"Xue Rui, what’s gotten into you? Did you forget your own seat after one weekend?" Qiu Mengze looked utterly speechless.

"I have something to discuss with her."

Xue Rui himself only just realized what he’d done. Why had he subconsciously sat down next to Lin Ruoxi?

Still, he really did have something to discuss.

"My uncle is on duty Tuesday morning, so I can take your grandmother to the hospital for a check-up. You’ll need to ask the head teacher for a leave of absence, and while you’re at it, get one for me too," Xue Rui laid out the entire plan.

He had originally wanted to do it as soon as possible, but his uncle said Tuesday would be best.

Xue Rui didn’t mind. It just meant he got to take half a day off.

"Thank you," Lin Ruoxi whispered, stealing a glance at Xue Rui from behind the curtain of her hair.

’Xue Rui really does keep his word,’ she thought.

’Then that thing about me paying him back with myself...’

At that thought, Lin Ruoxi grew restless. Her heart began to pound, and she didn’t know why.

Xue Rui reached out and brushed Lin Ruoxi’s hair aside, meeting her gaze. Her eyes darted away shyly.

He shook his head. Ever since they’d left the house, Lin Ruoxi had once again let her hair down to hide her face.

Xue Rui wasn’t surprised. With a personality like hers, Lin Ruoxi was terrified of other people’s stares.

But that was fine... He didn’t want Lin Ruoxi to reveal herself so openly to everyone just yet.

It wasn’t that he wanted to "keep" Lin Ruoxi all to himself, but that she needed a gradual process.

"Xue Rui!" Guo Qingqing called out in a low voice.

"Class President? What’s up?" Xue Rui recognized the girl—she was the Class Two president.

"Don’t you get any ideas about Lin Ruoxi. Just focus on chasing your Gu Muxue." Guo Qingqing pulled Xue Rui out of the classroom.

Guo Qingqing figured that Xue Rui must have discovered how beautiful Lin Ruoxi was after she fainted last time, and that’s why he had started pestering her.

Xue Rui couldn’t help but laugh. ’What the hell does this have to do with you?’ he thought.

"Why?" he asked, curious.

"A shallow person like you who only cares about looks isn’t worthy of Lin Ruoxi," Guo Qingqing said sarcastically.

Xue Rui wasn’t surprised. Lin Ruoxi was a boarding student, so she was bound to show her face in the dorms. It made sense that the male students wouldn’t know how beautiful she was, but the female students definitely would.

"Then tell me, if not for looks, what should I be looking for?" Xue Rui retorted.

Guo Qingqing thought for a long moment before saying with a serious expression, "Uh... as students, we should obviously focus on academics."

"That’s actually what I was thinking, too. Look, Gu Muxue is first in our grade, and Lin Ruoxi is second. Spending more time with them is beneficial for..." Xue Rui argued convincingly.

"I can’t win an argument with you. In any case, I’m telling the head teacher," Guo Qingqing said, her face dark.

"Go on, hurry up," Xue Rui said with a dismissive wave.

’I’m interacting with Lin Ruoxi with full approval. Xue Xiaying even praised me for it. There’s no way she’d listen to a tattletale like Guo Qingqing.’

Back at his seat, Qiu Mengze was shaking his head repeatedly, as if deeply disappointed in Xue Rui.

"What’s with that look?" Xue Rui immediately guessed that Qiu Mengze had something nasty to say.

"Even if you can’t get Gu Muxue, there are plenty of other options. Why would you pick Lin Ruoxi?"

"She’s so gloomy and creepy, and she’s completely silent when she walks. Like a damn ghost. She scared the hell out of me by the bathroom entrance during evening self-study one time!"

Qiu Mengze complained nonstop.

"???" Xue Rui gave him a strange look and punched his arm. "If you’re not going to use your eyes, you can donate them to someone else."

"Besides, if you don’t have a guilty conscience, what’s there to be afraid of?" Xue Rui could picture the scene perfectly.

Qiu Mengze must have been fooling around outside the men’s room when Lin Ruoxi happened to come out of the women’s, walking silently with her hair hanging down...

"I’ll make sure you get the scare of your life at dinner later," Xue Rui chuckled mischievously.

At dinnertime, Gu Muxue had already gone home.

The teachers didn’t care at all whether a good student like her attended evening self-study or not.

Xue Rui, Lin Ruoxi, and Qiu Mengze were eating in the cafeteria. Xue Rui found a quiet corner to sit in.

Of course, he acted like a king, waiting for Lin Ruoxi to bring him his food.

Lin Ruoxi constantly felt indebted to him.

