The next morning, before the warning bell for morning study had even rung, an unusually strange atmosphere had already spread through the classroom of Sophomore Class 3.
The moment Xia Zhifeng stepped through the classroom door with her backpack, the lively, noisy discussion abruptly stopped. Dozens of complicated, curious gazes—some even carrying contempt and scrutiny—instantly focused on her.
“Look, she’s here...” “She always acts so aloof and innocent. Who would’ve thought she’d be so scheming?” “Exactly. I heard that to get the citywide competition recommendation slot, she secretly tore out the most important pages of the review materials! Then she even tried to frame someone else.” “That’s not all! She hugged Bro Zhou in front of everyone yesterday and said something like, ‘I’m serious.’ She obviously saw that Bro Zhou’s family had connections and wanted to latch onto the Zhou family. How shameless...”
The whispers, deliberately lowered but buzzing through the air, sounded like swarms of annoying flies.
Xia Zhifeng crossed the hallway with a calm expression, not slowing down for even a moment. She walked to her seat, sat down, put her backpack in the desk drawer, and pulled out the English textbook she needed for morning study.
In her past life, she had been an extremely sensitive and fragile girl. What she feared most was being ostracized and misunderstood by her peers. If the sixteen-year-old Xia Zhifeng had faced this overwhelming wave of malicious rumors, she would probably already have been so angry that her eyes turned red, fumbling helplessly as she loudly defended herself, only to flee in humiliation amid everyone’s jeers.
But the Xia Zhifeng sitting here now possessed the mature mind of a twenty-seven-year-old and years of experience from the workplace.
In her eyes, this level of high-school social isolation and pathetic framing was as childish as little kids playing house. She did not even furrow her brow. She opened her textbook and began quietly reading aloud, minding her own business.
In the seat diagonally behind her, vice class president Li Xinyi—the class beauty who had secretly competed with her and envied her grades and looks throughout her past life—was holding a cup of water, a smug, cold smile playing at the corners of her lips.
In the last row of the classroom, Zhou Huai’an was sprawled carelessly against the back of his chair. One hand hooked into his jacket pocket while the other idly toyed with a black metal pencil. His narrow, seductive eyes narrowed slightly as he coldly watched everything unfold, not a trace of emotion visible on his face.
The first period was taught by their homeroom teacher, Ms. Zhang.
The moment Ms. Zhang stepped onto the platform, Li Xinyi eagerly stood up. Her eyes reddened on cue, and her voice carried a hint of grievance and fragility. “Ms. Zhang... there’s something I’d like to report. The most important pages explaining the problem-solving methods were torn out of the citywide competition review materials shared by our class competition group. The last person who took those materials yesterday... was Xia Zhifeng.”
A faint chorus of inhaled breaths rose through the classroom. Everyone waited to see Xia Zhifeng make a fool of herself.
Li Xinyi pressed her lips together, then added pointedly, “Zhifeng, I know you really want the competition slot, and I know your family may have... run into some trouble lately. You’re desperate to prove yourself. But you can’t do something like this. And what you did to Zhou Huai’an in the classroom yesterday... everyone’s saying you might be trying to get resources through other means...”
Her words were dripping with fake sweetness. They stirred everyone’s suspicions that Xia Zhifeng had “stolen the materials” while reigniting yesterday’s gossip about her “over-the-line confession,” pushing Xia Zhifeng straight into the center of the storm.
Ms. Zhang’s brows drew tightly together as she turned to Xia Zhifeng. “Xia Zhifeng, is this true?”
The entire class focused on her again. A victorious smile flashed through Li Xinyi’s eyes.
Yet, contrary to everyone’s expectations, Xia Zhifeng did not cry or scream in protest.
She slowly stood, her back perfectly straight. Her school uniform had been washed until it was slightly faded, but it was clean and neat. Her eyes were clear and calm, carrying even a hint of lofty composure.
“Ms. Zhang, since Vice Class President Li has raised her suspicions, I’ll clarify them one by one.” Xia Zhifeng spoke at an unhurried pace, her voice crisp and decisive. In an instant, it overwhelmed every other sound in the classroom.
“First, regarding the torn review materials.” Xia Zhifeng extended her right hand and laid out the timeline in a clear, orderly fashion. “Vice Class President Li gave those materials to me at four-thirty yesterday afternoon. At four-forty, I placed the complete set on the public bookshelf at the back of the classroom. My desk mate Xiaomei and Xiaozhang, who was on duty, can both confirm that. The torn pages were discovered at seven-twenty this morning.”
Li Xinyi’s expression shifted. She hurriedly interrupted, “Who knows if you secretly tore them before you left?!”
