Chapter 032

Meng Li’s consciousness slowly became clearer. She quickly looked down at the several exam papers placed on her desk.

She casually flipped through them, and indeed, she had scored full marks in every subject.

After reading through them, her mind was fully awake. She looked up at Wang Chaohai, slowly stood up from her seat, and thought for a moment before saying, “There’s no special trick to it. Just read more, do more exercises, memorize more, think more, and apply what you’ve learned. It’s about making connections and thinking critically.”

Hearing such serious words coming from Meng Li, it was just as shocking and unbelievable as her perfect scores across all subjects.

In everyone’s mind, she was simply a troublemaker, someone who knew how to fight and grab attention.

Meng Li could probably guess what they were thinking. After considering it for a moment, she continued, “A lot of you probably misunderstand us. Even though we’ve been involved in some shady things, we didn’t do it for nothing. I’ve had many people following me. If I didn’t have real skills, how could I manage that? But these skills aren’t just about fighting—that’s too shallow.”

“To put it simply, when we’re out there, we need to have the confidence and presence to stand tall and command respect. But if we want to study, we have to excel. In our world, the rule is: whatever you do, you have to be the best. You have to earn people’s respect, and that includes studying.”

Ji Chen looked at his exam papers, each one barely passing: “……”

He felt deeply insulted.

The implication behind her words seemed to be that Meng Li was the best at everything—when it came to causing trouble, she was number one in fights and leading her followers; now that she was in school, she was also number one in academics. Was there anything she couldn’t do?

And she even claimed that their world had rules about excelling in studies—how come Ji Chen had never heard of this?

Were they supposed to be on the same level as the good students who excelled academically?

Despite the seemingly arrogant tone, Meng Li’s words made sense. Even Wang Chaohai, who had initially thought of them as just a bunch of kids messing around, was nodding in agreement. He now realized that these kids were no fools. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have been able to build their own little world.

Adults often dismissed their little world as childish and insignificant.

But looking at it now, it did seem rather interesting.

After nodding in acknowledgment, Wang Chaohai said, “Having your own way of doing things and your own approach to learning—that’s fine.”

Meng Li felt a bit guilty, thinking that perhaps she had exaggerated, but seeing Wang Chaohai’s approval gave her more confidence. She responded, “Thank you, Teacher Wang.”

Wang Chaohai gave her a nod and said, “Sit down.”

Meng Li didn’t say anything else and simply bent down to sit back in her seat.

The class didn’t focus on actual lessons. Wang Chaohai gave everyone time to correct their mistakes and review the exam papers.

As a result, the entire class was filled with quiet murmurs, though it was unclear whether they were discussing the questions or gossiping.

Ji Chen kept staring at Meng Li, his expression one of disbelief, as if he were looking at some kind of monster.

They had originally been on the same level, but now, with the sudden gap in their exam results, the distance between them had grown.

Ji Chen was reluctant to accept this reality. He looked at Meng Li and forced a dry laugh, asking, “Did you really get these strange scores by yourself?”

Meng Li glanced at him. There was still a hint of hostility in her eyes. She replied, “What’s the problem? The questions were pretty simple. If you couldn’t figure them out, why couldn’t I?”

Ji Chen: “……”

Simple?

The way she said it made him feel as if he were the idiot.

Meng Li didn’t know how difficult the midterm exam was for others, but for her, it was really easy. Before her time travel, she had been in a high-pressure study environment, and the questions she faced back then were much harder than the ones in this exam.

Thinking about it, many of her classmates didn’t study seriously on a regular basis. They only crammed at the last minute before the exam. Ji Chen, for example, had done the same this time, so it was no surprise that he didn’t perform well.

But Ji Chen was still relatively smart. Even with last-minute cramming, he managed to pass all his subjects.

Most of the others who crammed had failed several subjects.

Normally, exam results wouldn’t affect anything much, but since Ji Chen and Meng Li had been rivals for many years, now that they were sitting at the same desk, eating the same meals, and attending the same classes, the stark difference in their exam scores made Ji Chen feel extremely embarrassed.

Although it was embarrassing, he only blamed himself for not studying well; he didn’t blame Meng Li for performing well.