Xue Rui could sense this, and he knew that the more he ordered Lin Ruoxi around, the more it would alleviate the silly girl’s guilt.

’Besides, it was just getting food.’

Lin Ruoxi and Xue Rui sat side by side, with Qiu Mengze sitting across from them.

Qiu Mengze didn’t know what had happened between Xue Rui and Lin Ruoxi, but he felt his childhood friend was going way too far.

"Xue Rui, I never realized you loved ordering people around so much," Qiu Mengze said sarcastically, his expression full of disdain.

"N-no... it’s not like that. I... I’m doing it voluntarily," Lin Ruoxi quickly explained, afraid that Xue Rui would be misunderstood.

"You hear that? She said she’s doing it voluntarily," Xue Rui said with a smile.

"I get it." The corner of Qiu Mengze’s mouth twitched. ’Who would voluntarily run errands for someone? Lin Ruoxi must have a crush on Xue Rui.’

Even though he didn’t think much of a girl like Lin Ruoxi, no one had ever confessed their feelings to him in his entire life. He couldn’t help but feel a little sour.

Xue Rui could tell what Qiu Mengze was thinking with just a glance.

Boys this age were so easy to read; they wore everything on their faces.

He stood up, walked behind Lin Ruoxi, and gently lifted her hair.

Lin Ruoxi instinctively tried to lower her head, but Xue Rui tilted her chin up, revealing a long, swan-like, alabaster neck.

An innocent and exquisitely beautiful face was reflected in Qiu Mengze’s eyes.

"Y-you... hello... I-I-I’m Qiu Mengze," Qiu Mengze stammered.

"Hello, I know who you are."

Lin Ruoxi found this very strange. She and Qiu Mengze were classmates, and they had even been in the same class during their first year. ’Why would he say something like that?’ she wondered.

’It’s as if... we’re meeting for the first time.’

Xue Rui chuckled mischievously, gave Lin Ruoxi’s hair a playful ruffle, and returned to his seat.

Qiu Mengze’s heart hammered in his chest, his face flushing a deep red.

’He was going to see her eventually anyway,’ Xue Rui thought. ’So what if I give him an early preview?’

After all, the one getting flustered wasn’t Lin Ruoxi, but Qiu Mengze.

Qiu Mengze’s personality wasn’t exactly introverted, but he wasn’t extroverted either. It wasn’t that he couldn’t talk to female classmates, or that he didn’t have any good female friends.

It was just that he treated them more or less the same as he treated the guys.

But as soon as he encountered a ridiculously beautiful girl like Gu Muxue or Lin Ruoxi, or even a girl Qiu Mengze had a crush on...

...Qiu Mengze would become a stammering mess, unable to get out a single complete sentence.

Once Lin Ruoxi let her hair fall back into place, Qiu Mengze gradually calmed down.

"Xue Rui!" Qiu Mengze said through clenched teeth.

How could he not know he’d been played by Xue Rui?

Besides, Lin Ruoxi was just too beautiful. He felt she was in no way inferior to the school belle, Gu Muxue.

"Are you thinking, ’How did I never notice before? How did a bastard like Xue Rui find her first?’" Xue Rui voiced Qiu Mengze’s thoughts out loud.

"Shut up and eat!" Qiu Mengze’s face instantly turned beet red.

Because Xue Rui was exactly right.

Lin Ruoxi picked the tomato skins out of Xue Rui’s dish and then went to get him a bowl of egg drop soup. 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝙬𝙚𝓫𝒏𝓸𝓿𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝙤𝓶

Xue Rui, in turn, gave all the food he didn’t like to Lin Ruoxi, which was mostly meat.

Watching the two of them being so intimate, Qiu Mengze nearly ground his molars to dust.

Before he knew what Lin Ruoxi looked like, he hadn’t felt anything. In fact, he had thought Xue Rui must be blind.

But now, he felt an indescribable sense of frustration. It was jealousy.

’Why would a goddess-level beauty like her be so meekly running errands for Xue Rui?’

And yet, he felt he shouldn’t be jealous of his good friend. His heart was torn.

"Is your grandmother okay at home by herself?" Xue Rui asked casually.

He thought for a moment. ’Lin Ruoxi’s grandmother’s health isn’t great, but she can still take care of herself for now. In a few years, though, that might not be the case.’

"Grandma can cook," Lin Ruoxi said in a small voice.

"In a few days, you should apply to be a day student..."

Qiu Mengze suddenly cut in. "Wait, you’ve already met the parents?"

"Mhm, her family doesn’t object," Xue Rui said, being deliberately ambiguous.

"Right?" Xue Rui nudged Lin Ruoxi with his elbow.