Chapter 9

Without a doubt, Shi Yan was one of the 6 group leaders. Today he had come to school earlier with a few of his junior high buddies. Like the old saying “those of the same kind flocked together”, his buddies all had parents who wielded some sort of power in their county. Before they came, they had already known who would be allocated to which cla.s.s; Shi Yan and one of his buddies, w.a.n.g Feng were in Cla.s.s 2, while the rest were scattered amongst the other five cla.s.ses. The reason they came to school early wasn’t because they were in different cla.s.ses, nor was it because they were excited to start school. Truthfully, they just did it to look out for pretty girls. The moment the both of them sat down, they started to scan the field of flowers; there were a few who didn’t look too bad, but Shi Yan didn’t think they were pretty enough to make him fall in love at first sight. What he was satisfied with, though, was how the lights of the other decent-looking boys dimmed when he showed up — the girls didn’t even have them in their line of sight anymore.

He took his group’s name list and counted; there were 9 people in his group, including him. Then he started to call out the names on his list one by one, every member who came would do a short self-introduction to the rest of the group. Of course he noticed the blissful look on the girls whose names he had called out, but none of them looked particularly striking, though there also weren’t any whose looks would ruin his appet.i.te; as for the guys, there weren’t any whom he felt was threatening. The next name entered his field of sight, “Hei Nuo, this surname actually existed?” Instinctively, he thought that anyone called “Nuo” would be a girl, plus her surname was “Hei”, so she must be a very dark-skinned b.u.mpkin…who was the blind person who allocated a crooked melon with ugly cracks to my group. He loudly called out, “Hei Nuo! Hei Nuo!”

A boy walked over from somewhere near the wall. From his peripheral view, Shi Yan had casually glanced over his figure but he quickly looked away in disgust and continued shouting while he looked around the rest of the cla.s.sroom, “Hei Nuo! May I know who is Hei Nuo?”

A clear and light voice called out from his side, “My name is He (p.r.o.nounced HE) Nuo, sorry, this surname is a bit uncommon, so there aren’t many who are familiar with it.” Shi Yan saw that he was the one from his peripheral vision just now. He had quickly skipped over this figure before because he didn’t want to burn his eyes. Shi Yan had always revered beautiful things, including people. The person in front of him wore discoloured clothes that were terribly worn out, and his pants were even hanging on his legs (which refers to pants that were too conspicuously short); just that pairing – in fact, calling it a pairing of clothes was probably overdoing it – of clothes on his body depicted the image of a primitive man covering himself up with leaves. Ever since he was young, Shi Yan’s family never had any trouble with their finances, and in recent years his living standards were even better than most other families. When he was in junior high, he was already paying attention to the matching of his clothes and the quality of what he wore. So when such a figure had appeared in his line of sight just now, he instinctively ignored it.

But now that they were standing face to face, Shi Yan realised that this figure was a rather slim guy, and even though he didn’t have an outstandingly beautiful face like himself, his facial features were surprisingly delicate and fine. If it wasn’t for his shabby dressing, he really could have taken away half of Shi Yan’s glory and become a decent compet.i.tor. Now Shi Yan was secretly glad: he actually wasted such a good face, how can someone like that compete with me? He completely forgot that all his compet.i.tiveness was one-sided, others had no idea he had such thoughts. As he saw the girls around him curiously size up the old-fashioned figure in front of him, Shi Yan felt more and more comfortable: with this b.u.mpkin at his side, his own gloriousness would only stand out even more. Not bad, this grouping was really not bad.

After the group members introduced themselves, the first agenda Shi Yan implemented was the cleaning duty schedule. He proposed the following allocation: for the girls, one would be in charge of cleaning the blackboard, door and windows; 3 would sweep the floor. In the cla.s.sroom, there were 8 seats in one horizontal row, but 2 people could sit together so vertically 8 people would take 4 rows. Shi Yan is someone who would play favourites, the 4 girls had no opinion towards his allocation. Out of the 5 guys, 2 of them were in charge of fetching water and mopping the floor (within the cla.s.sroom), one was in charge of cleanliness of the corridor outside Cla.s.s 1 and Cla.s.s 2, and the last 2 were burdened with the least popular task — the sharing area — the area outside the school building that was allocated to each cla.s.s to clean. After attending school for so many years, everyone had acc.u.mulated tons of experience. The sandstorm from the north during spring and the winter’s snow were the reasons why the students hated cleaning the sharing area.

From the way Shi Yan allocated the cleaning duties, one could see the methods he employed in order to win over people’s hearts. Even though Shi Yan was a very arrogant person, he wouldn’t stupidly display his haughtiness in front of others. When he allocated the duties to the guys, he couldn’t neglect his role as a leader, so of course he had to pick the toughest job – the sharing area. But the one he pulled along with him to be his partner in cleaning the sharing area for the next 3 years was the He Nuo whom he could only describe as cutting a sorry figure. This was perfect for Shi Yan’s sinister’s side.

“Hey, bro, the sharing area will be handled by you and me. Is that ok?” Shi Yan appeared to affectionately put his hand on He Nuo’s shoulder, and looked like he was asking for his opinion — after he had already written down the other 3 guys’ names in the appropriate columns on the cleaning duty schedule sheet. Shi Yan wouldn’t give other people a chance to refute his decisions.

Hei Nuo nodded his head, and slightly backed away from the grasp of that hand. Shi Yan’s lips lifted up with a slight, interested smile. This bright and beautiful student’s affectionate movements might look like kind gestures to others, but what He Nuo saw was the overwhelming superiority above everyone else hidden behind that kindness. He didn’t reveal his true talents and abilities, but he was definitely far from being stupid. He Nuo had seen through this guy’s hypocrisy with just one look.

Shi Yan gave He Nuo a few meaningful glances. It seems like no boy or girl had ever rejected the olive branches1 he personally handed out before, even if they were fake.

1. Olive branches = symbol of peace, like the dove of peace (it’s a dove of peace right?)↩

TN: This will be the last daily post for awhile, busy week next week~ Also I’m really not used to the name He Nuo…. I read the rest of volume 1 calling him Hei Nuo in my head :’)