Chapter 629 — A Thorough Loss of Face

But seeing that Su Taizao was drunk as well, and mindful of the face they owed each other, Chen Yuxuan did not explode.

Wei Zhao, however, was taken aback. Chen Yuxuan—a suitor of Qiu Lingshan? From the look of it, Qiu Lingshan was not too keen on him. Wei Zhao wondered: if he went and kissed Qiu Lingshan himself, how would she react? Most likely, she would swallow her anger and say nothing.

"What is this Truth or Dare thing?" Wei Zhao had never heard of the game, nor played it.

"Heh heh, seems Brother Wei Zhao has never played. Taizao, you explain the rules!" An Liwen said to Su Taizao.

"Sure, the game is very simple!" Su Taizao said. "What we call Truth or Dare is a game for several people. You can use rock-paper-scissors, or spin a bottle, to decide who gets asked. Of course, you can also just go around in order—there are a lot of us, so let's skip rock-paper-scissors, it's too much trouble! Then, say I'm the questioner—I can put a question, and the person asked must answer, and must tell the truth, no nonsense. If the nonsense gets caught out, he drinks a whole bottle as forfeit! Of course, if the question is rather sensitive and touches on personal privacy, he can decline to answer, but then he must choose a dare instead! And a dare means I name something and the person asked has to do it, no objections, whatever it is, he has to do it! And once he's chosen the dare, he can't take it back—unless he drinks a bottle as forfeit beforehand!"

"Oh. Then you go ahead and play a round first, I'll watch." Wei Zhao felt this was a game better left alone; it had little to do with him.

"Fine, we'll play first, you just watch!" Su Taizao nodded and readily agreed. As far as he was concerned, whether Wei Zhao joined or not made no difference at all—so long as Gu Mengyao joined. "Then I'll start, I'll begin by questioning Brother An!"

"All right, ask away!" An Liwen nodded, composed and unhurried. In his view, Su Taizao would never ask him anything too tricky or weird, and this first round could hardly be the moment to make him confess his feelings to Gu Mengyao—that would be too abrupt. At the very least, he would have to wait until they had gone a full circle.

"Then I'll make a start, and I won't make the first question too tricky—wait for the next round, heh heh!" Su Taizao said this on purpose. "My question is: what is the bravest thing you've ever done?"

"The bravest..." An Liwen thought it over. If you asked what the bravest thing he had ever done was, it would have to be cutting out other people's kidneys—though of course he could not say that! He still had to maintain a positive image in front of Gu Mengyao, so naturally he could hardly talk about those brawls and fights from his past either. He thought for a long while: among the bad and nasty things he had done, quite a few were impressive, but when it came to anything positive, there was simply nothing.

At this thought, An Liwen could not help but feel irritated at Su Taizao's question. What the hell kind of damn-fool question was this?

But he could not leave it unanswered—not answering would not be Truth or Dare at all. Whether it was the truth, though, only An Liwen himself would know!

Sorting out his words, An Liwen thought of some adventure films he had seen before, and said, "If you want the bravest thing I've ever done, it would have to be fighting a shark!"

"Ooh, ooh, ooh, fighting sharks is my favorite, and Sister Yaoyao likes brave people too!" Shen Yushu clapped her hands and cried out.

Gu Mengyao shot Shen Yushu a look, but said nothing.

Hearing Shen Yushu's words, An Liwen was instantly overjoyed. Gu Mengyao liked brave people? It seemed Su Taizao's question had hit the mark after all! Then he would have to give a proper performance! So he said, "Once I was at a seaside bathing beach, swimming, when suddenly I heard screams and cries for help from not far behind me! I turned around and saw a huge shark swimming toward us fast! At that moment, what I thought of was not fleeing, but saving these tourists from danger, so I swam quickly toward the shark. Seeing me swim over, the shark thought I was coming to offer myself up as a meal, and was overjoyed, about to swim up and eat me—little did it know that the one offering himself up was really the shark itself!"

"Wow, Brother Jianwen, you're so brave!" Shen Yushu exclaimed.

"It was all right!" Hearing Shen Yushu's praise, An Liwen grew even more excited, and with the help of the liquor he began to spin his tale. "I smashed my fist into the shark's mouth, shattered its teeth outright. In an instant the shark had no teeth left, turned into a toothless tiger that couldn't eat me, and it was stunned! Then it turned to flee, but how could I let it get away? Frighten people and then just run off—was it that simple? So I grabbed the shark's tail and swung it round and round, and with a bang it crashed onto the sand and got a concussion from the fall!"

"Holy crap!" Shen Yushu's eyes went wide with disbelief. "Brother Jianwen, you're amazing! I've heard shark teeth are the strongest animal teeth in the world, and you can smash them—that's incredible!"

An Liwen was slightly taken aback. How would he know whether shark teeth were hard or not? He had only ever seen living sharks in an aquarium—when had he ever touched a real shark? He had just been making up a story, only to show off his bravery, without thinking that far!

But now the words were out, and there was no room to take them back. He could only tough it out and say, "It was all right, not really that amazing!"

"Oh, Brother Jianwen, I have a keychain made from a shark's tooth here. Why don't you show us how you smash it?" As she spoke, Shen Yushu took out a keychain and set it on the table.

This was a tooth Shen Yushu had cut from the shark Wei Zhao had killed last time and brought home; bored and with nothing to do, she had made it into a keychain.

"Gah?!" An Liwen's eyes went wide, and his face nearly cramped. He had not expected Shen Yushu to actually produce a tooth and ask him to smash it—was this some kind of joke? Never mind that shark teeth were the hardest teeth in the world; even an ordinary tooth, he could not smash!

An Liwen's face was turning green. How was he supposed to explain this? Was this not just a joke? How could he possibly smash a shark's tooth? But if he refused, he would need a reason—otherwise he would lose face completely! Yet what reason could there be?