The military training uniforms were brought over by Huang Zhongfei and a few others.
After receiving his uniform, Jiang Ning said thank you, which brought a radiant smile to Huang Zhongfei's face as he bashfully replied:
"It's only right to serve our fellow students."
As soon as Huang Zhongfei left, Ma Shicheng remarked, "That guy's pretty handsome. He's almost giving me a run for my money."
The female student sitting at the front desk turned around and glanced at him with a thoroughly offensive look, which irritated Ma Shicheng:
"What? Got a problem?"
The female student retorted, "Self-awareness is a rare and precious virtue."
Ma Shicheng scrambled to argue back. He genuinely thought he was drop-dead gorgeous; every time he looked in the mirror, he wondered how the world could produce such an astonishingly handsome man. Whenever he visited relatives, everyone praised how much more handsome he was getting, and back in middle school, when he declared to his best friend that he was the best-looking guy in the entire class, his best friend had enthusiastically agreed.
Yet on the very first day of high school, his appearance was being questioned by a female student, throwing Ma Shicheng completely off balance.
Up on the podium, Dan Qingrong made an announcement to the class:
"Textbooks will be distributed after military training ends. This morning everyone will have a self-study session here at school, and the freshman orientation meeting will be held this afternoon. Attendance is mandatory for everyone."
"Class monitors will be elected after military training, and seating arrangements will be decided after the first monthly exams."
After saying a few more words, Dan Qingrong left the classroom, and a minute later, the room descended back into a noisy chatter.
Ma Shicheng wanted to go argue with the female student, but he felt it would be too feminine, so he could only keep it bottled up inside. After a while, feeling bored, he asked:
"Jiang Ning, which middle school did you go to?"
"A township school down in the countryside. You probably haven't heard of it," Jiang Ning replied.
"What was your score?"
"650." While dealing with Ma Shicheng, Jiang Ning was simultaneously pondering cultivation techniques.
Unaware of Jiang Ning's perfunctory attitude, Ma Shicheng remained full of enthusiasm. Upon hearing about the high school entrance exam scores, the two girls at the front desk joined the conversation as well, and the group began chatting away.
During the self-study session leading up to the midday break, Jiang Ning didn't go home. He went to the cafeteria and bought a set meal for 10 yuan. Cafeteria food wasn't cheap these days, and the taste was thoroughly average; relying on this kind of nutrition for Body Refining definitely wouldn't sustain him.
After finishing lunch, he bought a carton of milk and strolled around the campus. With the scorching sun high in the sky, Jiang Ning sought out a large tree and sat down beneath it to rest.
Compared to the noisy, stuffy classroom, he much preferred the open environment.
Jiang Ning wasn't the only one under the big tree; there were also two identical, cute girls wearing matching outfits, huddled together whispering secrets. When they saw Jiang Ning approach, their voices dropped even lower, buzzing like mosquitoes.
One of the girls was Chen Siyu, who was in the same class as Jiang Ning. As for the other girl, Jiang Ning didn't recognize her.
Jiang Ning closed his eyes to meditate quietly, but the pair's whispered conversation drifted into his ears.
"Sis, there's a guy in our class who's so handsome."
"Really? How handsome?"
"Handsomer than a Korean boy band star. His name is Huang Zhongfei. This afternoon, let's swap classes, and you can see for yourself."
"Oh, okay, won't we get caught?" Chen Siqing asked hesitantly.
"Don't worry! Do you see the guy sitting next to me? He's in my class. Seems his name is Jiang something, I forgot. Go say hi to him as a dry run, and I guarantee nobody will tell us apart."
Chen Siqing agreed. It sounded thrilling—and she loved a thrill most of all.
She walked over to Jiang Ning and softly called out:
"Classmate, classmate."
Jiang Ning opened his eyes. "Can I help you?"
"You're in Class 8, right? I saw you this morning. My name is Chen Siyu." Chen Siqing maintained a normal expression with no detectable flaws.
Chen Siyu felt secretly pleased with herself nearby. She and her sister often took advantage of their identical looks to mess with people. Whenever others were fooled, she felt an extraordinary sense of joy, as if she had won a victory.
Jiang Ning said, "Your name isn't Chen Siyu."
He looked at the real Chen Siyu and said, "She is Chen Siyu."
As his words fell, the pair of twins stared with wide eyes.
"Did you eavesdrop on us?" Chen Siyu demanded.
"No. You guys were whispering so softly, who could possibly hear that?" Jiang Ning didn't admit it.
"Fair enough," Chen Siyu said. "Then how did you figure it out?"
"I could tell at a glance that she wasn't you. As for why—take a guess."
