Imperial Capital No.3 High was known for advocating students’ all-round development. Its teaching style leaned Western and was highly liberal, earning it mixed reviews over the years.

Some believed such an approach could maximize the potential hidden within children, allowing them to experience the joy of learning. Others thought that, at this age, most students lacked self-control, and under the exam-oriented education system, this kind of lenient management made it impossible for students to discipline themselves.

This distinctive teaching philosophy also resulted in the severe polarization of students’ academic performance at No.3 High.

Those who were good were truly exceptional—just the last time, several students from each subject made it into the national training team for the Olympiad.

Those who were poor were really poor—probably could even compete head-to-head with Ji Fan in mediocrity.

On Tao Zhi’s first day at school, she overheard the class committee and the head of the student council’s publicity department talking, busy organizing the Winter Culture Festival.

Tao Zhi glanced at the calendar in shock, confirming that it was indeed already late February, almost March.

Second semester of second year—right before stepping into senior year—and these student council members still had the mood to organize a Winter Culture Festival.

She suddenly felt that Tao Xiuping must have transferred her to this school precisely because he couldn’t stand seeing her grades improve.

But in such a relaxed learning environment, Tao Zhi truly felt that even her mood had lightened considerably.

The students at No.3 High weren’t exactly lazy either. The school was well-funded, the faculty strong, and the teachers’ lectures were lively and engaging. At least in Tao Zhi’s class, the classroom atmosphere during lessons was unexpectedly good.

Her new deskmate was a slow and dawdling boy named Lin Suyan, who enthusiastically introduced himself on the first day of school.

Listening to his rather poetic name, Tao Zhi guessed, “The Su Yan from ‘brush, ink, paper, and inkstone’—‘Han Hai Su Chao’?”

“Not that,” the boy said proudly, “My dad’s surname is Lin, my mom’s surname is Su, and my grandma’s a calligrapher.”

“……”

Tao Zhi thought that sometimes, one simply shouldn’t think too deeply about things.

Out of courtesy—and compassion for her new classmate’s simple mind—Tao Zhi didn’t say anything. She just nodded and continued reading the newly distributed textbook.

Lin Suyan waited for her to complain for quite a while, but nothing came. He felt that his new deskmate was truly cool and aloof.

Within just a few days, word spread throughout the second-year grade: Class Five had gotten a quiet and reserved beauty—cold, elegant, and seemingly a little top student who did nothing but read books and work on papers every day.

Less than a week into the semester, Tao Zhi had already been unofficially crowned the new school beauty of the second-year boys’ circle.

But after the first monthly exam, everyone realized that this so-called top-student beauty was actually quite average in grades.

Except for English, in which she completely outshone everyone, none of her other subjects were particularly impressive.

No.3 High was already full of prodigies, and teenage boys always liked novelty. Once the initial excitement faded, no great stir was caused.

The once-dominant school tyrant from the experimental school faded into anonymity, becoming a beautiful little school beauty focused on studying.

Tao Zhi hadn’t expected that, after all those bloody rumors had died down, she would actually gain even more admirers.

She began receiving frequent confessions and little love letters from boys. During breaks, snacks and small gifts would inexplicably appear in her desk drawer. Tao Zhi didn’t keep any of them, sending everything straight to the school’s lost-and-found.

“Your arrival is like that of a generous philanthropist supporting a poor mountain region. Nowadays, everyone at school goes to the lost-and-found to grab snacks,” Lin Suyan said one day, mumbling around a heart-shaped jelly of unknown origin.

Tao Zhi glanced at him. “You seem to be the one running there most often.”

“No one else dares to take them—they think it’s embarrassing. But since it’s just sitting there, why not?” Lin Suyan said carelessly. “They just don’t understand you. Our Taozi only lives for studying.”

He spoke, then asked curiously, “But seriously though, what kind of guys do you actually like? That one who came to block your classroom door yesterday—wasn’t he pretty handsome?”

Tao Zhi froze for a moment, the tip of her pen halted on the test paper, unmoving.

She had never really known what kind of boy she liked before.

But now, the standard in her heart—each and every point—seemed to correspond to someone. Every trait had already taken shape.

After a while, she said calmly, “Someone who scores over 700.”

Lin Suyan widened his eyes. “You only got a bit over 500 yourself.”

“So what?” Tao Zhi rolled her eyes. “I just like men who are way better than me, the kind I can never catch up to my whole life and I enjoy the thrill of riding on their shoulders. Can’t I?”

“……”

Lin Suyan clasped his hands toward her. “Of course you can. I underestimated you. You’re a true queen.”

