Despite the classroom air conditioning being on, beads of sweat actually broke out on Zhang Chenxi's forehead.
This was a problem about solving a system response equation. Zhang Chenxi happened to have seen a similar problem in the senior student's book and remembered the steps to solve it.
Three minutes later, Zhang Chenxi finished the problem. When he turned around, his gaze locked directly with that pair of cold, clear eyes.
The senior student's eyes were truly gorgeous, as if rivers, mountains, lakes, seas, the sun, the moon, and the stars were hidden within them.
Zhang Chenxi stood there in a daze, thinking to himself.
Suddenly, he noticed a flash of craftiness across her eyes.
"Here, you used the coefficient matching method to find the value of the first derivative of $y$ at the $0^+$ moment, and then substituted it into the system of equations to solve it, didn't you?"
Ji Mingyue pointed at Zhang Chenxi's blackboard writing and asked.
"What the heck do I know about any coefficient matching method? Didn't you write it this way yourself? You're the one who taught it, my idol."
Ten thousand alpacas stampeded through Zhang Chenxi's heart.
"Yes, Teacher, that should be right." Zhang Chenxi muttered under his breath.
"Of course it's right. Instead of using the transmission operator method from the textbook, classmate Zhang Chenxi went ahead and used a new method not taught in class. Truly commendable. Teacher will definitely give you extra, extra-large course credits."
Ji Mingyue looked like a cunning and insidious hunter; behind every sincere word of praise lay a knife capable of finishing Zhang Chenxi off.
Zhang Chenxi awkwardly scratched his head and smiled. Just as he thought it was over and he could return to his seat, Ji Mingyue called him back again.
"Classmate Zhang Chenxi, one last question: why is the coefficient of the impulse signal here the value of the first derivative equation?"
Upon hearing this, Zhang Chenxi almost passed out.
"A demon, she's simply a demon! Senior student, you look so gorgeous and you were so cute when you were sleeping—how did you turn into this during class?!"
Zhang Chenxi roared in his heart.
At that moment, he thought: *You lent me your book, so we basically know each other—why are you giving me such a hard time?*
Yet at this point, Zhang Chenxi seemed to have forgotten that from her perspective, the senior student had never met him before.
So he turned back, wearing an aggrieved expression, and whispered in a low voice:
"I'm sorry, Teacher, I don't know."
Seeing the junior student's completely aggrieved expression, looking as though he was about to shatter at any second, Ji Mingyue suddenly panicked.
Looking at the junior student before her, his face written all over with grievance, her own heart grew flustered as well.
*"Was I a bit too harsh?"*
Ji Mingyue secretly reproached herself in her heart. She began to reflect on her behavior just now, realizing she might have hurt the junior student.
However, right at that moment, an evil thought suddenly surged into her mind:
*"Still, the junior student's pitiful, aggrieved look really makes one just want to pinch his cheeks and stroke his hair."*
This thought made Ji Mingyue's heart race, but she quickly forced it down.
After all, he wasn't him.
(Zhang Chenxi: *Does being him mean you can just do whatever you want to me?!*)
"You can go back."
Ji Mingyue waved her hand, transforming back into a cold-faced judge as she resumed her lecture.
Zhang Chenxi didn't absorb a single word of the rest of the lecture, and the moment class ended, he bolted out.
Watching Zhang Chenxi's retreating figure, feelings of amusement, guilt, and pity all mixed together, leaving her standing foolishly in place.
Barring any accidents, she probably wouldn't have any further intersection with this junior student. The junior student probably wouldn't come looking to borrow her book again either.
Nor would the junior student ever know that she was his Honor of Kings duo partner [Genie Girl], and that she had just taught him a harsh lesson.
***
After returning to the dorm room, the more Zhang Chenxi thought about it, the angrier he got.
*Why didn't you wake up when I draped my jacket over you this morning?!*
*If you had opened your eyes to look at me, I refuse to believe your eyes would have been empty!*
Feeling deeply depressed, Zhang Chenxi called up Sun Dong, and the two of them engaged in a fierce battle in the Summoner's Rift.
"So you're the damned one they call Leigong? Still pulling people? Huh? Pulling or not pulling anymore? Pull me again then? Don't you just love pulling people?"
Zhang Chenxi recalled the grief Ji Mingyue had put him through in class, so he took his frustration out on Leigong.
