Chapter 306: That's Way Too Cringe

Yu Zhiyi took the key and opened the front door, only to find someone already in the classroom.

"Huh?"

No one responded to her.

She didn't feel awkward either; she closed the front door of the classroom on her own. The cold wind was completely shut out, and the classroom became warm again.

"You guys came this early?"

"Mm, your future self will thank....:" Jiang Nian looked up at Yu Zhiyi for a moment and opened his mouth with a chicken-soup-for-the-soul line.

"Hold it, thanks but no thanks." Yu Zhiyi instantly broke out in a cold sweat, thinking to herself that this hanger-on was getting more and more shameless, launching straight from zero frames with a string of memes, which could often summon a sliver of a divine soul.

Cringey beyond belief.

She just hated Jiang Nian's shamelessness; every time he could precisely step on her sore spot. Then he'd stomp back and forth on the sensitive point, almost becoming muscle memory.

In short, this guy was pure shamelessness.

Yu Zhiyi sat down at her seat and also started doing homework. She had originally planned to finish the homework early yesterday, but after procrastinating again and again, she still had to get up early.

The coming-of-age ceremony was certainly important, but the homework was also due in the afternoon.

Sigh.

Time passed minute by minute, and the classroom gradually filled with more people.

Lin Dong walked into the classroom wearing a small suit, with a coat draped over his shoulders outside. His pretentious aura needed no concealment, and he had no intention of hiding it at all. "Damn, the fog is really thick today."

"It really is, should be a clear day." Sun Zhicheng was also wearing a small suit; right now he felt he looked very handsome and unconsciously struck a pose.

Yesterday he had taken Zhang Xiaofan's electric scooter keyhole and glued it shut with 502 glue, venting his spite thoroughly. When he came in the morning, he had even made a point of taking a look.

Ha, the scooter was still there.

That sense of accomplishment lingered in his heart and refused to fade.

He planned to wait a while until Zhang Xiaofan let his guard down, then scratch up his scooter's headlight and seat to avenge that one kick. The moment he thought about how yesterday, in front of the girls in their class, he had been kicked to the ground by Zhang Xiaofan, his heart ached in twinges. Only revenge!

Revenge! Only that could quench his hatred!

"Yeah, a clear day." Lin Dong didn't leave either; he and Sun Zhicheng leaned together.

He was waiting, waiting for people to gather around so he could chat (show off).

After waiting a while, no one paid him any attention.

He turned his head and saw that the few people in the classroom were all chatting among themselves. Either that, or they were doing test papers, pretending to study seriously, not caring about the coming-of-age ceremony that was about to arrive.

In the group..... the two boys hadn't come, and neither had Chen Yunyun nor Wang Yuhe.

Just as Lin Dong couldn't help but want to strike up a conversation with Jiang Nian, Liu Yang arrived wearing a Korean-style coat. At one meter eighty, he stood between the two of them.

"Brothers, what thick fog."

Lin Dong: '

ii

.. what a load of crap!"

Sun Zhicheng:

The two turned and walked away, suddenly feeling how stupid it was to look for someone to chat with.

Forget it, forget it, better study properly,

At his seat, Sun Zhicheng pulled out the homework he had to do while saying to Lin Dong.

"Honestly, that little prick's clothes really don't look good."

"Right, having time to show off is worse than learning more knowledge." Lin Dong smoothed his hair, said solemnly, "Where there is a share of heat, let it give out a share of light."

Sun Zhicheng turned his head to glance at Liu Yang, who had gone off to chat with girls, and couldn't help nodding forcefully.

"Exactly!"

The two had never been so studious before; mainly because none of the girls they were familiar with had come. Yu Zhiyi had come, but there were quite a few people gathered around her.

Jiang Nian focused single-mindedly on doing his problems, only feeling that the classroom was noisy.

After a while, Li Hua ran in.

Walking in and seeing Jiang Nian doing problems, he went straight for the opening thunder strike. A friend typing on a blue switch lets me sleep peacefully; a brother flipping pages is deafening. What the hell are you grinding for!

Li Hua instantly erupted in a piercing shriek and grabbed Jiang Nian by the collar.

"Why are you studying again? Have you been possessed?!"

"Bro, getting worked up already?" Jiang Nian pushed Li Hua's hand away, glanced at his phone, and said, "It's eight o'clock, I should go get hot water."

Saying that, under Li Hua's shocked gaze, Jiang Nian picked up two thermos cups and prepared to leave.

"Wait, where's your coat?"

Hearing that, Jiang Nian turned around, and his expression turned horrified.

"Can you see through clothes?"

The youth then turned nonchalant and waved his hand.

"Forget it, a free look at the big bird, lucky you."

With that one sentence, he rendered Li Hua completely silent. Li Hua opened his mouth to speak, then closed it, and finally complained.

"Bro, you're way too cringe."

Hearing that, Jiang Nian didn't mind. He thought to himself that if he really had x-ray vision, he'd just watch to his heart's content, turn into Tang Maru in a month, and fast-forward to not eating seafood.

"I'm off, play by yourself."

Of course he knew what Li Hua meant; it was just that the trench coat was truly chuunibyou. It did look good, but it could only be worn out on specific occasions.

It was like how someone in the class had a personal signature that read, "Suddenly a familiar heart crossed my mind, and looking back, the rivers and mountains were already autumn."

At first read, a faint melancholy and pretentiousness came rushing at you. In fact, this line was adapted from Gong Zizhen's "Poems Written in the Year 1839."

Jiang Nian didn't want to be that "pretentious," at least not before the coming-of-age ceremony began.

Outside the school.

"Bang!!"

Zhang Ningzhi pulled Yao Bei Bei out of the car, closed the door, and said to the person in the driver's seat.

