qiyan and pulled up the backend data. Good heavens—over three hundred orders had automatically processed overnight! Seeing these numbers, Qing Ye found herself mirroring Pang Hu and Du Qiyan's earlier reaction: standing frozen before the computer, completely stunned.
After their initial shock, they could only frantically call Qing Ye for help. But once Qing Ye recovered from her own astonishment, she immediately stepped out of the office, dragged over a blackboard, and began confidently listing the urgent tasks that needed immediate implementation.
She ultimately identified five key areas: materials, production, online store, shipping, and social media operations. At the center of it all, she wrote one large character: "People."
They desperately needed more manpower—immediately. With just the four of them, there was no way they could manage this entire supply chain.
Within just one morning, they made calls far and wide seeking help. Liu Nian even recruited his mother to assist. Pang Hu finally demonstrated his capabilities as class president—with a single phone call, dozens of people promptly showed up. Many students from their tutoring class voluntarily came to help Qing Ye, directly joining the production line.
Meanwhile, Grandpa Xie had been playing chess when he received the news. He immediately fired up his beat-up Wuling van, gathered all his aunts and relatives, and headed to their rural hometown to secure product supplies.Du Qiyan stayed glued to the online store, handling inquiries from all over the country. Quan Ya brought over a batch of cardboard boxes and took charge of product packaging—an extremely labor-intensive process. Yet he seemed highly experienced in this area, having even brought a packaging tool with him. Under their skilled hands, packages of various sizes were miraculously wrapped, each box spun around and sealed tightly with tape.
Qing Ye didn’t even have time to eat lunch all noon, busy contacting shipping services. In the afternoon, Huang Mao showed up with his father driving a truck. When Qing Ye saw Huang Mao jump down from the vehicle, she felt like giving him a huge hug.
By evening, the video had garnered over a million likes, and the online store continued to receive a steady stream of orders. Everything had happened so suddenly. Everyone had been buried in work all day, and it wasn’t until nightfall that Qing Ye finally caught her breath and said to Pang Hu, "This is absolutely surreal. You should look into social media and manage your account—traffic equals money, you know, fatty."
It was as if a lightning bolt had struck Pang Hu’s head, revealing a whole new world. He spent the entire night researching how to become a competent social media influencer.
After dusk, they stopped working because Grandpa Xie hadn’t delivered the goods yet. Pang Hu, as if possessed, pestered Qing Ye to record another video to test the waters.
So Qing Ye casually picked up a book, rolled it into a microphone, and was about to tell Pang Hu to start when she suddenly touched her hairstyle and asked, "Should I fix my hair or put on some makeup or something?"
A chorus of voices shouted from the side: "No need!"
Qing Ye laughed. Pang Hu told her, "You, just like this—n-natural beauty. Try to keep it c-casual."
Qing Ye thought it really was better to be casual, so she snapped her fingers and said to the others, "Don’t all hide behind Pang Hu. Go do whatever you need to do. We’ll title this ‘High School Seniors Get Rich and Prosper, Balancing Studies and Earnings’—how’s that?"
Pang Hu suddenly had an inspiration and exclaimed, "Th-that’s good! It’s c-catchy!"
Everyone immediately returned to their positions and got into the scene. Qing Ye tossed her long hair and began introducing their small but fully-equipped food factory in flawless pronunciation. On a whim, she playfully switched to a funny Japanese accent for English, then shifted to a Korean accent, deliberately interacting with Pang Hu behind the camera by asking if he knew which country it was. Pang Hu replied, "Sseu-mi-da." Qing Ye laughed until the corners of her eyes crinkled.
This was actually one of her special talents. Having attended international schools since childhood, she had met many classmates from different countries. Through constant exposure, she had somehow picked up the ability to mimic various English accents. Since middle school, whenever she got bored memorizing texts or vocabulary, she would hide in her room and entertain herself by switching between different accents, making rote learning less tedious.
Qing Ye never expected this little hobby of hers to one day become a hit on social media. After Pang Hu returned home, he stayed up all night studying video editing, background music, and special effects. He uploaded the video in the early hours of the morning and had only slept for two hours when his phone woke him up.
By morning, many people had simultaneously come across this trending video. In just one morning, the likes surpassed a million, and the online store was completely overwhelmed with orders.Countless viewers flooded the comments begging for the contact information of the girl in the video. Qing Ye, bare-faced yet naturally exquisite with delicate features, delivered fluent English with a dramatically engaging tone, instantly gaining a massive following.
Her interview with Du Qiyan using a Korean accent, coupled with Du Qiyan's shy, camera-dodging confusion, made many viewers declare their love for that adorably clueless girl.
