Zhou Zhuoyuan returned to the classroom just as the bell rang, signaling the end of class. Everyone was packing up their things, some even shifting desks and chairs around, turning the room into a chaotic mess.
He paused in the doorway, standing there in a daze.
Fortunately, He Tiaosheng spotted him and poked her head out from behind a stack of books. “Zhou Zhuoyuan, what are you doing just standing there like an idiot? They’ve changed the seating. Check the chart up front.”
It was a seat change. Zhou Zhuoyuan gave her a grateful smile.
He wasn’t socially awkward, but returning to this unfamiliar and largely unfriendly environment inevitably left him feeling rootless and anxious.
He had no idea how many people here disliked him, but he suspected it was quite a few.
And his premonition turned out to be spot on.
He’d been lucky before—his previous deskmate was a quiet girl with whom he only exchanged words about homework. Now, though, his luck had run out.
He’d been reassigned to sit next to a baby-faced boy.
The boy had a youthful, innocent look, but his words were far from harmless. “What bad luck.”
The moment Zhou Zhuoyuan realized the face looked familiar, he’d half-expected this. Now, it came as no surprise. He turned his head, his dark eyes fixed intently on the boy. “What did you say?”
The boy had started the provocation, so he wasn’t about to back down. “I said sitting next to you is bad luck.”
Had something like this happened in his previous life? Zhou Zhuoyuan couldn’t remember. But he knew his own temper well—if he’d been the eighteen-year-old version of himself, he’d have jumped into a fight over words like that.
So it probably hadn’t happened before. He’d only ever gotten into a fight with Liu Kuo, which meant he’d never sat next to this boy previously. This must be a butterfly effect from his rebirth.
The boy glared back defiantly when Zhou Zhuoyuan said nothing, just stared at him with a face ashen with anger. “What are you looking at? You got a problem? Sitting with you is bad luck—who knows if you’ll pull some stunt like knocking over a cup of water on purpose again?”
He was referring to an incident that had happened over a year after Zhou Zhuoyuan returned to the Zhou Family.
By then, Zhou Zhuoyuan had come to deeply understand how everyone rejected him, and he’d noticed their blatant favoritism toward Zhou Zhuoyi.
Still young at the time, he felt it was deeply unfair. Everything Zhou Zhuoyi had should have been his by right. If he’d grown up in such a wealthy family from the start, he surely would have done better than Zhou Zhuoyi.
He could carry himself with the same refined grace in every gesture. He could be just as talented and polite. And on top of that, he was healthier than Zhou Zhuoyi. His parents’ and brothers’ love, the money, the friends—all of it should have been his.
Why was it that Zhou Zhuoyi, who had stolen everything from him, was the one everyone pitied? As if he’d been the one persecuting Zhou Zhuoyi?
Zhou Zhuoyuan’s psyche began to twist. Back then, he still didn’t dare openly harm Zhou Zhuoyi—the boy was like fragile porcelain, liable to crack at the slightest touch.
Driven by jealousy, Zhou Zhuoyuan did something utterly childish, pointless, and self-defeating.
While Zhou Zhuoyi was studying, he “accidentally” spilled a drink on his notes.
Looking back now, his acting must have been terrible, or else everyone present—except Zhou Zhuoyi—wouldn’t have shot him such looks of disgust.
Yet Zhou Zhuoyi believed him and anxiously asked if he’d burned his hand.
That silent agreement among the others was telling—they shielded Zhou Zhuoyi like the apple of their eye, keeping all darkness from his sight, which was why he grew up so fragile, unable to withstand the slightest blow.
The ruined notes were quickly recopied by Zhou Zhuoli, and Zhou Zhuoyi happily came to tell him about it, making Zhou Zhuoyuan question his own intelligence for the first time.
He hadn’t caused Zhou Zhuoyi any real harm; instead, he’d dug a pit for himself.
And the boy sitting in front of him now was clearly one of those pits from years ago.
Before recalling this dark chapter of his history, Zhou Zhuoyuan had felt confident enough to confront him. Now, he just wanted to crawl into a hole and disappear.
He turned away, ignoring the boy completely.
Self-study was half an hour from ending, and night had fully fallen. It was early autumn, and the wind outside carried a chill.
A gust made Zhou Zhuoyuan cough twice. Only then did he remember to close the window. He glanced at the boy beside him and instead turned to ask the guy at the desk behind, by the window. “Could you help me close the window? Thanks.”
Unfortunately, the boy behind him clearly had some grudge against him too. He raised an eyebrow. “Don’t you have hands? Close it yourself.”
Zhou Zhuoyuan clenched his fists.
He held back for a long moment without snapping. Instead, he stood up and reached to shut the window himself.
After his rebirth, it seemed his temper had improved a bit.
Ji He was still smugly plotting how to humiliate him later when a glimpse of a slender, pale waist flashed right past his eyes.
Zhou Zhuoyuan wasn’t short. He could reach past Ji He to shut the window, even if it took some effort.
Once he sat back down, he covered his mouth and coughed twice more. Evidently, his cold hadn’t fully cleared up before he dragged himself back to class—his slender fingers were as pallid as his face.
Ji He heard the muffled sound from inside his sleeve and hesitated, swallowing the complaint on the tip of his tongue. No way was he like Zhou Zhuoyuan—bullying the sick just wasn’t his style.
The school’s evening self-study session ended at nine. Boarding students could stay in the classroom to study on their own if they wished. To make up for years of lost knowledge, Zhou Zhuoyuan usually lingered until ten-thirty.
