Chapter 330: Why Are You Still Cursing People?

Hearing Jiang Nian's outrageous words, Li Hua instantly became a laughingstock.

"Bro, you're being a bit of a joke."

What the hell, a guaranteed win?

Jiang Nian said nothing, snatched the pen from Li Hua's hand, and casually tossed it, drawing a graceful arc through the air.

Clatter—it landed in the black metal pen holder on Ma Guojun's desk.

Li Hua was dumbfounded, unable to speak for a long while.

"Ouch! What the f*ck?"

Ma Guojun directly picked up the thrown pen, and without changing expression, tucked it into his drawer.

"Confiscated."

"You f*cking—!" Li Hua raged, but when he turned to look at Jiang Nian, he found him already immersed in the world of doing problems.

The big fatty didn't bother with him either; he was left all alone.

No love, and no pen either.

"F*ck!" Li Hua let out an angry roar—these people were really too rude!

As soon as class ended.

The classroom instantly livened up; a group gathered in the open area at the back of the room and started happily playing the pitch-pot game.

The vast majority of these people were boys, with only a few girls.

No need to line up, no fuss about it. The main thing was an immersive experience—a bunch of people just tossed the arrows straight from their hands.

"Why can't I get it in?" Yu Zhiyi complained.

"Isn't it simple? Just get closer and it'll work." Sun Zhicheng took an arrow, walked up to the pot, and wanted to show off a bit.

After last week's mountain-climbing fiasco, he didn't stay down for long. Low moods came on fast and passed just as fast.

After all, he was a man who'd experienced online chatting; after enough blows, you stop feeling them.

He called it desensitization to setbacks.

Sun Zhicheng went all-in on breaking the jar—planning to first distance himself from Chen Yunyun. He retreated to the friend line, turned around, and went to play with the others.

He didn't need to go looking either; there were quite a few pretty girls in the class.

The moment he let go, the arrow smacked the edge of the pot and missed.

"Haha, noob!" Yang Qiming pulled no punches mocking him. "Got your brain wrapped in a foot-binding cloth? Looks pretty small to me."

Having lost face, Sun Zhicheng instantly flared up, glaring at Yang Qiming.

"What's there to compare! If you're so good, you do it!"

Clatter—the arrow dropped into the pot.

"It went in! Yang bro's amazing!" Huang Cailang clapped hard, face flushed with excitement, happier than if he'd thrown it in himself.

He knew full well that whenever Yang bro was happy, he loved to treat people—completely without counting the cost.

A pure tycoon, not a crude one—a pure magnate.

Yang Qiming clapped his hands, looking at the petrified Sun Zhicheng with a teasing expression.

"Why so quiet? Did you wrap your little brain around your mouth too?"

Sun Zhicheng's face was full of grievance—getting slapped in the face by Yang Qiming in front of so many girls. His face was completely thrown on the ground.

He could only leave in a huff.

He swore that if he didn't get revenge, he wasn't a gentleman—he would definitely slap back!

Seeing Sun Zhicheng leave, Yang Qiming's upturned lips couldn't be pressed down. He thought, revenge is sweet as f*ck—next time, pay him back!

What an idiot!

The scene at last time's coming-of-age ceremony, at the school gate where Sun Zhicheng stole his thunder, was still vivid in his mind.

Finally... a small grudge repaid!

So, riding his high spirits, he tossed a few more rounds. His precise throws drew everyone's attention, along with exclamations from a few girls.

Yang Qiming instantly felt like he was on cloud nine, thinking he'd soon be representing the class in the competition—looks like he had to practice hard these next few days!

Thinking of this, he stopped throwing.

Instead, he automatically transformed from athlete to coach, starting to condescendingly guide the girls on tossing arrows, every inch the grandmaster.

A few boys were a bit annoyed, muttering among themselves.

"Damn, look at him showing off."

"F*cking dog, he only teaches the girls."

Yang Qiming didn't mind, thinking—is showing off illegal? He happened to see Jiang Nian passing by from the back row, seemingly looking for someone.

He instantly perked up—showing off only meant something in front of someone with good athletic genes, and besides, he could pull Jiang Nian in to share the fire.

He called out, "Jiang Nian, come toss one!"

"No need, I don't know how to play." Jiang Nian waved him off, then walked up to Yu Zhiyi and whispered a couple of lines.

"That physics booklet—lend it to me for two more days?"

"Huh? But I need to read it too, the exam's in a few days." Yu Zhiyi hesitated for a moment, then Ye Yanqing's eyes rolled.

"How about this—you teach me to play pitch-pot, and I'll lend it to you until... Thursday night, fair enough?"

It was Tuesday night now, the exam was Saturday. She only left herself one day to speed-read it—indeed fair enough.

Jiang Nian thought it over and nodded in agreement.

"Alright."

He took two arrows from Yu Zhiyi's hand, pointed at the pot not far in the back row, and said.

"You watch carefully later how I throw it, just learn from that. I won't say you'll get it at a glance, but it'll be as easy as pie."

Yu Zhiyi smiled and nodded.

"Okay."

But she saw Jiang Nian pick up the arrow and turn to leave, and her expression instantly froze. At the same time, a vague sense of foreboding stirred in her heart.

A few seconds later, Jiang Nian, who had walked to the middle of the classroom, didn't look back. He tossed two arrows backward blind, each cutting a curve through the air.

Clang, clang.

The arrows, one after the other, landed precisely in the pot, knocking around inside with two clatters.

In an instant, the people in the back row playing pitch-pot froze.

A501, liberal arts class.

Lü Xuan twirled her pen out of boredom, looking rather absent-minded.