Numerous comments also raved about the "hot guy packing orders," demanding more footage of him. Pang Hu was still wondering who this packaging guy was until he rushed to the factory and saw Quan Ya squatting in the yard cutting cardboard boxes – then it clicked.
The explosion of orders the next day completely stunned Qing Ye. She first estimated the production capacity and called Grandpa Xie to ask if he could keep up with the demand.
While he couldn't handle it alone, Grandpa Xie told her many households in their village produced these items and guaranteed he could source enough goods. With this assurance, Qing Ye gained confidence.
Within two short days, everyone was in motion. Huang Mao jokingly declared Liu Nian the Production Manager, Quan Ya the Planning Manager, Da Hei the Logistics Support Manager, Du Qiyan the E-commerce Manager, and Pang Hu the Marketing Manager – while proudly announcing himself as the Shipping Manager.
Though said in jest, with everyone performing their roles diligently, they shipped over 700 orders in five days. Pang Hu even started receiving partnership inquiries. No one expected Sunny Valley would become a genuine internet-famous store this quickly.
Each member of their ragtag team gained their own followers too. The daily vlogs Pang Hu uploaded regularly garnered hundreds of thousands of views.
The biggest appeal became how these penniless young people were building wealth through labor and wisdom. Pang Hu grew increasingly passionate about learning video editing, studying filming techniques and scripts with Quan Ya.
He discovered his genuine love for creative storytelling, even turning Huang Mao's daily deliveries in his dad's truck into comic skits. Huang Mao, ever eager for attention, went overboard in his quest for internet fame – his daily rotation of skin-tight outfits, bean shoes, and floral T-shirts made him the most roasted member in Sunny Valley's videos. Yet the more he got teased, the more enthusiastically audiences responded to his appearances.
He even opened a Weibo account dedicated to posting truck selfies that were... visually challenging.
When Xing Wu heard about Sunny Valley's online popularity, he'd watch their videos during training breaks, smiling over their antics from afar. However, with half a month left until the competition, they had to enter closed-door training.
Most esports players being teenagers or young adults, past competitions had seen incidents where players disappeared after fights with girlfriends – some even missing matches entirely, causing significant losses for clubs. Current contracts now mandated two weeks of isolated pre-competition training, cutting off external contact to ensure tournament readiness.
The night before lockdown, Xing Wu had his final video call with Qing Ye. Noticing his sharper jawline, she asked if he'd lost weight.
Xing Wu grinned and rubbed his chin, half-joking: "Beauty filter."He added, "You can't focus your energy on the factory anymore. Wait until I get back to handle it. Remember to eat breakfast, and have milk and eggs every day. I just called my mom and asked her to buy meat for you every day during this period..."
At this point, he chuckled himself. His hair had grown a bit longer, falling in strands by his cheeks. Perhaps because he had just showered and hadn't styled it, paired with a black short-sleeved T-shirt, his casual appearance had a somewhat Japanese vibe. Qing Ye's eyes reddened as she gazed at him, pouting into the video and saying, "I want a hug..."
Those words stirred something in Xing Wu too. He lowered his head, rubbed his nose, then looked up again, his eyes shimmering like countless bright stars, yet he couldn't utter a word.
That was their last video call. After that, their only means of communication was cut off. Qing Ye didn't know how he was eating in the days that followed? Did he have time to sleep? If he didn't perform well, would someone scold him? This hollow feeling left her heart feeling empty too.
But life went on as usual every day. The college entrance exam was entering its final sprint phase. Just as Xing Wu had said, she had to pull all her focus back.
However, she had learned a lesson from her father since childhood: money can solve the vast majority of problems in this world.
Although the more than 700 orders had only brought in a little over 40,000 yuan, and after deducting various costs, it was even less, one must understand trade-offs to go further in life.
So, she used the money earned from this batch of goods to pay part-time wages. Many slackers from Anzhong came flocking upon hearing about it, and soon the good students were replaced. Their second batch of orders was also shipped out in a very short time.
Amid the initial chaos, things gradually fell into place. Although every day still felt like a battle, it seemed everyone had found their direction.
Xing Wu's house was being built. Before he left, he had already given instructions to the workers. This house was essentially designed by Xing Wu himself, and the general outline was already visible. Every time Qing Ye went home, she would deliberately detour to the front door to check on her little balcony, imagining the scene of waking up early and embracing the sunlight, which lifted her spirits.
It seemed everything was steadily moving in a positive direction.
She would stop by the factory every noon on her way home for lunch. It was on one such sun-drenched afternoon that Pang Hu suddenly rode his bicycle to the factory to find her.
When Qing Ye stepped out of the workshop, Pang Hu gasped breathlessly and said to her, "Your dad... your dad came to the school!"
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