He Did the Catfishing, I Did the Harvesting

Upon spotting me sitting across from Yvonne, Henry's smile instantly vanished. He widened his eyes in surprise and stammered, "V-Vincent?"

I took a sip of my iced coffee, completely ignoring him.

Yvonne furrowed her brow, her gaze sharp and disapproving as she looked at Henry. "Is this your classmate?"

I casually swirled the ice in my drink and replied, "He's my roommate, Henry Luster."

Henry bit his lip, his expression a mix of sheer panic and resentment. His greed got the better of him after looking at Yvonne's stunning features and then at me. He took a deep breath, braced himself, and pulled out a chair to sit right beside us.

He deepened his voice on purpose, putting on a deeply affectionate posture while saying, "It's truly a coincidence meeting you here, Yvonne. I'm actually the one who made the appointment to see you today."

He attempted to take Yvonne's hand from the table while saying, "Vincent just happened to be nearby. He doesn't even play this game."

Yvonne flinched and withdrew her hand, a trace of disgust flashing in her gaze. She then looked at me with a questioning expression.

I chuckled softly, propping my chin on one hand as I stared at Henry. "You're the one who set up this appointment, huh? Why don't you tell me which dungeon we raided together last night, then?"

Henry went rigid in an instant. He had hacked into my account, but he had spent all his time talking to people on voice chat and knew nothing about the game. He struggled to come up with a response for quite some time before stammering, "I-I was very tired last night, so I don't remember it."

He looked around nervously as he attempted to salvage the situation. "You shouldn't listen to his nonsense, Yvonne. He's never even laid eyes on a max-level account!"

I looked at him with a pronounced, mocking smile. "How about we discuss game mechanics since you're such an expert, Henry?"

I shifted my gaze to Yvonne and spoke with a professional yet nonchalant air. "In last week's patch, the mage's skill 'Frozen Miles' had a hidden 0.5-second casting delay nerf. If you want to avoid being interrupted during cross-server battles, should you pick 'Rapid Cooling' or 'Frost Shield' in the third row of the talent tree?"

Yvonne's eyes immediately brightened, knowing that this was the kind of high-level metadata only pro players tracked. She turned a sharp, questioning look on Henry and asked, "What's your take on it, Henry, since you're 'WindListener'?"

Henry was completely dumbfounded. He only ever used my account to flirt and get free items in the safe zones. He barely knew the hotkeys, let alone cast animations or talent trees. He clutched the fabric of the oversized suit and stammered, "I-I guess I'd go with 'Frost Shield' because of the survivability."

He came up with what he thought was a smart, sensible-sounding reply.

Yvonne's expression immediately hardened.

I scoffed without holding back. "You ought to know that that's a trash talent only newbies under level 30 would choose. You don't even know something this fundamental, and yet you still have the nerve to claim that you're the top mage of the server."

It seemed like every word I uttered served as a resounding slap to Henry's face.

Yvonne went even further and directly asked him to leave. "You should leave now since I have private matters to talk about with my boyfriend—we don't want to be disturbed by strangers."

Henry's face flushed with embarrassment. He had been exposed as a fraud, and the "perfect catch" he had worked so hard to manipulate was now firmly on my side instead. He immediately broke down, overwhelmed with shame and spite. He covered his face and bolted from the coffee shop like the coward he was.

"Holy shit! That pro-level shutdown by the supporting male lead was incredible!"

"Henry is such an incompetent hack! He couldn't even answer a single question!"

"I'm cracking up over here! He's trying to act like the top-ranked mage without even knowing what 'Rapid Cooling' is!"

"He's done for! His 'perfect catch' is entirely in the supporting male lead's hands!"

"Henry is crying so miserably! He definitely won't let this go without a fight!"

I stared at the flood of fast-moving comments and slowly drained the last of my iced coffee. I was fine with Henry not letting this go without a fight; after all, I had only just snatched the first target—the best part had yet to come.