“Holy crap, how did you suddenly get so good at games? And your grades are shooting up too. Be honest with me. Are you cheating?”

Chen Kai clung to Su Yu and kept rambling. He was still hung up on how Su Yu had completely crushed him in-game last night. Separated by a computer screen, he'd suddenly felt that Su Yu had become a different person. The change was absurdly drastic.

“I just practiced a bit. It wasn't hard to begin with. I used to go easy on you.”

Su Yu leaned back in his seat, feeling a little bored. He answered Chen Kai casually. Exams were close, and the school worried the atmosphere was too tense, which wouldn't help students perform well, so they often held mental health lectures.

But Su Yu couldn't take any of it in at all. There were only two or three weeks left until the gaokao. No one wanted to waste their attention on this kind of thing. Everyone else was worried about the unfinished problem sets still sitting on their desks, while Su Yu was worried about...

He suddenly lifted his head.

Xia Qiange was sitting right in front of them, whispering about something with a few girls from the class. Every now and then, she covered her mouth and laughed softly. At some point, her growing hair had already passed her neck, almost falling to her shoulders.

And Su Yu liked long hair.

“Hey?” Chen Kai waved a hand in front of Su Yu's eyes. “What are you looking at?”

“Nothing.”

Su Yu shook his head and moved his gaze to the stage. The lecturer was holding a microphone, speaking with full enthusiasm.

“Looking at Xia Qiange?” Chen Kai lowered his voice, since the girl herself was sitting right in front of them. “Still thinking about it? You got third on this week's exam. You're only a tiny bit behind Xia Qiange. Aren't you really gonna give it a shot?”

Su Yu only shook his head. He didn't have an answer himself.

“Let's talk after the exams.”

...

The lecture ended, but the exams went on. Su Yu returned to the classroom, and before long, class started again.

He lay on his desk, planning to rest for a bit, but a book suddenly appeared in front of him. He looked up and met Xia Qiange's eyes.

“There are a few problems I can't figure out.” Xia Qiange looked at him, and the eyes Su Yu had liked for so long curved into little crescents. “Can you explain them to me?”

Su Yu lowered his head and glanced over the questions in her notebook. Xia Qiange wasn't very good at physics, so she often came to him with questions. After all, physics had always been what the old Su Yu was best at.

“Of course.”

“Then... start from here.”

Xia Qiange nodded hard. She leaned close to Su Yu and pointed at the parts she didn't understand.

“This problem...”

The question itself wasn't hard for Su Yu, but his focus was a little scattered. He could feel how close Xia Qiange was. The soft ends of her hair brushed against the back of his neck, leaving a faint tingling itch. The subtle fragrance around his nose, the scent from her body, was familiar too. For a moment, it made him lose himself.

“That doesn't seem right. Su Yu, didn't you explain this part wrong?”

“Huh?” Su Yu focused and looked at the problem again. She was right. He had explained it wrong. “Yeah, there's a bit of a problem here. It should be like this instead...”

“Su Yu, someone's looking for you.”

Someone standing at the door called out to him. Su Yu looked up, and his gaze fixed on the doorway. He saw He Muqing hiding behind the doorframe. The girl only showed a pair of lively eyes, staring straight at him.

“I'll go out for a bit. I'll explain the rest when I get back.” Su Yu glanced at Xia Qiange, a trace of apology in his voice.

“Oh... it's fine.”

Xia Qiange quietly drew her gaze back from the pretty girl at the door. Her smile only rested on the surface of her eyes. She shook her head.

“Go on. Don't keep her waiting too long.”

“Mm... okay.”

For a brief moment, Su Yu wanted to explain something. But when he saw the calmness in Xia Qiange's eyes, he swallowed the words back down, put down his pen, and left the classroom.

...

“What do you need me for?”

Su Yu looked at He Muqing, who had suddenly come to find him. The old He Muqing had never come to his classroom before. Even when they went home together after school, they only met at the bus stop. Not many people in class knew about his relationship with He Muqing. Even Xia Qiange only found out later.

“Just come with me.” He Muqing didn't explain. She grabbed his sleeve and led him running toward the rooftop.

The senior year classrooms were on the sixth floor. One floor above that was the rooftop. Su Yu could feel the teasing smiles around them. A boy and a girl together, even specially running off to the rooftop—people would only think of that kind of relationship. Su Yu hadn't expected the first time he drew attention would be because of something like this.

The moment they stepped through the rooftop door, He Muqing let go of his sleeve. She turned around and stared at Su Yu. There was a wetness in her eyes she couldn't quite hide.

“What happened?” Su Yu had meant to joke, but the thought faded. Only then did he notice the corners of He Muqing's eyes were slightly red. “Why are you crying? You're not a kid anymore.”

“My dad's physical exam... found stomach cancer.”

He Muqing's voice was very soft, like the wind brushing across the rooftop. A disease like that was no different from a demon to anyone. In an instant, it could shatter a family. She was still a girl who hadn't seen much of the world. It was only natural for her to be afraid.

“Is it serious?”

“The doctor said they found it very early. The cure rate is high. He told us not to worry too much.” He Muqing bit her lip and forced her tears back down. “I don't want to worry either, but...”

“If it can be cured, then that's enough, isn't it? You look better when you're fiercer.” Su Yu rubbed the top of He Muqing's lowered head.

“Don't touch me. You're so annoying. And you're still laughing.” He Muqing pushed his hand away, her eyes turning fierce. “My mom told me to ask you over for dinner tonight. She wants to thank you.”

“Mm, you really should thank me.” Su Yu nodded quite seriously. “How about... you repay me by marrying me?”

“Get lost, pervert.”

He Muqing glared at Su Yu. There was more than just fierceness in her eyes now. There was even a faint trace of killing intent. She punched him lightly on the shoulder, then ran off...

Her voice was carried far away by the wind, then drifted back into Su Yu's ears.

“You explained problems to Xia Qiange, so just make her your wife then, you scumbag.”

...

“Still want me to explain?”

Su Yu returned to the classroom, genuinely in a great mood. Rebirth had given him the chance to change many things. He was no longer as powerless as he had once been. He could change everything from his previous life...

But what about her?

What Su Yu couldn't judge was the image of that girl reflected in his pupils before death—the madness and obsession in it. Could something like that really be changed?

Looking at the notebook that had already been taken back from his desk, Su Yu asked Xia Qiange.

“No need. The rest of the problems... I already figured them out.” Xia Qiange turned back and looked at the smile at the corner of Su Yu's lips. “That girl just now... who was she?”

“Not a senior. Just a friend.”

“A friend, huh? I thought maybe you... were dating.”

Su Yu only smiled. In the past, he would've hurried to explain himself and exposed all kinds of tells. But now, he didn't want to explain anymore. If Xia Qiange misunderstood...

Maybe that wasn't so bad.

“I'm going back to my problems.”

Xia Qiange turned around. She lowered her head and started working, but for some reason, what rang in her ears wasn't the soft scratch of pen on paper.

It was the sharp, grating sound of nails suddenly scraping across a page.

Why would a fish give up the bait and leap out of the pond?

Confusion wrapped around her heart in layer after layer, like thin strands of silk. Everything pointed to the same answer.

He seemed to have... changed.