Chapter 12: Confused, 5000 Reward Secured

"Sss!" Xu Qianqian sucked in a sharp breath, "Be gentle."

"Mm, whose fault is it for not watching where you're going upstairs?" Jiang Nian bent his head, meticulously massaging her ankle; faintly visible beneath the pale skin were blue veins.

An unbidden thought surfaced in his mind: if she wore white silk tights...

No, no, this is Xu Qianqian.

Jiang Nian shook his head, shaking the chaotic thoughts from his mind—green plums weren't off-limits, he just hadn't expected Xu Qianqian to have such a girlish vibe.

"Can I help it? I told you... there was a rat."

The air reeked of strong bruise-relief liquor; the boy massaging her foot stood straight as a young white poplar, shoulders level, thick black hair.

An unbidden thought surfaced in her mind: should she go watch him play ball next time?

No, no, what am I even thinking? This is Jiang Nian!

The most annoying Jiang Nian!

"So what if there was a rat? Rat life... sigh." Jiang Nian didn't continue, changing the subject: "Have you guessed your score? How much do you think you'll get?"

"Hmm..."

"You're a freak—why don't you go hang out in Class Zero?" Jiang Nian was stunned; his hands moved faster, the sprained area warming.

Xu Qianqian thought for a moment. "Don't feel like moving. Got used to it."

After applying the medicine, Jiang Nian returned to his own apartment across the hall to sleep. After he left, Xu Qianqian dozed off drowsily on the sofa; the door clicked with the sound of a key.

Xu Zewen dragged his weary body home from work, pushed open the door, sniffed, then saw his daughter asleep on the sofa.

"Dad?" Xu Qianqian woke up groggily, rubbing her eyes. "You're off work?"

She started to rise, but Director Xu called out to stop her.

"What happened to your foot?"

"Twisted it going upstairs. Already applied medicine." Xu Qianqian stood up limping, forcing a smile. "See? All better."

Director Xu grunted, reminding her to apply more medicine tomorrow.

The next day.

Jiang Nian rose as usual, went downstairs to buy breakfast, and before heading upstairs, spotted Old Xu driving off early for work. His parents were still asleep; he placed the breakfast on the table and crossed to Xu Qianqian's apartment to reapply the medicine.

At 7:30 a. m., morning self-study began; Xu Qianqian, despite her sprained foot, had already washed up.

"Feeling better?" He set the breakfast down, crouched, and began rummaging for the bruise-relief liquor. "Why's Uncle Xu off to work so early?"

"There's a project in his department—he's been busy." Xu Qianqian's eyes dimmed for an instant.

"Oh~ Your dad's busy, no problem—your other dad's applying the medicine."

"You die!"

Xu Qianqian kicked him with her uninjured foot; they bickered back and forth, the atmosphere turning lively again.

Below.

Xu Qianqian, backpack on, stared in surprise at Jiang Nian riding up on his electric scooter.

"You took it—how's Aunt Li getting to work?"

"Get on, stop nagging." Jiang Nian braked sharply, impatient. "Old Jiang isn't working today—he's driving Mom to her office."

"You're the one nagging!" Xu Qianqian climbed onto the backseat, still annoyed.

After thinking it over, she opened Jiang Nian's WeChat chatbox and changed his nickname from "Annoying Brat" to "Nagging Annoying Brat."

Just as they exited the alley, Jiang Nian slammed on the brakes.

Xu Qianqian, unprepared, crashed into his back; her soft curves pressed hard against him. Her pupils shrank; her face flushed visibly red.

"Jiang Nian, are you trying to kill me?!"

"Wait—I'm thinking." Jiang Nian opened the panel visible only to him, stared at the words "Task Completed," and frowned in confusion.

【Task: Defeat strong romantic rival Zhou Haifei, causing him to give up on Xu Qianqian. Reward: 5000 RMB (Completed).】

His phone buzzed; his bank balance jumped from 2131 to 7131 RMB.

Glancing around, the streets were nearly filled with students heading to morning self-study. Monday was flag-raising day—uniforms required; white summer uniforms stretched everywhere.

Jiang Nian thought again, still puzzled, then gave up and let it go.

"Were you just pretending?" Xu Qianqian's voice floated from behind, quiet and sharp.

"No, there was a rat ahead—I got scared." Jiang Nian was distracted, making up nonsense. "I didn't want to run it over—red and white all exploding..."

"Ugh!" Xu Qianqian punched him. "Stop talking!"

After the flag ceremony, the first Chinese class began with test papers handed out.

Jiang Nian slumped on his desk, still confused. The glasses-wearing girl, the aluminum-copper guy—how did she just give up? I didn't even get a chance to talk to her.

So young, and already giving up on love.

Oh well. Brilliant.

Jiang Nian's understanding of love was shallow too—he was someone destined for divorce. Better to chase money than romance, and if free, chase a few girls.

When poor, guard your own integrity; when rich, help the world.

On the podium, the Chinese teacher was handing out papers, calling out scores above passing.

"Zhou Yuting 90, Ren Dong 104, Chen Lili 117..."

She paused suddenly. "Jiang Nian 110."

The class erupted in noise. The top few were always top scorers in Chinese—but Jiang Nian? He usually got around 80. How did he get 110?

Well, only the students around Jiang Nian were noisy.

"Is this real? Jiang Nian, did you fill in your dad's student ID?"

"Damn, Jiang Nian's taken off after just one summer."

"F***, this hurts more than killing me! Please tear up the test, bro—how about I eat a pound of Oreo cookies if you admit you cheated?"

Borrowing jokes to cover his quirks, coming here to scrounge food and drinks, right?

The classmate was only joking—how do you copy Chinese? The more you copy, the lower your score.

When Jiang Nian went up to the podium to get his paper, his face was calm, but inside he was smug—his Chinese score was actually ten points higher than his estimate. A good start.

The Chinese teacher was still lecturing on stage, "Chinese is getting harder? Where's it hard? Sometimes you should look at your own reasons for your score, okay? After all this time, have your grades gone up or not?"

"Have you been seriously practicing problems, or not? Chinese has always been this difficult. I really don't know how to teach you all anymore."

In the classroom, Zhou Yuting shifted her gaze away from Jiang Nian, her brows slightly furrowed.

How did he score so high?

But she didn't pay it much mind—Chinese was the sort of subject where sometimes you got lucky, and sometimes you slipped up.

Third and fourth period was math class.

When the test papers were handed out, the math teacher was a young teacher with a fiery temper. He threw a fit first, then started handing out the papers, calling students up one by one to get theirs.

When it was Jiang Nian's turn, the math teacher nodded.

"112, not bad. Big improvement."

There were too many math war gods in this class, so Jiang Nian's 112 was basically trash and didn't draw much attention.

Only Zhou Yuting's brows furrowed deeper and deeper, a vague sense of foreboding stirring.

At noon, Jiang Nian found Xu Qianqian and helped her apply medicine again in a quiet spot. Xu Qianqian's deskmate Song Xiyun followed the whole way, stars in her eyes, a shy smile on her face.

Damn it, these people are sick.

In the afternoon, the scores for physics, chemistry, and biology came out one after another.

Jiang Nian's combined science score was exactly 201, about the same as his estimate.