"Irene, you have a package. What did you buy?"
Bae Juhyun’s voice couldn’t hide her excitement. She exclaimed and hurriedly got up from the sofa in the practice room.
Today was already July 5, just one day before Liu Xin’an’s birthday.
Bae Juhyun had planned to sneak home tonight and give her boyfriend a big surprise at midnight.
So, that package arriving today was very important to her.
She had bought a mouse.
"Yeah, tell me what you bought first."
"It’s a birthday gift for Xin’an. His birthday is tomorrow."
"Oh... huh? His birthday is tomorrow? I thought it was June 21."
Seong Taekyon’s confusion also made Bae Juhyun look surprised: "Taekyon, how do you know my boyfriend’s birthday so well?"
"...That’s a weird question. Is he just your boyfriend?"
"What? Could he be Taekyon’s boyfriend instead?"
That was a good comeback, which rendered Seong Taekyon speechless. He had wanted to say that Liu Xin’an was like a close brother to him.
Bae Juhyun giggled, put away her phone, and then looked at Kang Seulgi next to her.
"Seulgi, I’m going to get the package. Will you come with me?"
"Sure, is it the stuff you bought for Liu Xin’an?"
"Yeah." Thɪs chapter is updatᴇd by novel⟡fire.net
Kang Seulgi leaned closer to Bae Juhyun and followed her out of the practice room, not forgetting to chat with the excited older sister along the way: "Don’t forget to deliver our gift to Liu Xin’an too."
"Don’t worry. But what did you get him?"
Kang Seulgi raised her eyebrows, pretending to be mysterious: "It’s a secret, it’s nothing too special."
"Now I’m curious. Can’t I open it first?"
"What are you talking about? It’s carefully wrapped."
Last night, a group of Bae Juhyun’s younger sisters gathered to figure out how to wrap the gift.
Fortunately, the dorm’s storage room had plenty of wrapping bags for packaging stuff.
At that time, Bae Juhyun had gone to video chat with her dear boyfriend, so she didn’t see it herself.
Soon, the two reached the company’s designated area for storing packages.
After finding her package, Bae Juhyun hugged the small box and went back upstairs with Kang Seulgi.
"Do you need to rewrap this?"
"Yeah, I can’t just hand the package as a gift to Liu Xin’an. That’d be too weird."
Bae Juhyun used a small knife to open the package box and then took out the box inside, inspecting it from various angles.
"Is it really this small?"
She had bought the GPW second generation. Although Bae Juhyun didn’t know the difference in specifications between the first and second generation, the second generation was more expensive.
For something expensive, especially a digital product, to Miss Bae, who didn’t understand these things, expensive meant good.
"It’s just a mouse. How big could it be?"
"True. I’ll get some ribbons."
A day later, even the Korean internet began to pick up on the news.
Seong Taekyon constantly monitored the netizens’ reactions.
But to his surprise, the usually harsh netizens took a relatively gentle approach to this matter.
Not that there weren’t any harsh words; trolls exist everywhere, and those were mainly from people who had no good impression of Bae Juhyun anyway. Their opinions didn’t matter.
What Seong Taekyon really cared about were the reactions from the fan sites and Bae Juhyun’s dedicated fans.
It was the gentle response from this group of people that really surprised Seong Taekyon.
[Wow, so Irene is really dating Mr. Liu Xin’an?]
[Hahaha, that’s nice. Irene is already 30. It’s not easy to find a good man. As a fellow woman, I support this relationship.]
[Even though that guy is from China, he’s got our country’s blood too.]
[That jerk...] Hmm... this was a hateful comment, which Seong Taekyon ignored.
One must admit, Liu Xin’an’s excellent persona on the show had made many fans in their country develop a good impression of him. The popularity of Chinese men had already been evident for a few years.
Seong Taekyon glanced at his vibrating phone on the desk and quickly picked it up: "Manager."
"Taekyon, come to the office."
Seong Taekyon took a deep breath. What was coming seemed inevitable.
He composed himself and left his office, soon knocking on Manager Kim’s office door.
Seong Taekyon pushed the door open, bowed respectfully to the man, and then sat down in front of Manager Kim.
"Manager, you wanted to see me."
"Irene and Liu Xin’an’s relationship is..."
"They’re indeed a couple."
At this point, it was no longer necessary to hide it. The signs were there, the company had started to become suspicious, and rather than continue to cover it up, it was better to make their relationship transparent to the company. This would make subsequent actions and risk management easier.
This answer didn’t surprise Manager Kim. He rested his chin on one hand and gently tapped the table with the other.
The crisp tapping sound made Seong Taekyon a little nervous. The manager swallowed and waited for his leader’s reprimand.
But surprisingly, the scolding he expected didn’t come. Instead, Manager Kim chuckled and looked at him: "When did you find out?"