BTO CH21

The three boys stood face-to-face. For a moment, no one spoke a word.

Shao Zhan clearly looked as if he had just rolled out of bed. Squinting slightly, one hand rested behind his neck while the other remained on the door handle. Despite the sweltering heat, his eyes looked like they harbored a blizzard, sending a chill down anyone’s spine.

Except this time, that chill carried something else.

Like… a rare trace of panic. And utter helplessness.

The bizarre silence stretched on.

Shao Zhan could practically read the words written across the other two’s faces. Tan Kai’s face broadcast a clear line: What the hell is going on between Zhan-ge and the school tyrant? Yesterday’s rumor is definitely true now. They… they’re actually living together!

Hou Jun’s expression was much simpler. His jaw hung open as if to say: Holy shit, the ironclad proof.

Tan Kai and Hou Jun exchanged a glance, ultimately screaming silently in their heads: Zhan-Wu-Bu-Sheng is real.

After everything blew up, neither Shao Zhan nor Xu Sheng had bothered tracking the contest’s progress. Consequently, they had no idea that under the unified, wildly imaginative speculation of the entire Linjiang Sixth High student body, the Study God and the school tyrant had actually been branded with a couple name.

—Zhan-Wu-Bu-Sheng (Invincible Zhan & Sheng).

The name sounded high-end, grandiose, aesthetically pleasing, and catchy.

There had been plenty of rumors about the Study God and the school tyrant before, starting with the lollipop incident that sparked whispers of bad blood. Looking back now, every little incident was prime shipping material.

The setup of a delinquent and a model honor student was incredibly addictive the more people thought about it.

Everyone frantically raised the banner of Zhan-Wu-Bu-Sheng.

Oblivious to all of this, Shao Zhan was entirely focused on the crisis immediately in front of him. What should he say? Say that student Shao Zhan and I actually swapped dorms? When people panic, they’re more prone to making mistakes. Shao Zhan’s mind was a tangled mess.

A moment later, dropping his hand, he forced himself to calm down, first securing a logical and reasonable excuse for why he was standing in this room.

“He had something to do and went out,” Shao Zhan shifted sideways, revealing a dorm room that was indeed empty save for him, then pointed toward the room across the hall. “The pipes in my room are acting up, so I came over to use his bathroom to wash my face.”

This explanation was undeniably logical.

If the Tieba fiasco hadn’t happened last night, Tan Kai and Hou Jun might genuinely not have thought twice about it.

But there are no “ifs” in this world. Snapping out of their daze, Tan Kai and Hou Jun forced out dry, awkward laughter: “Hahaha, oh, so that’s how it is! No need to feel embarrassed, we totally get it.”

Embarrassed about what?Get what?

Shao Zhan’s temple twitched. Grinding through his patience, he said, “If you need him for something, you can wait inside.”

Tan Kai hurriedly replied, “No, no, we won’t look for him. We won’t disturb you.”

With things having reached this stage, what more needed to be said? Convinced they had just stumbled upon the ultimate secret, Tan Kai and Hou Jun backed slowly toward the stairwell: “We’ll head to the classroom first.” Hou Jun, unable to suppress his class monitor instincts, added, “King of Hell Gu is doing morning rounds today. Try not to be late.”

• You awake?
• Hou Jun and Tan Kai knocked on the door this morning.
• I opened it. …

Xu Sheng had just opened his eyes when he received the messages. Scanning the brief lines, he nearly vaulted straight out of bed.

Never did Xu Sheng imagine he had just stepped one foot closer to the “suicide” Shao Zhan had commanded.

Unable to sleep last night, he had scoured the internet for case studies on PR crisis management. He had spent the entire night reading, summarizing, and analyzing key response strategies with a level of dedication he had never shown in class—only to wake up and discover that right now, none of those strategies mattered.

Fuck, not even celebrities have faced a PR crisis this severe!

Xu Sheng replied: …Where are you right now?

Shao Zhan: Dorm.

Xu Sheng: ??

