The atmosphere was indescribably heavy, and Zhang Pengyu didn’t know how many points he had scored, but his sixth sense told him it wasn’t good because he had experienced a barrage of incomprehensible knowledge points in the past half-hour.
This incomprehensible knowledge could be divided into two categories. One was indeed knowledge points he initially only partially understood, but after listening to ‘Cousin Shao Zhan’ explain, he had become even more confused. The other kind was the knowledge points he knew, but after listening, he felt like he didn’t know them anymore.
Zhang Pengyu began to doubt his own knowledge reserve, unsure if what he was thinking was the correct answer. This led to his confusion while completing the entire test paper.
Some questions, before ‘Cousin Shao Zhan’ explained, he was clearly good at, and he had never lost points over them before.
Nervously picking at his fingernails, Zhang Pengyu asked, “Cousin, how did I do?”
Cousin Xu Sheng, who was tutoring for the first time, “…”
He was not too eager to let this little cousin know.
You did, quite poorly.
Forty-eight points, far from passing, no significant difference compared to the person currently in Shao Zhan’s body.
After a while, Xu Sheng put down the test paper, released the pen in his hand, grabbed his phone, and stood up. “Wait a moment; I have a friend coming to see me. I’ll go pick him up. Learning puts an emphasis on a balance between work and rest; you should rest for a while.”
“Are you going out?” Shao Zhan’s aunt asked as soon as Xu Sheng changed his shoes, poking her head out from the balcony.
“My classmate is looking for me,” Xu Sheng reported. “He’s waiting downstairs. May I bring him up?”
Shao Zhan’s aunt, hearing that Shao Zhan had a classmate with a good relationship, couldn’t help but feel happy. Since the incident at home, Shao Zhan had always been alone, so having friends was a good thing. “Of course, you can. Has your classmate had lunch yet? How about this, I’ll cut some fruit for him.”
Xu Sheng, who had previously been ‘fostered’ by Auntie Kang, was good at dealing with such elders. He smiled habitually and noticed the woman was struggling to hang clothes on the balcony. “Auntie, it’s inconvenient to hang clothes alone. If you wait a moment, I’ll come up and help you.”
The aunt was stunned for a moment, and when she recovered, she found her face was a bit hot. “…This child, when did he become so well-behaved.”
Shao Zhan rushed over as quickly as possible.
But in reality, he didn’t have much thought about the act of ‘preventing Xu Sheng from misusing his body’. Rather, he found the reason he wanted to be quick, even quicker, was simply because he wanted to see him.
And he was afraid that he felt awkward because of the ‘tutoring’.
When Xu Sheng went downstairs, he happened to see ‘himself’ sitting on the railing at the roadside below the residential building. Today’s ‘himself’ was wearing an athletic jacket with two white stripes on the sleeves, black trousers wrapping around his legs, and due to the low railing, he had his long legs bent with one foot on the ground.
Shao Zhan looked up. “You came down?”
Looking at his own face always felt strange. Shao Zhan dispelled that weird feeling when he spoke. He couldn’t make such an indifferent expression, and his tone wasn’t that cold.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
But after not seeing each other for a day, having chatted and video-called, it still felt insufficient.
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Three minutes later, Shao Zhan followed Xu Sheng into the house. He politely declined the auntie’s warm invitation and went straight to his little cousin’s bedroom. Sitting in front of the desk, he faced the test paper covered with ‘X’ marks, falling into a brief silence.
Zhang Pengyu didn’t know this cousin’s friend, but he seemed unfriendly.
Xu Sheng introduced, “This is your cousin’s deskmate; he has good academic performance. Cousin’s throat isn’t feeling well, so he’ll explain this test paper to you.”
The little cousin obediently said, “Oh.”
Then, the friend of the cousin quickly scanned the entire test paper, put it down with a cold expression, and said one word, “Pen.”
“Why did you choose the wrong answer for this question?” Shao Zhan’s pen pointed at a multiple-choice question, marking the incorrect option selected by the little cousin. He remembered emphasising this knowledge point to him before. “Who told you to represent the solution concentration in this way?”
The little cousin shrank his neck. He didn’t know why, but he had been feeling a familiar sensation from this cousin’s friend. From the moment he had entered, it seemed like he had brought cold air with him. As he sat down, the whole room had rapidly cooled. He looked uncomfortably at Xu Sheng, “Cousin said so.”
The fake cousin Xu Sheng, misleading people, “…”
The real cousin Shao Zhan, “…”
“What about this question? What’s the calculation formula for this?” Shao Zhan’s words weren’t finished before the little cousin promptly said, “Cousin taught me this.”
“…”
The real cousin himself stated that he hadn’t taught it this way.
While Xu Sheng was downstairs, he didn’t have the heart to say that he had taught him, fearing that he couldn’t handle it. Shao Zhan quickly understood, glanced at Xu Sheng, and sent him a message while the little cousin was busy correcting the questions. After sending it, he tapped the screen with his finger without making a sound.
-Did you teach him?
Xu Sheng: Wasn’t I just trying to stall for time?
Xu Sheng: Before teaching him, I thought I could handle it.
S: You are indeed quite capable.
S: Teaching for half an hour can lower a score by thirty points.
