A Slight Smile is Very Charming Vol Chapter 4

Lots of headnotes this time. They are mostly names and ways of referring to others.

[1] 猴子酒 (Hou Zi Jiu): literally meaning “monkey wine”.
[2] 愚公爬山 (Yu Gong Pa Shan): literally “Foolish/Stupid man climbing a mountain”;a perversion of a famous Chinese idiom愚公移山 which refers to a famous folk tale of a “Foolish old man moving mountain”, somewhat similar to Siphysus who also performed what looks to be an unending task.
[3] In the original text, this was mm, which stands for mei mei in internet slang. Mei mei means sister but in slang is used to refer to any female, who should be younger than the speaker.
[4] 莫扎他 (Mo Zha Ta): the name is similar to莫扎特 (Mozart in Chinese – Mo Zha Te). It literally means “Do no p.r.i.c.k/poke him”.
[5] 三嫂(san sao): literally “third sister-in-law”. In China, when men are good friends, they become “brothers” so they refer to the wives as “___sao” depending on the ranking. Here, Nai He is implied to be third in their group so Wei Wei is “san (third) sao”
[6] This meaning of this sentence is hard to translate properly. First, kao is a swear word. Then, Nai He is described as 万年光棍 which is “ten thousand years naked stick” which is a lot more rude and doesn’t flow properly. But this way, the crudeness doesn’t get through as well.
[7] The wording used isn’t pet (宠物) but 宝宝 which also can be a synonym for a baby.
[8] 神兽级: legendary or immortal beast/monster. Immortal is the one I’m sticking with because It can be used also with weapons, as legendary can also be传说 while usually isn’t applied to weapons.
[9] The original phrase was 花痴, literally being infatuated/obsessed with somebody of the opposite gender, usually in regard to their physical beauty
[10] Xiao-ge: The surname of Xiao Nai and the suffix ge which means older brother. Men refer to each other in an order of senority using ge (older brother) and di (younger brother)
[11] 师姐 (s.h.i.+jie): used to refer to a female older than the speaker, from the same teacher/department/school.

 

Chapter 4 Before the wedding

Since they have decided to get married, then they are now acquaintances.

Hm, something about the logic here seems a bit strange … …

So in the following two days, Wei Wei spent all her time hanging out with Yi Xiao Nai He and joined his usual team. Nai He’s team was composed entirely of top players. Wei Wei had even PK’d with two of them before, but her knowledge only extended to familiarity with their IDs.

The first time Wei Wei met them happened like this.

Hou Zi Jiu[1]: “Hoho, new person.”

Yu Gong Pa Shan [2] : “Nai He, whose this mei mei?”[3]

Yi Xiao Nai He: “My fiancée.”

He said it so naturally that Wei Wei couldn’t help but hexian. She typed out a smiley face: “Hi everybody ^_^”

Mo Zha Ta[4]: “Wa, san sao.”[5]

Yu Gong Pa Shan : “Kao, the eternal bachelor is getting married.” [6]

Everyone started teasing and congratulating until somebody suddenly said: “San sao’s id is a bit familiar.”
“
“Since you said so, I feel it too. Did san sao ever place in the rankings?”

The simple-minded and quick-mouthed Hou Zi Jiu said: “I remember now, Lu Wei Wei Wei, isn’t that Zhen Shui Wu Xiang’s ex-wife?”

The team suddenly quieted and the mood became strange. Wei Wei nearly said that they were getting married for the PK tournament when Yi Xiao Nai He steadily typed out a line of characters: “En, You guys’ san sao married someone terrible, but you should not discriminate against her.”

Wei Wei choked on her chips.

In this moment, Wei Wei had a revelation. When doing quests or fighting monsters together with Nai He, one should never eat or drink, because he may say something so astonis.h.i.+ng, if she doesn’’t choke, she will definitely spray her monitor.

Fighting bosses and doing quests with this group of people was, with no doubt, very relaxing and satisfying. First of all, everybody cooperated, and then there is the fact that the success rate was high. Before, when Wei Wei and players from her sect formed teams to fight bosses, they took a very long time. Now, it only takes a short while to get it done. Of course, when it comes to fighting, Nai He Da Shen must be mentioned. His occupation was a musician. Musicians, in 《Dreams of Jianghu》existed in a bit of a limbo state. While they could do everything, their attacks weren’t as strong as warriors, support and healing wasn’t as good as the specialized occupations. In conclusion, musicians was a useless jack-of-all-trades.