However, Meng Li didn’t see it that way. She thought Ji Chen must be insanely jealous of her.

While feeling a bit smug, thinking that she had finally one-upped Ji Chen and brought some pride to her alley, she also reminded herself not to provoke him at this moment. If he decided to pick a fight and she couldn’t beat him, that would be too much of a loss.

So, when the bell rang for the end of the day and Ji Chen told her to wait for him after school, she secretly packed up her bag. As soon as the bell rang, she unexpectedly dashed out of the classroom and ran toward the school gate. She met Zhuo Xi and the others outside and quickly jumped on a bicycle to leave.

Ji Chen, who didn’t realize what had happened: “……”

Is she really a rabbit?

Zhuo Xi saw Meng Li running out of breath and turned to ask, “What’s wrong?”

Meng Li shook her head. “Nothing, why are you guys here?”

Zhuo Xi slightly increased the speed of the bike. “Didn’t you ask me this morning to find a lamb ticket for you?”

Meng Li remembered and took a deep breath. “Did you find it?”

Before Zhuo Xi could speak, Wei Dong answered, “We’ve been looking all day. We do know a few Hui people, but since it’s almost the end of the month, their lamb is already gone. We couldn’t find any today, but we’ll try again tomorrow.”

Meng Li swallowed, thinking that since it was Gu Huijuan who wanted the lamb, she wasn’t in a rush. She nodded and said, “It’s fine. There’s no rush. If we can find it, great. If not, no worries.”

Zhou Nan then asked, “Why do you suddenly need lamb?”

Meng Li thought for a moment. Not wanting to mention Gu Huijuan, she said, “Grandma Cheng wants to eat it. You all know, in the Cheng family’s courtyard, only Grandma Cheng has been kind to me. She bought me face cream and even made me new clothes for the New Year.”

Zhuo Xi nodded after hearing this. “We’ll try again tomorrow.”

Jin Bei then chimed in, “If we can’t get it, we’ll just have it next month. At the beginning of the month, for sure there’ll be some.”

Meng Li nodded. “Thanks, guys.”

Jin Bei smiled. “You’re getting more and more polite…”

As he said this, something seemed to cross his mind, and he quickly changed the subject. “By the way, how did Third Master do on the midterms?”

Mentioning the midterms, Meng Li immediately became more animated.

She smiled and didn’t hide anything. Clearing her throat, she said directly, “Third Master didn’t embarrass you guys. Full marks in every subject, first in the whole grade.”

Upon hearing this, Zhou Nan’s eyes nearly popped out of his head, and he excitedly said, “Damn, that’s awesome, Third Master!”

Meng Li continued to smile. “Gotta keep it low-key, low-key.”

Wei Dong raised his voice, “Low-key, my ass! Shouldn’t we be showing off a bit? By the way, how did that bastard Ji Chen do?”

Meng Li’s tone relaxed. “He did okay. He passed all his subjects.”

Wei Dong, sitting in the back seat, slapped his thigh hard. “Finally, we’ve got one up on that bastard. Let’s see if his underlings still dare to look down on us after this.”

Although their paths rarely crossed, neither side truly respected the other.

Meng Li laughed. “He looked green in the face all day.”

Zhou Nan proudly said, “It doesn’t matter who it is, they’d all turn green!”

Meanwhile, the person who had been green-faced all day saw Meng Li leaving the school in Zhuo Xi’s bicycle. He headed to the bus stop, bought a ticket, and took the bus home alone.

After arriving home, he had dinner at the cafeteria and finished his evening routine. Only then did Xiao Jianguo and the others come to find him.

As soon as they saw him, Xiao Jianguo immediately asked, “Bro, I heard Meng Li got full marks in every subject. Is that true?”

Ji Chen rolled his eyes at Xiao Jianguo, clearly not in the mood to deal with him. He replied, “From now on, don’t bother me. I’m going to study properly.”

Hearing this, it seemed to be true. Xiao Jianguo pulled out a chair and sat down. “That’s crazy! How did he do it? You don’t know, but their people are acting all high and mighty now, saying Third Master just studied a little and scored full marks in every subject.”

Ji Chen had already anticipated that this would happen, so he wasn’t too emotionally affected by it.

