Chapter 496: This Picture is Too Scandalous

Jiang Qin didn’t stay long in Shanghai, taking a flight back to Linchuan on the third day.

By now, Zhihu’s campus beauty and beau contests had reached the final stages.

The rankings for campus beaus were mostly settled, with the top five male gods widening the gap in votes, unlikely to change significantly. However, the campus beauties were still neck and neck, keeping the suspense alive.

The battle for top spot between “Hard-to-Lose Feng” and “Xu Jia-rou” has been intensifying over the past few days, full of fireworks.

Feng Nanshu herself, however, remains blissfully unaware, indifferent to the contest but seemingly quite interested in colds.

“I’m not the top campus beau? Is Yanzi not popular anymore? When did aesthetic preferences start to change?”

“Boss, why not tweak the votes in the backend? Add three or five thousand votes, let them know who’s the real boss!”

“Forget it, as long as everyone knows who’s the most handsome, winning or not is trivial. The important thing is the traffic the contest brings.”

Sitting in the boss chair, Jiang Qin grinned at the top-ranked handsome guy who resembled Yan Yikuan: “I’ll let you have this one.”

The campus contests were originally meant to boost daily activity on the forum, and this surge in traffic should indeed help propel Tonight’s Headlines and the group-buying efforts.

Generating traffic for Tonight’s Headlines is straightforward: publish a few interview articles once the results are out, and have photographers snap some exclusive beauties showing off abs and dainty feet. Surely, lsp will sniff these out.

Male lsp, female lsp, captured in one net.

As for boosting group-buying site traffic, naturally it involves distributing coupons to the top campus beauties and beaus’ followers.

Then create some limited edition campus beauty and beau medals, photo collections, etc., for sale on group-buy sites in limited quantities.

These tricks, much like those used for milk tea cups, are specifically targeted at college students. Making money is secondary to cultivating spending habits.

But since the contest involves national colleges, the workload is substantial.

“By the way, boss. During the recent voting, some outrageous pictures were posted by the beauties, too scandalous to pass moderation. I’ve held onto them, thinking you might want to critique them.”

“?”

Jiang Qin glanced down and noticed an internal system notification about a 2.5 GB zip file submitted by Dong Wenhao.

Scandalous pictures…?

2.5 GB of scandalous pictures, how outrageous and spectacular must they be!

Boss Jiang’s expression turned serious in an instant.

Alright, let’s see just how these pictures are violating the rules!

Jiang Qin clicked open the zip file, held his breath, enlarged each picture, and savored them for a moment before exclaiming in amazement.

The internet scene back in 2011 was quite wild, and oversight wasn’t tight. Everyone was bold in their postings, robust, really spirited.

That’s the perk of having privileges. What need is there to mooch off others’ memberships?

“Huh? Why is my photo in here?”

Dong Wenhao paused: “Oh, that was uploaded by the boss’s wife to her competition column. Since it wasn’t her, the review team didn’t pass it.”

Jiang Qin was puzzled: “Why did she upload my photo to her competition column?”

“It seems the boss’s wife uploaded a casually snapped side shot. Your photo is also a side view. She probably isn’t much interested in the contest but wanted to match couple avatars with you.”

The non-mainstream era of 2011 hadn’t yet passed; such slightly blurred, side-face photos were popular.

And believe it or not, Feng Nanshu’s competition photo matched her own side view eerily well. No one would believe they weren’t a matched pair of love avatars. She must have searched a long time for it.

Jiang Qin fell silent for a moment then suddenly chanted Amitabha, feeling guilty and deleted all the big, scandalous ones.

Imagine if the little rich girl secretly viewed others’ abs shots. I’d definitely spank her. So, putting myself in her shoes, I can’t keep looking at those girls’ big, white… photos.

True friendship requires such transparency.

Besides, I’m not some lsp; there’s no pleasure in this stuff.

“Doggy, come here.”

“Woof~~!”

A bark rang out as the corpulent Splashy Riches waddled to Jiang Qin’s feet, circling him.

He’s the pet dog of the boss and his wife, crowned as the prince of the group-buy headquarters, so he eats better than most humans and is nearly a different species now.

Jiang Qin looked down: “Is this my Splashy Riches?”

“Yes, boss.”

“Damn, he’s so fat I can hardly recognize him.”

Jiang Qin stroked his fur: “You really live up to your name, Riches.”

Riches purred, thoroughly enjoying the attention.

After handling all the internal system feedback and hastily eating dinner, Jiang Qin leaned back in his boss chair, feeling a bit restless.

