Walking with Yu Bei toward the teaching building, Chen Qingning—the "Dark Witch"—drew no shortage of stares.
The winter morning wind was biting, and Chen Qingning shivered from the cold.
But when it came to style, temperature had to take a back seat. Chen Qingning had a feeling she'd already won the first round—Yu Bei had noticed her beauty.
His startled expression was proof enough.
Like someone who'd accidentally missed half a step on the stairs, Chen Qingning chuckled to herself.
Glancing at the silent wall of a man in front of her, Chen Qingning called out, "Yu Bei-gege, wait for me—"
Yu Bei remained unmoved.
Bored by the lack of reaction, Chen Qingning let her gaze wander.
She hadn't looked carefully yesterday, but slowing her pace this morning, she noticed that Baihe Special School wasn't large. In front of the teaching building were the playground and outdoor activity area. The playground was different from regular schools too—the track was noticeably smaller, and the lawn was probably covered in artificial turf, which, at this time of year, still gleamed an almost glaring oily green.
It was eight o'clock, and parents were trickling in with their children.
A boy nearly as tall as Chen Qingning ran toward the corridor. He had a buzz cut, a lean face, and wore a royal blue down jacket. The moment he saw Yu Bei, he stopped, smiled, and made strange guttural sounds at him.
Yu Bei gave a slight smile and made a thumbs-up gesture.
The boy glanced at Chen Qingning a moment longer, then with a curl of his lips, scampered off.
Before going upstairs, he looked back at her again.
Chen Qingning beamed with satisfaction. "Even your students think I'm pretty—they can't stop looking back."
Yu Bei said nothing.
Chen Qingning ground her teeth, feigning curiosity. "What did he say?"
Yu Bei turned his head.
The wind was strong, blowing open his already short bangs and revealing a pair of sharp, well-defined brows. "Good morning."
Chen Qingning's little scheme had worked, and she swayed her head smugly. "Bonjour~"
Yu Bei averted his gaze.
Chen Qingning pretended not to notice his reaction. "Why did you give him a thumbs-up just for saying good morning? Why do you give everyone else so much emotional validation?"
Yu Bei looked straight ahead. "Don't you do any preparation before class?"
Chen Qingning rattled her bag dramatically. "I did prepare."
The noise from inside sounded like a cluttered storage room.
Yu Bei offered no comment.
"It was sign language," he said, making a quick gesture. "Good morning."
Chen Qingning hadn't caught it at all. "Can you slow down? Show me again at 0.5x speed."
Yu Bei didn't grant her extra request.
What a difficult man—hard hands, hard mouth. One day I'll crack you open, shell and all.
Chen Qingning grumbled inwardly as she slowly climbed to the second floor. The special school's office building and teaching building were connected in an L-shape. From the window, she could see more people at the school gate—parents mostly dropping off kids by bike, people of all sizes saying goodbye, security guards keeping order. Chen Qingning paused for a second. Seen like this, it didn't seem much different from a regular school.
She noticed the name of the teaching building at an angle from the corridor window.
Three bold, three-dimensional characters in running script, aligned vertically, hanging high on the building: Nianzhen Hall.
"Why are your school building names named like a temple?" she couldn't help but complain.
Yu Bei glanced at her.
His gaze was somewhat complicated. Chen Qingning protested, "What?"
Yu Bei lightly knocked on the office door. When no one answered, he pushed it open. A female teacher was bent over her desk, deeply focused. Light and wind rushed in together, snapping her back to attention.
"Teacher Yu, morning." She looked up to greet him.
Yu Bei nodded. "Morning."
She noticed Chen Qingning behind him and stood up with a smile. "Hello there, Teacher Chen."
Chen Qingning was surprised. "You know me too?"
"Yes." She smiled warmly.
Chen Qingning shot Yu Bei a look.
She'd figured it out now.
In this school, only Yu Bei treated her like a threat. Everyone else treated her like a celebrity.
Chen Qingning trotted over to the teacher's desk, turning into a student who knew exactly how to charm. "Teacher, teacher, what's your name?"
