Chapter 30: The Red Lemon Is Youth in a Warm, Sweet Hue
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Monday morning was fresh with wind, bright beneath a clear sky, and carefree in its clouds. Humanity, however, was barely alive.
“Ugh. I can’t believe I have to go back to school and do this all over again. Just kill me already.”
Zhou Ke drooped his dead-fish eyes, radiating indiscriminate hostility toward everyone and everything that crossed his path.
He had gone home after school on Friday afternoon, only to be dragged into a magical incident the moment he arrived. By the time he finally escaped, it was already Saturday evening.
So he had wasted an entire weekend without even doing anything!
“Heavens above, grant me the nuclear truth of Mr. Oppenheimer, so I can burn this cruel world—where school starts at six in the morning—to ashes!”
His indignation swelled within his chest, and Zhou Ke could not help throwing back his head and letting out a long sigh.
The pedestrians along the road hurriedly gave him a wide berth. A few particularly civic-minded citizens even spent their own phone credit calling the nearest psychiatric hospital to ask whether any patients had escaped.
A schoolchild carrying a backpack pointed at Zhou Ke curiously.
“Mommy, what’s that?”
“That’s a good-for-nothing, darling. You must never grow up to be like him.” His mother pushed down the child’s pointing finger, shot Zhou Ke a look of disdain, and walked away.
“Zhou Ke?”
Amid the endless stream of people keeping their distance, a girl’s voice burst forth, warm as sunlight.
Zhou Ke turned around slowly. Approaching him was a lively girl with a single ponytail and a rabbit-headed shoulder bag in a comic-book style.
She wore a pair of spotless white sneakers, with little white ankle socks patterned with carrots peeking out above them. Even the loose-fitting school uniform could not conceal the lovely bounce in her step.
Strangely enough, they were both wearing the blue-and-white uniform of Guangcheng First High School. On her, it brimmed with vitality; on Zhou Ke, it looked like a condemned prisoner’s uniform.
“Who are you?” Zhou Ke asked listlessly.
“Excuse me? You’re joking, right?” The girl stared at him in disbelief. “It’s me! Me!”
“Hmm, let me think.” Zhou Ke studied her face for quite some time before saying uncertainly, “My betrothed from an arranged marriage?”
“Your head! You’ve been reading too much nonsense online!” The girl now realized that Zhou Ke genuinely did not remember her.
“Isn’t your memory supposed to be excellent? How could you not remember me? We were classmates for two whole years in our first and second years of high school! We weren’t separated into different classes until our final year!”
“Sorry. The brain has limited storage capacity. Every so often, I clear out information that isn’t important.”
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“That makes it even more hurtful, you know.”
“Oh!” Zhou Ke’s eyes lit up, as though he had remembered something. He wagged a finger, the answer practically on the tip of his tongue. “Oh. The background-character girl.”
“All right. Expecting anything from you was my mistake.” The girl’s hopeful expression instantly collapsed. “It’s me! Tang Hongning, your old class sports representative.”
“Oh!” Zhou Ke’s eyes lit up again.
“Stop saying ‘oh.’ I know you still don’t remember me,” Tang Hongning said, black lines practically appearing across her forehead.
“Oh.” Zhou Ke calmly acknowledged the fact.
Since they were headed to school by the same route, the two decided to walk together.
Though they were not particularly close, Tang Hongning was naturally outgoing, so the atmosphere never had a chance to become awkward.
“I heard you awakened a Truth. What kind is it? What abilities does it give you?” Tang Hongning fired off question after question.
Zhou Ke, meanwhile, was busy yawning. Most of his replies consisted of little more than murmurs of agreement and vague sounds.
He had spent the entire night watching short videos, even getting up at three in the morning to cook himself a bowl of noodles. Today, he was so exhausted he could barely keep his eyes open.
“By the way, are you going to take the Magus examination?” Tang Hongning suddenly remembered something, and her expression grew tense.
“Mm.”
“I advise you not to.” Tang Hongning lowered her voice. “I’m in the same class as Su Wumi now, and there’s a rumor going around that she’s planning to come after you.”
“Hm?” Zhou Ke immediately took an interest. He remembered that Su Wumi was the prodigy who had awakened the Universal Law of Gravitation.
“Why? I’ve never done anything to her.”
“I’m not entirely sure. In any case, be careful.” Tang Hongning patted Zhou Ke on the shoulder, then pointed toward the class sign beside the door. “You’ve arrived. I’ll see you later.”
Under the envious, jealous, and resentful gazes of a crowd of male classmates, Zhou Ke waved goodbye to Tang Hongning and returned to his seat.
The moment his head touched the desk, he fell asleep, remaining there until morning reading period ended.
He woke with a stretch and looked up to discover that several seats in the classroom were empty.
Perhaps they had been empty for some time. When he arrived, the class had not been full, so he had not noticed.
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It was now the second semester of their final year, and the academic workload was crushing. Unless they were seriously ill or severely injured, students were generally not permitted to miss school.
There was an exception, however: students applying for the Magus examination were allowed to take a week off to prepare.
“Li Hua must have already called the homeroom teacher,” Zhou Ke said, glancing at one of the empty seats.
He had originally intended to call and explain his situation as well. He simply could not be bothered to make another trip to school. But his homeroom teacher had insisted that he come to the office in person, saying there was something they needed to discuss properly.
Figuring that the teacher should have arrived by now, Zhou Ke slipped away to the office before the warning bell rang.
The homeroom teacher was a middle-aged man with graying hair, a stern yet passionate temperament, and the surname Lu. In private, the students affectionately called him Old Lu; behind his back, they called him Old Six.
Old Lu had taught the elite honors class for many years and produced several top scorers in the city. His achievements in education were so impressive that the principal held him in high regard. He even had an office of his own.
The office door was always left open so students could come in to ask questions. Out of politeness, Zhou Ke knocked twice.
“Zhou Ke, it’s almost time for class. Why are you here so early?” The homeroom teacher poked his head out from behind the computer screen. Seeing Zhou Ke, he sounded somewhat displeased.
But instead of telling Zhou Ke to go back, he stood up and waved him over.
“You came at just the right time. Come take a look at this object for me.”
“An object?” Zhou Ke, who had been listless a moment before, instantly perked up. Fired by the prospect of some juicy gossip, he crossed the room in three quick strides. “Old Lu, after being single for decades, you’ve finally figured things out? Let me see!”
The moment he saw the document on the computer screen, however, he regretted everything.
“First click this, then click that. There, you’ve created a new object.”
Zhou Ke let out a dejected sigh. He had never imagined that he, too, would have a day when he got played—least of all by an old man who did not even know how to use a document editor.
“Wow, young people really do have sharp minds.” Old Lu had more or less grasped the steps for operating the document and offered him an approving compliment.
He led Zhou Ke to sit beside a small tea table. As he poured them water, he said, “Zhou Ke, in my impression, you’ve always been an exceptionally clever and perceptive student. You should be able to figure out why I asked you to come here for a face-to-face conversation.”
“Sorry, but I’m not interested in teacher-student romance.”
“?”
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