Looking up foreign literature required logging onto overseas websites via a VPN.
Lin Xuechun had bought a VPN installation package on Xianyu, and following the seller’s instructions, she downloaded and installed it. After fiddling with it for quite a while, she still couldn’t connect to the foreign network.
Zhou Xinran and Xu Yang were looking at domestic literature, so they didn’t need a VPN. Only Xi Chenzhou and she needed one.
Her eyelashes fluttered lightly as she secretly glanced across at the person opposite.
Xi Chenzhou was staring at his computer screen, his dark eyes cold and focused. His sharp jaw was slightly tightened, his thin lips pressed together, his expression carrying a natural sense of pressure.
He looked like someone who shouldn’t be disturbed.
Forget it, she’d just figure it out herself.
Lin Xuechun withdrew her gaze and continued fiddling with the setup.
After troubleshooting for a while, she finally discovered that the installation software had been blocked domestically, which was why she couldn’t log in.
She screenshotted the message and sent it to the Xianyu seller, who promptly refunded her.
But she didn’t have the energy to search for another seller and repeat the same steps.
After hesitating for a few moments, she decided to ask Xi Chenzhou for help.
“Ahem.”
“Classmate Xi.”
Xi Chenzhou slowly lifted his eyes and looked at her. There was no impatient expression of being disturbed as she had imagined—just a slight raise of his brow, his gaze asking a question.
Lin Xuechun looked at him with her moist, sparkling eyes, her voice soft: “Um… do you have a VPN account? Could you lend it to me to download two papers? The VPN I bought online won’t log in.”
“Sure. Give me a moment.” Xi Chenzhou moved his gaze back to his computer, his fingers tapping rapidly on the keyboard.
A few minutes later, he stopped his movements and looked up at her, his chin lifting slightly as he said in a calm voice: “Check your WeChat.”
Huh?
Following his words, Lin Xuechun opened WeChat and saw that Xi Chenzhou had sent her several PDF documents.
“I downloaded the papers for your portion. You can just read them directly.”
Lin Xuechun hadn’t expected him to be so thoughtful—he’d even downloaded everything for her without her having to search herself.
“Thank you so much.” Her eyes curved at the corners, her voice light and sweet.
“You’re welcome.”
Xi Chenzhou lowered his eyes and looked back at his own screen, his expression unchanged. But the page of the document on his screen remained unflipped for a long time.
Lin Xuechun opened the PDF to check and found that the papers he’d found were all highly relevant to the content she was responsible for.
She probably couldn’t have searched for them so precisely herself.
Or rather, it would have been impossible for her to judge whether the content of the papers was highly relevant in such a short time.
At the very least, she’d need to spend five minutes reading the introduction of each paper before making a judgment.
Five papers would take thirty minutes.
But he’d only used a few minutes in total.
His English must be really impressive.
Lin Xuechun glanced across at him with admiration, sat up straight, and began reading the papers.
As she read, she opened a small annotation window beside her and jotted down useful points.
Her English was actually pretty good—she’d scored over 130 on the college entrance exam—but reading literature filled with academic vocabulary and long, complex sentences was still somewhat challenging.
As she read, her brows unconsciously furrowed.
One moment she’d bite her lip, the next she’d puff out her cheeks, her screen constantly switching between translation AI software and the PDF.
The PDF couldn’t even be copied directly—she had to take screenshots.
“What’s wrong? Is there a problem with the papers?” Xi Chenzhou had finished reading two papers and looked up to see her puffing out her little face, looking troubled.
Lin Xuechun looked at him, her mouth pouting slightly, her nose scrunching as she spoke: “Several paragraphs have sentences that are pretty hard to understand. I feel like the translation software isn’t translating them very accurately either.”
“Send them to me.”
Lin Xuechun took a screenshot and sent it to Xi Chenzhou on WeChat.
Xi Chenzhou opened it to look.
While he was reading, Lin Xuechun tilted her head, rotating her neck a couple of times to loosen up her stiff shoulders and neck.
A wave of drowsiness washed over her. Her red lips parted slightly as she covered her mouth with her delicate, fair fingertips and let out a yawn.
Xi Chenzhou had just finished reading her message and was about to speak to her when he looked up and caught a glimpse of the vivid red inside her mouth, her pink tongue flashing briefly.
His Adam’s apple bobbed as he suppressed the darkness in his eyes.
“Check your WeChat.”
“Oh.”
Lin Xuechun opened WeChat and saw the sentences he’d translated, along with grammar explanations attached.
“So that’s how it should be translated. No wonder I felt the AI translation didn’t seem right. Your English is amazing, Classmate Xi.”
She looked at him with admiration, her moist almond-shaped eyes sparkling, two small dimples forming at the corners of her lips, delicate and sweet.
“It’s alright.” Xi Chenzhou rubbed his nose awkwardly.
“You really are amazing—no need to be modest. Having lived abroad for so long, can you get a perfect score on the TOEFL?”
“Yeah. Pretty much.”
“Wow! Impressive!”
“Ahem, you can do it too.”
Lin Xuechun shook her head: “Not me. I took the IELTS over the summer break and could only get a 6.5.”
“You took the IELTS—are you planning to study abroad?”
“No, my mom made me take it.”
“Oh.” So she was a good girl after all. Xi Chenzhou raised an eyebrow.
The two chatted for a bit, and Lin Xuechun felt that he wasn’t as hard to get along with as she’d imagined. Though he spoke little, he always answered whenever she asked.
She wasn’t as reserved as she had been at the start, and she was even a little curious about him.
“Xi Chenzhou, how many years did you spend abroad?”
“I went over in elementary school and stayed there through high school.”
“Then… why didn’t you go to college over there?”
Many families in China were killing themselves to get their kids into Ivy League schools in the US—why had he come back instead?
Realizing belatedly that this topic might touch on something private, she quickly added, “Sorry, I was just asking casually. You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to.”
“It’s not that I don’t want to answer.” Xi Chenzhou explained, “My grandparents’ health hasn’t been great, and my parents’ work focus has shifted, so I came back to China.”
“Oh, I see. So are you planning to settle down in China from now on?”
“Yeah. Pretty much.” Life in China was a lot more convenient than abroad these days, and there were more forms of entertainment too.
Lin Xuechun stopped right there, nodded, and withdrew her gaze, looking down at her own computer screen, ready to get back to her homework.
She clicked the mouse, but the screen didn’t respond.
She pressed the keyboard—still nothing.
Huh?
Had it frozen?
Her eyes widened slightly as her fingers rapidly jabbed at the Enter key.
Still no response.
“What’s wrong?” Xi Chenzhou noticed and looked up at her.