Chapter 23 The Tuition Fee

Chapter 23 The Tuition Fee
In the dead of night, the sound of the video call echoing through the quiet bedroom was incredibly loud. Wayne Lynes sat up in bed, his sleep-deprived brain slowly trying to process what had just happened.
Honestly, he was still completely baffled. Unless it was a mandatory corporate board meeting, Matthew Lynes never initiated video calls with anyone. Ever.
So the core reason for this bizarre, 3:00 AM international call definitely wasn't the band-aid... No, absolutely not. That was just a smokescreen.
As Wayne mentally replayed the conversation, he finally caught the actual point.
What exactly had Matthew said?
My girlfriend was so incredibly worried about me... she absolutely insisted on putting it on my face... I was terrified of infection...
Extract the keyword: Girlfriend.
"!"
It felt like someone had just violently poured a bucket of ice water directly over Wayne's brain. He instantly snapped fully awake, his eyes going wide. "Holy shit! Bro, did I hear that right?! You have a girlfriend?!"
On the screen, Matthew's expression remained perfectly calm. He offered a faint, deeply satisfied smile, the cartoon pink flower on his cheek bobbing slightly as he nodded.
He even looked slightly disappointed by Wayne's slow reaction. "Is your memory completely shot? Didn't you see the photo I sent to the family group chat this weekend?"
"But Dad said you photoshopped it!" Wayne cried, feeling deeply wronged. "Dad said you were just aggressively trying to avoid the blind date with that Buckley girl, so you either edited the photo or hired a random actress to pose with you!"
"..." Matthew was speechless.
Clearly, the "Boy Who Cried Wolf" effect was very real. He had spent the last twenty years effortlessly lying to his parents, so now that the wolf was actually here, absolutely no one believed him.
Especially since his usual partner-in-crime was currently doubting him too.
Feeling a sudden wave of exhaustion—and since Ruth wasn't physically here to prove it—Matthew had no choice but to adopt his most painfully sincere expression. "Brother. This time it's actually real. I've been chasing her for over a month."
Wayne was completely, utterly dumbfounded.
"So it's actually real..." Wayne muttered, accidentally voicing his innermost thoughts out loud. "Honestly, I always assumed that one day you were just going to casually..."
Matthew smiled, seamlessly finishing the sentence. "...Casually toss a marriage certificate onto the kitchen table?"
"No," Wayne shook his head gravely. "I assumed you were going to casually come home and come out of the closet."
Matthew: "..."
Wayne was being completely serious.
When they were kids, Wayne had never understood how Matthew—who barely spoke and possessed an incredibly toxic, venomous personality—managed to effortlessly attract every single girl in their vicinity. As they got older, Wayne finally realized it was purely because of Matthew's god-tier face.
Wayne had literally watched him grow up. When Matthew was little, he had massive eyes, a small face, and a sharp chin; everyone who saw him constantly praised him for being prettier than a girl. As he hit puberty, his features sharpened, losing their softness and transitioning into the distinct, aggressively handsome, razor-sharp lines of a young man. That was exactly when his terrifyingly chaotic romantic luck began.
But no matter who pursued him, or how aggressively they tried, Wayne had never seen his younger brother show the slightest bit of interest in anyone. Sometimes, Wayne would see a genuinely gorgeous girl chasing Matthew, and when he asked about her, he'd discover that Matthew didn't even remember her name.
When you have a devastatingly handsome guy in his twenties who has literally never entertained a single romantic prospect... who wouldn't assume he was secretly gay?
But considering tonight's events...
If the premise "Matthew Lynes has a girlfriend" was true, then the only logical conclusion was that Matthew had intentionally called him at 3:00 AM purely to...
Brag.
Wayne couldn't believe his younger brother was this psychopathic.
The second you start dating someone... do you just completely abandon all human shame?!
"I completely forgot about the time difference today," Matthew's voice pulled Wayne out of his thoughts. Matthew sounded incredibly slow and deliberate. "I feel terrible for interrupting your precious four hours of sleep. Tomorrow, if you have any corporate documents you can't finish processing, you can send a batch to me. I'll review them for you."
Hearing that, Wayne's mood instantly skyrocketed. He grinned brightly. "Now that's more like it."
