Early the next morning, Ansheng opened his door and cautiously peeked out toward the neighboring apartment.
Seeing that the running shoes that had been outside yesterday were gone—implying she had already left—Ansheng finally let out a sigh of relief and stepped out.
Walking down the path, he frowned as he looked at the cat plushie in his hand. He had completely forgotten to return it to her yesterday.
"My brain must have short-circuited. It would've been so easy to just hang it on her door..."
After a moment of thought, Ansheng let out a slight sigh, pulled out a tissue, and gently wiped down the white cat plushie.
"I'll just give it back if I run into her today..."
When he reached the door of his assigned classroom, there were only a few scattered students inside. Some of them seemed to already know each other and were deep in conversation.
Ansheng glanced at the seating chart by the door, then quietly walked down the aisle and took a seat in the lower-left corner by the window.
After sitting down, he propped his right hand on the desk and looked out the window.
This was a great spot. As proven by countless anime and manga, the seat by the window in the back corner of the classroom was known as the throne.
Only the male protagonist was worthy of sitting here!
Just as Ansheng was daydreaming, more students filed into the classroom, and the chatter grew lively.
"Hey... look at that guy over there. His hair is almost covering his eyes. Kind of creepy..."
"I just saw him giving a deadpan stare... He looks so weird!"
Ansheng's train of thought paused. He felt a bit helpless, but his expression remained unchanged.
With things like this, you just get used to it.
Fortunately, the chatter didn't last long before gasps and commotion rippled through the classroom.
"So pretty..."
"I'm dying—"
Ansheng frowned. What was this, was Chunhe crawling with beauties?
"I want to be Miss Miaomiao's dog!"
Hearing those crucial words, Ansheng froze. He raised his head and looked over, only to find that it was indeed the girl from yesterday—Miaomiao.
Ansheng's heart gave a jolt. So she wasn't an upperclassman; she was a freshman after all?
And how on earth did they end up in the same class?
Ignoring the frantic wave of confessions behind her, Miaomiao checked the seating chart and then flashed a polite smile at the mass of suitors clustered outside the door.
"Please go back, everyone."
She sighed. Ignoring how utterly spellbound many of them were by her smile just now, she closed the door right in their faces.
Scanning the room, she found her seat, but her brow immediately furrowed tightly.
Why was her seat right in front of that stalker?
She bit her lower lip, a look of confusion crossing her face, but she crossed her arms and begrudgingly walked over to Ansheng's front desk, sitting down without a word.
Ansheng watched in a daze as she walked from the door to his desk and sat down, raising an eyebrow.
What kind of coincidence was this... They were apartment neighbors, classmates, and now she was sitting right in front of him.
"Stop staring at me."
Miaomiao, seemingly sensing Ansheng's gaze from ahead, spoke coldly, her tone dripping with undisguised disgust.
Ansheng snapped out of it, looked down at the cat pendant in his hand, and after a moment of hesitation, decided to speak up.
"Look... it's not what you think. I—"
Before Ansheng could properly explain himself, Miaomiao shoved her chair forward by a large margin, clearly intending to draw a clear line between them.
"There's nothing to explain. You're just a stalker," she said coldly, leaving no room for argument.
Hearing this, Ansheng felt a flicker of anger.
His conscience was clear; he wasn't stalking her at all. They just happened to live in the same building and were neighbors!
To avoid any misunderstandings in the beginning, he had even slowed his pace to wait until Miaomiao was far ahead before walking.
This morning, worried that she might run into him, he had even deliberately woken up a bit late, all while planning to return the pendant she had dropped.
Yet she wouldn't even give him a chance to explain. He wasn't going to coddle her like those guys did.
Stinking 3D women were such a hassle!
The more he thought about it, the angrier he got. Ansheng took a deep breath, stood up without hesitation, and walked over to Miaomiao's desk with a gloomy expression.
Miaomiao was startled. She looked up at the brooding boy standing before her and couldn't help frowning.
"I'm not going to accept your ap—"
Before the word "apology" could leave her lips, with a sharp *thwack*, Ansheng clenched his fist and slammed it heavily onto Miaomiao's desk.
*Bam—*
The crisp sound instinctively silenced the entire classroom, causing everyone to look their way.
Miaomiao was also taken aback by his sudden action, unsure of what he was trying to do.
