While Su Zhiyan did end up staying, true to his word, it was because he felt it would be too embarrassing to let his opponent “lead” his team.
“You’re worried about losing face?” Shen Nianjing had asked then.
Su Zhiyan smiled faintly. “Yes, I am.”
Although he only signed up for the competition to avoid those dreams, he actually had a point to prove.
Between his work and Shen Nianjing’s, whose would win first place nationally?
He admitted that when it came to teamwork, he wasn’t as good as Shen Nianjing. But in terms of professional ability, he had always fought to be the best.
Especially when competing against this “bastard.”
After awkwardly but successfully finalizing the model and proposal, they finally settled on the first draft of the paper.
That evening, after Wang Mingzhi and Zhou Zhou left, Su Zhiyan dragged Shen Nianjing out to eat.
At the hotpot restaurant, Shen Nianjing sat across from Su Zhiyan, glancing left and right, visibly restless.
Su Zhiyan asked, “Did you get a heat rash or is the chair poking your butt?”
Shen Nianjing froze immediately: “…”
The steaming beef tallow hotpot was served, and they dropped in tripe and fatty beef rolls. The tender meat sizzled in the pot, filling the air with savory aromas.
“You haven’t been eating properly these past few days. Are you sure you can handle eating food this heavy now?” Shen Nianjing asked.
“Of course I can!” After answering, Su Zhiyan showed him through action that not only could he handle it, he was crushing it!
Shen Nianjing: Alright, alright, alright.
“Thanks for last night. This meal is on me, as thanks to the Great Hero Shen for coming to my rescue.”
Shen Nianjing, who was eating a shrimp ball, almost choked on it when he heard this. “I-it’s nothing.”
He looked up as Su Zhiyan placed a glass of lemon water next to his hand. “Don’t choke.”
Shen Nianjing: “…” He already did.
He noticed that since last night, no, more precisely since this morning, Su Zhiyan’s attitude toward him had become much… gentler than before?
He wasn’t sure if that was the right way to put it, but he felt that Su Zhiyan wasn’t as hostile anymore, and now treated him more like one of his own people.
One of his own people… Shen Nianjing shuddered at the thought.
Looking up to see Shen Nianjing’s ever-changing expression, Su Zhiyan asked, “What are you thinking about?”
Shen Nianjing denied it immediately, “Nothing.”
Su Zhiyan wanted to smack him on the head to get him to tell the truth.
But it’s fine, Su Zhiyan thought, there’s plenty of time. Now that they were friends, he could ask again another time.
–
“Finally, everything’s submitted!” Zhou Zhou cheered with raised hands, laughing as he put an arm around Su Zhiyan’s shoulders. “Thanks for doing the final check, Tangtang.”
Su Zhiyan smiled slightly, then after a moment of silence said, “I’m sorry. I said I’d complete it alone before, but I couldn’t do it.”
Wang Mingzhi looked up at him.
Zhou Zhou froze, flustered. “You shouldn’t have had to do it alone anyway. We’re also at fault.”
“We know you’ve been busy with all sorts of things. We’re just not good enough and ended up putting so much pressure on you.”
“I’m the one who should apologize.” Wang Mingzhi stood up. “I even misunderstood you.”
“I’m sorry,” he said earnestly, looking at Su Zhiyan.
“It’s fine.” Su Zhiyan waved it off with a smile, without asking what the misunderstanding was.
“Thank you,” Wang Mingzhi said, his expression conflicted.
Zhou Zhou put his arms around both their shoulders and laughed. “Okay, okay, we’re heading back to school this afternoon. Let’s have dinner together tonight!”
“I know you had dinner with Shen Nianjing yesterday without us!”
Su Zhiyan suppressed the inexplicable sourness in his heart and lowered his head to pack his things. “Well, I had to thank him for taking me to the hospital.”
“As for tonight…” he tilted his head. “Why don’t both teams have dinner together? We can go sing karaoke afterward, my treat!”
“Oh my god, Su Zhiyan, you’re simply a god!” Zhou Zhou’s eyes lit up, nearly jumping with excitement. “I know the new KTV place in the South Shopping Street near the campus has a 30% discount on large rooms!”
“Mm, I’ll go next door to tell them. I just saw them packing up too.”
Su Zhiyan walked out the door and leaned against the wall, taking several deep breaths.
This was his first time experiencing what it felt like to be part of a team.
In his freshman year, when he participated in the competition with his senior, he only wrote the paper and didn’t feel very involved with the topic itself.
In his sophomore year, he and his two teammates had conflicting opinions and different approaches. In group projects, situations like this were the trickiest. Then the two teammates had a fight and completely cold-shouldered the competition. In the end, Su Zhiyan completed everything left by himself, and fortunately still won second place.