Upon seeing this, Xu Sheng coughed and shifted his gaze away from the phone screen. There were only two chairs in the room, and with no place to sit, he had to perch on the windowsill. There was a best-selling novel on the windowsill, and he casually opened it to pass the time.
Originally, the little cousin felt that this cousin’s friend seemed familiar. However, he quickly had no time to ponder over these thoughts and focused on the tutoring. The cousin’s friend had a concise and straightforward style of teaching. He wouldn’t use two sentences if he could explain a concept in one. Instead of adjusting his teaching method to fit others, he habitually guided them to follow his own train of thought.
In just half an afternoon, he went through the entire chemistry textbook.
After finishing the tutoring, fearing they might expose themselves if they stayed longer, the two didn’t linger at the aunt’s house.
Shao Zhan’s aunt escorted them downstairs. The streetlights weren’t on yet, but the sky had darkened. Xu Sheng waved his hand and said, “Auntie, no need to accompany us. You can go back.”
After the aunt left, Xu Sheng and Shao Zhan stood facing each other downstairs. After a while, it was unclear who started laughing first. The tension from the tutoring session finally eased, giving them a feeling of having survived a disaster.
Xu Sheng also laughed. “Damn.”
What kind of day had they just experienced?
Xu Sheng, “When your little cousin knocked on the door at noon, didn’t you remember the tutoring? If I had known about this, I wouldn’t have gone.”
Shao Zhan: “I forgot.”
It wasn’t far from Shao Zhan’s home. After crossing a few streets and two residential areas, taking a few steps forward, there was a narrow alley between two residential buildings. It had rained last night, and the bluestone pavement was wet. After Shao Zhan said “I forgot,” he suddenly grabbed Xu Sheng’s wrist.
Xu Sheng was directly pulled into the alley by him. His back pressed against the slightly cool wall, and a sentence, “Hold me for a moment,” brought him back to his senses.
Although the current situation was a bit strange, considering a person with a face similar to his own was suddenly approaching with a sense of oppression, emotions were hard to predict. Sometimes, rationality could be put aside.
Xu Sheng could clearly feel Shao Zhan’s breath close to his ear and his heartbeat that seemed within arm’s reach.
“Gege, even though the feeling of hugging oneself is a bit…” Xu Sheng didn’t finish his sentence before he said, “But I can reluctantly let you hug for a while.”
When the two returned to Shao Zhan’s home, the sky had already become completely dark, and the streetlights lit up on schedule.
Xu Yaping had to work overtime at the company during this period. Even when she returned home, she came back late and left early. She didn’t have much time to care about him. Shao Zhan only needed to tell her that he was going to a classmate’s house to play.
As Shao Zhan stood on the balcony for the phone call, Xu Yaping briefly asked, “Which classmate?” It was obvious that she had heard of Shao Zhan’s name. Then she said, “Be careful, study well with outstanding classmates. Look at them, then look at your scores.”
Anyway, he openly stayed for the night.
“I thought I could randomly walk a few steps on the street and encounter a few little brothers,” Xu Sheng sat on the sofa, watching Shao Zhan busy himself in the kitchen. With the original homeowner in the house, Xu Sheng returned to the role of a guest. His gaze fell on the wall posted with several disciplinary notices. With legs crossed, he said, “After wandering around for two rounds, I didn’t encounter anyone.”
Shao Zhan often yielded to his boyfriend’s unconventional thinking. “What are you talking about.”
Xu Sheng, “Isn’t that how it’s portrayed on TV?”
Shao Zhan, “Which show?”
Xu Sheng, curled up on the sofa, thought for a moment, “Young and Dangerous?”
“…” Shao Zhan pressed down the instant noodles, turned around, and left the kitchen.
Although he was currently in Xu Sheng’s body, Xu Sheng’s appearance was quite intimidating when not smiling. He walked up to Xu Sheng, took off his coat with the back of his hand, slightly lowered his body, and used two fingers to lift Xu Sheng’s chin. Naturally switching to his school tyrant mode, he asked in a cold tone, “Like this?”
Xu Sheng wasn’t afraid of him; his eyes narrowed. “Did you often tease classmates like this before?”
“Not often,” Shao Zhan released his hand. “Classmate Xu is the first. Get up and eat the noodles.”
Xu Sheng lay on the sofa for a while before getting up. Shao Zhan took out clean clothes and went to the bathroom to take a shower.
It was already unclear who was staying over at whose house.
While eating dinner, Xu Sheng scrolled through the class group chat for a while. Hou Jun and the others had organised a grand Genesis team-building event for the day.
Hou Jun urged in the class group: Who isn’t online yet?
Yuan Ziqiang expressed his inability to understand: You’re all in the newbie village. Where’s the fun in this game? What team-building? Let’s do newbie tasks together?
Hou Jun: What’s your understanding? The newbie village is full of innocence and romance. You, a level 5 player, go somewhere else.
Yuan Ziqiang: …
When Hou Jun mentioned everyone in the group, he also tagged Xu Sheng and Shao Zhan, who were not present.
[Hou Jun]: @S, @Shao Zhan, are you two coming?
Unexpectedly, the first person to reply was the study god.
[Shao Zhan]: Sure.
[Hou Jun]: What about Sheng ge?
Xu Sheng played with his phone with one hand. Without thinking, he casually replied: Him? I’m waiting for him to finish showering.