Then he sneakily opened the recycle bin, restored the folder with the scandalous pictures, and savored them once more.

Damn, a man’s guilt really is short-lived?

Jiang Qin criticized himself repeatedly as he viewed the images.

What does this tell us? Some may be lsp, but that doesn’t stop them from being gentlemen.

“Boss, what are you doing?”

At that moment, Su Nai pushed the door open, carrying a plate of cake, casually inquiring.

Jiang Qin coughed, closed the window, and said like a true gentleman, “Nothing much.”

Su Nai and Dong Wenhao were different.

Dong Wenhao was a loyal subordinate, but Su Nai was closer to his boss’s wife and would dare to tattle on him.

If her boss, Feng Nanshu, saw this, she’d be jealously limp until he was utterly weak.

His pride was long gone, unable to withstand even the slightest.

Jiang Qin looked at the cake she brought: “What’s this? Your birthday?”

“I just got my driver’s license,” Su Nai proudly lifted her chin.

“Awesome, definitely worth celebrating.”

“I was thinking of getting a matching car.”

Jiang Qin was about to dig into his cake but paused: “You think a piece of cake can get you a car? Get ou—damn it, who taught you this doggedness?”

Su Nai narrowed her eyes: “You said if I got my license this year, you’d reward me.”

“I was mocking you for taking three years to pass. Didn’t you get that?”

“But I’ve passed it now!”

Jiang Qin scooped a piece of cake into his mouth and waved it off: “Not that I won’t get you a car, I’m just worried about your skills. Here’s the deal, drive the company car for six months, then we’ll talk about your own car.”

“What about my reward?”

“I’ll pay for three years of video streaming.”

Su Nai was livid, thinking three years of video streaming was underestimating her: “At least make it five years.”

Jiang Qin nodded: “Okay, you she-lsp. But there’s something you need to know—you’ll be traveling to Shanghai for business next week, likely long-term.”

“What?”

“Our Algorithm Center’s recruitment is nearly complete. You’ll oversee that for a while. We’ll be testing some algorithm recommendations on Tonight’s Headlines, later integrating them into group-buying.”

Over the following days, the top five candidates from the campus beauty and beau lists received partnership requests, signed image licensing agreements, and took promotional photos for advance merchandising.

Room 208, emptied and not returned to the school, now served as a makeshift phototherapy studio.

On the day of the image shoot, Jiang Qin too was there, drooling over those tender, tender feet.

“I’m Xu Jia-rou, Jiang senior.”

Xu Jia-rou was in a white long dress, adorned with pendant earrings and wavy hair, exuding charm.

“Oh, I know, the rising campus beauty from the Literature Department.”

Jiang Qin had just seen her in the scandalous photos yesterday. Very scandalous.

Xu Jia-rou smiled sweetly: “Senior, you also entered the campus beau contest, right? I vote for you every day.”

“Junior, you understand handsomeness.”

“Of course, senior. You’re the top male god in my heart!”

Jiang Qin smiled, knowing he should say something like, ‘Junior, you’re the top goddess in my heart’ at this point.

But he couldn’t—his top goddess was his own aloof ying-ying monster at home.

Seeing that Jiang Qin didn’t respond, Xu Jia-rou couldn’t help but speak: “Senior, I shouldn’t be the one to say this, but there seems to be a bug in your contest.”

“?”

Xu Jia-rou was from the Literature Department, definitely not versed in computer science or coding. Jiang Qin was surprised she noticed a bug.

“What bug did you find?”

“Someone’s manipulating the votes, though I don’t know how she’s doing it, she definitely is. I want to report this officially.”

Jiang Qin paused, then smiled without further comment.

Xu Jia-rou wouldn’t point out the vote manipulation by people below her, as it wouldn’t benefit her, so while she didn’t specify, Jiang Qin knew she meant the top-ranked “Hard-to-Lose Feng.”

If Lu Feiyu were here, he’d definitely rush up and scold.

You marginally delicate lady, don’t you know that’s our boss’s wife?

But Jiang Qin always stubbornly claimed he was single, and since discussing “Feng Nanshu” was banned on Zhihu, and that cute little social anxiety sufferer from the Literature Department was new and in the eastern campus, Xu Jia-rou likely had no idea.

It was like those top stars who play the role of single virgins in public but actually have children.

Xu Jia-rou was quite interesting though, boldly making claims without any proof.

Especially her phrase ‘although I don’t know, she definitely’—such a fairy-like statement.

“Alright, junior, thank you for your feedback. We’ll look into this matter.”

“Thank you, senior.”