During morning class, Lin Ran realized the teacher was taking special “care” of him. The teacher wrote a problem on the board, and after the top students had rushed to solve it, he nodded with satisfaction. Then he suddenly looked at Lin Ran. “Lin Ran (Li Sisi), why don’t you explain your solution too?”

So Lin Ran took his problem-solving notebook up to the podium and explained his method—a far more tedious and time-consuming one than the top students’ solutions. Then he sat through the teacher’s criticism and advice.

Ugh, what a pain!

After making it through the whole morning, Lin Ran hadn’t even had a chance to catch his breath when a text from Ye Qingqian came in: 【Come to the office after lunch.】

When Lin Ran got to the office, Ye Qingqian had him do a bunch of trivial things—in other words, run errands. Lin Ran suspected she was up to something!

After boiling the water, Lin Ran couldn’t take it anymore.

“If there’s nothing important, I’m going back. Find someone else to do this kind of busywork,” Lin Ran said to Ye Qingqian, without much courtesy.

Ye Qingqian looked up from what she was doing, glanced at Lin Ran, then smiled. “You’re a member of the Student Council. This is your responsibility.”

“My responsibility isn’t boiling water, pouring tea, and fetching things for you,” Lin Ran said coldly.

“It’s not for me. It’s for the Student Council. You’ve boiled the water, so when everyone gets back after finishing their work, they’ll have something to drink. That’s how you contribute to the team,” Ye Qingqian said, as if it were only natural.

“Honestly, I really hate it when you do this,” Lin Ran said bluntly.

“Tch. Plenty of people hate me,” Ye Qingqian said, completely unfazed.

Lin Ran took a deep breath. “I’m going back.”

Watching Lin Ran try to lose his temper and then hold it back, Ye Qingqian found it strangely amusing. It made her want to tease him. She also thought it was odd of her: Lin Ran was clearly unhappy, yet she found it entertaining. Maybe it was because he didn’t hide the fact that he disliked it. Whenever she asked someone in the Student Council for help, they’d all say, “Sure, sure,” then complain while doing the work. Some even badmouthed her behind her back, though to her face they smiled sweeter than flowers. Lin Ran might not like it, but he’d do the work properly—and afterward, he’d tell her, “I don’t like you making me do this kind of busywork.”

Lin Ran went back to class, but before he’d even warmed his seat, Ye Qingqian came to call him again. This time, he walked out with a scowl. When they reached the stairwell, he turned to face her and spoke without the slightest courtesy. “Can you stop bothering me for no reason? Are you that free? I’m under a lot of pressure studying in class. If it’s nothing important, can you just leave me alone?”

After he said that, Lin Ran noticed the smile on Ye Qingqian’s face stiffen for a moment. She slowly let it fade and pressed her lips together. Was she… feeling a little hurt?

Lin Ran got a headache. Seriously, you keep bothering me, and I complain a little, and now you’re hurt?

“So, what is it?” Lin Ran clicked his tongue, turned his face away, and asked awkwardly.

Ye Qingqian gave Lin Ran a strange look, then smiled again. “The Discipline Committee has something to do at noon, so you’ll need to check discipline with me.”

“Find someone else,” Lin Ran said.

“Your job right now is to assist me,” Ye Qingqian said with a smile.

Annoyed, Lin Ran took the folder from Ye Qingqian’s hands.

“Put on the armband!” Ye Qingqian said.

“You’re seriously such a pain!” Lin Ran snatched the armband and slipped it onto his arm.

“Can’t be helped. It’s part of the job. Just put up with it,” Ye Qingqian said, covering her mouth as she laughed.

As they checked the lunch-break discipline in each class, Lin Ran wore a face like his mom had just died the entire time. Ye Qingqian was basically just tagging along. She didn’t need to say a word; Lin Ran filled in the report himself, noting whether each class was behaving or not.

After they’d finished checking every class, Lin Ran handed the folder and armband to Ye Qingqian. She took them and thought it over. She still needed to tell him the results had to be entered into the computer, but looking at him, she decided not to. If she said it, he’d probably blow up for real.

“Remember to come to the office on your own tomorrow at noon!” Ye Qingqian called out deliberately, waiting until Lin Ran had walked some distance away.

Lin Ran walked off in a foul mood without saying a word. This woman really had something wrong with her. Did he have to chew her out before she’d stop? Lin Ran made up his mind: if Ye Qingqian did this again, he really was going to give her a piece of his mind!

Back in class, Lin Ran started wondering if something was wrong with him. She’d been bothering him so much, and he’d put up with it until now. Damn it, was he messed up again? With his twisted personality, he should’ve pointed at her and cursed her out the first time Ye Qingqian annoyed him. Somehow, he’d held it in all this time without snapping.

Thinking it over, Lin Ran realized that maybe he wasn’t as messed up psychologically as before. Before he was reborn, whenever he saw a woman, he’d think all kinds of sarcastic things about her—he’d been twisted to the extreme. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have gone so far as to kill someone with a knife. But ever since he was reborn, he didn’t think much of girls when he saw them. He just ignored them, as if he didn’t see them, and didn’t make sarcastic remarks about them in his head.

His foul mood kept him from paying attention in afternoon class, and the teacher scolded him.

After school, Lin Ran sat in the classroom for a while. He took a few deep breaths, then got up and went to the cafeteria for dinner.

While they ate, Si Qing and Su Shijie kept on chattering. Lin Ran couldn’t stop thinking about what to do during evening study. Knowing how teachers were, he was bound to be called up to solve a problem that night. The material they’d already covered was one thing, but what if it was a “challenge yourself” problem? The teacher might pull something like that.

As it turned out, Lin Ran shouldn’t have overthought it. When your worries come true, there’s nowhere to cry.

During the second evening-study period, after the top students had shared their solutions, the teacher nodded with satisfaction. Just like during the day, Old Man Cui turned his eyes to Lin Ran. Lin Ran’s heart gave a thump, and he silently repeated, Don’t give me a challenge-yourself problem. Don’t give me a challenge-yourself problem!

“Lin Ran, come up and share how you’d solve the third problem,” Old Man Cui said with a broad smile.

The heart that had just dropped in Lin Ran’s chest suddenly leaped back up. The third problem? Oh, that was great! Lin Ran never would’ve guessed that stepping in dog shit didn’t always mean bad luck—you could also get lucky as hell. This third problem was a challenge-yourself problem, but he remembered it. It had appeared in one of the past exam sets the teacher had uploaded to the group files. It wasn’t exactly the same, but it was pretty close!

So Lin Ran confidently went up to the front with his little notebook. He picked up a piece of chalk and wrote on the blackboard in bold, sweeping strokes. Once he’d finished, he began explaining his approach.

When Lin Ran finished, Old Man Cui nodded with great satisfaction. The fact that Lin Ran could solve this problem meant he’d at least looked through the study materials in the group files. That was a very good attitude.

Still, Old Man Cui pointed out where Lin Ran fell short, and Lin Ran accepted the criticism with an open mind.

Back at his seat, Lin Ran wiped away his sweat. Good grief, that was intense. If he hadn’t looked through the study materials before bed last night and happened to spot this problem, he’d have been done for today!

From that day on, Lin Ran figured out some of Old Man Cui’s tricks. Most of the challenge-yourself problems Old Man Cui assigned were based on questions from past exams in the group files. As long as you downloaded the materials and studied them carefully, you might not be able to solve every single problem, but at least you wouldn’t be charging in blindly like a headless fly.