With less than twenty minutes left before morning study hall, Xu Sheng quickly threw himself together and knocked on the door opposite his: “You’re not leaving?”

For the first time, Shao Zhan felt that Xu Sheng’s habit of ditching morning study hall was actually quite brilliant: “I don’t attend morning study.”

Xu Sheng: “…”

So the torrential storm was meant for him to face alone?!

Shao Zhan delivered his final ultimatum with a freezing tone: “You have one morning study period. Have this resolved before I get there.”

With that, Shao Zhan moved to shut the door.

Grabbing the handle, Xu Sheng shoved the door back, wedging himself in the doorway and refusing to let go: “One morning study period might not be enough to fix this.”

Shao Zhan didn’t speak, using only his eyes to order him to let go.

Closing his eyes, Xu Sheng resorted to pure shamelessness: “How about I just kill myself right now?”

Early morning. Horns blared incessantly outside the school gates.

The breakfast stalls near the entrance were packed. Others charged through the gates with flatbreads clamped between their teeth. Looking thoroughly refreshed, King of Hell Gu stood at the entrance keeping watch.

Before heading out to buy breakfast, Xu Sheng had ransacked his room for a disposable mask without success. He wished he could walk with his head buried in the ground.

Though the rumors were vicious, under normal circumstances, random students wouldn’t crowd around to grill him for gossip. From the moment he stepped out of the dorm building, Xu Sheng was merely met with strange stares and whispers—looks full of probing curiosity, bewilderment… and an inexplicable, feverish zeal.

Yet King of Hell Gu cheerfully flagged him down: “Ah, Shao Zhan! How are your studies going lately?”

Xu Sheng weighed his words carefully: “Pretty good.”

King of Hell Gu: “Hit any roadblocks in your subjects? Feel free to drop by my office anytime.”

Stuck at the gate and drawing an increasingly complex array of stares, Xu Sheng wanted to end the conversation as fast as possible: “Everything is easy. If I had to name a difficulty, it’d probably be that it’s too easy.”

“…” King of Hell Gu thought to himself: Truly worthy of being my star pupil.

Answering on the move, Xu Sheng bolted toward the street: “I’m rushing to class, Director Gu! We’ll chat next time you’re free!”

Having secured breakfast, Xu Sheng still felt as though the eyes of the entire world were boring a hole through his back. If some BGM started playing right now, he’d look exactly like a movie protagonist making a grand entrance.

Someone whispered by the stairwell: “It’s the Study God. The Study God and the school tyrant…” “Did the Study God really write that comment himself yesterday?” “Peach-blossom…”

Though Xu Sheng couldn’t make out the full sentences, the keywords Study God, school tyrant, and peach-blossom trailed him wherever he went.

He never wanted to see a peach blossom again for the rest of his life, nor did he ever want to hear the word.

Like a mortal braving a heavenly tribulation, Xu Sheng took the stairs two at a time, flashing into the classroom at top speed—only to be met with a sight that filled him with sheer dread.

More than half of Class 7 had arrived. Instead of catching up on homework, memorizing vocabulary, or doing anything remotely related to studying, they were clustered neatly around Shao Zhan’s desk, packed three or four layers deep.

Seeing Xu Sheng appear in the doorway, someone shouted, “The Study God is here!” and all four rings of students swiveled their heads in unison.

Xu Sheng: “…”

He admitted he had braced himself mentally before walking in.

But.

…What the fuck kind of massive public execution was this?!

Random students might be too embarrassed to ask, but Class 7 was a different story.

They were all in the same class, almost two weeks into the term; there was no way they could be considered strangers. Add to that the fact that human curiosity simply cannot be contained: “Study God, morning!”

Xu Sheng thought to himself: Not in the mood to greet you.

Another classmate leaned in closer: “Study God, what was the deal with Tieba yesterday?”

The classmate immediately followed up with: “Everyone’s saying you’ve admired the school tyrant for a long time. Is it true?”