Matthew nodded. "Alright, I'm hanging up. Go back to sleep, brother. Next time, I'll make sure to call when it's daytime in your time zone."
Wayne opened his mouth to say something else, but the screen instantly flashed to: Call Ended.
Wayne replayed Matthew's final sentence in his head. His smile completely froze.
Motherfucker!
What do you mean, 'NEXT TIME'?!

After his chaotic bragging tour, Matthew assumed he was probably going to get blocked by several people and receive a massive influx of profanity-laced texts. In fact, Arthur Finlan was still aggressively spamming the group chat with furious insults.
But Matthew didn't care at all. Watching a bunch of miserable single guys violently lose their minds actually made him feel incredibly refreshed.
Having successfully tortured his friends, Matthew stood up and walked into the kitchen to feed the orange cat.
Looking down at the cat's incredibly stupid, chubby face, Matthew suddenly felt the urge to mess with it.
"Stupid," Matthew murmured, using his index finger to gently scratch under the cat's chin. The cat purred loudly, its eyes sliding shut in pure bliss. Matthew asked softly, "Who put this band-aid on my face?"
"..." The orange cat obviously didn't answer.
Matthew placed the bowl of wet food on the floor. Just as Stupid aggressively lunged forward to eat, Matthew seamlessly picked the fish-shaped bowl back up, lifting it high into the air where the cat couldn't reach.
Holding the food hostage, Matthew asked again. "I'll ask you one more time. Who put the band-aid on my face?"
Stupid's eyes went wide. Desperate for the food, the cat let out a loud, incredibly soft, highly pathetic "Meow!"
Matthew laughed out loud. He lowered the bowl back to the floor and affectionately patted the top of the cat's head.
"Exactly. Your mother did. Good boy."

Early the next morning, when Helen and the rest of the Vanguard Cup team walked into the classroom, they found Matthew sitting entirely alone in the back row.
He was wearing a black jacket, his head bowed as he casually scrolled through his phone. From a distance, they couldn't see his expression clearly.
Jerry walked up first, raising his hand. "Hey Mat, morn—" His voice violently cracked. "AH! Mat! What happened to your face?!"
Helen and Tom rushed over. Tom let out a loud "Holy shit."
Helen, however, wasn't surprised at all. In fact, the second Matthew looked up, she thought the terrifyingly dominant, untouchable campus god wearing a tiny cartoon flower on his cheek was the cutest thing she had ever seen.
Matthew realized that since he had applied the band-aid right before class ended yesterday, and then immediately escorted Ruth back to the dorms, these three hadn't actually seen his 'injury' yet.
For hygiene purposes, Ruth had given him a spare band-aid yesterday. So, after notifying his inner circle of friends and family last night, Matthew had peeled the old one off and applied the fresh one this morning.
He had no idea where his girlfriend bought these aggressively cute bandages, but yesterday's flower had been pink, and today's was baby blue.
When the sports rep had walked by earlier, he had loudly expressed his deep concern over Matthew's "disfigured face"... so Matthew had been forced to aggressively educate him.
Now, facing three fresh, entirely single targets, Matthew felt deeply obligated to educate them on the origin of the band-aid as well.
Matthew put his phone down and offered them an incredibly warm, gentle smile.
Starting with the phrase, "Honestly, I didn't want to wear it..." and ending with, "...but she was so terrified of infection,"the entire tragic, incredibly boastful monologue took exactly thirty seconds.
By the time he finished, Jerry and Tom stared at the little blue flower on Mat's face, feeling deeply uncomfortable and entirely nauseated by the aggressive display of affection.
Helen, however, who had already fully converted into a die-hard Keen-Lines shipper, didn't feel tortured at all. She felt like she had just been forcefully force-fed pure sugar.
She sat down at her desk, immediately opened the campus forum, and navigated to the shipping thread. Right before she started violently typing, she let out a quiet, incredibly intense whisper.
"...Keen-Lines is absolutely real!"

Ruth had overslept by twenty minutes today, practically sprinting into the classroom right as the bell rang. The professor had already turned on the projector.
She slid into her seat next to Matthew, breathless. When she turned to look at him, she immediately noticed the incredibly bright, highly conspicuous blue flower stuck to his pale cheek. She couldn't help but laugh.
"No way... is your face still not healed?"
