Seeing Hu Yuying agree, Li Qian invited her to go to the restroom together.
For some reason, girls always seem to enjoy going to the restroom in pairs.
On the way, Li Qian also took the opportunity to introduce Hu Yuying to the dynamics of their class.
Truthfully, aside from a few troublemakers, the class atmosphere was quite good.
On their way to the restroom, they happened to run into Wang Shuo, who was returning from the restroom.
"Hu Yuying, we meet again," Wang Shuo said, having previously teased her and noticed her reluctance to retaliate. He knew that a well-behaved girl like her would be easy to bully, and he couldn't resist the urge to continue provoking her.
Facing Wang Shuo's words, Hu Yuying pressed her lips together tightly, pretending not to hear him. She lowered her gaze, avoiding eye contact, and walked past him in silence.
This was just Hu Yuying's nature. Asking her to lash out or curse was something she simply couldn't do.
So, when faced with people or situations she disliked, she always chose silence, treating them as if they were invisible.
High school, at the age of seventeen or eighteen, is a time when saving face is of the utmost importance.
Being outright ignored in front of so many people immediately changed Wang Shuo's expression.
After all, he was one of the more prominent figures in the senior year. Even if a girl were to scold him, others would simply see it as playful banter between him and the girl.
But being completely ignored made him feel like he had lost face.
Returning to the classroom, Wang Shuo walked around the room and, as he passed Hu Yuying's seat, deliberately slowed his pace. With a nonchalant expression, he knocked her pencil case off the desk.
Then, with a careless smile, he returned to his seat.
When Hu Yuying returned to her seat, she found her pencil case on the floor, its contents scattered.
Being a simple-minded person, she assumed that a classmate had accidentally knocked it over without noticing.
She crouched down to pick up the scattered pens and the pencil case.
However, she noticed that one of the pens had rolled under Long Aotian's seat, half of it still crushed under his foot.
Cautiously, she tried to pull the pen out from under Long Aotian's foot.
At that moment, a lazy voice came from above her: "What are you doing?"
Startled, Hu Yuying looked up at Long Aotian. When her eyes met his drowsy, inquisitive gaze, she instinctively lowered her head.
In her mind, Li Qian's words echoed: "This guy really does hit people."
Did she wake him up? Would he hit her?
Flustered, she explained, "My pen fell on the floor. I didn't mean to wake you."
Hearing this, Long Aotian looked down at his foot.
Sure enough, he was stepping on a pen. He subconsciously lifted his foot.
Seizing the opportunity, Hu Yuying quickly picked up the pen and hurriedly returned to her seat.
Watching her actions, Long Aotian frowned slightly. After waking up from his nap, it felt like Hu Yuying was even more afraid of him than before.
After some thought, Long Aotian rummaged through his own pencil case, pulled out a barely used pen, and placed it on Hu Yuying's desk.
Back at her seat, Hu Yuying quietly let out a sigh of relief.
But the next second, she noticed Long Aotian reaching out toward her.
Her mind flooded with thoughts: "Don't provoke him. He's even more dangerous than Wang Shuo. He really does hit people."
Nervously clenching her hands, she instinctively closed her eyes and shrunk her neck.
The expected pain never came. Peeking through a narrow slit in her eyes, she saw a brand-new pen on her desk.
She glanced at Long Aotian.
He was resting his cheek on one hand, staring out the window, yawning widely.
Perhaps her gaze was too obvious, because Long Aotian turned his head and met her eyes.
"What's wrong? Don't like that pen? Then pick one you like," Long Aotian said, opening his pencil case.
Seeing his gesture, Hu Yuying was momentarily confused, then quickly waved her hands. "No, no, the pen isn't broken. It still works. You don't need to replace it."
With that, she returned the pen Long Aotian had placed on her desk.
Long Aotian didn't insist.
The class bell rang.
Hu Yuying composed herself and focused on the lesson.
For Hu Yuying, nothing was more important at this stage than studying.
Meanwhile, Long Aotian lazily sprawled across his desk, his eyes wandering toward the podium, looking utterly distracted and on the verge of falling asleep.
It wasn't his fault. He had stayed up all night reading a novel and had just fallen asleep when he found himself transported to this world.
Having not slept all night, it was only natural that he felt sluggish.
Plus, this was a math class, which felt like a lullaby to him...
By the end of the class, Hu Yuying had diligently noted down all the problem-solving methods the teacher had explained.
Every school's teachers have different teaching styles.
The math teacher at Second High School, where Hu Yuying had previously studied, had a completely different approach to solving problems compared to her current math teacher.
Mathematics is all about finding different paths to the same solution. Having an additional method to solve problems was nothing but beneficial for Hu Yuying.
Glancing at the pen in her hand, she inadvertently looked toward Long Aotian, who was sitting by the aisle: "He really can sleep."
"Hu Yuying, earlier outside, why didn't you answer me when I spoke to you?" Wang Shuo approached Hu Yuying's seat, looking at the sweet, soft-spoken girl.
Hu Yuying remained silent, simply preparing the books she needed for the next class.
Seeing her organizing her things and refusing to speak to him, Wang Shuo felt a surge of defiance.
The more someone refuses to talk to you, the more you want them to.
Especially after seeing Hu Yuying happily chatting and laughing with other classmates, it felt like she was treating him differently.
Feeling betrayed, Wang Shuo pretended to accidentally knock her pencil case off the desk again.
This time, he stepped on it and said, "Oops, my bad!"
With a smug smile, he returned to his seat.
The other students saw what happened but chose not to intervene.
Senior year is a critical time, and Wang Shuo, a troublemaker who didn't care about studying, had no intention of going to college.
Anyone who stood up to him risked becoming a target of his resentment, which could disrupt their own studies.
Even though it was obvious to everyone that Wang Shuo was deliberately bullying the new student, no one wanted to provoke a troublemaker during this race against time.
Hu Yuying looked at the shoe print on her pencil case, lowered her eyes, and picked it up.
Opening it, she found that all the pen casings inside had been crushed.
Seeing the shattered casings, Hu Yuying carefully picked out the fragments.
On her first day at a new school, encountering something like this would upset anyone.
As she removed the broken casings, a sense of grievance welled up inside her, and her eyes gradually reddened...