Chapter 63 (Extra 3)
When the class bell rang, Lu Yao started tossing items from his desk into the drawer. “Are you okay on your own?”
No response.
He glanced over and realized Yu Le was actually talking to him, confused, “It’s okay, right? What could be the problem?”
Lu Yao looked at him for a moment, took out his phone, and opened the class group chat. He found the contact card for Yu Le, whose avatar was Pikachu, and sent a friend request.
“If you need anything, message me on WeChat.”
He put away his phone, stood up, and his height, which had long surpassed 180 cm, gave Yu Le the feeling of being enveloped under his wings.
Being tall is really nice.
Yu Le nodded, twirling his pen as he watched Lu Yao leave the classroom with his hands empty. As he put down his pen and prepared to leave as well, two boys from the podium suddenly called out to him, “Yu Le, are you a boarder?”
Yu Le shook his head instinctively. Just as he was about to say “No,” he remembered that he had transferred and was now a boarder with his dorm bed all set up.
Lu Yao wasn’t a boarder.
So, when he asked if Yu Le was okay alone, it was because he would be going home, and Yu Le would have to stay at school alone.
This feeling was quite new. Was he being treated like a child by a peer?
The students at the podium laughed, “Why are you shaking your head and nodding at the same time? Are you dumb?”
Yu Le smiled, “No, I mixed it up. I’m a boarder, in room 305.”
The boy’s eyes widened, “Oh! We’re boarders too. You took the bed by the balcony, right? Then we’re roommates. Let’s go, let’s go, we’ll go to the cafeteria and celebrate!”
Boarders had evening self-study sessions from 7 PM to 9 PM.
Dinner was at 6 PM, and Yu Le’s new roommate took him on a tour around the school, showing him where the four convenience stores were located. By the time they returned to the classroom, it was nearly time.
When the non-boarder students had all left, there were fewer boarders, so for easier management by the supervising teacher, three classes were usually combined into one to fill up a classroom.
The empty seat left by Lu Yao was filled by his new roommate.
The roommate piled up the books from Lu Yao’s drawer on the desk, attempting to build a fortress so Lu Yao could mess around behind it.
Yu Le saw that Lu Yao had left all his Five Three workbooks on the desk. Remembering how Lu Yao had left empty-handed in the afternoon, Yu Le randomly picked up a book. It was almost pristine, with only a few formulas scrawled messily for the occasional final big problem.
According to what he learned today, teachers often assigned five exercises.
“Doesn’t doing nothing get him scolded?” Yu Le murmured in shock.
His roommate turned around, “You mean Brother Lu? No way. Brother Lu is a hexagon warrior. Doing homework is just a waste of time for him. The teachers know this, so they turn a blind eye.”
Yu Le didn’t understand, “Hexagon warrior? What does that mean?”
The roommate proudly explained, “He’s a genius in all six subjects—Chinese, Math, English, Physics, Chemistry, and Biology. He’s always ranked first in the grade, far ahead of the second place, like there’s a gap. Got it?”
Yu Le was astonished. He thought Lu Yao was just good at math and English, but didn’t realize he excelled in every subject. “But isn’t he a school bully?”
The roommate laughed, “That’s a stereotype, right? Don’t blame you. When we first became classmates, we thought the same. Everyone thinks that those who fight and skip classes are definitely bad students. Especially someone like Brother Lu, who skipped the most classes and fought the hardest, seemed like he looked down on everyone.”
“So when he topped the grade with almost full marks in the first monthly exam, everyone was shocked, including the teachers.”
“They couldn’t believe such a typical troublemaker could score so high. They checked the exam room surveillance repeatedly and even suspected leaked questions. They almost prepared another set of papers for Brother Lu to solve, but Old Liu firmly opposed it.”
“After that, the teachers began testing him subtly and discovered that this so-called troublemaker wasn’t incapable but simply too lazy to do homework. The problems we thought were unsolvable, he could answer with a glance. The gap between people is sometimes undeniable.”
Yu Le felt his worldview was being challenged.
From a year ago when Lu Yao bought him ice powder during a wall-climbing truancy, Yu Le had suspected that this academic prodigy might be exceptional, but he didn’t realize just how exceptional.
