ATLAS TRANSLATES

When she felt someone staring at her so intently, Xu You felt uncomfortable all over.

After enduring it for a while, her face flushed red. Unable to bear it any longer, she pushed away the person beside her. “Xie Ci, don’t get so close.”

She didn’t know that when she was angry, she looked quite cute, with her cheeks puffed up as she muttered to herself.

“Are you shy, Xu You?” He leaned in, tilting his head to observe her expression.

Xu You pressed her lips together firmly, trying to speak calmly: “No.”

“You’re clearly angry.”

“I’m not.”

She had a shy and hesitant nature, and even when angry, she wouldn’t show it. So Xu You kept her lips tightly closed, trying hard to control herself. She turned her face away.

A few seconds later, she used her pen to point at the line between their two desks, “This is the boundary line. Don’t cross it.”

“The 38th Parallel?”

Xie Ci’s tone rose. He propped his head up with one hand, his lowered voice full of teasing, “How old are you? Even elementary school kids don’t play these games anymore.”

Xu You threw down her pen and took a deep breath, trying to stay calm for a few seconds.

Fine, just endure it.

Soon after, the chemistry teacher walked into the classroom, holding test papers.

He went to the podium, looked around the classroom, and his first words were: “Who is Xu You? Stand up so I can see you.”

Xu You, being called out, stood up with her hands on the desk.

“You’re Xu You?” Teacher He asked with a smile.

Xu You nodded.

“Impressive, young lady. Very good, very good.”

Such straightforward praise in front of everyone made Xu You blush, and she lowered her head, unable to speak.

Teacher He had heard other subject teachers discussing it in the office. This year’s top student was a transfer student from Class 9, with high scores in every subject, especially physics and mathematics, achieving perfect scores in both.

After making a few symbolic remarks, he let Xu You sit down.

As soon as Xu You sat down, the person next to her who was playing with a PSP laughed and said in an affected tone, “Oh my, our study queen is amazing, so amazing, so amazing.”

Xu You let out a breath, really wanting to escape from this place.

“Alright, now everyone take out your test papers, I’ll briefly go over the mistakes from this exam.”

The classroom was filled with the sound of rustling test papers.

Teacher He paced back and forth on the podium with his hands behind his back, “For this test, there were several key difficult points, but to be honest, the questions weren’t that hard, nothing particularly novel…”

This statement was met with a chorus of sighs from below.

The question review took about twenty minutes, half the class time. The teacher then asked the students to copy the problems from the blackboard into their correction notebooks, saying they could discuss with each other or ask him if they didn’t understand.

Having just changed seats, there was some novelty to it. When the teacher allowed free discussion, the classroom began to buzz with chatter.

Xu You opened her correction notebook, and had just written down two problems when Fu Xueli came over to talk to her:

“Cutie, next week is the sports meet. Want to go out and play with me?”

Xu You looked at her bright smile and hesitated before saying: “The teacher probably won’t allow it…”

“That’s a minor detail.” Fu Xueli was enthusiastic and about to say more.

A cool male voice came from the front, it was Xu Xingchun:

“Fu Xueli, the teacher’s coming.”

As soon as he finished speaking, Fu Xueli instantly turned around and sat properly. Her expression became serious, her posture perfect.

Her practiced reaction was almost laughable.

Xu You watched in amazement.

When she realized that the teacher, who was actually standing far away, had tricked her, Fu Xueli’s expression froze in embarrassment, especially in front of everyone.

She got a bit angry, whirled around, and said irritably to Xu Xingchun: “What’s wrong with you? Got a problem!”

Xu Xingchun lowered his eyelashes, continuing to do his homework indifferently, his expression as cold as ever, as if he hadn’t heard anything.

His school uniform collar was clean, and his profile looked very peaceful, like someone completely detached from worldly matters.

But Fu Xueli grew more irritated the more she looked at him.

Who knew better than her that Xu Xingchun, who appeared so pure on the surface, was actually just a cultured thug.

She grabbed the pen from his hand and deliberately drew two lines on his test paper, childishly saying: “Big gorilla.”

Xu Xingchun lowered his eyes to look at the two centipede-like black lines drawn on his test paper. He was silent for two seconds.

“Nyah nyah nyah.”

Seeing him not respond,

Fu Xueli laughed triumphantly.

From childhood to now, she had always taken pleasure in bullying him, and she was especially happy whenever she bullied him into silently enduring it.

“No talking to others during class.” Xu Xingchun paused slightly, then looked away after speaking.

His serious and stern manner was like that of a rigid old cadre.

Fu Xueli snorted lightly, lying on her desk and turning her head away from him. Her scattered black hair brushed against the back of his hand.

She was sick of hearing that phrase.

Don’t talk to this person, don’t talk to that person, don’t talk to anyone…

With his own gloomy personality, and Fu Xueli being such a chatterbox.

If she couldn’t talk to others, who was she supposed to talk to…

She didn’t know how she had endured these years.

Fu Xueli pouted, if it weren’t for the fact that aside from his strong possessiveness, his personality was fairly flawless, and he was handsome.

She wouldn’t be happy dating him at all.

—

“Teacher Xu, help me with a problem?”

Xu You was concentrating on solving problems when a casual, irreverent, and somewhat annoying voice sounded beside her again.

She pretended not to hear, continuing to write.

Xie Ci slowly put away his PSP and moved his stool closer.

His legs were long, and he deliberately squeezed under Xu You’s desk, shaking it.

“Are you going to help or not? At least give me an answer.”

