"Let me touch it."
"You... pervert!"
In the classroom of Class 2, Senior Year, at Jingchuan No. 2 High School, the old, weathered clock on the wall ticked rhythmically.
Lin Mo had cornered a young girl, their eyes locked.
The girl was An Youyu, eighteen years old. She had an oval face and eyes as clear as a mountain stream. Her frame was delicate, carrying a fresh, ethereal air, and her loose school uniform could not hide the stunning curves that far exceeded those of her peers. Her waist-length, dark hair was tied into a low ponytail with a red ribbon.
She was pure, like the sky after rain. She didn’t need to do anything; her mere presence was the embodiment of youth for countless others.
Lin Mo’s Adam’s apple bobbed. "Just one touch."
An Youyu’s gaze was guarded, and her pale, sickly complexion flushed with a faint crimson. "No!"
Her soft, milky voice held an ethereal quality that could melt a heart.
Lin Mo felt a pang of helplessness. A week ago, he had been reborn into his senior year—the very day An Youyu had transferred to the school.
From the moment he saw her, he had felt a piercing pain, a sensation that touched his soul, impossible to describe in words. Yet, he could recall no specific memories of her; he only knew that she was incredibly important to him.
Upon seeing her, he had awakened the Goddess Cultivation System.
Rebirth? Check. A cheat code? Check. He had everything!
However, he hadn't expected that the system required activation—and the condition was to touch An Youyu’s face with her permission.
While the condition seemed simple, the actual difficulty was immense.
Since she had transferred to the school, the hearts of every boy in the building had been captured within a single day. She received countless love letters daily.
This was precisely why Lin Mo could never find an opportunity to be alone with her. Furthermore, her personality was naturally timid, making it highly unlikely she would agree to such an abrupt request.
During the second-period chemistry lab that afternoon, Lin Mo had noticed An Youyu leaving the lab early. Such a rare, golden opportunity could not be missed.
That was the reason for the coercion and cajoling he had just attempted.
But... she had refused him anyway.
The bell rang right on cue.
Startled like a bird in flight, An Youyu pushed past Lin Mo and hurried back to her seat.
The students of Class 2 began to trickle back into the classroom. As many of the boys passed by her desk, they dropped off love letters—sometimes even several at a time.
These were letters from boys in other classes, entrusted to the boys of Class 2 to deliver to An Youyu. It happened every single day.
An Youyu frowned, intending to toss the pile into the trash can by the classroom door. Just as she stood up, she noticed their homeroom teacher, Yan Shiming, walking in, so she had no choice but to shove the letters back into her desk.
The period passed quickly. The final period was supposed to be Yan Shiming’s math class, but he had urgent business and switched it to a Chinese literature period instead.
During the break, An Youyu gathered all the letters from her desk and dumped them into the trash can.
As she turned back, she took a deep breath, made a difficult decision in her heart, and walked softly toward the back of the classroom.
At that moment, Lin Mo was slumped over his desk, feeling troubled, when An Youyu’s voice suddenly reached his ears.
"Lin Mo, can you... can you apply to the same university as me?"
In an instant, everyone in the classroom turned to look at the last row by the window.
A girl inviting a boy to apply to the same university?
Everyone knew exactly what that meant.
It was an invitation, a promise, and something more...
"Crack!"
The sound of countless hearts breaking filled the room.
Lin Mo lifted his head, feeling a surge of distant memory.
He had experienced this exact scene in his previous life.
Time erodes all things, and memories are no exception. But as he relived the dream, the fog that had filled his mind began to disperse, and the events of his past life became clear.
"C-can I?"
"Yes."
Hearing Lin Mo’s agreement, the tension in An Youyu’s heart eased slightly, though her speech remained halting. "A-after school, can we... leave a little late?"
"Okay!"
"Thank you."
An Youyu breathed a sigh of relief and quickly turned to walk back to her seat.
Gu Fan, who sat next to him, kicked Lin Mo under the desk. "Not bad, you dark horse. It’s only been a week, and you’ve already snatched up An Youyu. Brother Mo, let me bow to you!"
