Chapter 5: Lin Tingwan, Jiang Yubai

Monday morning, inside Lincheng Third Middle School.

Jiang Yubai shook the water droplets off his black umbrella and casually slipped it into the umbrella stand by the classroom door.

Due to his home being relatively far away and the rainy weather, by the time he arrived at school, more than half the students were already seated. A few girls had pulled up small stools, gathering in twos and threes to gossip in hushed tones. In the back row, several boys were sprawled over their desks, writing furiously—obviously making a last-minute dash to finish their weekend homework.

Jiang Yubai scanned the room, his gaze unconsciously landing on a figure sitting near the podium.

Lin Tingwan wore a clean, crisp sky-blue school uniform. Her back was perfectly straight, her head slightly bowed as she focused intently on the open textbook on her desk.

As a private high school, Lincheng Third Middle School had relatively lax uniform regulations and didn't force students to wear them every day. Consequently, many appearance-conscious students quietly played their own little styling tricks within this limited freedom. Girls would tie delicate, thin bow ties around their shirt collars, or swap their uniform pants for better-fitting, dark straight-leg trousers. The hems would be slightly cropped, revealing a glimpse of beautifully contoured ankles. Paired with clean white socks and canvas shoes, the look brimmed with youthful energy.

The boys kept it a bit simpler. They either left brightly colored hoodies unzipped or deliberately rolled up their pant legs a fold or two, topping it off with a pair of stylish sneakers.

Amidst all this fashionable fuss, however, Lin Tingwan remained the perpetual exception.

She was almost the only person in the entire class who obediently wore the full sky-blue school uniform every single day. The buttons of her summer uniform were always fastened to the very top, and her jacket zipper was pulled up to her chest. Her baggy uniform pants were ironed perfectly flat, the hems draping obediently over her shoes.

On her, that unadorned school uniform didn't look rigid at all; instead, it accentuated a clean, serene temperament. Outside the window was a gray curtain of rain, and she just sat there, like an isolated, tranquil corner amidst the noisy downpour.

"Jiang Yubai, what are you looking at so intently?"

A smiling voice rang in his ear.

Jiang Yubai snapped out of his daze, only then realizing that Lin Tingwan's deskmate, Zhao Yun, had somehow appeared beside him. He subtly shifted half a step away and casually replied, "Nothing, just spacing out."

After giving a perfunctory answer, Jiang Yubai didn't linger. He turned and headed toward his seat at the back of the classroom.

The moment he turned away, Lin Tingwan, who had been keeping her head down to read, briefly lifted her eyes. She quickly lowered them again, returning her focus to the open pages as if nothing had happened.

Meanwhile, watching Jiang Yubai's retreating figure, a flash of annoyance flickered in Zhao Yun's eyes.

Jiang Yubai naturally had no idea what had transpired behind him. He tossed his backpack onto his desk, casually fished out a still-warm plastic bag from inside, and deftly pulled out a steamed bun, stuffing it into his mouth.

It couldn't be helped. Although the school rules strictly forbade eating in the classroom, for someone like him—who lived far away and wanted nothing more than to dedicate every morning minute to his warm bed—this rule was simply too much of a luxury to afford. As a result, cutting it close every day meant he didn't even have time to eat breakfast at home; he usually just bought something and finished it in the classroom.

As for skipping it altogether? That was impossible.

Putting aside whether he'd have the energy to endure a whole morning of classes on an empty stomach, just the sight and smell of the steaming, fragrant steamed buns, jianbing, and soy milk at the breakfast stalls by the school gates... To Jiang Yubai, who suffered from terrible home cooking and lived in a remote area, it was an irresistible salvation. How could he possibly pass up this meal?

Swallowing the juicy pork bun in just two or three bites, Jiang Yubai licked his lips, still craving more, and reached his hand back into the bag.

Just as he pulled out a second bun, before he could even bring it to his lips, his deskmate Li Yang's familiar, slightly sycophantic voice drifted over from next to him. "Jiang, um... I need an emergency rescue..."

Jiang Yubai didn't even bat an eyelid. He took a massive bite out of the meat bun in his hand with a loud CHOMP, mumbling indistinctly, "Get it yourself. Left compartment."

"Got it! Jiang, you're my second father!"

Overjoyed, Li Yang reached in, fished out a math test paper, and turned back to his own desk to furiously 'reference' it.