If he weren’t worried about disturbing his roommates with late-night washing up, he probably would have kept at it even longer. Dorm life meant making allowances for one another. With that thought, Zhou Zhuoyuan toweled off his hair and pushed open the bathroom door—nearly colliding with someone’s chest.
He halted, tilting his head up slightly. “Why are you lurking right outside the door? You didn’t make a sound—you scared the hell out of me.”
It was He Qinglan. He stood half a head taller than Zhou Zhuoyuan, so being this close up required looking up.
Zhou Zhuoyuan was very close indeed right now. His eyes were half-lidded, lashes casting faint shadows on his lids. He wore a set of deep blue pajamas, and the steam had brought a slight flush to his otherwise too-pale skin. His hair was a damp, tousled mess, sticking up in wet spikes, with droplets trailing from the tips down his neck and vanishing into the sharp lines of his collarbone.
He Qinglan couldn’t help swallowing hard.
Zhou Zhuoyuan, oblivious, casually wiped away the droplet on his skin. “In a rush for the bathroom? You’re blocking the door—how am I supposed to get out?”
He Qinglan snapped back to reality. He held up the towel in his hand, stammering, “I was trying to tell you—you grabbed the wrong one. This is yours. The colors are similar, but the patterns are different.”
Zhou Zhuoyuan went rigid.
He Qinglan watched his earlobes turn visibly red. Pretending to stay calm, Zhou Zhuoyuan let out an “Oh.” “Sorry. I’ll buy you a new one tomorrow.”
“No, no, just give me mine back.” He Qinglan waved his hands frantically, then added in a rush as if remembering something, “Mine’s only been used to wash my face—nothing else. I washed and dried it just yesterday. If you want to take another shower, that’s fine—I won’t think anything of it.”
He let out another “Oh,” swapped back to his own towel, and climbed straight into bed without so much as glancing up.
Pei He was propped up against the headboard, fiddling with his phone. His gaze swept over the towel in He Qinglan’s hand, and his brow furrowed ever so slightly.
Because of the mix-up, Zhou Zhuoyuan forgot to blow-dry his hair. The next morning, his head was throbbing again. He choked down two fever reducers and stormed out of the dorm in a foul mood.
He’d been the first one out these past few days, deliberately timing his exit to avoid even Guan Qi, who woke earlier than him.
He Qinglan was always the last to wash up. On impulse, he lifted the towel to his nose and inhaled. A faint camellia scent—exactly like the fragrance he’d caught on Zhou Zhuoyuan yesterday. Must be his shampoo or body wash.
The memory of that scene made He Qinglan’s mouth go dry. He splashed some water on his face and chugged a glass.
Pei He spoke up out of nowhere from nearby. “That fragrant, huh?”
He Qinglan hadn’t realized he was there. He nearly spat his water right in the guy’s face.
In the classroom, Zhou Zhuoyuan—already radiating low pressure—caught sight of Ji He’s hostile glare. His expression darkened even further.
He dropped his bag with a thud. Without explanation, he said, “Come with me to the teacher. We’re switching seats.”
“Huh?”
Ji He was utterly baffled. Switching seats? What the hell had he done? He hadn’t even started yet!
Zhou Zhuoyuan was absolutely displacing his anger. His head hurt because he’d forgotten to dry his hair, but he was blaming half of it on Ji He anyway—convinced the guy had stressed him out.
Ji He sneered. “Who else are you gonna sit with if not me? You think there’s a line to sit next to you?”
That actually did piss Zhou Zhuoyuan off for real. His chest heaved. “You!”
Guan Qi had been keeping a close eye on Zhou Zhuoyuan. Sensing his moment, he eagerly stepped forward. “What the hell are you talking about? Zhuoyuan’s got top grades and he’s a great guy—tons of people would kill to sit next to him!”
He laid on the flattery without a hint of shame. Zhou Zhuoyuan felt mortified, and the words struck him as especially ironic. Compared to what Guan Qi had actually done, his beef with Ji He could wait.
Coldly, he said, “My business is none of yours.”
Guan Qi slunk back to his seat, looking a little wounded—like he couldn’t fathom why Zhou Zhuoyuan would say something so heartless in front of everyone else.
Ji He stared at Zhou Zhuoyuan, who had begun reading his book. He realized he might have misunderstood something earlier. He had heard that Zhou Zhuoyuan and Guan Qi had fallen out, and he assumed Guan Qi had finally lost patience with the young master’s spoiled antics, tearing off the facade with open sarcasm.
But now it seemed that wasn’t the case at all. At least, the one who couldn’t stand it wasn’t Guan Qi—it was Zhou Zhuoyuan.
Zhou Zhuoyuan grew thoroughly irritated under the scrutiny and turned his head. “What exactly are you staring at?”
Ji He grumbled as he looked away. “It’s not like a glance will cost you a piece of flesh.”
His hunch had been right on the money. With a temper like that, it was no wonder the man couldn’t hold out for even a few days before his true nature came spilling out.
The Ji Family had churned out no small number of talents in recent years, always pushing to surpass the Zhou Family at every turn. Everyone around him fawned and flattered, and even Zhou Fuxuan treated him with polite deference, never once pulling rank as an elder.
Only Zhou Zhuoyuan was so clueless and superficial, too ignorant to know he should suck up to Ji He—instead offending people wherever he went. He wouldn’t even realize how he’d meet his end one day.
No one had ever treated him with such a rotten attitude!
The angrier Ji He got the more he dwelled on it. Why should he have to listen to Zhou Zhuoyuan? Just because the guy told him not to look, he was supposed to obey?
With that, he whipped his head back around and fixed Zhou Zhuoyuan with a fierce glare.