"Dad, we're off."

The two of them, Zhang Ningzhi and Yao Bei Bei, were wearing ancient-style dresses. Over them they wore down jackets that didn't reach past their calves, so only the classically elegant hems of the dresses were visible.

Zhang Ningzhi was too embarrassed to dress like that alone, and even with the down jacket covering her she still didn't dare, so she simply arranged with Yao Bei Bei to come to school together.

"Bye-bye." She waved quickly.

"Bye-bye, take your time." Zhang Wanhai also waved happily, and only after seeing his daughter and her classmate enter the school did he drive off.

For some reason, he thought again of his daughter's desk-mate.

That blond kid... no, that young man actually looked pretty decent. He wasn't slick-tongued either. Hopefully they could get along fine as classmates.

"Wait for me, Beibei." Zhang Ningzhi was a little out of breath walking, her heart pounding. The closer she got to the Gao San building, the more nervous she grew—she was about to see him.

Jiang Nian had wandered around the third floor for a while, and not seeing Xu Qianqian, immediately started muttering.

"Why haven't those two come yet? What time is it?"

If he had slept in the same room as them last night, he would definitely have woken them up on time.

After all, his biological clock was more accurate than an alarm clock. With great power comes great responsibility. This little hardship he could still bear. What a pity he didn't mention that he had deliberately glanced once more into Bande Sect's classroom, where he saw Zhou Haifei buried in her work.

Still wearing her school uniform, black-framed glasses on, behind a tall stack of books.

Zhou Haifei seemed to sense something and was about to look up. But she forcibly stopped that instinctive motion, as if she'd seen something filthy.

Then she went on pretending to bury herself in her work.

Jiang Nian was speechless. Pretending you can't see me, huh?

Fine, you're tough.

He was only looking casually, and turned and left.

Zhou Haifei, after Jiang Nian left, also quietly let out a breath of relief behind her towering stack of books. That guy was a little off, but definitely not someone to provoke.

Even though she didn't think Jiang Nian was a bad person—on the contrary, he was probably the fierce-but-good type—her instincts told her it was best not to provoke him.

After all, there was the poverty subsidy, and the scholarship the school had set up.

That support was enough to carry her through until the end of the college entrance exam. After that she'd pick up a summer job to scrape together tuition, borrow a little from her aunt, and pay it back slowly once she got into college.

As for student loans, they probably wouldn't agree to let her take one out.

But it didn't matter. She'd looked into it. Universities had scholarships—in fact, if she got into a certain university, she might even be able to have her tuition waived entirely.

So her instinct told her it was best not to get involved with anyone in Zhennan besides her aunt. After all, in the end, she still had to cut ties.

Break out of the cocoon and become a butterfly.

She was holding on with that one breath; the only straw she could grasp was her grades.

Otherwise, it would be very hard to survive.

Sunlight fell on the fourth-floor stairwell.

"Hey! Jiang Nian!" Yao Bei Bei called out to someone on the stairs.

"Oh oh..." Jiang Nian turned his head, his expression visibly lighting up. "Baby Zhizhi, you're so late? Here, your thermos. And Huang Beibei."

"Also early."

Yao Bei Bei immediately blew her top and landed a hard punch on Jiang Nian.

"Damn it, my surname is Yao!"

Hearing that, Jiang Nian hesitated for a moment and asked, puzzled.

"Starry Glory rank? Your tier's a bit low."

"I'll push you down from the fourth floor!" Yao Bei Bei instantly turned love into hatred, transforming on the spot into a venomous woman. "I'll punch you into next week!"

"Stinky Beibei, if you can't have me you'll destroy me?" Jiang Nian said with a grin, immune to Yao Bei Bei's damage. "Your love is too damn heavy."

Zhang Ningzhi watched them bickering on the stairs and couldn't help covering her face.

Sunlight swept across her plain little face, revealing her pearly teeth.

"Come on, don't block other people's way."

At this spot on the stairs going up, the sunlight was blinding.

She couldn't help squinting her eyes. Then, realizing something, she reached out to take the thermos.

"Oh oh, thanks."

She couldn't see clearly and could only grope blindly, and ended up touching his hand. The back of his hand and fingertips were a little cold, and then the thermos was tucked into her hand.

The next second, she felt her hand wrapped by another hand.

The palm was very hot, unusually so. It touched the back of her hand briefly, then let go.

When Jiang Nian did this, he was still splitting his attention to horse around with Yao Bei Bei.

"Stop seeking revenge, let's go upstairs."

To be fair, Huang Beibei was pretty cute when she broke down.

Jiang Nian went up to the corridor, and only when he turned his head did he notice the hems of their dresses peeking out from under their knee-length down jackets. He realized there was more to their outfits than met the eye.

"What kind of dresses are you wearing? Are they nice?"

"They're nice." Zhang Ningzhi pressed her lips together and smiled. "They're dresses, um... modified ones, ancient-style dresses."

"Let me see." Jiang Nian said.

"Crude man." Yao Bei Bei attacked.

"Starry Glory girl." Jiang Nian countered.

Zhang Ningzhi's face immediately flushed. "Wait a bit, this is the corridor. Let's talk about it when we get to the classroom."

"Alright." Jiang Nian agreed readily.

The girls' dormitory.

Chen Yunyun put on light makeup, having learned it from a girl in another dorm room. That girl didn't do full makeup either; light makeup was what she was best at.

Because in winter she could wear it often, and unless someone got close, they'd never notice. People would just think, "Oh wow, your skin looks so good today."

Chen Yunyun's bare face was already a crushing-tier beauty, and after the light makeup she looked as if she'd had a photo edited.