Matthew nodded gravely. "There's still a slight red mark."
Ruth blinked.
Honestly, she had assumed Matthew only wore the band-aid yesterday because he was forced to. After all, walking around campus with a tiny flower on his face didn't exactly fit his ruthless, arrogant persona.
But now... the fact that he was voluntarily wearing it just for a tiny red mark seemed completely out of character.
Has my understanding of him been completely wrong this entire time?
Is he not actually a tough, self-reliant, hardworking college student? Is he secretly an incredibly fragile, delicate little princess on the inside?!
Ruth kept the bizarre theory to herself. She pulled her notebook and pen out of her bag, mentally planning to Google exactly how long a paper cut took to heal.
Before she could unlock her phone, a strong, sweet scent of artificial fruit hit her nose.
She turned her head. Matthew was holding an unwrapped lollipop directly in front of her lips. "Open."
Hearing his voice, Ruth didn't even hesitate. She naturally parted her lips, and he slipped the candy in.
Today's flavor was green apple.
She rolled the candy around her tongue for a few seconds before asking a question that had been bothering her for weeks. "I've been meaning to ask you... why do you constantly switch between giving me lollipops and hard candies? Is it just random, or is there a specific pattern?"
"You really haven't noticed?" Matthew smoothly pulled the plastic stick out of his own mouth. "There is a pattern. Whatever flavor I'm eating, you have to eat the exact same one."
"It's called 'Husband and Wife Harm—'"
Before Matthew could finish the outrageously shameless phrase, Ruth's reflexes kicked in. She reached out, violently snatched the lollipop out of his hand, and aggressively shoved it back into his mouth to shut him up. "...Okay, okay, I get it!"
But the more flustered she got, the more Matthew enjoyed it.
He leaned in entirely too close, deliberately flaunting his devastatingly handsome face—complete with the little blue flower—directly in her line of sight.
"Are you really this easy to embarrass?" "I barely even said a proverb and your face is already red?" "If you're blushing over a proverb, what are you going to do later when I—"
...Fuck! This man's mouth is actually radioactive!
Ruth knew she lacked romantic experience, so blushing easily was normal.
But what about him?!
How is the thickness of his skin actually medically possible?!
Driven to the absolute brink of a mental breakdown, and terrified he was about to drop an incredibly dirty line in the middle of a lecture hall, Ruth repeated her previous maneuver. She grabbed his hand and forcefully shoved the lollipop back into his mouth.
"...Can you please just quietly eat your candy?!"
With the lollipop jammed in his mouth, Matthew watched his girlfriend's wide, panicked eyes and completely flushed ears. He had to bite the inside of his cheek to stop himself from laughing out loud.
But his emotional intelligence was flawless. He knew exactly where her limit was. Realizing that pushing any further would result in actual anger, he obediently muted himself.
Five minutes after the professor started the lecture, Ruth looked down at the two pens sitting on her desk. She suddenly realized she hadn't given Matthew his designated 'spinning pen' yet.
But when she slid the pen across the desk, Matthew—for the very first time in over a month—actually rejected it.
He casually tossed his own black pen onto the desk with a soft clack. "I'm not spinning a pen today. I don't need it."
While the professor lectured loudly at the front of the hall, the two of them whispered quietly in the back.
"Huh?" Ruth blinked in confusion. "But you said you literally couldn't pay attention unless you were—"
"That was before," Matthew smoothly cut her off.
Okay, then what about now?
Before Ruth could ask, she felt a sudden, firm grip wrap around her wrist. Matthew effortlessly pulled her hand off the desk and dragged it down into his lap.
He completely enveloped her hand in his. Using his thumb and index finger, he slowly, methodically began to massage her knuckles, working his way up from the base to her fingertips. His grip was firm and deliberate, applying just enough pressure to feel incredibly good without hurting her.
Ruth's brain completely short-circuited.
Before she could even register what was happening, she watched in pure shock as Matthew lifted her hand directly to his lips. He pressed a soft, lingering kiss against the back of her hand.
His lips were warm, soft, and slightly cool.
After kissing her, he lowered their hands back under the desk, completely hiding them from view. He continued to slowly massage and play with her fingers, acting exactly like a professional hand masseur.
