When Adrian arrives a week later at the address he's been told by his incredibly excited coworker, he has to stifle the pure jealousy in his heart as he stares at the luxury apartment before him.
"I used to have an apartment in a building like this," he says sadly as he passes security and enters the elevator. "Actually, forget the apartment, I even bought the building because I didn't want to pay rent."
Bebe ignores the whining of his ex-local tyrant host. Over the past few months, it is sure it has heard about every lavish aspect of Jia Hyson's original life and has long grown numb to it all.
"Then I thought, I'm rich, why don't I buy a bunch of apartments to get money from."
Yes. Numb to it all.
"So I bought ten but I didn't like taking care of them."
Numb to it all.
"After a week I gave up and hired a man to do it for me."
Numb...
"But it felt a lot like paying rent anyway so eventually I just bought the guy's company with the money I earned renting apartments and the royalties from my new book. Got turned into a movie you know?"
(ノಠ益ಠ)ノ彡┻━┻ Bebe has gone temporarily offline.
At the notification, Jia Hyson smiles helplessly at his silly, easy to bully system. Feeling great, he steps out of the lift and onto soft carpeting. With a nervousness that's only half-faked, he rechecks the text on his phone and heads to the last door to the left, knocking softly. "Hello? Jenna, it's Adrian."
"Adrian!" Jenna flings open the door with a grinning face so fast that he suspects she had been waiting by the door the whole time. He can't help but chuckle a little at how similar she was to Maddy. Her cheeks flush as she eyes up her very handsome coworker in a casual white shirt and tight blue jeans.
Jia Hyson smiles awkwardly, looking self-consciously down at his simple clothes, "Is this okay? You just said jeans and a t-shirt but I didn't-" he trails off hesitantly, ducking his head down while his blue eyes shyly look anywhere but at the young woman in front of him, seemingly like a person completely out of his depth.
It was enough to make the coldest person melt much less a young, greenhorn like Jenna. "No way! You, you look good," She stammers.
"Jenna!" A grumpy voice calls out from another room, "Is the model here yet? I have a thing in a few hours remember?"
"Sorry uncle!" Jenna calls out, not sounding very sorry at all. She even has the face to grin and roll her eyes cheekily at Adrian, very different to her usual demure appearance at the cafe. She really is a lot like the main character and he chuckles again. "My uncle has volunteered to help take photos for my portfolio, he's a bit harsh but he knows how important this is to me."
Adrian blinks and nods, following Jenna to her studio. Internally, Jia Hyson was a little intrigued at where the plot divergence was leading. Jenna, this barely considered mob character, seemed to be secretly a rich second generation with dreams of being a fashion designer. Her uncle doesn't seem too simple either. If he had followed the plot and refused Jenna's offer he would have never known anything about them.
It truly feels that, in this moment, that he's no longer in a story but a proper world.
"Hello, Uncle." Adrian greets politely, lowering his head in a slightly submissive pose as he feels a strong scrutinizing gaze hit him. He shivers, feeling a little violated at the assessing gaze.
"Not bad," A gruff voice finally says after a minute of uncomfortable silence, "Eeven if he's just a vase he's a damn pretty one."
"Uncle!" Jenna cries out embarrassed at his rudeness.
Adrian straightens his back and looks directly at this uncle with a faint smile. "Well I trust you'll be able to make this vase shine for Jenna's sake." he lightheartedly flatters with a charmingly self-deprecating smile.
Unfortunately, it seems Jenna's uncle was resistant to his looks. With a snort, he goes back to fiddling with his camera, "Even if you were a pile of stinking dung I can still make something acceptable for my niece."
Adrian lightly laughs but under his obedient expression, Jia Hyson darkly curses. Who's a pile of stinking dung? Look at this beautiful face and have the gall to say that again! He dares him!
Bebe: Bebe has looked at your face and after careful analysis, Bebe can conclude that... you're a pile of stinking dung.
The pile of stinking dung Jia Hyson: "(凸ಠ益ಠ)凸 Cheap systems should learn to shut their mouths! (凸ಠ益ಠ)凸"
Bebe: ╮(╯∀╰)╭
Jia Hyson: F*ck your mom!
Of course, none of this even flickered onto his face. His past life experience of being a famous author and his current life of enduring a hundred different jobs in the service and retail industry have hardened his facial muscles to maintain a first-rate gentle smile. Unless you were inside his head, no one could know he was silently writing gory, horror torture porn featuring everyone that has ever wronged him.
Bebe who is inside his head: Bebe begs its abnormal host to please stop, Bebe is sorry, Bebe cannot unsee what has been seen ಥ_ಥ
Jia Hyson: ¯_(ツ)_/¯
As Jia Hyson changes into Jenna's first outfit, he quietly admired her handiwork. "This girl has good taste." he tells Bebe seriously, "do you think she'll let me keep an outfit?"
