ATLAS TRANSLATES

Xie Ci stood there in a daze. After a pause, he looked down at Xu You again.

She slid one hand down and interlaced their fingers together, holding on tightly.

“Have you gone silly?”

Xu You held his hand, ready to walk out of the small alley. Just as she took a step—

“Wait…” Xie Ci came back to his senses and shifted slightly, holding Xu You back. Trying to act calm, he stammered, “You… I… you…”

“What is it?”

“It’s just…” Xie Ci absentmindedly raised his hand to touch the cheek she had kissed, “You only kissed one side. It feels uneven.”

“…Pfft.”

Xu You found his silly behavior incredibly adorable, and for once felt playful. Her smile deepened as she let go of his hand and said softly, “Alright then, come closer.”

Xie Ci immediately bent down and closed his eyes. His eyelashes trembled slightly as he waited obediently.

A few seconds passed with no response.

Just as he was getting impatient, he caught a whiff of that familiar, faint floral scent. A soft, warm pair of lips gently pressed against his right cheek.

His heart thumped wildly in his chest.

Even the darkness felt sweet.

Xu You laughed and stepped back, “Xie Ci, goodbye.”

Xie Ci opened his eyes just a crack. By the time he fully came to his senses, Xu You had already disappeared. On his way home, his mind was in such a daze that he nearly lost his soul, getting lost several times.

When he got home, Xie Ci was humming a tune as he casually tossed his keys aside.

The living room lights were on.

He paused, changed his shoes and went in to find Zeng Qilin lying across the sofa, head propped up watching TV.

A football match was playing on TV. Xie Ci bent down, picked up a cold bottle of mineral water, twisted the cap off, and took a drink.

“What are you doing at my place?” he asked casually.

Zeng Qilin glanced at him, “Am I not allowed to come?”

“………”

“Tch.”

Seeing his smug expression, Zeng Qilin snorted and asked lazily, “What’s up? Got your girlfriend back?”

“Yeah.”

Xie Ci flopped onto the sofa, stretched out his long legs onto the footstool, and swung his feet idly.

“Tsk tsk, you were practically dying before. Thought you were going to die of heartbreak,” Zeng Qilin mocked.

But Xie Ci didn’t respond. He had a slight smile on his face, eyes downcast, lost in thought.

“By the way…”

Zeng Qilin remembered something important, “Didn’t you have some issue with someone called Fu Yishun before…”

Hearing that name, Xie Ci’s brows furrowed, “What about it?”

“You know him?”

“Yeah, he tried to mess with me before, so I had some people deal with him.”

“And then?”

Xie Ci answered carelessly, “Then he dropped out.”

“But why are you suddenly bringing him up?”

“Heh.”

Zeng Qilin lit a cigarette, squinted as he took a drag, “He transferred to No. 2 High School and found himself a ‘big brother’.”

……

—

School days always passed by monotonously and dully.

Song Yifan felt uncomfortable seeing Xie Ci’s enthusiastic studying demeanor, wondering where this sudden motivation came from.

Someone joked: “Looks like Ci is trying to turn over a new leaf.”

But Song Yifan thought Xie Ci might still be unwell, and since he couldn’t reason with him, he let it be. Everyone thought they’d just wait and see what he could actually learn.

They all knew Xie Ci’s temperament well – he didn’t have the patience to be a good student. Sitting in the classroom poring over books was just a passing phase; he’d probably give up in a few days.

The first morning class was English. Class 1 looked half-asleep, with everyone drowsy. Several boys got up to use the bathroom.

Teacher Chen Yue was reading the text at the podium. Her teaching pace was slow, and she liked to digress with irrelevant chatter, so most students inevitably zoned out.

Xu Xiaocheng was engrossed in reading a magazine, lost in its colorful pages.

The book was openly displayed on his desk.

Someone behind him pushed his back and whispered, “Brother Cheng, Brother Cheng…”

“What!” Xu Xiaocheng snapped impatiently, slapping his hand on the desk and turning his head, “Why are you calling me like I’m dead?”

The male classmate behind him lowered his head without speaking, trying to hold back laughter. Just as Xu Xiaocheng realized something was wrong, he caught sight of a dark shadow stopping beside him.

Chen Yue confiscated his basketball magazine. Xu Xiaocheng stood at his desk, listening to her lecture for about five minutes.