He blinked at her, his light amber eyes sparkling with pure amusement. The corner of his lips curled into a breathtakingly gorgeous smile, and his voice dropped into a low, rumbling laugh.
"...Now that I have a girlfriend, why the hell would I play with a pen?"
For the entire ninety-minute lecture, Ruth's hand served as his personal fidget toy. It honestly felt incredible, but by the time the bell rang, her fingers were completely numb from the constant manipulation.
And frankly, secretly holding hands under the desk in the middle of a crowded lecture hall... even though college rules were relaxed, the hidden, taboo thrill of it made her heart race uncontrollably.

Initially, Ruth hadn't realized there was anything wrong with Matthew wearing the band-aid. That was, until she casually opened the campus forum later that afternoon.
[THREAD] Is there actually anyone left who doesn't know why Mat is wearing a band-aid? Come in, let me educate you.
In a state of complete bewilderment, Ruth clicked on the thread. The more she read, the more she felt like she was going to spontaneously combust.
Matthew Lynes.
Actually.
Had! The! Audacity! To! Do! This!
Great.
Now the entire universe knew that Mat's flawless face had been violently scarred by a piece of paper.
And that his girlfriend, Ruth Keen, was so deeply, madly, obsessively in love with him that she feared the tiny scratch would get infected, forcefully demanding he wear a band-aid.
And that Matthew Lynes, helplessly whipped by his tyrannical girlfriend, had no choice but to submit, parading around campus every single day wearing a cartoon flower.
With a completely deadpan expression, Ruth scrolled down the main page. There were currently two other massive threads dedicated entirely to this incident.
[THREAD] Attention Finance 101 students: Whenever you see Mat, it is your sacred duty to ask "What happened to your face?" If you don't ask, you are a traitor to Cal U!
Ruth: "..."
[THREAD] Medical Question: How long does a paper cut actually take to heal? My bio-major friend said putting a band-aid on a micro-scratch actually causes the flesh to rot.
Ruth: "..." Rot?! Are you insane?!
In reality, the scratch on Matthew's face had completely vanished by the second day. But because he had smoothly lied about a "lingering red mark," Ruth hadn't doubted him, and had willingly handed over a yellow floral band-aid for him to wear on day three.
Which naturally led to that day's trending thread:
[THREAD] Pink flower. Blue flower. Yellow flower. What's tomorrow? A tangerine flower?! [Starry Eyes]
Eventually, some incredibly bold student directly tagged her on the forum:
[THREAD] @Master Ruth, please look here! I just want to say one thing! Mat's face is definitely fully healed by now, but if he keeps wearing a band-aid in the sun, he's going to get a horrific tan line... Please control your man! [Doge Emoji to protect my life]
By the third day, Ruth had finally pieced together the sheer magnitude of the situation. Pushed entirely past her breaking point by the absolute, crippling embarrassment, she forcefully ripped the yellow band-aid off the main culprit's face.
But even though she cut off the source, the legend had already permanently spread. Ruth had originally wanted to lurk on the forum to secretly enjoy shipping herself, but after this incident, she literally didn't have the face to open the app.
The "Band-Aid Saga" remained pinned on the front page for an entire week, only dying down by mid-October.

By late October, the Vanguard Cup training simulations had reached a fever pitch. There was only one month left before the official tournament began.
The first month had covered the basic rules and introductory simulations, but now, every single class was dedicated entirely to full-scale, team-vs-team corporate combat.
The five-person team structure functioned exactly like a corporate executive board running a simulated company. Since they were treating it like the real tournament, every team had to officially register a company name. However, Ruth absolutely never expected that the person responsible for naming their team would be Jerry.
Honestly, letting Jerry pick the name was an act of pure desperation.
Their entire five-person roster consisted of deeply analytical, aggressively un-creative numbers nerds. Every single name they brainstormed was either way too pretentious, painfully boring, or sounded exactly like a generic, bankrupt tech startup.
Eventually, Jerry got completely fed up. He slammed his hand on the desk. "Alright, screw it! Let's just name it after our hometown!" He looked around the circle. "Tom, Helen, and I all grew up in the same town. Master Ruth, if I remember correctly, you also grew up in a small town. And Mat, you..."
All four pairs of eyes instantly snapped to Matthew. Without missing a beat, Matthew delivered his default, highly predictable response. "I'm exactly the same as my girlfriend."
