Winning with your hand must be important to you

"Hey, what did you do over National Day?" Jiang Nian played the straight man.

Two days had passed since they moved up to the advanced class, though a three-day National Day break had followed right afterward. Still, not making any friends in your new class yet was taking social anxiety a little too far.

What, were your relatives from the family group chat in this class? Was your homeroom teacher your cousin?

Zhang Ningzhi was a textbook case of social anxiety-the kind who always looked at her phone when walking alone, repeatedly opening different apps to pretend she was busy.

That way, she could avoid making eye contact with anyone. If she could send a text, she would never send a voice message.

If she wanted to order food but the waiter hadn't noticed her, she could spend ten minutes standing there, mentally preparing herself. Eventually, she would muster the courage for a timid, "Hello~ excuse me~"

The kind of girl who couldn't pee if another stall in the restroom was occupied.

"I went to Dali with my parents and saw Erhai Lake." Zhang Ningzhi had finally found someone familiar to talk to, and the young lady seemed especially excited.

"What about you?"

Jiang Nian wasn't an introvert and didn't have social anxiety, but even he hesitated for a second at such an innocent question.

You went to Dali, and I stayed home. What can I say?

Was I supposed to say I successfully conquered lust for three whole days at home without jerking off? Wasn't that super-duper amazing? Congratulations on unlocking the achievement: more self-control than 99% of innocent high school boys!

After thinking it over, he tossed out, "Studying."

That one sentence instantly killed the conversation. Zhang Ningzhi awkwardly changed the subject.

"Where did you go to middle school? No. 1 or No. 2 High School?"

"Second." Jiang Nian wondered, With my grades, do I look like someone from First?

"Yay, I went to No. 2 High School too! Who was your homeroom teacher?" Zhang Ningzhi was delighted that she could keep the conversation going and didn't notice Jiang Nian's peculiar expression.

"Um, you're about to get every answer to my QQ security questions out of me."

Okay, okay, so you're trying to steal my account, huh?

"Ah! Sorry, that wasn't what I meant." Zhang Ningzhi blushed and apologized quietly. "My QQ security questions aren't those, so I didn't realize."

Jiang Nian leaned over his desk, propping his head on one hand as he looked at her with a faint smile.

Baby Ningzhi really couldn't take any teasing. She was already blushing? If I said something dirty right now, she probably wouldn't get any sleep tonight.

"Jiang Nian, stop picking on her." A baby-faced girl walked over and stood on Zhang Ningzhi's side. "Even I can't stand watching this."

Every class had girls who were painfully shy about speaking in front of everyone, but posted online like they were possessed by a pervert. (Hehe, heaven gave me the middle finger, so I held on to it and lowered myself onto it.)

And they'd fucking giggle about it. The moment they opened their mouths in private, everyone's mind went straight into the gutter.

Yao Beibei was that kind of girl. Her unique bubble-gum-blowing technique had prompted Jiang Nian to risk breaking a major rule by taking out his phone in the classroom and adding her on QQ.

When chatting with a girl like her, the first sentence or two would generally be normal. By the third, you had to click "ignore the risks and keep listening."

"That's Jiang Nian for you. Three sentences and you won't know what hit you." His deskmate, Li Hua, had average looks and good grades but was otherwise unremarkable. In short, he came with the "factory default settings."

In graduation autograph books, he listed movies and music as his hobbies (Jay Chou forever). Dating existed only in his imagination. His unattainable first love was a quiet, fair-skinned girl from middle school.

His only distinguishing trait was that he was particularly unhinged. He was the kind who would watch a horror movie and worry someone was under his bed, then simply sleep under the bed himself to eliminate the problem.

"Yeah, Jiang Nian's a real fucking bastard." Ma Guojun, the fat boy sitting behind them, turned around. He looked like Baymax and wore black-framed glasses. His nose got oily easily, so he pushed his glasses up all day long.

"Fuck, a few days ago, he asked me which side I'd help if my hands and feet got into a fight. I said my hands, obviously. Feet weren't as important."

"Shit, then he goes, 'Winning with your hand must be important to you, huh?'"

"Fuck!" Ma Guojun pushed up his glasses and cursed. "That was when I knew this son of a bitch's heart would be pitch-black if you dug it out."

Zhang Ningzhi looked puzzled and curious.

"What's wrong with winning with your hand? He wasn't wrong."

As soon as she said that, Jiang Nian, Yao Beibei, Li Hua, and Ma Guojun all froze. They turned to look at Zhang Ningzhi in unison, their expressions both awkward and strange.

"Huh? Why... are you all looking at me?"

"Hahaha!!!" Li Hua, Ma Guojun, and Jiang Nian burst out laughing.

Yao Beibei leaned close to Zhang Ningzhi's ear and whispered a few words. Zhang Ningzhi's pupils instantly contracted. In barely three seconds, her face turned red, and the blush spread down her neck.

"Hmph!" She glared at Jiang Nian, abruptly turned away, and buried herself over her desk, refusing to lift her head.

"Hahaha, holy shit, Jiang Nian, you're such an asshole!" Ma Guojun laughed so hard he could barely breathe, gasping between words. "Oh, fuck, I'm dying."

Li Hua was laughing just as hard. "See? I told you this bastard Jiang Nian was full of nasty tricks."

"Exactly. Ningzhi, don't hang around someone like him." Yao Beibei planted her hands on her hips, displaying the confidence of an Asian woman. "Stay away from Jiang Nian. Hang out with me instead."

Listening to them take turns piling on, Jiang Nian said to Yao Beibei,

"Hang out with you? The moment you open your mouth, I know this month's rotating porn flag is definitely going to our class. Other people get emo and post sad songs. When you get emo, it means 'every moment obsessed with touching me,' right?"

"I don't even know how you manage to say this stuff out loud."

Then Jiang Nian turned to Li Hua.

"When the Chinese teacher asked you for the multiple-choice answers, I told you CCBCC, and you fucking stood there in class and said, 'Mulan sat weaving at the door'?"

"And you, Ma Guojun." He called them out one by one. "I took you out through the school gates during break to buy buns, and we saw a few girls from the vocational school passing by."

"You fucking said, 'The girls from the brothel are so pretty.' Good thing I ran fast, or I'd definitely have gotten beaten up."

"Tsk, tsk. The pot shouldn't call the kettle black, okay?" Jiang Nian folded his arms and sneered. "You're all society's cream of the cock and the motherland's rising piles of shit."

"Holy shit, listen to yourself!" Ma Guojun pushed up his glasses, opened his little mouth, and started spewing sweet nothings. Li Hua followed up by joining the attack, the two of them trading remarks.

Yao Beibei fanned the flames from the sidelines, even dragging Zhang Ningzhi into their campaign against Jiang Nian.

"Ningzhi, don't you think he's a sneaky little bastard?"

Her face still red, Zhang Ningzhi hesitated for a moment before nodding.

"Mm."

Jiang Nian remained completely unfazed in this one-versus-four battle, firing back at each of them. Caught in the middle, Zhang Ningzhi looked small, pitiful, and helpless, as though she were saying, "Don't

fight, don't fight! Stop!"

The bell rang for self-study, but they were still trading insults.

Even the Great Dao had been obliterated.

Suddenly, while Jiang Nian paused for a drink of water, a thin figure slipped through the classroom's front door. Black-framed glasses, thinning hair-it was their homeroom teacher, Liu Liangsong.

With a dark expression, Liu Liangsong stood at the lectern and snapped,

"What is there to talk about? Did you do that well on the placement test? Your class is the noisiest in the whole building! I could hear you from the hallway. Everyone who was talking just now-

"Stand up!"

(End of chapter)