To the cafeteria together

The afternoon sun was just right, and there was no little sister upstairs.

The fourth-floor classes were all in session, leaving the corridor empty. A desk and chair stood outside every classroom, commonly known as the special seats for extra tutoring during evening study hall.

They were generally for students with good grades but serious weaknesses in particular subjects.

Jiang Nian held his breath and straightened his back as he passed the other classrooms. He tried to look as inconspicuous as possible, lest the students inside subject him to a visual inspection.

Uh. He looked a little too much like he was sneaking around.

Classroom A403 was quiet, with seven or eight students scattered around. Books were piled high on their desks. They glanced up at him, then lowered their heads and went back to their exercises.

Jiang Nian saw no familiar faces. He returned to his seat, settled down, and started working on math problems.

He had yet to look closely at the system missions or give them much thought. Work was work, and studying was studying. He knew which mattered more.

First, the system missions had no time limit, nor could they sprout legs and run away. Second, as long as he never got married, he would, in a sense, have achieved his comeback at the source in the simplest, most brutal way possible.

Finally, the so-called comeback of his thirty-eight-year-old self in another timeline was, at its core, about using the system to correct a life that had taken a long detour.

However much weight that version of him lost, however often he reconnected with the childhood sweetheart he could never get over or his ex-girlfriend, he was merely correcting mistakes and trying to salvage things. What had happened had happened. No amount of effort could do more than cut his losses.

Jiang Nian had never experienced any of that and did not need the system. Simply by doing nothing, he had already beaten his thirty-eight-year-old self in the other timeline.

He had always treated the system as a cheat tool running in the background, but he had never relied on it completely. He was also trying to explore his future direction on his own.

Xu Qianqian was right: recognize that the past could not be changed, and know that the future could still be shaped. A person could not remain immersed in the past forever, nor blindly pin all their hopes on the future.

A cheat was only a tool. He still had to walk his own path.

The Memory Bread had filled the gaps in his foundations. If he wanted to maintain his grades in the end-of-month exams, if he wanted to get into a better university next summer, he still had to put in the effort himself.

He was eighteen, an age when anything was possible. There was no need to choose between making money through system missions and studying. He could have both.

He would make money with one hand and study with the other, enjoying both the fragrance of knowledge and the power of money.

Bzzz, bzzz, bzzz.

His phone alarm went off at 11:50. Jiang Nian immediately put down his pen, stood up, and headed outside.

Who was he kidding? No matter how fragrant knowledge was, it would not fill his stomach. The college entrance exam would not be decided in a single moment, and pretending to work hard was useless. When it was time to sleep, he would sleep. When it was time to eat, he would eat.

Besides, he really loved the cafeteria ladies. He always ran to see them. And the younger students loved them even more. If he did not run, there really would be no food left for him.

They bolted the moment class ended, sprinting as though their lives depended on it. Even romance had to wait. You could be single and lonely, but you could not go without food. Get your meal two minutes earlier, and you might even move up a few places in the family genealogy.

PE, a rare and endangered species of class for seniors, had even been scheduled in the prime slot of fourth period in the morning. Squandering that head start on lunch would be an utter waste.

The moment he stepped outside, he unexpectedly ran into the class monitor, Li Qingrong.

They came face-to-face, their eyes meeting for a moment. Jiang Nian found it oddly awkward. He looked away first and greeted her.

"Class monitor, are you... going home?"

Jiang Nian knew Li Qingrong came from a wealthy family and generally did not eat in the cafeteria. Yao Beibei had told him that. That pervy girl seemed particularly interested in Li Qingrong.

He had no time to learn about Li Qingrong. He just wanted food.

"To the cafeteria." Li Qingrong's gaze was quiet, her tone unhurried. "I haven't finished my problems, so I'm not going home at noon."

"Oh, right." Jiang Nian's mind was on the cafeteria. Just hearing her say the word made him hungry. "Me too. You'd better hurry, class monitor, or there won't be any food left."

He was only offering a friendly reminder. Jiang Nian was not usually this kindhearted.

Walking from the fourth-floor classroom to the cafeteria took six minutes; running took two. Even allowing for everything, Jiang Nian could spare six minutes to do a good deed.

Ultimately, he was only being polite.

To his surprise, Li Qingrong nodded and said,

"Okay."

I really am a damn good person, Jiang Nian thought, then headed down the stairs. After a few steps, he suddenly sensed something was off. He turned around and found Li Qingrong following him.

"Class monitor, aren't you going back to the classroom?"

"No, not anymore. I ran out of tissues." Li Qingrong nodded. "I was going to go back for some, but what you said made sense."

???

Jiang Nian wondered whether the class monitor had an antenna of hair sticking out of her head. But it did not matter.

Things had come to this. Food first.

They went down the stairs one behind the other, then walked side by side after leaving the classroom building. There was actually some distance between them, but it was not apparent from far away.

With dismissal approaching, most of the students from the PE classes on the basketball courts had already dispersed.

The day students headed home or went to the cafeteria.

The boarding students returned to the dormitories in the North District. The girls were busy fetching water to wash their hair at noon. The boys either ate in the cafeteria or went outside the north gate for the six-yuan buffet.

For a day student like Jiang Nian, the cluster of dormitory buildings by the north gate was an entirely new map. It was forbidden sect territory. Only a handful of day students entered the school through the north gate.

Ultimately, that was because the north gate led to the bus station for routes out of Zhen'nan County.

The whole street outside was dark and grimy, its roads battered. Repair shops, late-night barbecue joints, and old rental housing formed a stark contrast to the bustle outside the school's front gate.

The alleys were pitch-black, with tangled wires stretching across the sky. It had a sort of Little India aesthetic.

Bang!

A dusty yellow basketball flew high into the air, traced a graceful parabola, and dropped cleanly through the hoop. Cheers instantly erupted across the court.

The eight or nine boys remaining were drenched in sweat. Li Hua ran all over the half court, thrilled by his three-pointer.

Then he turned his head, saw that scene, and nearly dropped his jaw on the ground.

"Jiang Nian! Class monitor!"

"Have you lost your mind? You want Jiang Nian to be class monitor that badly?" someone teased. "Though our class monitor is a little too rigid. If it were Jiang Nian..."

"No, damn it, look for yourselves!" Li Hua was practically in tears.

Three-pointers were great. He would not shoot one next time!

On the nearly empty grounds, Jiang Nian and Li Qingrong walked side by side. From a distance, they looked like a young couple, yet Li Qingrong did not seem to think anything was amiss.

Her expression was as calm as ever, as though they were merely sharing a stretch of the walk.

Fair enough. She was the class monitor, after all.

"Holy shit! Why is Jiang Nian walking with the class monitor?" another boy with a buzz cut asked. "Didn't he-

"Didn't he go upstairs to work on problems? Was he hitting on the class monitor?"

"Stop getting so worked up. You're like NPCs every single day." The tall PE representative waved a hand. "Maybe they're just walking the same way. Didn't you notice the class monitor has no expression on her face?"

The others were all speechless. Seriously, dude, were you watching that closely?

A second later, Li Hua swore again, his pointing finger trembling. "She smiled! Fuck, how can she smile at Jiang Nian? That bastard! That fucking bastard!"

(End of chapter)