Lin Mo raised an eyebrow. "You can bow, but try to show some sincerity."
"What do you mean?"
"Kneel down."
"..."
After that little interlude, the boys of Class 2 spent the final period of the afternoon acting like frosted eggplants—completely dispirited.
This left their Chinese teacher, Wei Qingguo, utterly confused; he had no idea what had happened.
"Ding-ling—"
The dismissal bell rang.
The students began packing their bags and left one after another.
Zhou Wenhao, the study committee member, slung his bag over his shoulder and marched to the back of the classroom, his gaze venomous. "You aren't worthy of An Youyu!"
Lin Mo looked up, expressionless. "Are you done?"
"You... you’d better have some self-awareness!"
Zhou Wenhao turned to look at An Youyu, who was still burying her head in her exercises. He wanted to say something, but didn’t know what. Finally, he spat out a harsh remark and stormed out of the classroom in a fit of rage.
Soft sunlight streamed through the windows, casting a glow into every corner of the room, adding a touch of beauty to this place where one spent their time staring at problems and looking toward the future.
Lin Mo stayed at his desk, not moving to disturb her.
In his previous life, he had been so excited that he had forgotten the girl’s soft request and had been the first to rush out of the classroom after school...
A long while passed.
An Youyu set down her pen, packed her things, and walked to the back of the classroom. "I thought you would have left..."
"I might have before, but not this time."
A flicker of confusion crossed An Youyu’s eyes, but she didn’t dwell on it. She pulled out the chair and sat in front of Lin Mo.
Framed by the glow of the setting sun outside the window, the girl was as beautiful as a painting—even more radiant than the "white moonlight" of his memories.
Lin Mo’s eyes shone as he quietly admired the scenery.
They stared at each other for nearly a minute before An Youyu broke the silence. "Hello, my name is An Youyu..."
The simple sentence betrayed her internal nervousness.
Lin Mo stifled a laugh. "Classmate An, how about I go first?"
An Youyu stayed silent for a few seconds, then let out an almost inaudible "Mm."
Lin Mo straightened his posture slightly. "You want to apply to Qing University?"
"You..."
"What a coincidence. Me too."
In his previous life, Lin Mo had only known An Youyu for a little over two months. That short period had become the most beautiful memory of his life, bar none.
Half a month before the college entrance exam, as they were walking home together, they encountered an accident at an intersection. A drunk driver had barreled straight toward them.
In that split second, she had pushed him out of the way, saving his life, while her own life had stopped forever on that day.
As she lay in a pool of blood, on the verge of death, she had struggled to raise her blood-stained arm and touched his face frantically.
Back then, he had wept so bitterly...
Scenes from the past flickered past his eyes like a slideshow. Beneath the desk, his hands slowly tightened into fists.
An Youyu lowered her head, her delicate nose twitching slightly. Surprise and shock crossed her eyes as she raised her chin. "Is that a deal?"
"It’s a deal!"
Lin Mo squinted. "So... can you let me touch it now?"He had not noticed that An Youyu had stopped ahead of him, and he only managed to react just before he was about to bump into her.
An Youyu looked down at the stone-flagged path, her long bangs obscuring half of her face. "Why are you following me?"
Lin Mo replied without a second thought: "To see you home."
Upon hearing the word "home," a faint sadness flickered in An Youyu's eyes. It lasted only a split second before she returned to normal. "I grew up in an orphanage. I don't have a home."
"You... will have one in the future."
An Youyu did not respond.
Lin Mo could not see her expression clearly, so to ease the silence, he took the initiative to change the subject. "An, I won't bother you, but may I walk with you?"
After a long silence, An Youyu gave no answer and continued walking forward.
Not refusing was as good as consent.
Lin Mo followed An Youyu all the way to the vicinity of Baiyu Residential Area on Chaohai Road.
An Youyu stopped and turned to look at Lin Mo, who was a few meters behind her. Her expression held a hint of hesitation, as if there was something she wanted to say, and it took a long while before her voice emerged: "Get home... stay safe."
"I will."
