High School Year One

During the brief half month he spent moving through forests across the country, Su Yan discovered that he had grown nearly three centimeters taller. His limbs were long and strong, and from head to toe, his entire body was flawless. He vaguely felt that he had developed the most standard golden ratio; even his hair was better than before, and even his nails were smooth and gleaming.

His natural complexion was not particularly fair, closer to wheat-colored, so his original skin tone had remained perfectly intact. Su Yan was extremely satisfied. At this rate, he should be able to grow to around 1.85 meters. He was already 1.78 meters tall.

The dozens of plant species he had collected from Zhangjiajie and Shennongjia and transferred into the space had, in a short time, formed a primitive forest within it. Now, whenever Su Yan entered, he could clearly sense that the spiritual energy inside had become denser than before, while the Red Mist had dissipated a little.

He stayed in Shennongjia until the end of August before Su Yan decided to stop. He had harvested an abundance of plants, but very few animals. Those wild animals were too slippery; he could not catch them no matter how he chased them, and if he could not touch them, he could not bring them into the space. After working himself half to death, Su Yan had only caught a wild rabbit, a deer, and a large snake that had unfortunately stepped on him. The result nearly enraged that person to death, and he spent every day nagging that Su Yan was useless. Yet Su Yan refused to argue with him, making even a quarrel impossible. Su Yan did catch quite a few bees, butterflies, and ants to toss inside, along with all kinds of insects and medicinal herbs he happened to spot.

The day Su Yan emerged from the forests of Shennongjia, it was already September 1st. Helplessly, he rushed to school to register on September 2nd, completely late.

High School Year One

Lihua District No. 1 High School, C City, was considered one of the top five high schools in C City. Its conditions in every respect were fairly good.

Su Yan had only ranked around the middle when he tested into this high school. After finding the registration desk, paying the fees, and registering, he happened to find his homeroom teacher, Ma En, nearby. Ma En said somewhat unhappily, "Su Yan, you're in my class. Why are you only arriving today? Everyone has already had a full day of class. Come with me to pick up your books first."

"Thank you, Teacher Ma." Su Yan followed Teacher Ma to the book storage room. Though Teacher Ma spoke coldly, he was actually very kind-hearted. As he led the way, he pointed at the teaching building. "Class Seven is in that building, on the far right of the second floor. They're in their second math class right now. Looking at your score sheet, math is your strong subject?"

"Yeah. I like math."

"Not bad."

They chatted casually, and before long, they had collected all the books. Su Yan was the last student in Class Seven to arrive, so his homeroom teacher personally brought him to the classroom, making an appearance so the classmates could get familiar with him.

Setting foot on the familiar campus again, seeing familiar teachers, a familiar classroom, and familiar classmates, Su Yan smiled faintly behind Teacher Ma.

At the door, Ma En waved to the math teacher who was in the middle of teaching. The math teacher immediately stopped and consciously stepped to the side of the podium.

Ma En pointed to the empty desk at the back of the classroom. "Su Yan, sit there. The seating arrangement will be readjusted in a couple of days."

Holding his books, Su Yan silently walked into the classroom. The only empty seat was at the back of the third row, near the blackboard at the rear. It was actually a good spot, one that many boys would usually like, but Su Yan understood why no one sat there. The girl beside it, Chen Yan, was a complete dinosaur. Su Yan calmly sat down. The classroom was noisy, filled with girls chattering away. Countless eager gazes followed Su Yan, accompanied by quiet murmurs of words like "handsome guy" and "beautiful man."

He had experienced this sort of attention in his previous life too. It was merely the beginning of everything that followed. Because he was handsome, people praised him; because he did not like to talk, they praised him as "cool."

The homeroom teacher quickly left, and the math teacher continued the lesson. He also warmly told Su Yan, "I'm continuing with the example problem in the textbook. If there's anything you don't understand, you can come find me after class."

Su Yan nodded and opened his brand-new math textbook, writing down his name. Then he quietly flipped through it. Math was his strongest subject. In college, he had taken on plenty of part-time work tutoring math, so none of this felt unfamiliar now. It was all knowledge he remembered by heart. After all, he had gotten into a first-tier university back then, and his grades in every subject had been quite good. Even English, the one subject he hated, had been crammed extensively in college because of his enthusiasm for game programming. He had graduated with a CET-6 certificate. Now that he was starting over with first-year high school material, Su Yan felt no pressure at all.

September 2nd was not quite the official start of school, and there were still students who had yet to report, so all four classes that morning were math. Seeing that all the students had arrived, the math teacher stopped delaying and sped up the pace of the lessons. During the break after third period, Su Yan lay on his desk, boredly scribbling and drawing. The math teacher strolled over and warmly asked, "Student, you arrived late and missed some progress. Was there anything you couldn't understand?"

The math teacher was an old man in his sixties, stern yet kind. He was Su Yan's favorite teacher throughout his high school years.

Su Yan hurriedly replied, "I understand everything."

"Oh, that's good." After asking, the math teacher was about to leave when several girls suddenly ran over and asked with bright smiles, "Teacher, are you explaining problems? We want to listen too." As they spoke, their eyes stared fixedly at Su Yan. They exchanged meaningful looks, nudged and shoved one another, clearly wanting to get acquainted with him.

The math teacher was old and had taught for a lifetime. How could he fail to understand those expressions? Student Su Yan was tall and handsome, precisely the sort of person girls his age chased after.