The only thing on his mind now was that he couldn’t fall too far behind Meng Li. After all, he was a man!

If they ended up together in the future, would he have to rely on Meng Li to protect him? How could he still call himself a man then?

A man… should be the one to protect his woman…

Wait, what the hell was he even thinking?

Clearing his throat, he quickly shifted his focus back to Xiao Jianguo and the others. “You didn’t get into any trouble with their people, did you?”

Zhang Yue replied, “No, not at all. Didn’t you tell us not to mess with them? Today, they were looking for lamb tickets, and the request got passed along to us. So, we ended up running into them a few times and overheard some things.”

Beijing was a small place. Despite the different factions, connections ensured that people from various groups eventually got to know each other. The more people involved, the more likely they were to cross paths. The alley kids and compound kids weren’t all sworn enemies—some even secretly considered each other friends.

Ji Chen looked at Zhang Yue. “Lamb ticket?”

Zheng Hang nodded. “Yeah, seems like Meng Li wants it.”

Ji Chen straightened up. “Do we have any lamb tickets?”

Zhang Yue nodded. “Of course. It’s easy for us to find a lamb ticket. But what’s our relationship with Meng Li? We didn’t help him.”

Ji Chen thought for a moment and then looked at Zhang Yue. “Then get me a ticket. Bring it to school tomorrow.”

Zhang Yue was taken aback. “What are you going to do with it? Give it to Meng Li?”

Ji Chen didn’t elaborate. “You don’t need to worry about that. I have my reasons.”

Seeing that he didn’t want to say more, they didn’t press further. Zhang Yue nodded. “Alright, I’ll bring it to you tomorrow.”

After finishing their conversation, the group chatted for a while before Xiao Jianguo and the others grabbed their bath essentials and headed to the bathhouse.

There, they took cold showers, playfully spraying each other with the showerheads.

Ji Chen went to bed early the previous night and got up as usual the next morning to head to school.

Everything at school seemed the same as usual, just repeating the routine from the day before.

Meng Li was no different from usual, but she spent the whole day thinking about one thing. Since she didn’t have anything else to worry about, her mind kept returning to the question of what Ji Chen’s recent behavior meant. Why did he keep buying her things for no reason and telling her not to leave after school?

She realized that avoiding the issue wasn’t a solution. After thinking it over, Meng Li decided to face the problem head-on.

Whether it ended in a fight or something else, she needed to get the matter out in the open.

Once she made up her mind, before Ji Chen had a chance to ask her not to leave after school, Meng Li took the initiative and wrote him a note.

The note was written with a sense of authority, instructing Ji Chen: [Meet me behind the school after class.]

When Ji Chen saw the note, he was momentarily stunned, then immediately broke into a smile.

He hadn’t expected this; it seemed like they were on the same wavelength. He had been about to ask her not to leave after school.

Ji Chen tucked the note away and waited until after school. He packed his bag and headed toward the small grove behind the school.

Meng Li didn’t walk with him and arrived three minutes later.

Entering the grove and walking up to Ji Chen, Meng Li held her breath slightly, tightening the expression on her face.

It was Ji Chen who spoke first, looking at her and asking, “You called me to a place like this, what do you want?”

Meng Li took a deep breath and, gathering her courage, asked, “What do you want?”

After a brief pause, she added, “You keep telling me not to leave after school. Are you trying to start a fight or something?”

Ji Chen wanted to laugh but held it back as he looked at her.

The intensity of his gaze made Meng Li’s scalp tingle, and she didn’t speak.

Feeling a bit uneasy, Meng Li swallowed nervously. “Say something!”

Ji Chen took a step closer to her, standing right in front of her, staring into her eyes. Then, he slowly lowered his head toward her ear.

Meng Li was startled by his actions and froze, not daring to move.

She could feel his breath near her ear and instinctively closed her eyes.

Meng Li thought Ji Chen was about to say something harsh or even start a fight.

But after a brief moment, Ji Chen’s voice came softly near her ear, “Hey, do you like men?”

Meng Li was caught off guard, standing still for a moment before she finally reacted.

She then shoved Ji Chen away with all her strength, her face turning as red as a fruit. Weakly, she scolded him, “You… crazy!”