When she stepped forward to greet him, Bai Jiangxin had already prepared himself for his ears to grow calluses.

But no. Along the way, as they talked, he could only hear the sentences she spoke; the moment she stopped talking, he could no longer hear anything.

Bai Jiangxin reacted quickly—it should be that the biological link between him and Xiang Di had disappeared.

Bai Jiangxin didn’t know what he was thinking. After a long while without getting his response, Xiang Di mustered up the courage to reach out and lightly patted his back shoulder.

“Bai Jiangxin?”

Bai Jiangxin lowered his gaze, looking at the hand she had lightly placed on him. The back of her hand was fair, her fingers slender, her nails small and delicate, tinged with a pale pink. Her hand was very warm—the warmth coming from her palm, even through his clothes, made him feel its presence.

Xiang Di also noticed that he was looking at her hand and thought he was resisting being touched without warning, so she hurriedly pulled her hand back.

Bai Jiangxin withdrew his gaze, gave a slow hm, and continued walking forward.

What was that hm for? Xiang Di caught up to his pace and asked him again.

Bai Jiangxin asked, “Do you really want to change seats?”

Nonsense—of course she didn’t want to. But wasn’t she supposed to look at him? He had already brought it up himself; she couldn’t possibly thicken her skin and cling to him, insisting on being his desk mate.

“…Let’s change.” Xiang Di imagined it out loud. “Actually, it’s fine as long as I switch seats with the class monitor, or you switch seats with Qianqian. That way everyone’s happy, hehe.”

That way she could be desk mates with Qianqian again, and Bai Jiangxin would still be very close to her. Being desk mates with her best friend, with the boy she liked sitting right behind her—whose senior year could be this blissful? Oh, turns out it’s hers.

Thinking of this, her tone also turned expectant. “What do you think?”

Bai Jiangxin was ranked first, and Teacher Chen liked him the most. If he also felt this arrangement was fine, Teacher Chen would definitely listen to him.

Bai Jiangxin slightly furrowed his brows, trying to see even a trace of forced cheerfulness on her face—but there was none. From her eyes to her mouth, Xiang Di was full of anticipation about sitting separately from him and reuniting with her good friend.

Changing seats was something he had brought up last week. Now, the one most eager to change seats had instead become her.

When he walked her home last week, upon hearing about changing seats, she had been so upset that she sang at the top of her lungs on the bus, as if he had committed some unforgivable crime. Now, after nothing more than a single day off, her attitude had instantly become different.

Bai Jiangxin gave a light scoff at the corner of his mouth. That night, she had spoken of her feelings with such sea-drying, stone-crumbling resolve, as if she couldn’t live without him in this lifetime—yet in the end, it was only this much.

The sense of disparity was unavoidable, because she was simply too good at taking things up and putting them down, as though one second she was still saying she loved him beyond redemption, and the next second she was suddenly asking who he even was.

At this moment, Xiang Di tilted up her small face and looked at him expectantly, the corners of her mouth lifting into a hopeful curve, especially wishing he would nod.

The happier she looked, the more obvious that sense of disparity became in Bai Jiangxin’s eyes.

His voice turned cold. “Not much.”

Xiang Di’s expectant gaze froze awkwardly at once. She hadn’t expected him to be so unaccommodating.

“Uh, then… who do you want to be desk mates with?” she asked for his opinion in her good-tempered way. “I can just switch seats with them, right?”

Bai Jiangxin said, “I don’t want anyone.”

Indeed, he didn’t want anyone—unless that person was mute from mouth to heart and couldn’t annoy him.

“No desk mate? Then you want to sit alone?” Xiang Di thought for a moment, her tone surprised. “Ah, don’t tell me you want to sit in the VIP seat next to the podium?”

That was usually where teachers arranged for the most unruly students in the class to sit. Those people talked a lot and were very restless; whoever sat with them would be disturbed, so they were simply made to sit with the teacher instead.

The person currently sitting in that seat was Wang Sichen. With him sitting there, aside from his own dissatisfaction, all the classmates and teachers felt it was well deserved. If Wang Sichen knew that Bai Jiangxin actually wanted to sit in his seat, he’d probably be so happy he’d die of joy.

Xiang Di hesitated in her tone. “But I feel like that seat doesn’t really suit you…”

From ancient times to now, when had there ever been a top student sitting in that seat.

“You feel?” The corner of Bai Jiangxin’s mouth tugged as he lowered his eyes and asked her back, “What you feel is right?”

His tone was cold—not the polite distance kind, but rather quite impolite, even carrying a hint of aggressiveness. Xiang Di was so retorted that she didn’t dare speak for a moment.

Xiang Di felt a bit of regret, realizing that she might have gotten a little carried away, thinking that just because she had been his desk mate for a day and had added him on WeChat, she could point fingers at his affairs.

Bai Jiangxin had always been someone with a strong sense of boundaries. She should have kept that firmly in mind.

“That’s not what I meant,” afraid of offending him again, Xiang Di said softly. “Then… if you think it’s suitable, it’s suitable…”

Xiang Di didn’t dare try to talk to him again. Bai Jiangxin lowered his eyes and, from the corner of his vision, looked at her lowered head and her lips slightly pressed together from feeling wronged.