“That brings me to my second point.” Xia Zhifeng turned around, her sharp gaze shooting toward Li Xinyi. “The class bulletin board at the back of the classroom was redrawn by me and the publicity committee member together from five to five-thirty yesterday afternoon. The scraps of the torn pages happened to be caught in the gap beneath the chalk box under the bulletin board. If I tore them at four-forty, why would chalk dust have settled over the torn edges of the paper? That proves the person who tore the materials did it after we finished the bulletin board and the chalk dust had risen—in other words, after school yesterday or early this morning.”
Li Xinyi’s fingers instantly clenched into fists, and a crack appeared in the mask on her face. “You... That’s just a coincidence! You deliberately put them there!”
“Third, and most importantly.” Xia Zhifeng smiled faintly, coldness filling her eyes. “The person who tore out those pages probably didn’t know that the competition materials were printed double-sided, did they? The back of the torn page fifteen happened to contain the math mistake notes that Vice Class President Li privately copied out yesterday. The distinctive purple highlighter marks belong to Vice Class President Li alone in this entire class.”
Xia Zhifeng walked to the back of the classroom, pulled the torn pages from the gap beneath the chalk box, and gently placed them on the platform, revealing the writing marked with purple highlighter on the back.
“Vice Class President Li, would you like to explain why ‘the materials I tore out’ have your private notes on the back?”
The public takedown came fast and viciously!
The entire classroom fell into deathly silence.
Her reasoning was clear, her logic airtight, and her timeline flawless!
The once-sensitive, weak Xia Zhifeng, who could only cry in anger whenever she was wronged, now seemed like a battle-hardened workplace elite. With just a few casual questions and undeniable evidence, she had driven the rumor-monger to the edge of a cliff!
Li Xinyi’s face went from white to green, then from green to purple. Under the class’s shocked and contemptuous stares, her body trembled faintly. Her lips moved, but she could not say a word for a long time. Finally, she suddenly burst into loud sobs, collapsed onto her desk, and repeatedly apologized.
Ms. Zhang’s face turned livid. She struck the platform hard. “Li Xinyi, come with me to the office! Everyone else, get ready for class!”
The framing aimed at Xia Zhifeng was neatly and decisively dismantled.
The spectators in the hallway dispersed one after another. The way the students in the classroom looked at Xia Zhifeng had completely changed—it was no longer the look of people waiting for a joke, but one filled with awe and amazement.
And in the last row of the classroom.
At some point, Zhou Huai’an’s hand had stopped moving the pencil.
His narrow, seductive eyes were fixed on Xia Zhifeng’s back, a look of immense shock and disbelief flashing through them.
The way Xia Zhifeng had stood up and fought back just now—calm, intelligent, and confident—gave off an overwhelming aura of strength that felt utterly unfamiliar to him. She was completely different from the Xia Zhifeng in his past life, who would redden around the eyes whenever a single harsh word from him upset her and point at his nose while calling him a “jerk”!
“Using me?” Zhou Huai’an withdrew his gaze, the corners of his lips curling into an extremely impatient sneer.
He threw the pencil in his hand heavily onto the desk with a sharp click. His cold gaze swept over the people who had joined in spreading the rumors, and his tone was arrogant and infuriating. “You did something filthy yourselves, so don’t use me as an excuse. Try making fun of me again and see what happens.”
Everyone shrank their necks in fright and hurriedly lowered their heads, afraid to speak.
Zhou Huai’an seemed merely annoyed that people had used his name, but he had unintentionally sealed everyone’s mouths for good. Irritated, he turned his head toward the window, yet his gaze kept falling unconsciously on that upright figure in front of him.
What the hell was going on with this girl?
After school, the setting sun dyed the entire school building golden.
The students left one after another, until only a few sparse patches of light and shadow remained in the empty classroom.
Zhou Huai’an carried his backpack in one hand, the strap slung diagonally across his shoulder, and was preparing to stride out of the classroom as usual.
Just as he reached the platform, a slender figure silently blocked his way.
Xia Zhifeng folded one arm across her chest. With the other hand, she pulled a neatly folded, slightly yellowed note from her school uniform pocket and lightly tapped it against the platform.
“Zhou Huai’an, want to talk?” Xia Zhifeng lifted her chin slightly, her eyes curving into a lovely arc. Her tone was as gentle as if she were discussing the weather.
Zhou Huai’an stopped short, his brows drawing deeply together. Looking down at Xia Zhifeng from above, he tried to put on yesterday’s fierce attitude. “Xia Zhifeng, what are you trying to do now? I don’t have time to mess around with you...”
“Look at this.” Xia Zhifeng tapped the note with her slender finger.
Zhou Huai’an instinctively glanced down.
The moment his gaze landed on the one-on-one academic support form and saw the three characters “Xia Zhifeng” written in his wild handwriting at the bottom, along with his own name in the signature section—
Zhou Huai’an’s pupils contracted violently!