From Lin Mo's perspective, the girl was bathed in the glow of the sunset, appearing almost ethereally beautiful.
He turned to leave, his footsteps lingering with reluctance. After a few paces, he looked back and waved at An Youyu. "See you tomorrow."
An Youyu stood rooted to the spot, not moving until Lin Mo had disappeared at the end of the road. She then withdrew her gaze and whispered in a voice only she could hear: "See you tomorrow."
……
At 6:30 in the evening, just as Lin Mo walked into his home, a woman of about thirty-five or thirty-six greeted him. Although her face bore the marks of time, one could still vaguely discern how beautiful she must have been in her youth.
Lin Mo’s mother, Lin Shu!
Lin Shu took the schoolbag from her son’s shoulder. "Why are you back so late today?"
"I was held up by something."
"The food is almost cold. Go wash your hands and come eat."
"Alright."
Lin Mo replied with a smile.
When he was ten, his father, Su Wenyang, had made a fortune in business. They say that when a man gets rich, he goes bad, and this sentiment was displayed to the fullest extent in Su Wenyang. He had an affair during their marriage—in fact, he had more than one.
Paper cannot wrap up fire, and eventually, Lin Shu discovered the clues. After a fierce argument, they chose to divorce. Lin Shu asked for nothing, taking only custody of Lin Mo and the house they had lived in after their marriage—the very apartment they were in now.
At that time, Lin Mo was not called Lin Mo; he was called Su Mo. It was only after the divorce that he changed his surname to Lin. This change was not requested by Lin Shu, but was Lin Mo’s own wish. Since the divorce, Lin Mo had never called Su Wenyang "Dad" again. In his eyes, Su Wenyang was a murderer; he had destroyed their home and ruined his mother.
At the dining table.
Lin Shu had just sat down when she noticed her son seemed somewhat distracted. "Xiaomo, what's wrong with you today? You’ve been absent-minded since you got home. Did you cause some kind of trouble at school?"
"No."
Lin Mo picked up some food for his mother and asked: "Mom, what university do you want me to apply to?"
Upon hearing this, Lin Shu widened her eyes. "What’s the point of hoping? You only scored 432 on the start-of-term mock exam. I’d be thanking the heavens if you could get into any university at all; how could I dare to hope for anything else?"
Lin Mo looked thoroughly embarrassed. It was true; his grades were terrible. In his previous life, An Youyu had spent over two months painstakingly tutoring him, and only then did he miraculously make it into a first-tier university. Without that, it was hard to say if he would have even cleared the third-tier cutoff.
"Trust your son!"
"Trust you? I’d sooner believe a sow could climb a tree!"
"……"
Lin Mo said nothing more and kept his head down, shoveling his rice.
After quickly finishing dinner, he grabbed his schoolbag from the wall by the door and went into his room. It was a small, warm space containing a single bed, a bookcase, and a computer.
Lin Mo took out his textbooks and practice papers, placing them neatly on his computer desk. He looked at the books and papers, a bitter smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.
Come to think of it, he had been quite the jerk. During the two-plus months he spent with An Youyu in his previous life, all he knew was that she wanted to apply to the top university in Xia Country, Qing University. Other than that, he knew nothing about her at all. He vaguely remembered mocking her at the time because she wanted to apply to Qing University—all because her grades were poor, even worse than his.
Back then, he had never realized why An Youyu could solve those incredibly esoteric math problems so effortlessly. It wasn't until much later that Lin Mo understood: An Youyu’s academic performance was excellent—extraordinarily so. A top student is not scary; what is scary is a top student who deliberately suppresses their scores.
An Youyu was just such a person. Her desire to get into Qing University was not a delusional dream, but something she truly had the strength to achieve.
Lin Mo reminisced about the past for a long while. Once he snapped back to reality, he estimated the time. There were only three months left until the college entrance exam. At his current level, he would struggle to even break three hundred points. By the time the conspiracy unfolded in his previous life, he was already in his early forties, and his high school knowledge had long since been forgotten. Compared to his previous life, his foundation now was even worse.