“Surprised?” The roommate noticed Yu Le’s expression and proudly said, “That’s just the tip of the iceberg. Brother Lu is amazing in many ways. Sometimes I even suspect he’s an AI robot. How else could someone be so good at everything?”
“And don’t be fooled by his high and distant demeanor. He’s genuinely righteous. Previously, there were some local thugs hanging around the school gate, collecting protection fees. After Brother Lu taught them a lesson, they didn’t dare come back. Everyone praises Brother Lu as a hero.”
“Shen Yu, the one who’s always with Brother Lu, you wouldn’t believe that he once gathered several school leaders to gang up on Brother Lu, only to be beaten and left on the ground. The next day, they were all begging Brother Lu to take them in as underlings—”
“Hey, hey, that boy in the back, what are you doing?”
The teacher tapped the podium, “I’ve been watching you for a while. Why are you chatting so long? Do you want to come up and share with everyone?”
The roommate quickly retracted his neck and smiled at the teacher, “No, we were just discussing chemistry problems.”
Teacher: “Finished discussing?”
Roommate: “Yes, thoroughly.”
Teacher: “Then be quiet and focus on self-study. Don’t disturb other students.”
Roommate: “Understood.”
Yu Le’s former classmates had been lively tagging him in the class group chat:
[@Yu Le, first day at school, missing Fishy/crying]
[So bitter, family. We have early reading at 7 AM. Is this high school or hell?]
[Five days of classes a week, one and a half days of exams, half a day of rest, and still have to do homework. Ahhh, I’m going crazy!]
[@Yu Le, how’s the new school? How are the new classmates?]
[Xuan Middle’s college entrance rate is famous for being high. @Yu Le, do you have early reading at 6 AM?]
Yu Le replied to each:
[@All members, I miss you too/crying]
[The new school is great. You can even lie on the corridor and watch the sunset.]
[The new classmates are great too, full of enthusiasm like a fire.]
[No, early reading is at 8:30 AM, school ends at 5 PM, evening self-study is only for boarders, and it’s just two hours.]
[???]
[I’m going crazy!]
[I’m calling my parents right away. I want to transfer schools!!!]
[But if the corridor isn’t closed, won’t ice shards blow in and freeze people to death?]
[Calm down, Xuan City is in the south. No ice shards.]
…
They were spamming so quickly that Yu Le couldn’t keep up. Just then, his former deskmate privately messaged him:
Deskmate: [On the first day of school, did you make any new friends, darling?]
Yu Le: [Yes, lots of them.]
Deskmate: [Hehehe, that’s good!]
Deskmate: [By the way, I checked the forum for your new school today and noticed that a lot of posts related to that Lu school bully have been deleted. What’s up with that?]
Yu Le: [I don’t know either. Maybe the forum’s new rules don’t allow rumor posts?]
Deskmate: [I have a feeling this Brother Lu isn’t simple. Just from the way things are going, he might be even more trouble than the ones at our school. Be careful and avoid provoking him. I’m afraid your head won’t be enough if he gets mad.]
Yu Le: [That’s not…]
Deskmate: [Of course, I know you wouldn’t provoke him, but with over 300 girlfriends, if you accidentally annoy one, she might complain to him, and you’ll be in big trouble.]
Deskmate: [Just in case, I’ll try to get you a list of his girlfriends, preferably with pictures, so you can recognize them. You’re too conspicuous; even if you behave, trouble might find you.]
Yu Le: [Calm down. Lu Yao isn’t the type you think he is/ wiping sweat]
Deskmate: [Lu Yao?]
Yu Le: [Yes, the Brother Lu you’re talking about. He’s really a good person, unlike those troublemakers at our school! I guarantee it!]
Deskmate: [How do you know?]
Yu Le: [Because I’m in the same class with him now, and we’re desk mates/
adorable jpg.]
Deskmate: [???]
Deskmate: [Damn, my successor is actually him?]
Yu Le: […You’re being dramatic.]
Yu Le: [He’s not super strong. Although he’s good at fighting, he doesn’t just randomly beat people up. He only targets those who deserve it. The posts on the forum are just nonsense. And, by the way, he doesn’t have over 300 girlfriends—he doesn’t even have one.]
Yu Le: [Also, you wouldn’t believe it, but he’s the top student in our grade. First place, with a clear gap from the second place. He’s truly a top student and extremely impressive.]