Of course, Chen Siyu couldn't guess.Not getting an answer left her feeling as though her heart were being scratched by a cat. She and her sister were identical twins, almost completely identical in appearance, right down to their voices. They had never been caught when switching places.
Yet today, she had slipped up right in front of Jiang Ning. It was simply baffling.
It was hard for her not to be curious: just how had Jiang Ning managed to tell them apart?
She had to figure it out; otherwise, wouldn't she and her sister be caught every time they switched places in the future?
Jiang Ning had no time to deal with the two of them. He gave them a few perfunctory replies and closed his eyes to cultivate.
Seeing this, while Jiang Ning's eyes were closed, Chen Siyu glared fiercely at him a few times to vent her frustration.
With his Divine Sense wide open, tiny details like that could not possibly escape his control. The afternoon sunlight was just right; he leaned against the shade of the trees and ran the Star Transformation Formula.
Within his Divine Sense perception, the surrounding spiritual energy flowed like water, surging toward him, while a certain substance within the sunlight was likewise drawn in by him.
The two forms of energy gathered around Jiang Ning's body.
Seeing that Jiang Ning ignored her, Chen Siyu felt a mix of anger and amusement. As one half of a pair of twins, both sisters were pure and cute. Every time they appeared in front of boys together, they would attract attention. Who didn't like attractive twin sisters?
While browsing the internet, Chen Siyu often saw netizens saying that twins were every man's dream.
Being a high school student, she understood a little bit about that aspect of life. Every time she saw those remarks, she would feel a strange mix of discomfort and an inexplicable sense of superiority.
Sometimes, even when she met girls prettier than herself, she didn't feel envious. After all, she came in a double package; nobody could resist one plus one.
Yet Jiang Ning actually ignored them! It was infuriating, utterly infuriating!
Summer was sweltering to begin with, and her anger made her feel even hotter.
Chen Siyu planned to drag her sister to the classroom to cool off. Although the classrooms at No. 4 High School didn't have air conditioning, they did have large ceiling fans.
At that moment, she suddenly felt a wave of coolness. Feeling somewhat puzzled, she discovered to her surprise that it was coming from beside Jiang Ning.
She tentatively stepped a little closer, and it felt even cooler than before.
Chen Siyu figured she must be hallucinating, yet that refreshing sensation was exceptionally real. Her family had air conditioning, but this coolness was different from what an AC unit emitted—it was much more natural, like a breeze blowing across the skin through a hallway in the dead of summer, bringing refreshment straight from the bottom of her heart.
She stepped back two paces from Jiang Ning, and the coolness vanished accordingly. A look of suspicion flashed across Chen Siyu's face. She pulled her sister Chen Siqing aside and quietly shared her discovery with her.
Chen Siqing was deeply shaken and declared that she didn't understand what her sister was talking about. She felt her younger sister's forehead, suspecting there was something wrong with her brain.
Chen Siyu told her sister in advance to pay close attention and try to feel it for herself, so the two of them approached Jiang Ning together. As a result, Chen Siyu found that the wave of coolness had vanished.
Her sister looked at her as if she were an idiot.
Chen Siyu thought to herself: *I really am an idiot, truly.*
Her sister Chen Siqing wasn't as cheerful and outgoing as her younger sister. With a shy personality, she wasn't accustomed to interacting with boys, so she put some distance between herself and Jiang Ning.
Just as Chen Siyu finished lamenting, a wave of coolness suddenly washed over her. Her expression instantly turned extremely dramatic, and she excitedly shouted:
"Quickly come here, Sister! It's back, it's back!"
Reluctantly, Chen Siqing shuffled over. After standing still for three seconds, she glanced sideways at her sister:
"There's nothing?"
Chen Siyu noticed it too, and said with disbelief:
"It's gone again?"
Thinking her sister was just messing with her, Chen Siqing threw her arms up in irritation and walked away.
Chen Siyu felt helpless. She really hadn't been tricking her sister!
Usually, her sister was very shy outside, but she was quite stubborn and firm in front of her.
Before leaving, Chen Siyu glanced at Jiang Ning, feeling that today had been terribly unlucky.
Once the twins had left, Jiang Ning opened his eyes, a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth as pleasure filled his heart.
He had done it on purpose.
When he first started practicing the Star Transformation Formula and summoned the power of the stars, some anomalies appeared in the surrounding space, causing Chen Siyu to feel the temperature difference.
However, it didn't take long before Jiang Ning was able to freely control the temperature around his body—acting as a walking air conditioner was effortless for him.
Teasing Chen Siyu had been a spur-of-the-moment whim. At first, they had used him as a guinea pig, and now he was returning the favor. Jiang Ning thought it was simply wonderful.