He knew that his tone just now hadn’t been very good. She had clearly meant well, yet he hadn’t appreciated it.

Feeling somewhat guilty, Bai Jiangxin let out a silent sigh. He had previously been wishing every day for the link to disappear—now that the link had finally disappeared, what exactly was he annoyed about.

People going to school in groups of two or three walked together; the road was lively, yet the two of them didn’t speak again, walking in silence like this until they reached the classroom.

The two of them walked into the classroom one after the other. Ye Minjia, who had arrived earlier than them, instantly widened his eyes in alertness and hurriedly nudged Liang Qianqian beside him, who was silently copying English vocabulary.

The two sat down in their seats. Ye Minjia leaned his head forward and, putting on an innocent act, asked, “Eh, why did you two arrive at the classroom together today?”

Bai Jiangxin ignored him. Only Xiang Di explained, “We just happened to run into each other on the way.”

Liang Qianqian asked, “Just happened to run into each other?”

Xiang Di blinked. “What else would it be?”

Liang Qianqian shot Ye Minjia a look, and Ye Minjia returned a “leave it to me” look.

These two really had tight mouths. From the school gate to the teaching building, there was indeed only this fixed route. Plus, their times coming to school were similar, so the chances of running into each other were indeed high. Bai Jiangxin hadn’t never run into other people before either, but entering the classroom together was a bit of a problem.

That meant the two had walked the whole way together. Walking the same route, they would have to chat, right? But someone like Bai Jiangxin—if he didn’t open his mouth, even immortals would find it hard to get started. Anyone who didn’t have the resolve to press a warm face against a cold one, who couldn’t thicken their skin and force a conversation with him, simply couldn’t get a few words out of him.

He directly sighed at Bai Jiangxin. “Big bro, you’ve changed, huh. Didn’t you used to dislike the flag-raising every Monday and only come after it was over? Tell me—what caused this drastic change in temperament? You didn’t even skip the flag-raising ceremony today and actually arrived this early?”

As he spoke, he very casually glanced at Xiang Di.

However, there was not the slightest ripple on Bai Jiangxin’s face. He calmly asked back, “You don’t want to see me that badly? Then should I leave now?”

Ye Minjia’s expression stiffened. What was wrong with this guy now, when had he ever said he didn’t want to see him?

He, the dignified class monitor, wasn’t going to indulge Bai Jiangxin. Raising his brows, he directly reached out and slapped Bai Jiangxin on the back.

“You swallow dynamite or something? Why’s your tone so sharp.”

【I don’t think I’ve offended him recently, right? Could it be that he found out about me secretly logging into his Honor of Kings account on Sunday and losing several stars?】

Bai Jiangxin: “……”

That useless noob, sooner or later he was going to change the password. But now wasn’t the time to settle scores with Ye Minjia. Just as Ye Minjia had pulled his hand back, Bai Jiangxin suddenly grabbed his wrist.

Ye Minjia: “What are you doing?”

Bai Jiangxin didn’t let go, just kept holding onto his wrist. Ye Minjia struggled a bit, but unexpectedly couldn’t break free.

“What are you doing, showing off your strength as a man?” Ye Minjia said. “If you’ve got the ability, arm-wrestle me—what’s the point of dragging me like this?”

Bai Jiangxin frowned and warned in a low voice, “Don’t move.”

There were no other test subjects—he could only use Ye Minjia to confirm it.

Ye Minjia was even more baffled now, having no idea what kind of stunt he was pulling.

Bai Jiangxin continued to grip Ye Minjia’s wrist like this, without explaining what exactly he was trying to do.

Beside them, Xiang Di and Liang Qianqian had no idea what the two of them were doing. Xiang Di asked softly, “What are they doing?”

Liang Qianqian wasn’t sure either. “…Practicing traditional Chinese medicine pulse-taking?”

But this didn’t really look like the correct posture for taking a pulse.

Liang Qianqian couldn’t figure it out. Just moments ago, Ye Minjia had still been probing the situation between Xiang Di and Bai Jiangxin—how did he end up entangled with Bai Jiangxin himself in the blink of an eye?

It was Monday. There was no rain outside, so by routine there was supposed to be a flag-raising ceremony. Someone had just returned from handing in homework at the office and stood at the classroom door to announce, “The homeroom teacher has something to do—let’s go downstairs to assemble first.”

The sound of chairs being moved instantly replaced the morning reading. Everyone dragged themselves up from their seats.

There was no time to guess Bai Jiangxin’s baffling human behavior anymore. Liang Qianqian urged Xiang Di, “Don’t worry about them, let’s go down and assemble first.”

Xiang Di hummed in response, and the two girls linked arms and left the classroom.

Since they were going down to assemble, Ye Minjia, as the class monitor, would have to take attendance later. His tone was helpless. “Big bro, don’t you think this is about enough? How long are you planning to keep holding onto me like this?”

As he spoke, he tried to pull his hand back again.