"I'm Yu Wenlei. Just call me Sister Yu."
"Sister Yu—" Chen Qingning pursed her lips. "I can tell you're a really great sister who knows how to look after a younger girl, unlike some brothers…"
Yu Wenlei's smile stiffened slightly, unsure how to respond.
Chen Qingning, however, showed not a trace of awkwardness. She clicked back over to Yu Bei's desk on her stiletto heels—heels sharp enough to poke holes in the floor like a honeycomb—and focused on making his life difficult. "Where do I sit, Brother Yu?"
Yu Wenlei was glad she hadn't just taken a sip of the hot water she'd poured.
Yu Bei scanned the office, confirmed there were no empty seats, then stood up and cleared a small section of his desk. He fetched a red plastic stool folded against the wall and set it down. "Sit here for now."
Chen Qingning eyed the stray stool that had somehow escaped the banquet table. "I don't even get my own seat?"
Yu Bei, rarely, cracked a joke, holding his ground. "Want me to give you mine?"
Chen Qingning replied with composure, "That works too."
Then, as if granting a favor, she lowered her lashes and gestured them toward Yu Bei's chair. "Swap with me—I want the one with a backrest."
Yu Wenlei watched the scene, caught between laughter and tears, and stood up again. "Miss Chen, let me find you a chair from next door."
"No," Chen Qingning shook her head. "I want his."
Yu Bei didn't argue. He gave her his chair.
Chen Qingning pressed her advantage: "I want to sit on the inside, against the wall, otherwise I won't feel safe."
Yu Bei said nothing, adjusted the chair and stool, let Chen Qingning in, and sat down himself.
He showed no sign of impatience, picked up the textbook beside him, pulled out a blank form from within, clicked his gel pen, and began filling it out with brisk strokes.
Chen Qingning gave a light scoff and said in a voice only the two of them could hear: "That's what happens when you care too much about saving face. Care too much about face and you live tired, you can't win—you know that?"
Yu Bei acted as if he hadn't heard, his pen tip never pausing, a steady rustling rhythm.
The moment Chen Qingning heard that sound, she wanted to sleep—it was a hypnosis device. She let out an audible yawn, picked up the handbag at her feet, rummaged through it with a clatter for a good while, and fished out a palm-sized compact.
The glints on the case were like golden ladybugs, occasionally flickering onto Yu Bei's face. He frowned and looked up.
He saw the girl fold the thin powder puff, press it close to her nose wings, then check her tongue coating.
Yu Bei was speechless.
Just then, Chen Qingning lifted her eyes from behind the round mirror. Their gazes met, and she showed Yu Bei her tongue a second time—bleh—utterly cocky, without a trace of shame.
Yu Bei lowered his head and continued filling out the form.
Chen Qingning snapped the mirror shut with a click, her patience gone: "When are we going to the cl—"
Before she could finish, the office broadcast rang out, and a louder melody swirled across the campus—the morning assembly reminder.
The special school's morning schedule was similar to a regular school's: the homeroom teacher arrived, held a brief morning assembly, then led the students to the playground to line up for exercises.
"Just ten minutes?" On the way to the classroom, Chen Qingning was extremely dissatisfied with the length of the self-introduction time Yu Bei had given her.
She chattered on endlessly, accusing him of mistreatment: "You're way too harsh on me. Feels like you're deliberately targeting me…"
Yu Bei stopped in his tracks: "The morning assembly is ten minutes total."
Chen Qingning fell silent for one second: "So you gave all of it to me."
Yu Bei neither confirmed nor denied.
Chen Qingning's face-changing skills were number one in Sichuan. She gave a sly smile, eyeing Yu Bei sideways: "Aren't you curious about my self-introduction?"
Yu Bei didn't challenge her, only said: "I think you should know what kind of students you're dealing with."
Chen Qingning was stunned.
He… didn't seem to distrust her entirely.
That flicker of doubt lasted only until they stopped in front of the classroom door. The sign on it was starkly simple—Hearing-Impaired Senior Class.
