Even though it was so late, the excited Brian Cooper couldn't help but start thinking about the task.

“Now I have my own shop. The shop downstairs is already mine, both legally and in reality, but why is the task status still incomplete?” Brian Cooper pondered as he gently tapped the nightstand with his finger.

Could it be because there’s no signboard, or because it hasn’t opened yet?

Seeing that the system still didn’t respond, Brian Cooper asked directly, “What kind of standard counts as having your own shop?”

The system displayed: “Own a shop that can be operated by the host.”

With that, Brian Cooper understood the task requirements and got up to rummage through the wardrobe.

He pulled out a piece of clothing, looked at it, then stuffed it back in, pulled out another, and after searching for a few minutes, finally found a set of clothes specifically for cleaning.

Holding the clothes, Brian Cooper spaced out for a moment.

The clothes were a dirt-resistant navy blue, made of pure cotton, comfortable to wear and easy to wash. It looked like an ordinary T-shirt, but the front was printed with the words for the “Circumference Noodle Shop.”

This shirt was what his parents used to wear for work in the summer when they were alive. It was bought as a souvenir T-shirt at a stall during a family outing for New Year, and then they had it printed.

As for his parents’ two shirts, they had already been burned and buried together in the cemetery by Brian Cooper.

After quickly changing, Brian Cooper thought for a moment, grabbed a baseball cap, took a towel from the bathroom, slipped on his slippers, and went downstairs.

“Pa.”

He pressed the dust-covered switch on the wall, and several fluorescent tubes lit up brightly.

The first floor was still as dirty and messy as before. The mark from his recent fall was still there, a clear side-profile silhouette standing out on the yellow tiles.

The place was thirty square meters in total, with the kitchen and dining area separated, and a one-meter-wide door directly facing the main entrance. There were six red long tables in the hall, each with four chairs, but none were in their original positions now, having been knocked over in all directions by the then-collapsing Brian Cooper.

“Creak.”

Brian Cooper reached out and pushed a few tables, all of which made unpleasant noises, and one even fell over with a “bang.”

“Looks like none of these can be used.” Brian Cooper shook his head and carefully checked the chairs.

Sure enough, only the one he used to sit on was still somewhat intact, but after the earlier fall, it was now a bit wobbly too. All of them would have to be replaced.

The wallpaper on the walls was peeling, and the kitchen still had the old noodle shop equipment: a double-burner gas stove—just a slight touch and the burner ring would break off with a “snap”—and a noodle-cooking pot, though he didn’t know if it still worked. But he wasn’t planning to use any of it anyway, since he didn’t know how, nor did he want to run a noodle shop.

Night fell, and the stars dotted the sky.

At exactly nine o’clock in the evening, all kinds of “crackling” sounds came from the former Circumference Noodle Shop. Occasionally, a passerby would glance curiously at the shop with no signboard, wondering about the noises coming from inside.

Three and a half hours later, Brian Cooper was covered in dust, with smudges all over his face, cobwebs hanging from his cap, the towel in his hand unrecognizable, and his feet, sticking out of his slippers, coated in a layer of black grime.

Looking like this, standing at the stairway with a satisfied smile, he had saved the money for a cleaning service.

Looking at the now clean hall and kitchen—ignoring the piles of trash at the door—the little shop was finally starting to take shape.

He tossed the now colorless white towel into the garbage bag with a “thud.”

“Ow, my old waist from ’92.”

Stretching, Brian Cooper headed upstairs. The first thing he did was go to the bathroom to wash up—he didn’t dare enter his room in this state.

Half an hour later.

Brian Cooper, hair dripping, sat in a chair and pulled out a piece of paper to start listing the things to do tomorrow.

One hand slowly tapped the table, while the other wrote carefully...

After planning out tomorrow’s tasks, he didn’t even care that his hair was still half-dry. He flopped onto the bed and fell asleep, not even bothering to pull up the thin blanket, and went off to dream about Miss Zhou.

In April, in Rongcheng, the weather was just right—not too hot, not too cold—the perfect time for a good sleep.

There’s a riddle that asks: what’s the first thing you do when you wake up? The answer is “open your eyes,” but that clearly wasn’t the case for Brian Cooper.

With his eyes closed, he accurately felt his way to the bathroom, relieved himself, then with a “thud” fell back onto the bed to continue sleeping—his eyes never opened the whole time.

He hadn’t even been lying down for a minute when Brian Cooper suddenly opened his eyes, as if a spring had been pressed on his back, and jumped up. “System!”

The system didn’t respond.

After seeing that the task status in his mind was still incomplete, Brian Cooper finally confirmed that this wasn’t a dream.

In a good mood, Brian Cooper started washing up, ready to tackle the tasks he’d set for himself the night before.

Standing in front of the main door, he took a deep breath and pulled the door open with force. The sound startled Boss Foster from the dry cleaner’s next door.

“Ah, it’s Brian Cooper, opening the door to go out?”

Boss Foster ran the most successful shop on the street. After all, everyone has a couple of nice outfits these days, and if you can’t wash them yourself, you send them to the dry cleaner. Now, seeing Brian Cooper open the main door was a bit of a surprise—after all, it hadn’t been opened since it closed, and this was the first time in three years.