Yu Le: [And he’s incredibly handsome/thumbs up/thumbs up]
Deskmate: [??? Is this a campus movie or something?]
Deskmate: [Wait, it’s only the first day of school, and you’ve been with him from 8 AM to 6 PM. How come you’re so captivated?]
Deskmate: […How handsome is he? Can you send a photo?]
Yu Le suddenly remembered that he hadn’t accepted Lu Yao’s friend request on WeChat.
He quickly went to accept it. Lu Yao’s Moments didn’t have any visibility settings like “three days” or “six months,” but since he rarely posted, there weren’t many updates. There were no photos, but a Samoyed appeared frequently, sticking out its tongue and smiling adorably.
Yu Le: [I don’t have a photo of him.]
Deskmate: [No problem, just take one tomorrow!]
Yu Le: [Forget it, maybe later.]
Deskmate: [Why?]
Yu Le: [After all, I’ve only known him for less than ten hours, so we’re not very familiar/ hands joined in prayer]
Ten minutes later, Yu Le, avoiding the teacher, took a high-definition photo of the fill-in-the-blank section of his math test and sent it to his new deskmate, who he still wasn’t very familiar with, along with a Pikachu facepalm emoji.
Less than a minute later, he received the solution process for the first problem, written on a draft paper—though it wasn’t actually a draft paper, but the back of some appliance’s instruction manual.
That was fast.
Yu Le called it “Brother Lu Speed”!
Yu Le: [Brother Lu, are you studying too?]
On the other end, Lu Yao was sitting in front of his computer, using his left hand to maneuver his game character in combat, while his right hand fluidly wrote out the solution for the second problem.
A new message popped up on his phone. Lu Yao glanced at it, took a photo with one hand, and replied with a single character: [Mm.]
Yu Le felt reassured; oh, even top students need to study. He wondered how someone could do so well without studying at all.
Lu Yao: [Use as reference, don’t copy.]
The other side didn’t reply, and Lu Yao didn’t pay it much mind.
Two minutes later—
Yu Le: [The teacher just came by my desk and hovered around for a while, scared me.]
Yu Le: [Okay! Thanks, boss! /rose /rose]
The screen dimmed and lit up again as Lu Yao, stretching his fingers, glanced over. He could almost imagine Yu Le sitting with his phone hidden, staring at his test and pretending to be engaged, a faint smile tugging at his lips.
Such a small courage.
At 9 PM, the bell marking the end of evening self-study rang sharply across the campus.
As students packed up noisily, the teacher walked out of the classroom, cup in hand, in a happy, off-duty stride.
Yu Le headed back to the dorm with his three roommates.
Unlike in the morning, now it was dark, the dorm was full of his roommates, and there was a lot of noise from boys playing around outside the dorm entrance. He finally had a real sense of living at school.
It was surprisingly refreshing.
The school turned off the electricity and lights at 10 PM. After they took turns washing up, they still had nearly an entire class period’s worth of time left to hang out.
So, at their enthusiastic invitation, Yu Le eagerly joined the thrilling and intense team game of “Tiger and Wolf Formation.”
Yu Le: “My skills with the knife aren’t very good, is that okay?”
Roommate 1: “No problem, I’m very skilled. Just relax and let me handle it!”
Roommate 2: “Yu Le, you can stick with me. I’m great at staying alive!”
Roommate 3: “Stick with me! I have a strong premonition this round is going to be great!”
Then, within less than five minutes of starting, the whole team was wiped out.
The roommates were quite embarrassed, but Yu Le was very happy: “Get ready, guys, let’s keep going.”
He didn’t care about winning or losing; as long as it was fun, he preferred playing with friends to solo queuing.
Seeing this, his roommates blinked and smiled too.
Who wouldn’t like playing with a nice, good-tempered, and good-looking new roommate?
Of course, no one!
“Charge!”
“I have a strong premonition!”
“I’ll play well this round!”
Sitting cross-legged for too long made Yu Le’s legs sore. He stacked his green dinosaur plushie on his pillow, scratched his neck, leaned back comfortably, and felt much better.
When the latest game was down to the second circle, Roommate 1, diagonally opposite, suddenly chuckled.
Roommate 2: “Why are you laughing like that? Did you find some gold?”
Roommate 1: “A lot of people are asking to play with me, hehehe.”
