Tao Zhi finished bowing, then suddenly remembered something. Grabbing the microphone again, she stood up lazily and added, “Oh, right, PS—if I run into this kind of thing again, I might still lose control for a moment.”
She raised her index and middle fingers, bent them apart, and pointed forward. “Grandpa’s watching you.”
The girl’s arrogant voice echoed through the entire playground via the speakers. After a brief silence followed by laughter, the whole crowd burst into cheers.
The discipline director stormed onto the stage, face ashen. Wang Zhezi’s arm trembled as she pointed a finger at her. “Tao Zhi—get down here right now!”
Tao Zhi slipped down quietly from behind the discipline director, deliberately looping around her to sneak back to the last row of the lineup, standing obediently in place.
Li Shuangjiang was still laughing, clutching his stomach. “I can’t—class monitor, you’re insane. They asked you to make a self-criticism, and you turned it into a moral lecture.”
“Developing the nation through science and education, right? Some of the crooked branches of our motherland’s trees have to be pruned back by force,” Tao Zhi declared grandly while tugging on Jiang Qihuai’s school uniform sleeve, hiding behind him as she timidly poked her head out. “Old Wang didn’t come charging over to hit me, did he?”
“No,” Li Shuangjiang wiped tears of laughter from his eyes. “Our class monitor’s right—our class monitor is a true warrior of justice.”
Tao Zhi hunched her shoulders, keeping an eye on Wang Zhezi and the discipline director’s movements, nodding rapidly like a pecking chick. “Right, right, I’m the guardian of experiments, the light of righteousness.”
Jiang Qihuai lowered his head and glanced at the wrinkled sleeve of his school jacket, which she had been clutching. “You’re about to rip it off.”
“Ah,” Tao Zhi yelped and quickly let go.
Jiang Qihuai lifted his hand to straighten the crooked collar of his uniform jacket.
His shoulders and back looked slender beneath the loose jacket, but his frame was broad—the way the fabric stretched across his back was quietly handsome.
Tao Zhi leaned forward a little and whispered, “Your Highness, I saw you laughing just now.”
Jiang Qihuai was silent for a moment, then said faintly, “I wasn’t.”
“I saw it.”
“You saw wrong.”
Tao Zhi nodded, not arguing. “You didn’t laugh—I saw a dog laugh.”
Jiang Qihuai: “……”
✦ . ⁺ . ✦ . ⁺ . ✦
As expected, after Tao Zhi’s soul-shaking self-criticism speech, she was once again summoned by Wang Zhezi to the office for another scolding.
When she returned, she was still in good spirits—until she realized the next period was math.
Ever since that last quiz, Wang Er had been on her case, chasing her relentlessly for several days straight—on average, calling her up three times per class.
Tao Zhi had never met a teacher like this. Most teachers, after seeing her attitude, simply adopted a policy of benign neglect—turning a blind eye rather than bothering to manage her. The Wang family’s double trouble really lived up to their reputation.
As soon as Wang Er entered the classroom, she slammed two thick stacks of test papers onto the math class rep’s desk. “Alright, alright, stop chatting. Class time. It’s already the third week—after next week, it’s the monthly exam again. How are none of you anxious yet? Zhao Mingqi, look at this paper—your correct and wrong answers are almost equal. You’re very balanced, huh? If you spent half your basketball time on studying, your correct answers would outnumber the wrong ones by at least one.”
Li Shuangjiang snorted and wheezed with laughter beside her.
“Li Shuangjiang,” Wang Er shot him a glare. “You dare laugh? Did you write your last problem with your feet? What even is that? You didn’t get the first sub-question right!”
Li Shuangjiang instantly fell silent.
After scolding a few more students, Wang Er turned her head. “Class monitor.”
Tao Zhi raised her head nervously.
“Relax, not you—your seatmate behind you,” Wang Er said, flipping through a paper. “This weekend’s test wasn’t your usual standard. Not in form today?”
Jiang Qihuai didn’t speak.
Tao Zhi turned around in mild surprise. It was the first time he’d ever been called on.
“Don’t rush when you’re solving problems, take your time,” Wang Er continued. “And the one in front of you—don’t just keep sneaking looks at your classmate. If you’re going to copy, at least do it right. You even copied the wrong answer. I won’t pressure you too much, but at least try to pass the monthly exam, alright?”
Tao Zhi mentally calculated the gap between her last semester’s final score and the passing mark. It seemed… quite a stretch.
She spoke honestly, “Teacher, I got twenty points on the final last semester.”
Wang Er fell silent for a moment, then sighed and waved his hand. “Alright then, aim for forty this time.”
Tao Zhi felt that Wang Er was still thinking too optimistically.
