Sorting Out the Plot

Kanlitel offered a great variety of specialty classes, with something for everyone.

Ding Yiheng had chosen fencing, while Shi Su and Fang Sheng had chosen horseback riding. The three asked Cen Xia what he had picked.

Cen Xia said, "Go."

"?"

"...Go class? That's pretty niche."

"They have Go among the specialty classes??"

Cen Xia answered patiently, "It's on the last page."

Shi Su asked curiously, "Did many people choose Go?"

"Not too many. About five or six, I think."

Ding Yiheng said, "You can count them on ten fingers, and you still have to say 'about'?"

Cen Xia said, "There were only five at first, but the teacher said another student dropped his original class and wanted to switch to Go."

Fang Sheng was shocked. "You can change it?"

"Nobody said we couldn't when we signed up." Cen Xia plunged into the enemy jungle and turned it upside down, then made a stylish getaway when an opponent came rushing over with a support.

He answered their questions while he played.

Ding Yiheng was terrible at the game, so he had picked a support and followed Shi Su's marksman around.

Three enemies grouped up to force a kill on the marksman. Shi Su's hero had a mobility skill and escaped quickly, leaving Ding Yiheng to be beaten to death by the group.

Ding Yiheng's cries for help and screams came through the mic, and the subject was dropped.

After the match, Shi Su logged off. Fang Sheng also said he had homework to do and left.

Ding Yiheng tried to persuade the last remaining player to stay, but he was too bad at the game. Now that they had climbed the ranks, Cen Xia had a hard time carrying him alone, so he coldly and heartlessly refused.

Before logging off, Ding Yiheng whined and whimpered.

The next day was Saturday, and Cen Xia considered whether to go home.

He had been here for so long since transmigrating, yet he had barely contacted his family. Their chat history was sparse: they had either asked how his studies were going and whether he was used to living at school, or sent him money.

In his own world, Cen Xia had been an orphan, abandoned by his parents at the gates of an orphanage. He had stumbled his way through growing up alone.

The words "family love" felt impossibly distant to him.

Besides, he had never taken this world seriously. To him, what he was experiencing now was like playing a large-scale immersive game.

He didn't want to invest too much emotion in it.

But-

He looked at the message sent that morning in the chat saved under "Mom" and hesitated.

Mom: You haven't been home in a long time. Your dad and I are both off tomorrow. Will you come home?

After staring at it for two minutes, he replied: No, I'll come back next time.

After sending it, he turned off the screen.

Forget it. Better not do anything unnecessary. He had to go back eventually anyway.

Besides, he didn't know how to face... Dad and Mom.

He had no experience with it, and no one had ever taught him.

After dealing with that, Cen Xia breathed a sigh of relief. He sat down at his desk and took a black softcover notebook from the bottom drawer.

He opened it and clicked his ballpoint pen.

The notebook was filled with writing and lines: the plot summaries of the first two books he had previously put together.

He had focused on the parts of the plot where NPCs appeared, glossing over the scenes with the protagonist alone or together with the protagonist's gong.

Because the three books had been mashed together, the timeline was unclear.

After sorting through them carefully, he discovered something.

The third book appeared last, but its plot developed the fastest. Cen Xia figured it was because the original was a mindless smut novel. The plot hadn't been depicted in detail, and much of it was summed up in just a few sentences.

Cen Xia wrote Lin Jiandu's name in the notebook, circled it, and drew four arrows leading out from it.

At the ends of the arrows, he wrote four names.

Ling Xian, Huo Jinran, Pei Huaiyi, Chi Zhao.

He had written them in the order they appeared in the original book. As for what kind of order that was, take a guess.

Huo Jinran-Pei Huaiyi's brother. He fell in love with Lin Jiandu at first sight. Since they didn't attend the same school, he asked Pei Huaiyi to look after him.

But he only asked him to look after Lin Jiandu without saying why, so Pei Huaiyi didn't stop Ling Xian from making a move on him.

Later, he too was drawn to Lin Jiandu and regretted it bitterly.

Chi Zhao-the Disciplinary Group leader rumored to have an eccentric, difficult personality.

After seeing Pei Huaiyi fall for Lin Jiandu, he approached him out of curiosity and ultimately ended up throwing away his helmet and armor too.