Xu You originally didn’t want to pay attention to Xie Ci, but the desk kept shaking to his rhythm.

And he seemed to never tire of it.

Xu You couldn’t write due to the shaking, and getting annoyed, she lowered her head to try to step on his foot.

Unexpectedly, Xie Ci reacted faster, quickly grabbing her ankle.

She was wearing loose dark blue school uniform pants, revealing a bit of her slim, white ankle bone, clean enough to catch the eye.

He ignored this untimely subtle feeling, but his fingertips unconsciously stroked over it.

“Hey, you- let me go, I’m telling you!!” Xu You panicked, not maintaining her balance well, slightly bending over to pull at his hand.

His strength was far greater than what her weak self could match.

Xie Ci slightly lowered his head, licking his teeth, and looked up to ask her: “Still want to mess with me?”

The classroom was noisy, and no one noticed their interaction.

She frowned, taking deep breaths, and after a long while finally squeezed out: “Clearly you—”

“Hmm?” He raised an eyebrow, using just one hand to encircle her ankle, holding it fixed, his five fingers slightly tightening.

This silent threat completely silenced Xu You.

She was almost crying from anger at this unreasonable thug, with her ankle still in Xie Ci’s grip, mortified to the extreme.

“Will you help me with the problem?” He pushed his luck.

Xu You strongly resisted the urge to slap her book in his face, saying word by word: “You. Let. Go. First.”

“I’ll let go if you help me.”

Actually, he just wanted to tease her now, not wanting to let go at all.

After dawdling for a long time, Xu You couldn’t take it anymore and reached out to grab his test paper.

“I’ll help you! Which problem? After I explain it, don’t bother me anymore.”

Hearing this, Xie Ci smiled.

—

Song Yifan and Meng Xingze were sitting in the second group, diagonally behind Xu You.

Others couldn’t see, but these two brothers saw everything clearly.

Meng Xingze watched for a while, then exclaimed with an “aiyo” and laughed: “Tsk tsk tsk tsk tsk, why is Brother Ci being so frisky in broad daylight?”

Song Yifan was unfazed, “I’m used to it by now.”

“Used to what?”

“The mushiness,” Song Yifan said concisely.

Meng Xingze laughed maliciously, saying lewdly: “Brother Ci sure knows how to play these little games.”

“Hmph.”

Song Yifan didn’t take it seriously at all.

He and Xie Ci had been brothers for so many years, and he’d never seen him have the patience to play such games with girls.

—

“Which problem do you want me to explain?” Xu You clicked her ballpoint pen, finding a blank piece of paper.

Xie Ci blurted out, “Whatever you want.”

Xu You: ……

She pulled out the answer sheet stuck between Xie Ci’s fingers.

After flipping through it, Xu You was speechless to find that basically every question he had attempted had problems, except for the ones he left blank.

Xu You sighed inwardly and said sincerely, “I think it would be more practical for you to read the textbook first, since you probably won’t understand even if I explain.”

“What do you mean, looking down on me?” He looked up.

“No.” Xu You propped her head up with one hand, planning to teach him some basic oxidation-reduction equations.

She wrote down several classic chemical equations from memory on the scratch paper. Just as she finished, she looked up to find his face very close.

Xie Ci had the clean scent typical of young men, mixed with a hint of cool minty tobacco.

There was a small mole on his straight nose, and his lips were thin and sharp.

It was a very good-looking face, just that his gaze was too aggressive, making people afraid to look directly at him.

Xu You moved aside slightly, subtly creating some distance. However, Xie Ci moved closer again, his lips curving up as he called her name, “How can I hear you from so far away?”

The last bell of the class soon rang.

As people in the class packed up their things to leave the classroom, Xu You kept her head down organizing her homework, in no hurry to leave. She was a boarding student and would return to the classroom after dinner to study until eight o’clock.

“Hmm, not sure, let’s go after dinner.”

Xie Ci leaned against the wall, his legs sprawled carelessly reaching to Xu You’s space, talking leisurely with someone. Occasionally he would deliberately bump Xu You’s leg, taking pleasure in teasing her.

Xu You was silently enduring it, and just as she finished packing up her pencil case, the glass window beside them was pulled open, and a sweet female voice came through:

“Ah Ci, aren’t you leaving yet? We’re waiting for you.”

Chen Jing leaned on the windowsill with both hands, looking cute and pretty, though her neckline was a bit low, showing a glimpse of white chest.

While talking to Xie Ci, she subtly glanced at Xu You, with a somewhat coquettish tone, deliberately saying: “We’re going out to play today, don’t drink too much with them, and don’t bring Qiu Qingqing.”

The girls in the dormitory liked to gossip, and Xu You was familiar with the name Qiu Qingqing. She also knew about her entanglements and grudges with Xie Ci.

However, Xu You had no interest in participating in these matters, nor did she want to delve deeper, she just wanted to quickly pack up her things and leave the scene.

Xie Ci yawned, standing up to stretch, his jacket loose and unzipped.

“Bring who?” He frowned as if he hadn’t heard clearly, tilting his head slightly.

Chen Jing repeated, “Qiu Qingqing.”

Xie Ci raised an eyebrow, “Qiu Qingqing?”

“Yes.”

The person behind him teased, “Your girlfriend, tsk tsk tsk.”

Xie Ci half-leaned against the wall behind him, his fingers lightly tapping his head, “Something wrong up here?”

His voice was cool and indifferent, and it wasn’t clear who he was addressing:

“I’m single.”