A whole forty points! That wasn’t something you could just decide to get.
She rubbed her nose. Sitting beside her, Fu Xiling glanced at her quietly, lips pressed together, not saying anything.
Tao Zhi didn’t notice. Wang Er, having finished scolding his way around the classroom, finally began explaining the test paper. Tao Zhi picked up her pen and started doodling little figures in the blank spaces.
By the end of class, a whole row of Doraemons had appeared across her test paper. The last one wasn’t finished yet—she was using a blue gel pen to color in its head.
A small folded note slid across the desk and was carefully pushed to her hand.
Tao Zhi paused, glanced down. The handwriting was neat and delicate, each character precisely formed: I’m not very good at math, but I can teach you the basics. I can help with other subjects too.
Tao Zhi turned her head. Fu Xiling was looking down, not meeting her gaze, her bobbed hair neatly hiding half her face.
“Why aren’t you talking? Class is over already.” Tao Zhi looked at her curiously.
Fu Xiling turned, flustered, her eyes reddening.
“I… I was embarrassed to talk to you,” she said softly, voice catching slightly. “I’m sorry. I dragged you down.”
Tao Zhi waved her hand. “If you mean that self-criticism punishment thing, I actually had a great time this morning. Honestly, I was a bit disappointed Old Wang didn’t suspend me. I lost a whole week of fun.”
“But you got scolded by Teacher Wang, and they called your parent,” Fu Xiling’s eyes glistened, looking more and more upset. “And you got hurt too.”
Li Shuangjiang was handing out papers nearby. Hearing the voices, he turned around. “Who got hurt?”
He froze when he saw Fu Xiling crying. “Hey, hey—what’s going on?”
“It’s fine,” Tao Zhi raised the note in her hand. “Teacher Fu here said she’s gonna tutor me so I can hit forty points in math. She got moved to tears by her own kindness.”
Fu Xiling didn’t know whether to cry or laugh.
“I can help too,” Li Shuangjiang said enthusiastically. He always loved jumping into ‘helping classmates.’ Leaning over, he said, “Fu Xiling’s good at English, right? I can teach you math. Two subjects at once—we’ll hit six hundred in no time! I’ll tell Zhao Mingqi later I’m skipping basketball after school.”
Tao Zhi felt her vision darken. She wanted to refuse.
“Come on, let’s form a study interest group! Fu Teacher can tutor me in English too—my English’s been scraping under the passing line forever.” Excited, Li Shuangjiang whipped out his phone, opened the class WeChat group, and pulled both Fu Xiling and Tao Zhi into a smaller chat. The class monitor’s name appeared at the top—next to Tao Zhi’s was Jiang Qihuai’s.
Li Shuangjiang turned his head. “Huai-ge, you in?”
Jiang Qihuai was drinking water. “What?”
“Study group,” Li Shuangjiang said. “With you joining, that’s a major boost in combat power—our ace attacker.”
Jiang Qihuai shoved his water bottle into the desk compartment, his tone flat and uninterested. “Not going.”
Li Shuangjiang fiddled with his phone. “Alright then.”
As he spoke, Tao Zhi watched him casually drag Jiang Qihuai into the group chat anyway.
The latter, not looking at his phone, remained blissfully unaware.
For a moment, Tao Zhi couldn’t help admiring Li Shuangjiang’s fearless courage.
✦ . ⁺ . ✦ . ⁺ . ✦
Li Shuangjiang’s original plan had been quite solid: the first half hour before evening self-study, he’d teach Tao Zhi and Fu Xiling math; during the second half, Fu Xiling would teach them English grammar.
But the moment the bell for evening self-study rang, Wang Er appeared again—like a restless ghost with a stack of test papers in hand—floating into the classroom.
She and Wang Zhezi engaged in a five-minute territorial battle over the session, ultimately splitting the period in half—and then promptly filled the entire evening with teaching.
Li Shuangjiang typed furiously in the group chat:【Big trouble, brothers. Evening self-study’s gone. We’ll have to reschedule.】
Tao Zhi, always on her phone, saw the message instantly and exhaled in relief.
【Zhizhi Grape: Then let’s do it another day! What a pity!】
Li Shuangjiang was surprised—he hadn’t expected Tao Zhi to sound so disappointed about not studying. Such a rare moment!
He decided he couldn’t let her newfound “enthusiasm” fizzle out. Sometimes, all it took to fall in love with learning was a single spark.
He quickly changed his tone:
【Or we could go to my place? I’ll tell Zhao Mingqi I’m skipping basketball tonight. Do you guys have cram school later?】
Tao Zhi: “…”
【Zhizhi Grape: ?】
Fu Xiling hesitated. She actually wanted to spend time with Tao Zhi outside of school—to thank her, and also to slowly build a friendship.