Tao Zhi’s new life at her new school was much happier than she had imagined—classes, breaks, and weekends spent visiting Ji Jin at the hospital to chat with her.

Ji Jin had finished one round of radiotherapy and was now in the oncology ward, undergoing daily chemotherapy.

The chemotherapy drugs were very harsh on the blood vessels; the liquid was icy cold. Tao Zhi would fill a small plastic bottle with hot water and press it against the infusion tube so the liquid could warm slightly, trying to lessen the irritation just a bit.

When she returned home that afternoon, Ji Fan was sitting on the sofa watching a movie. Hearing the sound, he lifted his head. “You’re back?”

Tao Zhi made a small “mm” in reply, looking at him with some hesitation.

She didn’t know if what she was doing was right. When she first learned about this, her mind had been full of only one thought—to keep Ji Fan from being sad. But some things couldn’t be hidden.

He couldn’t possibly never know—forever not know.

He was no longer a child, but a mature individual capable of independent judgment. About everything, he had the right to know.

Tao Zhi took off her coat and tossed it aside, standing before the sofa, trying hard to make her voice sound calm. “I went to see Mom.”

Ji Fan’s gaze stopped.

His eyes lingered on the tablet screen for a long time, as if deeply absorbed in the movie, yet also as if seeing nothing at all.

After a while, he spoke slowly. “How’s her condition now?”

Tao Zhi was stunned. “What?”

“She’s hospitalized, right?” Ji Fan closed his eyes briefly. “When I couldn’t reach her before—not that the call wouldn’t go through, but that she wouldn’t pick up—I already felt something was wrong. Old Tao’s behavior back then was strange too, so I followed him.”

“I was originally trying to see if he really went bankrupt and was secretly out collecting scrap behind our backs,” Ji Fan said, pulling at the corner of his lips with effort, “but then I saw him heading to the hospital again and again.”

Tao Zhi stood frozen, her hands a little lost. She didn’t know what to say. “A’Fan…”

“Anyway, I more or less guessed it,” Ji Fan took a deep breath. “So Mom really is sick? What illness?”

Tao Zhi pressed her lips together.

Ji Fan had grown up wild and untamed—mischievous and careless. Over time, Tao Zhi had almost forgotten that he actually thought deeply about things, sometimes revealing a kind of sensitive and delicate nature that enlightened her whenever she got stuck in her own thoughts.

They had indeed inherited the personalities of Tao Xiuping and Ji Jin respectively—one stubborn and straightforward, the other always hiding their emotions deep inside, telling no one, and then pretending nothing had happened by saying a few light, irrelevant jokes.

He wasn’t a fragile or ignorant boy.

He was, in fact, much stronger than she was.

Tao Zhi blinked, then bent down and hugged him.

She gently patted the boy’s back. “You should go see her.”

Ji Fan buried his head in her shoulder, his voice muffled. “She doesn’t want—she doesn’t want me to know. I can pretend I don’t know.”

“She does want it,” Tao Zhi’s throat tightened as she forced down her tears. “She wants to see you. You know that—you’ve always known that. You’re her favorite.”

Tao Zhi didn’t know whether Ji Fan ever went to see Ji Jin.

But one night afterward, he suddenly came home very late. Tao Zhi was in the living room, pacing in circles with one earbud in, memorizing English vocabulary.

When he lifted his head and looked at her, his eyes were red.

“Zhizhi,” he rasped, “I’ll protect you.”

In one ear, the song was a calm, soothing English melody.

In the other, the boy’s voice was low and rough, his eyes red as he looked at her with determination: “I’ll grow up. I’ll become a man. Mom, Old Tao, and you—this family—I’ll protect all of you.”

Someone once said that growing up happens in just a single moment.

In a certain instant, you suddenly realize that you’re no longer a child—that you can no longer act purely on your emotions or whims. You come to understand that this world is cruel to everyone.

It tells you clearly and soberly that one day, you will have to leave behind the peaceful land that has sheltered you, and become someone else’s protector.

✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦

Tao Zhi spent her days at No.3 High more comfortably than she had ever expected.

The tutoring lessons continued as usual. Her concentration during classes and the endless stream of test papers had become a habit. The red marks on her papers grew fewer, her problem-solving speed went from slow to fast, and the thickness of her mistake notebook went from thin to thick—and back to thin again.

All these things became such routine that she could hardly remember anymore what she had originally been working so hard for.

The name Jiang Qihuai seemed to have become merely a catalyst, not the goal itself.

She never encountered him again. After deliberately avoiding all the places he had ever appeared, she realized that, in a city this vast, running into someone by chance was actually a very, very difficult thing.