But Nai He Da Shen is a unique case.

Nai He Da Shen’s healing was just as good as any other healer, and his control was fast and positioning was precise. The teams didn’t have to worry about support or having to protect him. Once, when a boss was almost dead, Yi Xiao Nai He, who had for the entire time acted as a medic, pulled a sword out from his gu qin, released his one and only attack “Sword within the qin” piercing the boss’s fatal spot. The boss’s head sprouted big red letters before collapsing to the ground.

“Sword within the qin” is the only somewhat acceptable attack technique that minstrels could utilize. Wei Wei had seen it multiple times before, but never had seen such huge damage points. It almost matched hers. Wei Wei was so jealous she could cry. It must be because his equipment is too strong –a –a –a !

With this standard established, Wei Wei had no thoughts when she finally met Yi Xiao Nai He’s pet. [7]

Nai He’s pet was a small white cat.

Wei Wei’s pet was a strong and powerful tiger.

When a tiger couldn’t win against a cat, Wei Wei couldn’t muster any opinion up at all.

But Nai He, when he saw Wei Wei’s pet and studied it for a very long time, said: “After we get married, our pets should also marry.”

Pet marriage was another one of 《Dreams of Jianghu’s》 features. After players got married and their pets were of the same species, then their pets could also marriage. The marriage would create a small technique, which activated, would allow the pets to procreate.

Wei Wei said: “But their species aren’t the same.”

Yi Xiao Nai He said: “This is a mutated baby tiger.”

So this little cat is a tiger too. No wonder there were tiger stripes on the forehead. Wei Wei managed to gather up a little bit of her self respect. If a tiger lost to a tiger, then it’s not as embarra.s.sing.

“Okay, Okay. Let’s get them marred.” Wei Wei was very cheerful. That little cat was immortals-level[8]. Her tiger was just a normal tiger she captured herself. Any way of thinking about it, her pet was marrying up. Wei Wei asked thoughtlessly: “Your tiger is female?”

“No, male.”

“… … My tiger is also male.”

Wei Wei felt depressed. Obviously, immortals-level daughter-in-laws were not that easily found.

The wedding day was Sat.u.r.day. On Sat.u.r.day morning, Wei Wei went to the library as she did normally to self-study. Coming back to it, Wei Wei still put a lot of effort in her education. It wasn’t possible not to put effort in. At this kind of school, in Computer Science this kind of faculty, which student didn’t have a first grade brain? Getting left behind would result in beatings and humilation.

Self study continued until four when Wei Wei could not sit still any longer. At five, she cleaned up and rushed for the cafeteria at lightning speed. After dinner, she came back to her dorms and logged on but Yi Xiao Nai He wasn’t there. The other people’s names were also dark so level-up maniac Wei Wei set out alone with her huge knife to stab monsters. Just when she was getting in the rhythm, her dorm mates came back.
Wei Wei’s dorm was a quadruple. Other than Wei Wei herself, there also lived Xiao Ling, Si Si, and Er Xi who were also majoring in computer science. And the four of them were the only four girls in the year two Computer Science department.

“Wei Wei, stop playing. It’s almost six, our faculty and Biochem are having a basketball game. Let’s go together la~.” Xiao Ling said as she changed her clothes

Wei Wei cut down monsters and shook her head: “You guys go, I have things today.”

“Save it, what things do you have to do, it’s just playing games. Let’s go, Da Zhong said that Xiao Nai is coming today.”

“Ah! Really? Xiao Nai!!” Si Si and Er Xi shouted together.

Wei Wei turned with stars in her eyes.

Even though Xiao Ling wanted this effect, but when she saw her dormmates like this, “I can’t stand you guys. You are like rabid fangirls.[9] Look at Wei Wei, so steady.”

Wei Wei hurriedly raised a hand: “Don’t misjudge me, I’m also a fangirl.”
说实在的，微微宿舍的四个女生已经算很不花痴很不花痴的那种了，但是这世界上总有这样的人物，叫人觉得不花痴一下都不正常。
In reality, the four girls in Wei Wei’s dorm were the most un-rabid fangirls, but there were some people in the work, who made others realize that not being infatuated with them, at least for a moment, was not normal.

For example, Xiao Nai.