Roommate 1 was known in their class as a social butterfly. Among the twelve classes in their grade, there wasn’t a class he didn’t have acquaintances in.
Roommate 3: “Hmph, tell them we’re full, and no one’s joining tonight.”
Roommate 1: “Got it, just showing off. Let me take a screenshot.”
As the number of reservations kept increasing, Roommate 1 took a screenshot just as another reservation avatar popped up. When he saw who it was, he grinned, minimized the game, and quickly sent a screenshot through WeChat.
Roommate 1: [Image]
Roommate 1: [Too many people want to play with Yu classmate. Brother Lu, you’re currently last in line and will have to wait, hahahaha!]
Lu Yao: [Full?]
Roommate 1: [Yeah, our dorm has four people, just enough.]
Lu Yao: [Mm.]
Lu Yao was not only good academically but also excelled in other areas, including gaming. So it was unusual for him to actively apply to join a team; usually, others begged him to play.
Roommate 1 found it interesting: [Brother Lu, I’ve noticed you’re quite special to the new students? Did you know them before? Old friends?]
Lu Yao: [No.]
Roommate 1: [Then why?]
Lu Yao: [Old Liu.]
Roommate 1: [Oh! Old Liu asked you to take care of the new students, right!]
Lu Yao: [Mm.]
Roommate 1: [I see, Brother Lu, you’re really thoughtful, even taking care of them while gaming. That’s nice! I like it! Hehe.]
Lu Yao: [You’re dead.]
Roommate 1: [Huh???]
“Dog hair!! What are you doing?!!”
Roommate 2 shouted angrily, “You’re just standing there eating grass while I’m swinging my knife right in front of you!”
Roommate 1 was startled and quickly switched back to the game. Too late—he was already out.
Amidst the cries of anguish, the spectator count in the upper right corner dropped from 1 to 0.
Yu Le, hiding in the bushes with Roommate 2, laughed uncontrollably. Suddenly, his back started itching intensely, making his smile contort as he scratched his back.
Gaming was a great way to pass the time, one game after another, and only three minutes were left before lights out.
“Be quieter after lights out. The dorm supervisor will come around to check.”
“Seems like there’s a new supervisor? You’ve got someone behind you!”
“Okay, dead, how do you know the new one isn’t an advanced version?”
“Good point. Yu Le, lower your phone brightness. Watch out for light leaking through the door crack.”
The three of them chattered away. It wasn’t until they noticed Yu Le hadn’t said anything for a while that they wondered if he had fallen asleep. Then they heard a faint voice from the bed by the balcony, “Hey guys, I’m feeling really dizzy.”
“Huh?”
“Are you just really tired?”
“Idiot, dizzy from being tired? Must be the game making you dizzy in 3D, right?”
Yu Le lay by the bed, “My back itches a lot, and my head feels so hot…”
“?”
“???”
“Oh no?!”
A commotion followed, with someone almost falling down.
Half an hour later, Yu Le was at the nearest People’s Hospital from the school, sitting on a hospital bed with an IV drip, looking listless with his eyes closed.
The doctor came over to explain some precautions for allergies and then said, “Fortunately, it was discovered in time and isn’t too serious. You’ll be able to go back after this IV drip is finished.”
Roommate 1 nodded and went downstairs to get medicine with the list, since the dorm supervisor was there.
While waiting for the call, his phone vibrated. He took it out to check—it was a message from Lu Yao, telling them not to keep Yu Le out too late.
It turned out that the incident had occurred suddenly, and they hadn’t even exited the game.
Roommate 1: [No more playing, Brother Lu. We’re at the hospital QAQ]
Lu Yao: [?]
Roommate 1: [Yu Le suddenly had an allergic reaction, itching all over, and is getting an IV drip now. But don’t worry, the doctor said it’s not serious, and he’ll be able to go back after it’s done.]
Lu Yao: [What’s he allergic to?]
Roommate 1: [No idea. He was just lying in bed doing nothing and suddenly had an allergic reaction. We were all scared out of our minds. I was sweating all over when we brought him to the hospital.]
Lu Yao: [He’ll return to the dorm after?]
Roommate 1: [Uh, what else?]
Roommate 1: [Oh wait! We haven’t figured out the allergen. What if he has another reaction when he gets back? Should we stay in the hospital tonight?]
Lu Yao: [Wait, I’ll come over right away.]