His entire body jolted as if he had been electrocuted!
“You... How did you get this?!” Zhou Huai’an instantly lost control. The cold, composed mask he had been wearing shattered completely with a sharp crack.
His ears rapidly flushed bright red, the color spreading all the way down to the base of his neck!
Seeing him flustered after being caught red-handed, Xia Zhifeng’s amusement deepened. She took a small step forward, her clear eyes looking directly into the boy’s, and teased him, “Zhou Huai’an, didn’t you threaten me yesterday, saying you hated me and telling me to stop playing hard to get with you? Then, when this form was being filled out at the beginning of sophomore year... why did you secretly write my name?”
“I...” Zhou Huai’an felt a rush of heat shoot straight to his head. His heart plummeted uncontrollably in his chest, then began pounding wildly!
The shame and panic of having his secret exposed to his face ignited him like a fire.
Like a robber, he suddenly reached out, snatched the form from the platform, crumpled it into a ball, and stuffed it into his pocket. He tried to cover his guilty conscience with a fierce roar.
“I wrote it at random. So what?! I saw your grades were good and wanted to find a free tutor. So what?! Xia Zhifeng, stop flattering yourself! Get the hell out of my way!”
He hurled threats with a ferocious expression, even deliberately puffing out his chest in an attempt to use his height to intimidate her.
However, instead of retreating in fear as she had before, Xia Zhifeng simply folded both arms across her chest and stood quietly where she was.
She looked at him with the gaze of a mature twenty-seven-year-old woman watching a child throw a tantrum—gentle, tolerant, and tinged with amused insight into everything.
That gaze seemed to say: Keep pretending. Let’s see how long you can keep it up.
Looking at how she refused to be affected by either softness or force, Zhou Huai’an felt as though his punch had landed heavily on cotton. Not only had it failed to hurt her, it had instead made him look like a clown.
The helplessness and frustration of being seen through from every angle drove him nearly insane!
“Psycho! You’re seriously impossible!”
Zhou Huai’an gritted his teeth, gripped his backpack strap, and charged out of the classroom door in a chaotic, panicked stride without even collecting his textbooks. He was practically fleeing for his life!
The setting sun stretched his somewhat disheveled silhouette. He even nearly slammed into the doorframe in his panic as he left.
Standing in the gentle glow of the sunset, Xia Zhifeng watched the direction in which the boy had fled and finally let out a quiet laugh.
Late that night, at the Zhou family estate.
In the luxurious yet chilly bathroom, steam curled through the air, filling it with white mist.
The hot shower sprayed a dense stream of water from above, pouring down and pounding against Zhou Huai’an’s broad, solid back with a steady patter.
Zhou Huai’an stood beneath the shower with his eyes closed. Water ran continuously down his soaked black hair, his high nose, and his bobbing Adam’s apple.
Yet no matter how he washed with the hot water, it could not remove the searing heat from his face, much less calm the heart pounding wildly inside his chest.
He abruptly wiped the water from his face, opened his eyes, and looked up at the mirror blurred by steam.
In the mirror, the boy’s disheveled hair clung to his forehead. His eyes were bloodshot, filled with confusion and turmoil unlike anything he had ever experienced.
In his mind, scenes of Xia Zhifeng from today kept appearing and alternating like clips from a movie—
The old Xia Zhifeng: sensitive, weak, and insecure. Whenever she was misunderstood, she could only cry angrily, her eyes always filled with wariness, dislike, and rejection toward him.
Today’s Xia Zhifeng: calm and elegant, forcing the rumor-monger to break down and apologize with just a few words. And the way she looked at him was so gentle it seemed as if water could be wrung from it, even carrying a lofty kind of indulgence and tolerance.
Especially the way she had looked beneath the sunset today, holding that form and asking him with a knowing, amused smile, “Why did you secretly write my name?”
“Damn...”
Zhou Huai’an cursed under his breath. He braced both hands heavily against the cold tile wall, pressed his forehead to it, and gasped for breath.
Water streamed down his back, unable to carry away the turmoil raging like a storm in the depths of his heart.
*What happened to her? She’s practically become a different person...*
*Before, all it took was one glare from me to make her tremble with anger and run away. But the way she looked at me today... What gave her the right to be so calm? What gave her the right to act as if she could see through every thought in my head?!*
The feeling of being completely out of control, of being led around by the nose, made the seventeen-year-old menace feel fear and suffocation for the first time.
Irritated, Zhou Huai’an slammed his fist into the bathroom tile, producing a deep bang.
He stared at his disheveled reflection and clenched his teeth hard.
He knew that from this day forward, the girl named Xia Zhifeng had completely barged into his world—and there was no getting rid of her.