The other three: "..."
Ruth: "........."
Ever since Ruth and Matthew's relationship had gone public, Matthew had completely abandoned any pretense of having an independent personality during group discussions.
"You guys decide. I'll just listen to my girlfriend."
"I'll pick whatever my girlfriend picks."
"Didn't my girlfriend already speak? Her vote counts for me."
"My girlfriend..."
To the outside world, the concept of "Ruth Keen's independent boyfriend" no longer existed. He had fully embraced his identity as an aggressively devoted lapdog.
"Ahem," Jerry quickly adjusted his emotional state, refusing to be distracted by the aggressive display of affection. "Well, that makes it incredibly simple!"
He looked incredibly smug. "Think about it! The three of us were always the top students in our town! And obviously, you two are literal gods! Since it's such a coincidence, and we're all bringing glory to our respective hometowns... let's just call our team the Hometown Heroes!"
Perhaps they had all been tortured by the naming process for way too long, or maybe they were just terrified of the professor yelling at them to submit a name, but the team actually unanimously agreed to the incredibly cheesy, painfully generic name.
As a result, every time they ran a server-wide simulation, Ruth felt a profound, violent wave of regret.
1st Place: Hometown Heroes
2nd Place: GuLin Tech
3rd Place: Nova Innovations
4th Place: Love & Peace
Just look at the other names!
Even 'Love & Peace' sounds infinitely better than ours!
Because the training server was open to the entire Economics department, different classes occasionally ran simulations at the same time, crashing into each other exactly like matchmaking in an MMO video game.
After dominating the server twice in a row, the entire department knew that Finance 101 had a terrifyingly ruthless team called Hometown Heroes.

After finishing this week's simulation in the computer lab, Ruth instinctively began reviewing their data logs to find exactly where they had lost points.
It was exactly like professional esports players reviewing their VODs after a match to analyze their mistakes. Jerry and the others had officially dubbed this process: The Gods' Review Hour.
Initially, the three normal students had actively tried to participate. But they quickly realized that the two 'Gods' operated on an entirely different intellectual plane. Whenever Ruth and Matthew started discussing macro-economic shifts and supply-chain logistics, the other three instantly got lost in the jargon and couldn't contribute anything.
More importantly, Helen had secretly pulled Jerry and Tom aside to explain the reality of the situation.
"Look," Helen had whispered. "Not only are we completely useless, but the three of us standing there makes us massive, blindingly bright third-wheels! We are definitely ruining their intimate couple time! What if they want to do something cute?! Like... 'Oh, you found a missed profit margin, here's a kiss!' or 'You fixed a coding error, here's a smooch!' Hehehe!"
Because of Helen's flawless logic, the exact second the simulation ended, the three of them grabbed their bags and sprinted out of the lab, completely refusing to stay for the review.
Matthew was incredibly satisfied with their prompt departure.
Honestly, he didn't care if people were watching him—he would do whatever he wanted regardless. But his girlfriend's skin was incredibly thin. If other people were in the room, she absolutely refused to let him touch her.
"So I bought the wrong materials in this step?" Ruth asked, pointing at the glowing monitor.
Matthew had his right hand on the mouse. His left hand was entirely occupied holding her hand, gently playing with her fingers like a complete creep. Despite multi-tasking, his analytical brain remained razor-sharp.
"No, your purchasing was flawless. Your market selection was perfect too." Matthew clicked the mouse twice, pulling up a massive data spreadsheet, and scrolled down. "But when we introduced this new product line, our primary competitor was this company... HuaKe. You projected that HuaKe's production focus over the next two years would remain entirely on telecommunications. But in reality, telecommunications was just a front. They entirely pivoted their infrastructure toward chemical engineering... God only knows why." Matthew couldn't help but swear.
"Exactly! How is that even possible?!" Ruth stared at the screen in absolute disbelief. "Is the simulation bugged?!"
"I don't think it's a bug," Matthew said smoothly. "It's basically the corporate equivalent of an ultra-rare RNG event in a video game. It's not impossible, but the trigger conditions are incredibly rare. Using standard corporate logic to predict it, and then dropping the issue when it didn't align, was the correct strategic move. Double-checking it would have just wasted valuable time."