But going to a male classmate’s house… that was a little uncomfortable.
Tao Zhi glanced sideways at her, then sighed.
【Zhizhi Grape: Come to my place. My dad’s on a business trip, no one’s home. We can have dinner together too.】
Li Shuangjiang immediately sprang to his feet, turning around excitedly. “What! We’re going to the boss’s mansion?!”
The classroom fell silent. Everyone turned to look.
Tao Zhi and Fu Xiling stared at him expressionlessly.
Wang Zhezi, in the middle of explaining a problem, was interrupted. The piece of chalk in his hand snapped with a crack—and, with practiced precision, he flung the broken tip straight at the back of his head.
“Li Shuangjiang! If you don’t want to listen, stand outside. Don’t disturb the others.”
Li Shuangjiang clutched the back of his head and sat down obediently.
✦ . ⁺ . ✦ . ⁺ . ✦
After evening study ended, Tao Zhi brought her two little followers into the car.
Fu Xiling sat stiffly in the back seat, clearly nervous. From the front, she heard Tao Zhi call out, “Uncle Gu.”
The driver smiled and responded warmly, glancing at the rearview mirror. “Zhizhi made some friends in the new class?”
“Mhm,” Tao Zhi replied. “We’re going home to study.”
“To do what?” Uncle Gu thought he’d misheard.
“Study.” Tao Zhi repeated with a serious face, clearly displeased with his reaction.
“Alright,” Uncle Gu held back a laugh and nodded, thinking he’d better report this to Tao Xiuping tonight. “Studying’s good. Study hard.”
Tao Zhi’s house wasn’t far from the school—ten minutes by car without traffic. When they arrived, she pushed open the courtyard gate and led them inside.
Behind her, Li Shuangjiang was practically bouncing. “A big villa! It’s a big villa!!”
Fu Xiling frowned slightly. “Can you lower your voice?”
Li Shuangjiang didn’t hear her. His footsteps halted mid-hop, and he pointed to the other side of the yard, whipping out his phone. “A slide! There’s a slide!!”
Fu Xiling ignored him and followed Tao Zhi forward.
Tao Zhi unlocked the door with the fingerprint scanner, stepped in first, and moved aside. “Come in. There’s no one else home but me, so make yourselves comfortable.”
She had just finished speaking when a voice came from the living room—
“You’re so slow.”
Tao Zhi: “……”
Ji Fan was slouched on the sofa, one leg crossed over the other, tablet in hand as he played a game. Hearing the door, he craned his neck toward it, his voice lazy and drawn out: “I’ve been waiting for you all afternoon. I’m starving.”
Tao Zhi froze, blinking. “You’re fast. Already finished all the procedures?”
“Not yet, still missing a bit.” Ji Fan tossed the tablet aside, stood up stretching, then walked over and reached out to ruffle her hair. Smiling, he said, “I missed you, so I took the earliest high-speed train back.”
Tao Zhi: “Let go.”
Ji Fan: “No. You didn’t miss me?”
Li Shuangjiang and Fu Xiling stood frozen at the doorway, like someone had pressed a pause button—too afraid to make a sound.
I missed you…
Missed you…
Missed you…
Li Shuangjiang’s face morphed into one perfectly resembling a screaming rubber chicken.
He glanced at Fu Xiling, phone already in hand, and quickly started typing in the group chat:
【What’s this what’s this what’s this!】
【My big bro has a boyfriend??】
Fu Xiling: 【Shocked cat.jpg】
Li Shuangjiang: 【He said he missed big bro! And ruffled his hair!】
Fu Xiling: 【Shocked cat 2.0.jpg】
Li Shuangjiang: 【Lives in a mansion, has a slide, and a boyfriend!!】
Fu Xiling: 【Nodding cat.jpg】
✦ . ⁺ . ✦ . ⁺ . ✦
Jiang Qihuai only took out his phone on the way to his tutoring session.
The traffic was heavy during rush hour. He pulled the phone from the side pocket of his backpack, intending to send a WeChat message to the student’s parent—he might be a few minutes late.
But just as he switched off Do Not Disturb mode, before he could even tap the green icon, WeChat suddenly exploded with notifications—messages popping up nonstop.
He casually opened the app and saw that it was a group chat. Since WeChat didn’t require approval for group invitations, he had no idea when he’d been added. The chat was buzzing, messages flickering across the screen in rapid succession.
There were four people in total.
The group name was 【Beautiful Girls’ Justice League】.
Jiang Qihuai froze mid-motion, his expression blank for two full seconds.
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