“Look at the countdown board below – only 58 days! Just 58 days until the college entrance exam. Do you know what this means? It means you’re about to enter your final year of high school. How can you have no sense of urgency? Still reading these leisure books in class. We’re all taught by the same teacher, how can there be such a big difference between you and others? When I teach Class 0, they…”

“Sigh… here we go again. Middle-aged women, why do they nag so much…” Song Yifan sighed.

His deskmate glanced at him, “More like menopause.”

“……..”

“Oh…”

Song Yifan said casually, “Just kidding, you know I’m not well-educated…”

Chen Yue put down the book in her hand, “Among all the second-year classes, I haven’t seen any more disruptive than yours. I really don’t know where you find all this time. You know the class representative from my other class, right? The girl who always ranks in the top few of the grade. She pays attention in every class and doesn’t slack off even after class. You’re already so far behind the better students, yet you still don’t work hard…”

While Chen Yue was speaking enthusiastically, the classroom below had already erupted into chaos, with both jeering and sighing sounds. When that name was mentioned, everyone’s eyes inadvertently turned towards Xie Ci’s direction.

“Hey, Brother Ci,” Song Yifan called from behind, his tone slightly sour: “Tsk tsk, hearing the teacher praise your girlfriend, do you feel a kind of… natural pride? Are you especially happy?”

Xie Ci couldn’t be bothered to respond.

Song Yifan’s deskmate lowered his voice and asked, “What do you think would happen if the English teacher found out her star pupil was caught by Xie Ci? Would she faint on the spot?”

“I think it would probably make the teacher question her entire life,” Song Yifan shook his head, looking over seriously.

“Yeah.”

“And also… the two of them really don’t match,” his deskmate sighed, lowering his voice further to avoid Xie Ci hearing, “That girl from Class 0, with her grades, she could easily get into Tsinghua or Peking University. Once they’re out of school, the gap between them will show, like in social circles…”

The words fell on Song Yifan’s ears, making him slightly annoyed. He said flatly, “You’re overthinking it.”

“What?”

“Xie Ci and Xu You are good together.”

Song Yifan had always been protective of his friends since childhood and couldn’t stand hearing anyone speak ill of them.

Then he added casually, “Besides, you’re not taking our jokes seriously, are you? Xie Ci’s family is loaded. Even if he doesn’t study, he’ll do better than anyone after graduation.”

—

Before the exam, Xie Ci and his group were still struggling students, assigned to the multimedia classroom.

Usually, monthly exams were uneventful for them – they barely brought pens and caused no stir.

But this time…

Li Jieyi sat next to Xie Ci and couldn’t help asking, “Brother Ci, I heard your knowledge has improved lately. Pass me some notes later?”

Xie Ci didn’t even look at him and snorted coldly, “Get lost.”

“Fuck.” Li Jieyi cursed at him, “Xie Ci, don’t you care about brotherhood?”

“Who do you think you are?” Xie Ci glanced at him.

When the test papers were handed out, Xie Ci straightened his scratch paper and buried himself in solving problems. To others, he seemed completely absorbed in working through each question.

Song Yifan sat slightly ahead and to the side of him, occasionally glancing in Xie Ci’s direction. He was secretly amazed… looking at Xie Ci’s posture, could he really be about to make a breakthrough…

Xie Ci was completely oblivious to others’ curious glances, his brows alternating between furrowed and relaxed as he concentrated fully.

Even the supervising teacher couldn’t help but look at him several times. For a notorious troublemaker in their grade, sitting so quietly and doing the test was simply inconceivable.

Usually, their group would hand in their papers and leave after half an hour, but now they were all waiting for Xie Ci.

When the bell rang for collecting papers, students from the first row got up to collect the answer sheets.

When they reached Xie Ci, he was reluctant to hand it over, staring so intensely at the collector that they broke out in a cold sweat.

“Damn it, Xie Ci, are you coming or not?”

Song Yifan had already left the exam room, but because Xie Ci hadn’t come out yet, he’d been waiting outside for ages, so anxious he wanted to stick his head in and call him.

As soon as Xie Ci came out, Song Yifan followed him, chattering away: “What were you writing for so long? Were you writing an imperial decree or something?!”

As he was talking non-stop, he paused, noticing Xie Ci’s furrowed brows and serious expression.

Song Yifan carefully asked: “You’re not going to discuss the test questions with me, are you? I’m telling you, I can’t handle that… you need to find someone else.”

“What are you making noise about? I’m not an idiot,” Xie Ci glanced at him impatiently.

“…” So Song Yifan wisely shut up.

A few days later, the monthly test results came out.