With a dark expression, Ansheng slowly uncurled his fingers. Miaomiao's pupils constricted slightly as she saw her pendant resting underneath his palm."I'll say this one more time: I am not stalking you because I have nothing better to do, and I have zero, absolutely zero interest in you!"
"Before, it was purely coincidence that we were going the same way. I actually live in 207—go check for yourself if you don't believe me! That's simply the shortest route from the school to the apartments. I even intentionally slowed down and stopped along the way to let you go first so there wouldn't be any misunderstandings."
"Besides, here is your keychain. I'm returning it to you, Miaomiao!"
Ansheng delivered these words with a nonchalant expression, sliding the keychain across the desk.
With that, he returned to his seat, pulled a comic book out of his backpack, and buried his head in it.
"What was that dead-eyed guy just saying?"
"Sounds like he found Miaomiao's key ring?"
"His tone was so fierce..."
Ansheng kept a straight face, though he was wincing inwardly—he'd used a bit too much force just now, and his hand hurt.
Whatever people outside were saying didn't matter. He hadn't broken any laws, so let them talk. It wasn't like he was going to lose a single hair over it.
Besides, he had heard far worse things than this; his immunity to gossip was terrifyingly strong.
As for Miaomiao? She might end up hating him even more?
—Who cares?
Looking at the cute heroine in the comic book, he couldn't help sighing: 2D girls really were just better.
Meanwhile, Miaomiao sat dazed in her seat. Ansheng's sincere gaze, his serious testimony—this whole sequence of events had left her completely frozen in place.
She picked up the key ring, which had been so carefully kept that there wasn't even a speck of dust on the white cat charm.
The keychain felt faintly warm, as if Ansheng had been holding it in his hand for a long time.
Miaomiao choked back a breath, suddenly at a loss for what to do.
*「I have no interest in you.」*
*「Returning it to you, Miaomiao!」*
Recalling Ansheng's words, Miaomiao stared blankly, subconsciously glancing back at the boy who had his head buried in a comic book beneath his desk, looking utterly gloomy.
The people around her were whispering, all expressing their dissatisfaction with Ansheng and wondering how he could possibly have such an attitude.
Hearing their chatter, a rare trace of guilt stirred in Miaomiao's heart.
Perhaps she should go apologize to him? It felt like she had somehow caused him to be disliked on the very first day of school...
Yet she had no idea how to start; she had almost zero experience apologizing to her peers.
"U-... Um..."
Miaomiao turned around, biting her lower lip, her voice tiny as she prepared to call out to Ansheng.
*Ring-ding-ling—*
The class bell rang, startling her and cutting off her words.
Hesitating for a moment, she cast a couple of glances at Ansheng before turning back to face the blackboard at the front of the room.
*I'll apologize to her... him later...*
A fairly young-looking woman walked in through the doorway, wearing a professional skirt, holding a briefcase, and letting her long hair flow freely over her shoulders.
With a gentle smile, she swept her gaze across the students in the classroom and introduced herself in a soft voice:
"Hello, students of Class 1-3! I am your homeroom teacher—Hua Chai!"
As she spoke, she wrote her name on the blackboard.
"I hope you'll all get along well with me over the next three years. Now, let me go over a few important notices..."
Ansheng listened with complete boredom to the remarkably young-looking woman standing before him, his mind wandering.
*Hua Chai... just hearing the name sounds like Teacher Huacai*—though it wouldn't be long before this teacher's nickname actually became Teacher Huacai.
"...Mobile phones are permitted on school grounds."
Teacher Huacai dropped this bombshell, and the students below instantly erupted into an uproar.
"Everyone, please quiet down~ Our school implements a system benchmarked against top overseas academies, so bringing mobile phones is allowed. But please manage yourselves well—students with grades that drop too low might face direct expulsion!"
Seeing that the class had quieted down somewhat, Teacher Huacai nodded with satisfaction.
"In addition, you can check the school schedule on your phones. Classes are from eight to four!"
"..."
Ansheng listened in silence. The system Teacher Huacai described was basically identical to foreign schools; as expected of Chunhe, just the two rules she had mentioned were enough to make students from other schools grind their teeth with envy.
The rest of the rules and regulations had already been sent to every student's phone for them to review later.
"Now... the first item on the agenda... is the long-awaited class committee election!"
"Are you all ready~"
Teacher Huacai added with a beaming smile.