“…”

With several rings of people firing questions all at once, Xu Sheng was trapped in the center. The crowd was packed so tightly that not even air could slip through. He was suffocating. Just then, two distinct, measured knocks sounded against the glass window beside him. The others all had their backs to the window; only from Xu Sheng’s angle could he see a wrist and the slightly bent knuckles of a teenager.

The next second, the window slid open.

An incredibly cold, flat voice drifted in: “Director Gu is here.”

Those five words held sheer magical power.

The rings of students scattered instantly, bolting back to their seats and sitting ramrod straight. Throwing open random books, they didn’t even dare turn their heads.

As the crowd dispersed and Xu Sheng breathed a sigh of relief, he locked eyes with the person outside.

Standing by the window was Shao Zhan, who had supposedly sworn off morning study hall.

Shao Zhan entered through the back door and pulled out his chair. By the time everyone realized something was off, the class bell rang.

The classroom plunged into silence.

A moment later, Xu Sheng propped a textbook up with one hand, slumped forward, and turned his head to ask, “Why are you here?”

Having applied zero pressure, the textbook started sliding sideways within two seconds. Shao Zhan shot it a glance, lowered his head to pretend he was gaming, and reminded him: “It’s upside down.”

“…” Xu Sheng flipped the book over. “Didn’t you say you weren’t coming to morning study?”

“If I didn’t show up,” Shao Zhan loosened up his fingers before starting a match, “what were you planning to say while parading around in my identity?”

Xu Sheng truly hadn’t figured that out yet.

Shao Zhan checked the time at the top of the phone screen: “You have half an hour left to live.”

That half hour was a decisive window. Hindsight often grants clarity on countermeasures that are impossible to conceive before facing the crisis. As morning study concluded, Xu Sheng once again met the curious stares of his classmates. With his brain operating at maximum capacity, he managed to absorb the incoming blow: “What Tieba?”

Someone explained: “There’s a campus heartthrob voting contest…”

Xu Sheng was, after all, someone baptized by a full night of PR crisis case studies. His mind was crystal clear, deeply aware that denying it to the grave was the ultimate first step: “Although I have no idea what that is, I believe judging people by their appearances is highly inadvisable.”

“…”

“But that Tieba account is definitely yours.” “Yeah, you even went out of your way to write five hundred and seventy-one words, and used seven exclamation marks.”

Beneath Xu Sheng’s seemingly tranquil exterior, a violent storm raged: Why the hell did you guys even count the punctuation marks so accurately?!

Someone pulled up yesterday’s post and shoved the phone into Xu Sheng’s hands: “It’s this one. Peach-blossom…“

Xu Sheng genuinely never wanted to hear the word peach-blossom again. Snatching the phone promptly, he pretended to skim a few lines, reacting with precisely thirty percent indignation and seventy percent shock: “Who hacked my account?!”

“I rarely ever visit Tieba, let alone post garbage like this.”

Whether anyone believed him or not didn’t matter; under no circumstances would he confess.

To solidify the credibility of his alibi, Xu Sheng was forced to roast himself: “How could my prose possibly be this atrocious?”

“…”

Xu Sheng pressed the attack against himself: “Even miswriting the character for ‘dim.’ The vocabulary is a disaster, and the whole thing is riddled with grammatical errors.”

“…………”

Xu Sheng’s critiques were precise, laser-focused, and left everyone utterly unable to argue.

It was true: this dogshit writing was right there in front of them.

The Study God practically scored full marks on every Chinese essay; his papers were routinely photocopied and distributed by subject teachers for the entire grade to admire. They had simply been too shocked last night, drowning in the devastation of their collapsing worldviews.

How could the Study God ever construct a sentence like “peach-blossom eyes”?

The commotion in Class 7 was simply too loud. Just stepping out from another classroom, Meng Guowei marched past Class 7 with a stack of homework tucked under his arm, barking: “What is going on in here?! I could hear you all the way from Class 1! You think we have all the time in the world, do you? It’s been half a month since school started! Let’s see what kind of mess you all make on the monthly exams!”