Surprise

Nan Xiuxiu!

Jiang Ran gripped the edge of the desk with his right hand.

Twice in just two hours, he'd run into this girl, and both times the scene had been equally startling... Was she some kind of ghost?

"Why are you here?"

Jiang Ran eyed her warily.

"Were you following me?"

"Following you? That sounds awful!" Nan Xiuxiu protested, planting her hands on her hips.

Jiang Ran said nothing.

He didn't believe her for a second.

If she hadn't been following him, how could she have tracked him across two districts of Donghai so precisely?

It was absurd.

And she'd stood silently outside the door, peeking in. She was suspicious as hell.

"I came because I was worried about you!" Nan Xiuxiu insisted.

"How did you know I was here?" Jiang Ran pressed.

He hadn't answered Nan Xiuxiu's call, and he hadn't told anyone he was going to the Film Club at Donghai University. Without precise location tracking, there was no way she could have found him.

"The dating app!"

Nan Xiuxiu waved her phone.

"Did you forget? The dating app we linked lets us check each other's locations and movements."

"..."

That was news to Jiang Ran.

There was an app like that?

He opened his phone and, sure enough, found it on the second page of his menu. It was called "Love," and its icon showed two hearts pressed together.

He tapped it.

The home screen displayed the huge words [We've been in love for 4 days!], with profile pictures of Jiang Ran and Nan Xiuxiu on either side.

Good grief...

His scalp prickled.

Was that really him?

Jiang Ran began to seriously doubt himself.

He wished he could look in a mirror right then, just to make sure a Worldline Jump hadn't thrown him into someone else's body.

There was indeed a movement history below the app's home screen.

He tapped it and saw his entire route for the day at a glance.

It showed more than just his current location... It mapped every single step in detail, even his sneaking around after crawling through the hole into Donghai University.

He could see Nan Xiuxiu's movements too.

Just like him, she'd taken a taxi from the villa district to Donghai University, then followed the same route he'd taken all the way to the club building.

"What kind of creepy app is this?"

Jiang Ran frowned, immediately wanting to get this app off his phone.

It was suffocating.

Was this what dating was like? It left them not a shred of privacy.

"How is it creepy?"

Nan Xiuxiu huffed.

"It's a record of our love~"

Click.

Jiang Ran locked his phone and stared at her.

"What did you come here for?"

"To apologize." Nan Xiuxiu blinked.

?

That was unexpected.

"What are you apologizing for?" Jiang Ran asked.

"After you left, I called Wang Hao and found out you had a childhood friend named Cheng Mengxue..."

Nan Xiuxiu spoke earnestly.

"I'm sorry. I wasn't joking to be mean."

She put her hands together.

"I didn't mean any harm. You'd never mentioned her before, and I didn't know she'd passed away... Anyway, I said the wrong thing. I hope you won't hold it against me."

Jiang Ran watched her quietly.

Such a sincere, straightforward apology was a surprising contrast to her bold, domineering exterior.

The joke Nan Xiuxiu meant was probably her asking, "Cheng Mengxue—was she your ex-girlfriend?"... She'd just come out of the restroom and heard him say the name while on the phone with Wang Hao, so she'd come over to ask.

To be honest, Jiang Ran hadn't found the remark offensive.

For one thing, he didn't believe Cheng Mengxue was really dead. With the Positron Cannon and the Spacetime Bulletin, she was only "temporarily" dead.

For another, he didn't consider Nan Xiuxiu his girlfriend, nor did he accept that she was. So no matter how much she carried on, Jiang Ran simply didn't care.

"It's nothing."

Jiang Ran said casually.

"I didn't take it to heart."

"Hehe~"

Nan Xiuxiu quickly turned playful again, her mischievous side resurfacing.

"Honestly, you don't have to hide things like that from me. I'm your girlfriend, but I'm not that petty."

"Besides, even if... even if you really did have an ex-girlfriend, I wouldn't mind. We only met at university, so I won't hold anything from before against you."

"But don't run off over something like that again. I was so worried about you in the middle of the night, and you wouldn't answer your phone..."

"Enough, enough."

Jiang Ran cut her off.

"Let's get out of here. The patrol's coming soon."

He really had spotted the school patrol's flashlight in the distance and didn't want any trouble.

More importantly, he didn't want to share these secrets with Nan Xiuxiu.

The Film Club, the Worldline Jump, the Positron Cannon, the Spacetime Bulletin... He didn't want her to know any of it.

So they needed to leave. Now.

They left the activity room. Jiang Ran carefully locked the door, then put the spare key back under the flowerpot before leading Nan Xiuxiu out of the club building.

Once they were outside, the patrol's flashlight was already nearby.

They quickly crouched and took a quiet detour, finally reaching the small woods near the west gate without incident.

"Hey, you still haven't told me."

Nan Xiuxiu poked Jiang Ran.

"You snuck out in the middle of the night, fine, but why come here? What kind of club is that? It's a total dump."

"The Film Club."

Jiang Ran made up an excuse.

"It's a club for film-camera enthusiasts. A friend of mine is in it. I came here to hang out with him once, and I might have left something behind, so I stopped by to look for it."

It was a flimsy excuse, but he couldn't think of anything better, so he stuck to it stubbornly.

"Oh."

Nan Xiuxiu didn't dwell on it.

"How come you've never mentioned it before?"

"Heh."

Jiang Ran chuckled.

"Come on, sis. We've only been dating for [4 days]. I can't exactly give you my whole family tree, can I?"

"That's true." Nan Xiuxiu pursed her lips.

Jiang Ran checked his watch.

"It's late. Let's head back to the dorms."

After all that, it was already four in the morning. They might as well go straight back to the dorms and sleep.

As he spoke, Jiang Ran headed toward the dormitory, while Nan Xiuxiu turned toward the university's west gate.

?

?

They both turned at once, question marks over their heads as they stared at each other.

"Where are you going?"

"Where are you going?"

Jiang Ran pointed south.

"The dorms are this way."

Pfft—

Nan Xiuxiu burst out laughing.

"Dude! You're still out of it! This is Donghai University!"

"Yeah. So what?"

Jiang Ran asked, confused.

He was a student at Donghai University. Where else was he supposed to go but the Donghai University dorms?

"Come on, quit messing around."

Nan Xiuxiu grabbed Jiang Ran by the arm and hurried toward the west gate, then shoved him out through the hole in the railing.

"Where are we going?"

Jiang Ran asked, but got no answer.

Clearly, Nan Xiuxiu couldn't be bothered to entertain that question anymore.

Nan Xiuxiu headed for a taxi, opened the rear door, and pushed Jiang Ran inside.

Then she got in too and shut the door.

"Driver, take us to Donghai Vocational College of Foreign Economy and Trade."

???

Jiang Ran's neck stiffened.

"Why are we going there?"

Nan Xiuxiu looked at him like he was an idiot.

"To go back to our school."

Our school?

Jiang Ran froze.

Donghai Vocational College of Foreign Economy and Trade.

A vocational college?

He sucked in a sharp breath.

"A junior college!?"