The joint exam was imminent, and the grade group had once again set up a pitch-pot game for stress relief. She had zero interest in it; in her classmates' eyes, she came from a well-off family. Her temperament ran cold, and she wore an unapproachable look all day, but in reality she was spacing out the whole time.

With her mind occupied by things, her face naturally came across as cold.

"That shouldn't be the case—we're clearly in the same class." Lü Xuan muttered to herself, with no heart for this last evening self-study session.

After school, she found Sheng Zeyang.

"Help me ask someone for their QQ."

"Who?" Sheng Zeyang took off his earphones, looking completely baffled. "Male or female?"

"Male."

The moment he heard it was a guy, Sheng Zeyang immediately grew wary and asked tentatively.

"The joint exam is coming up this week, and you're still in the mood for this? Someone I know? Which class?"

Lü Xuan, unsuspecting, said outright.

"The science Olympiad class downstairs, named Jiang Nian. Go ask that Zhang Xiaofan—he should know. Send it to me once you get it."

After saying that, she left, burdened with worries.

Sheng Zeyang remained standing where he was, frowning as he watched Lü Xuan's departing figure. After a while, he slung his bag over his shoulder and left.

He muttered to himself, "That's strange...."

Late at night.

Outside a small alley, Xu Qianqian walked past under a streetlamp with her bag on her back. Jiang Nian followed behind, discussing a math problem.

A moment later, Xu Qianqian turned her head and said.

"Let me tell you something big—you definitely don't know this secret."

"What?" Jiang Nian asked, looking puzzled.

"During the third evening self-study, I went to the bathroom. On my way back to the classroom, I passed the office and heard the teachers talking about someone organizing cheating for the joint exam."

"Oh, really or fake?"

"How would I know? I only caught a few sentences." Xu Qianqian scoffed and hopped forward.

"But... I estimate the joint exam paper difficulty will go up this time."

At this, Xu Qianqian stopped on the concrete alleyway. She turned to look at Jiang Nian behind her and asked worriedly, "I say, can you still score six hundred?"

Hearing this, Jiang Nian's figure stalled, and he corrected her.

"It's six hundred and ten."

"Pfft!" Xu Qianqian couldn't hold it in and burst out laughing. "Keep your last score steady first, will you? They're definitely going to swap the test paper."

"Just two days? And they can still swap the test paper?" Jiang Nian hesitated.

"Our homeroom teacher said so. She called a few top students in for a talk before school let out." Xu Qianqian said, "I heard they've been investigating the cheating for a while now, and it's already been decided that the test paper will be swapped."

"Fine then." Jiang Nian muttered to himself, wondering why Old Liu hadn't told him.

Does he still want the Encouragement Star award or not?

Seeing Jiang Nian dumbfounded, Xu Qianqian couldn't help but curl her lips and offered a half-hearted consolation.

"It's okay, five hundred is already impressive."

The target score she had bet with Jiang Nian was six hundred and ten—she was just deliberately using scores like five hundred and six hundred to numb Jiang Nian.

So that Jiang Nian would subconsciously accept the six-hundred mark, and naturally let his guard down during the exam.

Xu Qianqian was quite pleased with her own cleverness—at this rate, Jiang Nian was bound to lose!

Jiang Nian sighed and shook his head.

"Forget it, I'll go home and play a game first to decompress."

"Mm-hm, balance work and rest." Xu Qianqian nodded, then added, "I'm going to play games when I get home too. Wanna play together?"

"Nah, I'll play on my alt." Jiang Nian waved her off.

A few minutes later, the two went upstairs in sync, turned their keys in the locks. With wordless tacit understanding, they glanced back at each other and shared a wry smile.

Bang! Bang!

The door closed, and Jiang Nian immediately rushed into the bathroom to wash up. He hastily blow-dried his hair, opened his backpack, took out the test papers, and got straight to work.

"Six hundred and ten—who the hell's playing games!"

"Games aren't half as fun as girls. Wait till bro wins, then I'll simp to my heart's content."

Meanwhile, Xu Qianqian finished her shower.

With a beep, she turned the air conditioner to heat, then sat at her desk, switched on the small lamp, and continued her prep, with her phone running a game on idle.

"Pull him down by fifty or sixty points, let Jiang-dog see what a genius looks like!"

Ding-dong!

Lü Xuan glanced at the phone on her desk. First a string of numbers popped up, then Sheng Zeyang sent a flood of messages to claim credit.

He elaborated on how, step by step, Zhang Xiaofan had blocked Jiang Nian. Then he found another person, and after several intermediaries, finally got the QQ.

She glanced at it and replied with one line.

"Thanks."

Sheng Zeyang: "??"

Lv Xuan didn't reply again. She and Sheng Zeyang had been friends for years; there was no need to explain further.

She copied the QQ number and sent a friend request.

When filling in the verification message, she hesitated for a moment. In the end she chose the two words "Old Friend," thinking most people would be curious.

Sent successfully.

After about several minutes, the temporary chat window flickered.

Jiang Yue Nian Nian Wang Xiang Si: "You idiot! (middle finger)"

Lv Xuan was dumbfounded — she had never been cursed at in her entire life. Suddenly unable to swallow the insult, she had already forgotten her original purpose.

Tap tap tap, she typed.

"Why are you cursing people?"

Jiang Yue Nian Nian Wang Xiang Si: "Getting worked up?"

Lv Xuan was indeed a little worked up, but right now she only wanted to reason things out.

"I know you."

Jiang Nian: "What era is this and you're still pulling that line? Don't scammers go to school?"

"I'm not a scammer. I really do know you."

"Know your mom (smiley)."

Lv Xuan hadn't been broken through by any of the earlier lines, but the moment she saw that yellow-face smiley, she was completely done for.