Xiao Nai of the Computer Science Faculty, one of the movers and shakers of A university. If UA had player rankings like in games, then Xiao Nai would be the definitive number 1. Disregarding the fact that he was astonis.h.i.+ngly talented at programming, and the glory at the ACM International Collegiate Programming Contest achieved by the university team for three years ever since he led them, he was also mult.i.talented at the guzheng and wei chi (go) and represented the university to become the champion at swimming compet.i.tions. If that was not enough to make most feel inferior, he was also in possession of a great and elegant beauty.It was easy for people admire him, whether they wanted to or not.

But fangirling was fangirling. The girls in the facultywere afraid to go up and connect with him. One factor was that he rarely came on campus, and so even though they were in the same department, the girls were not familiar with him. Another factor was that his standing was too high, and his manner was so proud and his expression had a hint of indifference that made others afraid of coming closer

Wei Wei only rarely and, from far away, ever saw him. Once was when he was rejecting a girl from another faculty. That girl had stopped him and given him something similar to an envelope, probably a love letter. But rather than taking the letter, he didn’t even glance at it once, didn’t stop in his stride and just walked past.

Strangely, even though he seemed so proud, he was still popular with the male half of the population. The males of the CompSci Faculty were all very respectful of him. It was rumoured that he had registered and started a company very early on and many of the genii of the faculty had been lured to work there.

There were many others rumours about Xiao Nai, lots of which even came from the professors’ side as his parents were history and archaeology professors. It was said that Xiao Nai’s parents were virtuous, traditional and non-materialistic, and then a mutation occurred when it got to Xiao Nai who in middle school knew to partner-up with relatives to open internet cafes. At that time, computers were not very common and it had been the best time to do business as an internet café. There were also whispers of big gains from real estate and the stock market, but those were much more dubious.

As a little minor presence in the CompSci Faculty, Wei Wei was one of Da Shen’s idolizers. Many of the little pieces of software in her computer were Da Shen’s idle compositions from many years ago. Da Shen was in year four this year, and after this year, it would be even harder to look at him. Wei Wei looked at the game, Yi Xiao Nai He’s icon was still dark. She looked at the time, Five fourty. She resolutely closed her computer and with her dormmates headed towards the basketball stadium.

When they got to the gymnasium, it was already noisy and crowded. Xiao Ling’s boyfriend Da Zhong stood at the doorway to greet them and ushered them towards the reserved seats

Xiao Ling asked as they walked: “Da Zhong, where’s Xiao Nai? Didn’t you say he would be playing?”

Da Zhong was resentful: “Are you coming to see me play or to see Xiao-ge [10]play?”

Xiao Ling didn’t care for him: “Of course we came for Xiao Nai, you don’t have anything to look at.”

The other three girls nodded their heads, Da Zhong nearly died from anger and stewed for a long while before saying: “Xiao-ge is not playing, we don’t know if he’s coming or not, it seemed like he had something unexpected come up.”

The girls were very disappointed. If before there were 100 watts of light in their eyes, now there was only 10 watts left. But it was still okay, the atmosphere in the gymnasium uplifted their spirits quickly.

While waiting for the game to begin, a tall male wearing a CompSci Basketball team jersey came in front of them. More specifically, he walked in front of Wei Wei. He had his head down, stammered and couldn’t speak, and his ears were red.

Xiao Ling and the others had three word in their mind “It’s started again!”

As expected, after an awkward pause, the tall and extroverted boy stammered: “Wei Wei s.h.i.+jie, [11] if we win, can I invite you to dinner?”

Wei Wei held a cool expression on her face and asked: “Will you lose?”

“Of course not!” The boy excitedly raised his head.

“Then play hard!” Wei Wei expressed the kind of smile elders gave to those younger and very patronizingly encouraged the young s.h.i.+di.

“En! s.h.i.+jie! I will definitely win!”
The little s.h.i.+di seemed to have received a boost and went onto the floor to warm up with a basketball.

“… …”

“… …”

“… …”

The above were Xiao Ling, Er Xi, and Si Si’s thoughts.

Er Xi said: “This little s.h.i.+di is very gullible.”

Si Si wasn’t surprised: “I really hate this type of children, using winning to threaten people. If Wei Wei refused, he might even blame the loss on Wei Wei.”

Xiao Ling: “Our Wei Wei’s rejection techniques are getting better and better!”

Wei Wei exulted, and mock-modestly said: “ You flatter me. When the numbers add up, lots of occasions to practice.”

What followed was a certain beating. She was the cla.s.sical example of itching for one.