Chapter 37 A Small Misunderstanding

On the playground, Jiang Mingyue was looking down, searching for something in the spot where she had left her schoolbag in the morning.

“Still looking for the note?”

Qi Ze asked seemingly casually, but his tone was a bit cold.

Jiang Mingyue wasn’t paying attention to him and didn’t catch the oddness in his tone. She replied casually,

“Yeah, help me look for it, will you?”

“…You can take your time looking by yourself.”

Qi Ze stiffly threw down the words and turned to leave.

But after walking just a few steps, he stopped again.

The weather was too hot, and after doing morning exercises, everyone was heading back to the classroom.

Jiang Mingyue raised her hand to shield her eyes from the sun. She looked around under the sunlight like a little monkey.

She accidentally bumped into someone and immediately apologized with an embarrassed smile.

Qi Ze felt a fire burning in his chest, an agitated heatwave churning inside him, yet he couldn’t find an outlet for it.

He reached into his pocket and tightly clenched the ball of paper in his hand.

If he could crush it to dust, that paper ball would probably have turned to ashes by now.

In the end, he threw the note on the ground and accidentally stepped on it.

Then he shouted to Jiang Mingyue, who was about to search elsewhere: “There’s a ball of paper here. Come and see if it’s yours.”

“Ah, coming.”

Jiang Mingyue came over and looked at the messy, unrecognizable ball of paper on the ground.

She picked it up and looked at it for a long time in her hand, but still couldn’t be sure whether it was the note she had lost.

The texture did match the kind of paper from a homework notebook.

But in the morning, it had been neatly folded. Now it was crumpled into a ball and dirty.

“What’s wrong?”

Jiang Mingyue said: “I’m not really sure if it’s the one I lost. It’s been crumpled like this, I can’t tell.”

Qi Ze showed no sense of guilt as the culprit. He snorted: “Just open it and see.”

Jiang Mingyue scratched her head.

“The thing is, I don’t know what’s inside. And the note belongs to someone else. It doesn’t feel right for me to read it.”

“Hm? The note isn’t yours?”

“It’s from a boy I ran into at the school gate this morning. He asked me to pass it to Li Ge. So I just stuffed it into my bag without checking what’s written on the note.”

Then he realized. “Oh… oh, I see.” Qi Ze froze for a moment, and the frustration in his heart instantly vanished.

Qi Ze rubbed his nose, finally showing a bit of embarrassment. “Well, in that case… maybe open it and check. There might be a name inside or something.”

“Guess that’s the only way.”

Jiang Mingyue unfolded the note and quickly skimmed through the beginning, finally spotting the name Yang Yaowen at the end.

She was finally relieved.

Good thing she had asked for the sender’s name in the morning. Otherwise, even seeing the name now wouldn’t have helped her confirm it.

“This is the note. Finally found it.” Jiang Mingyue said, relaxing at last. “If I had really lost it, I would’ve felt so guilty.”

Then she sighed again: “What can I say, I just have too strong a sense of responsibility. Too kind-hearted.”

Qi Ze said: “…Don’t get involved in things like this too often. Avoids misunderstandings.”

“I was just doing a small favor. Who would’ve thought? Besides… what kind of misunderstanding?”

Jiang Mingyue was a little confused.

“Nothing.” Qi Ze dodged the topic. “Alright, now that you’ve found it, better go deliver it before it gets lost again.”

“Oh, right.”

Jiang Mingyue’s attention immediately shifted, and she ran off with the note to look for Li Ge.

Qi Ze watched her figure disappear into the distance and unconsciously smiled.

Then he headed toward the school store.

Qi Ze picked up two ice creams, then grabbed a few bags of cucumber-flavored potato chips. Just as he was about to head to the checkout, he suddenly noticed the spicy sticks on the shelf nearby.

He turned his steps and went to pick out some spicy sticks.

Jiang Mingyue had bought these for him a few times before. The taste was alright—he couldn’t say he particularly liked them.

But every time, Jiang Mingyue would eat them with great enjoyment. Even when her tongue was burning from the spice, she would still keep eating.

Qi Ze picked out a few types that Jiang Mingyue usually ate.

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On the other side of the shelf.

Li Ge was picking snacks while chatting with someone beside her. “How much do you know about Qi Ze? And that Jiang Mingyue?”

“Not much. I just know Jiang Mingyue used to follow Qi Moyang around all the time, and then later switched to Qi Ze.”

“So what’s their relationship like?” Li Ge pressed further.

“Not exactly sure. I only know that at first Qi Ze ignored her, but now they seem pretty close—eating together, chatting, always laughing.”

“What kind of trick did she use to make Qi Ze treat her so well? She doesn’t even have any special qualities.” Li Ge said with a pout. “And she eats so much too.”

“You have no idea. She eats a ton. She once finished six whole dishes by herself—all meat—eats like a pig.” After saying that, the speaker couldn’t help but laugh. “If someone like her can win over Qi Ze, then someday I can too. When that time comes, I want Qi Ze to treat only me well.”

Li Ge was smugly indulging in her fantasy—only to have reality dump a bucket of ice-cold water on her head.

The icy water poured from above, making her leap up on the spot and scream.

She instinctively turned around and saw Qi Ze pouring a bottle of water over her head.

Li Ge couldn’t help trembling.

Maybe it was the chill of the water, or maybe it was the cold, cutting look in Qi Ze’s eyes that made her tremble with fear.

Qi Ze still wore his usual calm expression, lips even faintly curved into a smile, but his eyes were icy cold.

He spoke with quiet indifference: “Done dreaming? If you’re awake now, stop daydreaming.”

“Who I’m with, who I’m nice to, will never have anything to do with you. Whether someone eats more or less has nothing to do with you either.”

“I didn’t just say ‘stay away from me’ for no reason. If you come up to me again next time, or say something you shouldn’t, it won’t be as simple as today.”

“You should’ve heard by now, I’m not a good person, but I won’t hit a woman.”

After saying that, Qi Ze didn’t spare her another glance. He grabbed his things and went to checkout.

Li Ge stood frozen in place even after Qi Ze left. The girl who had been chatting with her couldn’t help but poke her. “Are you okay?”

Only then did Li Ge snap out of it. With red eyes, she said in a hurt tone: “Why did he treat me like that? No guy has ever dared to treat me this way since I was little. Why did he treat me like this?”

“Maybe he overheard what you said.”

“So what? I didn’t say anything bad about him.”

“Maybe it was the part where you were mocking Jiang Mingyue.”

“…But I was speaking the truth.”

“…”

⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆

Jiang Mingyue didn’t find Li Ge in Class One’s classroom, so she waited in the hallway for a while.

Just as she was about to leave, she saw Li Ge coming up the stairs with her hair wet.

When Li Ge saw her, she shot her a nasty glare before trying to enter the classroom.

Jiang Mingyue was a bit confused.

But she didn’t think much of it. She reached out to stop Li Ge and handed her the note. “A boy named Yang Yaowen asked me to give this to you.”

Li Ge pushed her hand away and snapped: “Take it away. I don’t want it.”

Then she returned to her seat.

Jiang Mingyue didn’t argue. She simply placed the note on Li Ge’s desk.

“Anyway, I’ve delivered it. I’ve left it here for you.”

After saying that, she turned and walked away.