Wanting to improve to a level where he could get into Qing University in just three months was no different from a pipe dream. Unless… a miracle happened!
Thinking of this, Lin Mo’s eyes narrowed. "A miracle? Well, it’s not entirely impossible…"
He walked to the window and whispered in his heart: "Activate system."
"Goddess Cultivation System activating. Activation progress… 39%… 73%… 99%. Activation successful! Detected that the host's foundation is too poor to possess cultivation ability. Awarding one Newcomer Gift Pack. Do you wish to open the pack now?"
"Open."
"Congratulations to the host for obtaining IQ +10."
Lin Mo felt a jolt of coldness pass through his mind, and then… that was it. He had a question mark written all over his face.
That was it?
Before he could overthink it, a line of small text appeared before his eyes.
【Cultivation Value: 0】
Lin Mo was puzzled. "What is Cultivation Value?"
"The Goddess Cultivation System is dedicated to training An Youyu into a goddess of unrivaled beauty. The host only needs to complete the tasks issued by the system to receive a certain amount of Cultivation Value as a reward. The specific amount is determined by the difficulty of the task. Cultivation Value can be used in the Cultivation Shop to redeem items to improve oneself."
"I see."
Having heard the explanation, Lin Mo had a rough understanding of this so-called Goddess Cultivation System, but then a question arose: "Why An Youyu? And why was the activation condition touching An Youyu’s face?"
He would certainly choose An Youyu, that was beyond question. But to have her set as the cultivation target from the very start was clearly a bit off, and the activation conditions were also related to her. Everything about it felt strange; the Goddess Cultivation System seemed to have an inseparable connection to An Youyu…
"This is a heavenly secret, and heavenly secrets cannot be revealed."
Lin Mo was clearly not satisfied with this answer. Before he could press further, the system’s voice sounded again.
"Task issued: Reduce An Youyu’s sense of loneliness."
Chapter 3: Can you take a punch?
At 6:00 a.m., the chirping of birds outside the window began to sound intermittently.
Lin Mo opened his eyes in bed, got dressed, and had just walked out of the bedroom when he nearly collided with his mother, Lin Shu.
Lin Shu looked surprised. "Xiaomo, why are you up so early?"
It was no wonder she was so astonished; usually, Lin Mo would lounge in bed until 7:30, but it wasn't even 6:10 yet.
"I want to get to school a bit earlier."
Lin Mo shifted to the side and scratched his head in embarrassment. "I can't exactly welcome the college entrance exam with a score of only 400-something, can I?"
Doubt flashed in Lin Shu’s eyes. "Don't scare me this early in the morning, okay? Since when did my son have this kind of determination?"
"Mom, your son has grown up."
Lin Mo was quite helpless. "I’m going to wash up. Just toast a piece of bread for me."
Watching her son walk into the bathroom, Lin Shu smiled with relief and turned to head into the kitchen.
In the bathroom, Lin Mo stood before the mirror, examining himself. His features still held a touch of childishness; while he wasn't devastatingly handsome, he could be considered refined. Since his rebirth, a composure that transcended his age had settled upon him. Not bad.
He finished washing his face and brushing his teeth in three minutes. At the dining table, he picked up a slice of bread. "I’m heading to school."
"You haven't had your milk—"
After heading downstairs, Lin Mo jogged out of the residential area, and ten minutes later, he appeared outside the main gate of Baiyu Residential Area.
At 7:00 a.m., An Youyu appeared. She was still in her school uniform with a low ponytail, yet she looked so fresh and refined that she caught the eyes of many people entering and exiting.
She was walking along the left-hand sidewalk toward the school with her head down. After taking only a few steps, she suddenly noticed Lin Mo standing more than ten meters ahead, and an look of surprise washed over her face.
After a few seconds of hesitation, she took a deep breath and walked timidly toward Lin Mo. "Why are you here?"
"I just wanted to come, so I came."
Without any pretense, Lin Mo was completely straightforward.
A faint blush crept onto An Youyu’s porcelain-like cheeks, intoxicating the wind of the early summer morning.