'If she says yes, Bebe recommends you take the grey suit.'
Jia Hyson raises an eyebrow as he examines a very stylish grey and silver suit. It gives off a novel futuristic without looking too ridiculous that he couldn't walk into the street with. Personally, he thinks that his original Asian appearance would pull it off better but there was no denying that wearing this suit would make many heads turn for him. "Bold choice, why?"
'Because Bebe believes it matches with your grey morals.'
Jia Hyson: ... system you've changed (°ㅂ°╬)
'Bebe has watched you secretly steal from the trash and scam people for money, Bebe no longer has respect in its eyes for you.'
Jia Hyson couldn't deny that. But who's fault was it to make his character be so caring while having so many financial difficulties?!
He didn't want to eat unwanted food either! But apparently, schools were huge money-hungry monsters that insist that he had to pay extra for Madeline and Monroe's compulsory end of year middle school and high school leadership camping trips. Adrian's parents told him that they refused to pay for it despite promising to at least cover their education costs so he had to tearfully hand over the cash. They didn't even provide the camping gear so Jia Hyson had to starve himself over a tent.
F*ck his sh*tty parents and f*ck the education system!
Walking out of the closet, Adrian smiles shyly as he spreads out his arms. "Jenna, what do you think?"
Jenna takes one look and then another, before pinching herself and squealing, "Yes! Oh, this is exactly what I wanted! This is perfect!" She greedily takes in the pure white clothes with golden edging and decoration she had painstakingly made, in hopes for a prince-like man to wear them. Once again, she thanks all the gods out there for her good luck in getting a job at that cafe where such a high-quality man worked.
Even the old uncle looks pleased at how good he looks. "Not bad kid, now sit on the couch."
Jia Hyson saunters to the couch, giving it a scrutinizing look before laying splayed out on it like a lazy yet elegant noble. He tilts his head up and stares deeply in the camera with an arrogantly seductive stare, like he was goading the camera to pull him off his magnificently high horse and dirty him up. He's an arrogant prince, a tyrant, a domineering beauty, you couldn't keep your eyes away from him even if you wanted to.
The uncle couldn't speak. No one could. Only the sounds of camera shutters were heard while Adrian adjusts his posture every minute or so.
Jia Hyson feels rather pleased with this result. His original level in modelling was at 42 since he's participated in some photoshoots beforehand and has some idea what to do. Adrian apparently was naturally photogenic so that added an extra 10 points to his stats. During the week before this shoot, Jia Hyson snatched two fashion magazines from the trash, burrowed another from a different coworker and bought a Basic How to Model guidebook (20p) from BeBay to study intently on. Every night he would practice posing for an hour and a half with Bebe being his judge. Since Bebe was a piece of technology that made supercomputers look like children's toys it was nothing for the system to absorb information from the books and the internet and compare them with Jia Hyson's poses.
By the morning of the day, his modelling stats was a very passable 68. It didn't make him a top model by any standards, but his decent grasp of lighting and camera angles as well as a nice variety of poses allows him to have a fighting chance with the above-average models.
"That's good, tilt your head a bit to the left, arms on your lap, yes, sneer a little, perfect." the camera uncle rambles, getting happier and happier at how unexpectedly well-trained this amateur seemed to be. Pulling away from his camera he cracks Adrian a satisfied smile. From the way the smile strains against his craggy face, Jia Hyson can't help but assume this old man doesn't smile too often. "You're not bad kid, is this really your first time?"
Dropping his icy prince facade Jia Hyson's face softened back into the usual gentle Adrian's smiling face, his cheeks flushing a little at the compliment, "En." he confirms embarrassedly.
"Good," The uncle murmurs as he subconsciously snaps a few more shots. The smile has melted the original cold and haughty demeanour, transforming the arrogant noble into a benevolent pure prince instead. While it wasn't what either Jenna or the uncle had in mind, the change was so alluring they both knew they had to seriously consider keeping those photos. "Good, very good!"
Jenna, who was in the background excitedly waiting with the next outfit in her hands, gapes at her uncle. The amount of times her grumpy uncle had complimented anyone out of the family could be counted with her fingers. She knew that when she first saw Adrian, he would be a man who could happily live on just his looks alone but she didn't really think he had this much raw talent. Not enough to garner her uncle's praise anyway.
She grins widely. It seems she hadn't mistaken a fisheye for a pearl when she asked for Adrian's help. Not only was her uncle going to take her suggestions more seriously now, it was also now clear that her portfolio was going to be the envy of all her classmates.
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