Matthew continued, "Because realistically, there is absolutely zero logical reason why a high-tech telecom company would suddenly pivot to mass-producing industrial fertilizer. It's fucking..."
Matthew scrolled further down the spreadsheet. The more he read, the more he wanted to violently curse out the simulation developers, but he forcefully held it in. "Anyway. HuaKe is an NPC competitor generated by the system. Running into a completely irrational algorithmic trap like this is just bad luck."
"Honestly..." Matthew suggested, "You could definitely delegate some of these minor analytical tasks to Helen and the guys. The only reason you didn't catch this error during your second sweep is because you're micro-managing way too many departments at once."
"..." Ruth looked deeply conflicted. "I know, I've thought about it. But I'm genuinely terrible at delegating tasks to other people."
Because she had spent her entire life fighting entirely alone.
When she had secretly participated in the global Vanguard Cup overseas, she had placed tenth. She assumed she had lost points on stupid, algorithmic traps exactly like this one. But since she was just playing anonymously for fun, she hadn't cared, and she hadn't been using her full strength.
However, she still vividly remembered the person who had taken first place in that global tournament.
The user's ID had looked exactly like a completely random string of chaotic, carelessly typed letters. But right next to that ID was the Chinese flag. And their final score had literally been an entire digit higher than the second-place winner.
The 'Keyboard Smash God' had been an absolute legend.
As she sat there reminiscing, Ruth suddenly realized something was wrong.
"I also managed to track down where we lost points in the Marketing sector." Completely unaware of her sudden suspicion, Teacher Lynes smoothly continued his flawless analysis. "Your core focus was on the American market. Starting from Year One, you..."
Ruth slowly turned her head, staring at the man sitting next to her with intense, piercing suspicion.
The simulation was an exact, one-to-one replica of running a real-world multinational corporation. The only difference was that time moved faster.
Anyone who understood business knew that a corporation had dozens of complex, overlapping departments. But the simulation only provided broad, generalized scores at the end of a run—like 'Marketing: 85/100' or 'Finance: 90/100'. It absolutely never told you exactly where or why you lost those points. You had to dig through thousands of lines of raw data to find your mistakes.
That was the entire point of the review process.
Ruth was incredibly obsessive about this. Knowing she had lost points but not knowing why drove her insane.
But she was genuinely bad at sifting through raw data logs. If Matthew wasn't sitting here, it would have taken her twice as long to find the errors.
She wasn't trying to be narcissistic...
But if she was struggling this hard... how was it mathematically possible for Matthew—a literal 20-year-old college student with zero real-world corporate experience—to effortlessly diagnose and instantly locate every single complex, microscopic structural failure in a multinational supply chain faster than an actual Harvard MBA graduate?!
"...And that should cover everything." Matthew glanced at the Word document in the corner of the screen where he had logged all their lost points. "I found every single error for you. So, girlfriend... am I allowed to clock out now?"
Ruth was so deep in her own existential crisis that she blinked, momentarily confused. "Huh? What?"
Matthew hadn't let go of her hand. With a sudden, forceful tug, he yanked her rolling chair across the floor. The two chairs violently collided. Because Matthew was still holding her arm, the sudden momentum forced Ruth to stand up.
Before she could even stabilize herself, a strong arm wrapped around her waist, effortlessly pulling her forward.
Matthew remained perfectly seated in his chair.
And Ruth was now planted firmly, perfectly straddling his lap.
Her eyes were wide and filled with complete bewilderment. In the dim light of the computer monitor, her pure black pupils perfectly reflected his face. Her lips were slightly parted in shock. She wasn't wearing any lip gloss, but they were naturally pink, soft, and incredibly inviting.
The temperature in the room was perfect.
The computer lab was entirely empty.
The only sound was the quiet, rhythmic hum of the massive desktop servers.
She looked entirely dazed, she smelled incredibly sweet, and she was his girlfriend—a girlfriend he had been officially dating for half a month, but hadn't actually kissed yet.
Matthew had been talking for twenty minutes straight. His throat felt incredibly dry.
He reached up, his fingers gently gripping her chin. Without a single second of hesitation, he pulled her down and kissed her.
"I've given you so much free tutoring..." Matthew murmured against her lips, his voice dropping into a dark, impossibly rough rasp. "...It's about time you paid your tuition."