"Achoo!"
Ji Mingyue, having arrived home, let out a massive sneeze.
"Looks like I really did catch a chill at the library this morning." She sniffled and muttered to herself.
Ji Mingyue took a hot shower, lay down on her bed, and opened Honor of Kings.
After ganking the opposing Leigong into an 0-8 record, Zhang Chenxi finally finished the match and spotted [Genie Girl] coming online.
[God in Charge of Being a Smartass]: "Playing games right after finishing exams? How was math? Was it hard?"
[Genie Girl]: "Didn't feel like anything special."
Ji Mingyue hadn't taken the exam, of course she didn't feel anything.
[God in Charge of Being a Smartass]: "You still didn't tell me your name yesterday?"
How could Ji Mingyue possibly tell the junior student her real name? So she tossed the question right back at him.
"Aren't you going to sing that song for me like you promised yesterday?"
Zhang Chenxi stared wide-eyed. How did it turn into *him* not singing to *her* again? She hadn't replied to so many messages he sent yesterday, and now she was turning around to point the finger at him?
"How could that be? I asked what you wanted to hear yesterday and you didn't reply to me—you're just as unreasonable as a senior student I ran into today."
Ji Mingyue opened her small mouth slightly in astonishment. *The unreasonable senior student you mentioned... wouldn't happen to be me, would it?*
[Genie Girl]: "What senior student? Tell me about it."
Zhang Chenxi was just fretting over having no one to vent to, so he dumped his entire psychological journey from the afternoon class and the library incident all in one go.
"Are you saying the senior student who lent you her book happens to be the teacher substituting for your class?"
"Are you saying that senior student is extremely pretty, but has a face as cold as if everyone owed her millions?"
"Are you saying that because you were afraid she'd catch a cold, you draped your jacket over her, and she repaid your kindness by dragging you up on stage to solve problems and giving you a hard time?"
Ji Mingyue narrowed her eyes as she stared at her phone screen, a cold smirk hanging on the corners of her lips.
At this moment, her expression looked just like the third sticker in her phone: a panda clapping its hands and saying *good, good, good*.
"Yeah, I'm telling you, that female tyrant, she..."
...
Zhang Chenxi continued uninhibitedly, adding plenty of exaggeration. Meanwhile, Ji Mingyue chimed in on the side, dropping in a comment every now and then.
"Listen to me..."
Yakkety-yak, the more Zhang Chenxi talked, the more hyped he got; the tighter Ji Mingyue clenched her hands.
Looking at Zhang Chenxi's unending stream of messages, Ji Mingyue suddenly relaxed her clenched fists.
She calmly changed her clothes and loosely tied up her hair.
With utmost quietness, she picked up that copy of *Signals and Systems* from the desk and began walking slowly toward the campus with small steps.
The June summer air remained sweltering, but centered around Ji Mingyue, the space within a two-meter radius felt as though it had dropped to freezing point.
Back on the other side, Zhang Chenxi finally wrapped up his grievances, adding a final postscript:
"I'm telling you, Longcheng University is full of senior students like this. If you can avoid coming here, don't."
Seeing this, Ji Mingyue was so furious she laughed instead.
*Still trying to pull fast ones at a time like this, are we?*
[Genie Girl]: "Sing."
[God in Charge of Being a Smartass]: "Seriously, think about it again. Maybe there are better choices out there."
[Genie Girl]: "Sing."
Zhang Chenxi: "............"
[God in Charge of Being a Smartass]: "What do you want to hear?"
[Genie Girl]: "《By Your Side》"
Three minutes later.
*Ding-dong.* "Voice message."
Ji Mingyue casually tapped it open, but the voice spilling from the phone instantly froze her in her tracks.
It was that voice she had listened to countless times; it was that singing voice she knew better than anyone else.
...
"I want to be by your side..."
As the final line of lyrics came to an end, Ji Mingyue stood frozen in place, listening through the entire song.
A sudden, blooming smile broke across her face, like a stream of clear spring water flowing past, instantly cooling the entire sweltering street.
Those bright eyes, sparkling like the stars, held endless amusement and tenderness, as if capable of melting every frozen piece of ice in the world.
Surprise swept over her like a surging, overwhelming wave, transforming into a sky full of dazzling starlight and a vast sea of stars, reflecting and shimmering in brilliant harmony with the bright moon hanging high in the night sky.