Chu Han froze for a moment, then quickly nodded—only to shake her head right after.
“Yes. But not real liking, not that kind of pursuit,” she explained quickly. “It’s more like using methods… getting close to you first, then dumping you, just to get revenge for you beating her last time.”
Xie Chen was silent for a moment.
Then he asked, “How did you know all this? Did she tell you herself?”
“No,” Chu Han’s face burned even more with embarrassment. “I… accidentally heard her talking to someone else.”
“So this was her own idea?”
“Not exactly. It was Yuan Weining who suggested it.”
“And her own attitude is—”
Chu Han remembered Su Yunluo’s quiet, almost helpless sigh at the time and said softly, “She said it was fine. She thought it was a pretty good idea.”
Xie Chen nodded.
He recognized Chu Han as one of the girls who often walked with Su Yunluo. She seemed steady enough—not the type to casually stir trouble.
Then he asked a question that made her even more uncomfortable.
“Why are you telling me this?”
Why?
Chu Han’s face instantly turned even redder.
Standing in front of this clear-eyed boy, the vague thoughts she hadn’t even fully sorted out in her own mind suddenly felt exposed, as if they were being gently pulled into the light by his gaze.
She didn’t know how to answer.
Before she could struggle through it, Xie Chen didn’t press her further. He only looked at her flushed face for a second and seemed to understand how much mental weight this had already cost her.
“Thanks for the reminder,” he said calmly. “But I’d appreciate it if you don’t mention this to anyone else. Can you do that?”
“I… I definitely won’t tell anyone!” Chu Han quickly promised, though bitterness rose in her chest.
Of course. Actions like this always come with consequences. He must think of her as someone who spreads gossip.
She opened her mouth, wanting to explain further, but nothing came out. In the end, she had already done something like that in front of him—there was no way to defend it.
Overwhelmed by shame, she quickly lowered her head and left.
Xie Chen stood where he was, watching her hurried figure return to the stands.
Li Zhe and the others had already noticed he had been called away by a girl. Moments like this always attracted gossip, and a few of them were already sneaking looks over, curiosity obvious in their eyes.
Zhao Shuo lowered his voice. “Brother Chen, what was that about?”
“Nothing,” Xie Chen replied casually.
He picked up his bottle from the seat, twisted the cap open, and took a sip.
The cool water slid down his throat, leaving a faint sense of clarity.
But in his mind, he couldn’t decide whether he felt more amused or disappointed.
Too small-minded.
So that was the so-called “rival.”
This wasn’t something a proud, composed person should be doing.
For the past month, she had seemed quieter, more restrained. He had assumed she was finally seeing the gap between them and stepping back. After all, when the difference in ability was too large, holding back and waiting was often smarter than pointless struggle.
Turns out he had overestimated her “rationality.”
Or maybe he had underestimated her competitiveness again.
A faint, cold smile tugged at Xie Chen’s lips.
Pursue first, then dump?
Use that kind of method on him?
Ridiculous.
Did she really think he was that easy to win over?
He wasn’t Zhou Xubai, who got distracted by romance. During all three years of high school, he had never planned to get involved in anything like feelings or relationships. Even less was he going to become someone who got “conquered” and then discarded.
And more than that—
His gaze darkened slightly.
If she really planned to use something like that on him, had she ever thought about how she would still face Zhou Xubai afterward, with that same dreamy, admiring look?
As for Su Yunluo, she didn’t take Yuan Weining’s “plan” seriously at all.
As for feelings, she didn’t even believe in them herself—so how could she possibly expect to hurt someone else with them?
Her emotional knots couldn’t be solved by “conquering some boy.”
At night, she found it harder and harder to fall asleep. At first, she would just lie there with her eyes open until morning. Later, she felt it was a waste of time, so she would pull the curtain around her bed, switch on a small night light, wrap herself in a coat, and sit up doing problems.
One after another. One set after another. Numbly solving them. Mechanically repeating them.
But it didn’t help.