The first half of the book only went that far, stopping at the point where Chi Zhao became curious about Lin Jiandu. As for what came afterward, Cen Xia had guessed it himself.

But he thought he had gotten most of it right.

After sorting out the relationships between the characters and the plot points, Cen Xia went through everything from the beginning.

Book one:

Shi Su, a resilient little white flower.

Scratch that, a tenacious cactus.

Three arrows: He Wangsheng, Wen Ci, Yan Wuping.

He Wangsheng, student council president and the only good person of the three.

The other two weren't at school, so he set them aside for now.

Book two:

Lu Mian, the real young master, a poor little thing.

The fake young master had taken his identity and the affection that belonged to him. After he was found and brought home, his biological parents actually loved the fake young master more.

A straight line connected Lu Mian and He Wangsheng, with a note beside it: biological brothers.

Yes, that was right. The two books were sister stories.

He Qi, the vicious fake young master, targeted Lu Mian at every turn, believing his arrival would take away everything he had.

When Cen Xia saw this, he couldn't help grumbling: it had belonged to Lu Mian in the first place.

Wen Xingzhou, Wen Ci's eldest brother, Lu Mian's official love interest and the founder of the Silver Club. Cen Xia made a note beside his name: the title was a little chuunibyou.

Wen Xingzhou was eight years older than them and had started taking over the family business early. He was the model child everyone else in their circle was compared to.

That was roughly how the characters were connected. As for the plot, it was too fragmented, and he still hadn't finished sorting it out. It was enough to remember it in his head.

Besides, from the looks of things, both protagonists were out of character to different degrees. Whether the rest of the plot could even continue was another matter.

Cen Xia was happy to see it. Wasn't the world's will terrified he would interfere with the plot? Well, now it was going to fall apart even without him.

But soon enough, he couldn't laugh anymore, because it was the end of the month, and they had exams.

He really didn't understand. This was an aristocratic school, so why did they still have monthly exams, just like an ordinary high school?

The person who invented exams deserved to be sent to the eighteenth level of hell.

The exams ran for two days straight, from Monday to Tuesday, and the activity and specialty classes were all moved to later dates.

When Cen Xia came out after the exams, he felt as though a heavy burden had been lifted.

Even taking exams in a fake world could make a person nervous.

Perhaps in consideration of how tense the students had been during the two days of exams and how badly they needed a breather, the Disciplinary Group was unusually merciful that evening. They even let people through with the utterly perfunctory excuse, "I want to go out."

It was the first time the four-man gaming squad had all met up offline.

Ding Yiheng had found the place, and he was also treating them.

Each of the four ordered a bowl of beef noodles, with extra noodles and extra meat.

Cen Xia couldn't help remarking, "I have to hand it to you for finding this little shop in the nearby shopping district."

The shopping district closest to Kanlitel was a half-hour drive away. The entire district catered to the high-end luxury market, with the streets lined with flagship luxury-brand stores, Michelin restaurants, high-end bespoke salons, and the like.

Finding a little shop like this really wasn't easy.

Ding Yiheng waved a hand. "If we had more time, I'd definitely take you to that place for rice noodles. But the beef noodles here taste pretty good too. Give them a try."

When it came to finding food, Ding Yiheng really was beyond criticism. The beef noodles were springy and smooth, with the rich aroma of meat wafting from them. They tasted even better than the ones made by the chefs in Kanlitel's cafeteria.

Shi Su took a bite and gave a thumbs-up.

Fang Sheng nodded repeatedly as he ate too.

Cen Xia picked up a mouthful with his chopsticks, but had barely put it in his mouth before he spat it out again because it was too hot.

Ding Yiheng immediately laughed at him. "Do you have a cat's tongue? Can't even handle a little heat?"

Cen Xia rolled his eyes at him, parted his lips, and stuck out the tip of his tongue to cool it.

Shi Su was sitting right across from Cen Xia, and his gaze was drawn to him. It's already red from the heat. He stared for a few seconds before remembering to get a cold drink.

He picked up a bottle of cola and handed it over. The white frost on the bottle melted into moisture from the warmth of his fingers, and a chill clung to his fingertips. After drawing his hand back, he rubbed his fingers together gently.

That bit of moisture evaporated.