Just as she was about to enter, Yu Bei tugged her back. He pointed at her, palm facing down, swept it across his chest, and slowly made a "thumbs up" gesture.
Chen Qingning didn't understand.
"'Hello everyone,' in sign language," he explained. "You can greet them that way."
Chen Qingning squinted her eyes flat and let out a disappointed "pfft": "And here I thought you were encouraging me."
Yu Bei didn't respond.
Chen Qingning lifted her chin high: "Teacher Yu, you're too old-fashioned. I have a better presentation."
She strode in with her head held high. What met her eyes were extremely sparse seats—only two rows of students, three in front and four in back, two girls and five boys, leaving a large empty space.
The layout here completely exceeded Chen Qingning's expectations. She turned back in surprise to find Yu Bei, who paused by the doorframe, clearly intending to hand over the stage entirely.
All the students looked at her, varying in age. Some grinned, some only curved their lips, all silent.
The boy she'd met before was also there, sitting in the second row, staring at her without blinking.
Chen Qingning cleared her throat and turned to find the podium. When her eyes landed on the large "WELCOME" written on the blackboard, she froze again, then stepped up onto the platform.
Biting her lip at the electronic screen in the middle, she tossed her bag onto the podium, then pulled out a thick stack of paper sheets and smoothed them out as if no one else were there.
Yu Bei glanced down at his wristwatch.
Once she confirmed everything was in order, Chen Qingning faced the students below, waving both hands rapidly, then alternating heart gestures left and right.
She smiled as sweetly as an idol at the end of a concert.
Strange sounds emerged one after another. Chen Qingning could tell the students were laughing, but it wasn't the laughter she knew—it was scattered, formless syllables and breaths, like they were being squeezed out forcefully, some high, some low.
It sounded uncomfortable, even a little eerie, like accidentally tuning into a radio on the wrong frequency. Chen Qingning was surrounded by a mass of the unfamiliar.
She lowered her hands.
A flash of an image crossed her mind—the greeting Yu Bei had taught her in advance. The motion was simple, not hard to remember.
Better to make a mistake than to be ordinary.
Chen Qingning stroked the edges of the white papers in front of her, then raised them high in one decisive motion.
—These were her handmade PPT, thrown together overnight. The paper was borrowed from Qu Xiao. Deciding plain black marker wasn't eye-catching enough, she'd gone through an entire lipstick instead.
Symmetrical dimples returned to the corners of her mouth.
On the pure white sheets were her bold, vivid scribbles, flipped through one by one.
Her slender nails were studded with diamond-like glints.
"My name is"
"Chen Qingning"
"As you can see"
"A total beauty"
"Your"
"New"
"Spicy female teacher"
The strange sounds surfaced again, accompanied by her fluid movements and effortless smile. They were quicker now, louder, more distinct than before.
Yu Bei swept his gaze over his students—they were all staring up at the podium with bright, sparkling eyes. After just a few seconds, they turned in unison to look at him, pointing at him, then at the podium.
He raised an eyebrow slightly, following the students' prompts back to the podium, and realized that Chen Qingning's self-introduction had called him out:
"Also"
"Teacher Yu Bei's"
"Top-tier teaching assistant"
The words were just words—straight and even, laid flat on the surface—yet they were incredibly loud, almost noisy.
The classroom was in an uproar too.
Chen Qingning wrapped it up with the final four sheets of paper:
"In the future"
"If anything comes up"
"Feel free to come find"
"Us" became a disorderly chorus of shouts, table-slapping, applause, and stomping feet. Yu Bei fixed his gaze—on the last sheet Chen Qingning smoothed out, there was a big red arrow drawn, pointing unapologetically in his direction.
Yu Bei pressed his lips together. He wasn't sure whether he should play along with her mischief.
But one thing was certain—he didn't want to spoil the fun. The students were delighted, and this morning had indeed become something different because of Chen Qingning.
He didn't move, nor did he say anything to stop it.
The girl, as expected, took advantage of the situation, wriggling with smug satisfaction. She lifted her skirt in a salute to the audience, turning her freshly learned sign language into an exaggerated dance:
"Hello, everyone."