On the third monthly exam, even with politics, history, and geography included, she was still stuck in the seventies in rank. Then during the winter final exams and the first-year second-semester midterm—when only the science subjects were counted—she dropped to 114th place.
After the midterm of second semester, Su Man came to attend a parent-teacher meeting. Teacher Song gently mentioned that Su Yunluo’s grades were still declining. Su Man was first surprised, but after seeing the scores—Physics 83, Chemistry 86—she relaxed.
“Well, isn’t that pretty good? She’s already better than she was in middle school. Back then she was only getting in the seventies!” she said. “Teacher Song, please continue to take care of her. Her foundation was a bit weak, but she did so well in the entrance exam, which shows she still has potential!”
Su Man didn’t stay long at the school. Recently, both parents had been busy every weekend running around for Zhu Muhuan’s primary school enrollment—pulling connections, sending gifts, hosting dinners, debating whether to choose the experimental primary school or the central primary school, and asking which school had more connections for extra care. After a few hurried words with Teacher Song, she left with her bag.
Su Yunluo took her report card back to her seat and stared at those numbers for a long time.
She thought she should probably feel disappointed.
But inside, there was nothing. Just emptiness.
You need desire before you can feel disappointment. So what did she even want now? To beat someone? To make someone proud? To prove something to someone?
There was no need anymore.
And beyond that—what else? Improve her ranking? And then what? Get into a good university? Find a good job? And after that? Move toward a bright, respectable future?
Future. A path ahead.
For every sixteen- or seventeen-year-old, it seemed like the most important thing in the world. Heavy enough that no one questioned it. Everyone was expected to work hard, to struggle, to push forward.
So she would just work hard then.
Even if she couldn’t sleep all night, she still had to show up in class on time the next day.
She was still always the first one to arrive.
On an early summer morning, before the sky had fully brightened, she stood alone outside the closed classroom door, holding her schoolbag and memorizing vocabulary.
From the stairwell came faint voices and laughter, getting closer. It was a few boys from Class Five.
“Go back to the classroom first, then slip back to the dorm after morning reading to wash up. Perfect timing—Old Sun won’t catch us!”
“If this gets out, Old Sun’s glasses will shatter. Xie God actually stayed up all night gaming with us after climbing the wall!”
“You’ve got to relax after exams. Even top students need balance.”
“Following a top student is stable. Even if we get caught, Teacher Sun will give us some face!”
“A top student’s face isn’t that big,” Xie Chen’s voice came with a light laugh. “If it really reaches the discipline office, even ten top students can’t save you.”
Still that same model-student tone.
As if the person who had climbed over walls in the middle of the night wasn’t him at all.
“Then keep it down—we’re already in the teaching building!”
“Who’s even up at this time—”
Before he could finish, they turned into the hallway and all froze at once.
There really was someone.
It was that top student from Class Six, Su Yunluo.
She leaned quietly against the door, not looking at them, not moving at all.
By now, Li Zhe and the others no longer dared to joke casually when they saw her. That cold, unapproachable aura around her was like frost—enough to make people stop ten meters away. Just like now, Zhao Shuo and Li Zhe instinctively stopped at the front of Class Five, standing behind Xie Chen and shutting their mouths obediently.
After a moment, Li Zhe nudged Xie Chen with his elbow and whispered, “The girl from the next class is basically a walking freezer now.”
Xie Chen looked at Su Yunluo.
She stood very straight, but her body was slightly tense, like a frozen statue. Even the morning light falling on her seemed cold and distant.
Zhao Shuo lowered his voice and added, “I remember last year she even said she wasn’t afraid of Brother Chen. She looked like she was ready to fight you to the end. How come there’s been no movement in the past half year?”
Xie Chen didn’t respond.
He only thought that not only had she stopped fighting him in grades, there had also been no sign of her other “plan”—like pursuing him.
If she really intended to pursue someone, was this even how you did it?
At this rate, she’d freeze the person solid before anything even started.