Jiang Yubai glanced at the mountain of test papers piled on the desk and said, exasperated, "Couldn't you have picked one from the middle of the stack to copy?"

"No can do. A man has to honor brotherhood," Li Yang said self-righteously, his hands never stopping. "Since I've acknowledged you as my boss, Jiang, I absolutely cannot harbor divided loyalties!"

"Bullshit, you just know my answers are mostly right." Jiang Yubai rolled his eyes.

After swallowing his second meat bun, he wiped his mouth, stood up, and called out to the room, "Those who haven't handed in their math homework yet, hurry up! They're taking down names this time."

The moment his voice fell, the frantic movements of several scribbling figures in the classroom visibly sped up. For a moment, even the frantic SCRATCH SCRATCH of pens against paper grew denser.

Jiang Yubai was about to say something else when, out of the corner of his eye, he suddenly caught a glimpse of a familiar figure strolling down the corridor. Cursing inwardly, he kicked Li Yang's stool.

Li Yang shuddered. As if by conditioned reflex, he grabbed the open Chinese textbook on his desk and slapped it down—SMACK—hiding the two test papers underneath.

The next second, the front door of the classroom was pushed open, and a stern-looking, middle-aged female teacher in her fifties walked in.

"...Why did it have to be Master Zhang?" Li Yang drew in a sharp breath, pulling the Chinese textbook slightly closer to better cover his papers.

The classroom, which had been buzzing with rustling noises, instantly fell dead silent. Whispering students shrank back into their seats. Those who had been blatantly copying homework now lifted their heads, hurriedly using their books as shields.

"Noise, noise, noise! You're the loudest class in the entire grade!" Ms. Zhang slammed her hand on the desk. "Xie Rui, Fei Lixuan, and Fang Yu, bring your test papers up here!"

A few students dejectedly brought up their test papers and consciously stood off to the side.

Watching the students getting reprimanded at the podium, Li Yang felt a layer of cold sweat break out on his back, his voice trembling slightly. "Dad, I owe you my life..."

"You're paying for lunch," Jiang Yubai replied in a low voice.

"No problem! I'll even buy you a bottle of Coke!" Li Yang readily agreed.

Once the caught students had all been thoroughly scolded and left looking humiliated, Ms. Zhang pushed up the gold-rimmed glasses on the bridge of her nose, her tone dripping with exasperation.

"You're in your senior year now! How many days are left until the college entrance exam? Do I still need to watch over you like elementary schoolers, making sure you don't copy homework and that you hand in your papers on time?"

She picked up another stack of freshly graded test papers from the podium and waved them in the air.

"The results of last week's placement test are highly unsatisfactory! The average score has dropped by nearly ten points compared to the second semester of your sophomore year!

"Ten points! Class, improving by just one point allows you to surpass a thousand people! With this single drop, you've essentially surrendered ten thousand spots and let ten thousand people walk right past you!"

The classroom was dead silent, filled only with the pitter-patter of rain outside the window.

Sitting below, Jiang Yubai listened to this speech without a ripple of emotion; he was even preparing to sneak a bite of his final meat bun. To be honest, he could distinctly feel that the difficulty of the back-to-school placement test had been dialed up a notch, clearly intended as a warning shot to put them in their place. The drop in scores was entirely expected.

Seeming to feel that she had hammered the point home, Ms. Zhang paused on the podium, her tone softening.

"I emphasized before that starting this semester, we would be rearranging seats based on the placement test scores and everyone's academic strengths and weaknesses. The goal is to seat students with complementary strengths together so you can motivate and improve alongside each other."

As she spoke, she raised another pre-prepared list in her hand, her gaze sweeping over the various expressions of the students below.

"Everyone, pack up your things. We'll use the morning reading period to sort out the seating arrangements.

"Now, those whose names I call will move to their new seats in order."

Ms. Zhang adjusted her glasses, looked at the list, and clearly read out the first group of names: "First one, Lin Tingwan—"

The classroom quieted for a moment, and many instinctively pricked up their ears.

"—and Jiang Yubai."

SWISH—

Almost the exact second her voice fell, the gazes of the entire class—filled with surprise, curiosity, or teasing amusement—swiveled in unison toward a certain corner in the back row.

At the epicenter of those stares, Jiang Yubai lifted his head with a bewildered expression, half an unfinished meat bun still dangling from his lips.

Huh?