Xu Xiaocheng’s group had an uncertain feeling. While smoking during break time, someone said: “Looking at Young Master Xie these days… we won’t see him on the rankings board, will we?”

Someone immediately choked on their cigarette, coughing twice, “No- no- please no, I can’t handle that shock!”

“Brother, if Ci makes it onto the board, this would be worthy of ‘Moving China’, right?”

“Hahahahaha!”

“We’d have to treat him then.”

Several people started discussing.

Song Yifan, who had been quiet on the side, didn’t participate in the discussion.

Back in the classroom, the math teacher handed out the test papers to the class. A group of students swarmed up, eager to get theirs.

Song Yifan returned to his seat and carelessly picked up his test paper to glance at the score.

32 points.

Not bad.

He never cared about these things anyway, so he felt nothing. Song Yifan turned to Xie Ci, “Ci, what did you get?”

Xie Ci had folded his paper. His expression was flat as he didn’t answer, instead asking: “What did you get?”

“Hahahaha fuck.”

In all his life, he never thought they’d be discussing grades. Song Yifan felt deeply emotional, shaking his head and saying: “I got 32 points, guessed a few multiple choice questions right.”

Then he saw Xie Ci’s expression become somewhat indescribable.

“What?”

Song Yifan frowned, “You’re not starting to look down on me, are you?”

“A little bit, so hurry up and go back.”

Song Yifan looked down at him for a few seconds, and taking advantage of his momentary distraction, snatched his answer sheet and took a look—

“You’re asking for death!” Xie Ci stood up immediately, trying to quickly grab back his paper, his expression terrible.

“12 points?” Song Yifan was stunned.

Xie Ci said irritably, “Give it back, get the fuck out!”

“This isn’t right! My dear Ci!” Song Yifan tried to hold back his laughter, but was also confused, “I saw you writing so seriously, how did you only get this many points hahahahahaha, even less than me?!”

Xie Ci didn’t speak.

Song Yifan was puzzled, “No, did the teacher mark it wrong, or did you just write random answers?”

Xie Ci looked serious with a dark face, “I fucking calculated each question by hand, I even used up all the scratch paper, damn it.”

“This…”

Compared to Song Yifan, Xie Ci was more confused, “How did you get 32 points? Did you copy?” He had actually studied, while Song Yifan, that bastard, didn’t even bring a pen before the exam and had to borrow one from him, so why did he score higher?

“Hahahahahaha.” Song Yifan coughed once and honestly said, “I just wrote whatever came to mind, all guesswork.”

“How did you guess?”

“Counted on my fingers, cool right?”

“…”

Song Yifan was being especially annoying, “You know what, haha, I even rolled dice to verify my answers, felt pretty effective.”

“…Fuck.”

Xie Ci wanted to kick him, irritably taking his answer sheet and crumpling it into a ball.

Looking at it just made him annoyed.

“Oh my.” Song Yifan patted his shoulder, consoling him, “How does that saying go? You can’t force what’s not meant to be… we’re not cut out for studying, accept it!”

“No no no.”

Xu Xiaocheng, who had been watching the whole scene from behind, was laughing so hard he could barely speak, “How can you give up so easily? Brother Ci, don’t be afraid, we’ll show heaven we won’t surrender!”

“…”

Somehow, someone told Xu You about this.

Early Saturday morning, while Xie Ci was still sleeping in bed, his phone on the bedside table rang.

He was still in a daze, turning over with his eyes closed, and answered without checking the caller ID.

“Xie Ci… are you awake?”

As soon as that familiar voice sounded, Xie Ci instantly became alert. He opened his eyes and suddenly sat up in bed, taking the phone away from his ear to look at it twice before putting it back, “Xu You?!”

“Yes, it’s me.”

He cleared his throat, lowered his head, clutching the blanket awkwardly as he said, “You…”

“Do you have time today?”

Xu You paused for a moment, her voice very soft and gentle, “I’m going to the library today, want to come with me?”

“…”

“…Xie Ci, are you busy…”

“I’m here, here!” Xie Ci threw off his blanket and got out of bed, randomly grabbing a pair of pants and hopping as he put them on, “I’m free, I’m free!!! Where are you, should I come find you or what?”

“Slow down, don’t bump into anything.”

Xu You was organizing her books on her end, hearing the clattering sounds from the other end of the phone, her lips curled into a small smile, “There’s a library in your area, right? I don’t know where it is, let’s go look…”

“Okay, okay!” Xie Ci’s voice was overflowing with joy.

Xu You couldn’t help but laugh, “Remember to bring your math test paper too.”

“……..”