After that, he got used to handling everything alone whenever possible, at least to ensure completeness.
He didn’t know if this counted as arrogance, but that’s just how it had always been.
But this time… he felt the teamwork was pretty good.
A very… special experience.
–
“What?? Treating us to dinner!” Qin Qi and Zhao Lin rushed from the back of the computer room after hearing Su Zhiyan’s words, almost crashing into Shen Nianjing.
Shen Nianjing disgustedly removed Qin Qi’s dirty hand from his face and looked at Su Zhiyan. “Actually… I don’t think we need to…”
He glanced at Qin Qi and Zhao Lin from the corner of his eye, desperately trying to signal them.
“Isn’t having dinner together nice? The competition’s finally over, everyone can relax?” Su Zhiyan looked at them too, and they immediately nodded vigorously.
Shen Nianjing: “…”
Zhao Lin looked up at the sky and sighed, “Heaven is fair after all, we actually get this blessing.”
Qin Qi wiped away fake tears and sighed, “This was earned by Shen Nianjing selling himself for one night, our brother really had it rough.”
“…” Shen Nianjing’s face turned green, wanting nothing more than to cover their mouths.
Su Zhiyan looked at him. “What about you, are you refusing?”
His voice was soft, without any of its usual aggression. Instead, it was casual and natural, pleasant to hear, reminding Shen Nianjing of a small cat he used to see sunbathing on the fence on his way to school back in middle school.
Shen Nianjing was stunned for a moment.
“Of course I’m going.”
He blurted out, then cleared his throat under the three’s gaze and added, “There’s no reason to refuse a free meal.”
That evening at the shopping street, the six of them introduced themselves and immediately became like old friends, arms around shoulders, laughing and chatting about everything.
“Hello classmates, this is a preview of our startup project, please support us~”
A flyer was handed to them. Su Zhiyan took it and saw it was for the Computer Science Department’s startup project – an anonymous mailbox social networking site.
“What’s that you’re staring at?” Zhou Zhou leaned over.
Su Zhiyan had no interest in social networking sites and shoved the flyer directly into his hands. “Something you’d like.”
“Huh?”
“What would he like??” Qin Qi also leaned in.
“Computer Science Department’s startup project, an anonymous social networking site,” Zhou Zhou scanned the information on the poster. “Oh? It’s like a message in a bottle system.”
“Pretty interesting, I’ll register an account and check it out later.”
By the time they reached the private room at the restaurant, Qin Qi was shouting about getting a dozen beers and wine to celebrate.
Wang Mingzhi hesitated. “Do we have to drink?”
Qin Qi: “It’s fine, don’t drink if you don’t want to. After all, if you’re not used to alcohol, you’re just not used to it. It’s not like milk tea that everyone loves.”
Shen Nianjing also looked at Qin Qi when he heard this. “Do we have to drink?”
Qin Qi: “What right do you have not to drink!”
Shen Nianjing: “…”
Su Zhiyan snorted and covered his face with embarrassment.
“If we drink now, are we supposed to keep drinking while singing karaoke later?” Shen Nianjing asked.
Qin Qi tilted his head to think about it, before agreeing, “If you want to, sure.”
Shen Nianjing: “…”
“Don’t tell me you can’t hold your alcohol?” Seeing his hesitation, Zhao Lin suddenly realized something.
“I just don’t like drinking,” Shen Nianjing said weakly.
“Come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve ever seen Nianjing drink alcohol, at most just pineapple beer?”
Su Zhiyan looked up.
Judging from Shen Nianjing’s expression, he seemed genuinely troubled.
Su Zhiyan said, “I’m about to order milk tea, does anyone want some? Which shop?”
Someone like Shen Nianjing was the type to get along well with friends. If it wasn’t because he really didn’t want to, he probably wouldn’t repeatedly refuse friends, especially during a celebratory dinner.
Su Zhiyan ordered the milk tea with a smile, quietly studying this person’s limit.
Drinking had become a limit… why?
Usually, people who don’t want to drink do so because it makes them feel sick, or they might have bad drinking behavior and fear embarrassing themselves the next day. Or simply because alcohol isn’t really a tasty beverage, why drink it if you don’t want to?
Shen Nianjing probably wouldn’t refuse in this situation just because he didn’t like the taste.
Afraid of embarrassing himself?
Su Zhiyan couldn’t help imagining Shen Nianjing embarrassing himself.
“Next Monday’s the start of break, are you guys going home? If not, let’s go play games together,” someone casually said during the conversation.
BOOM! A thunderous realization struck Su Zhiyan’s mind like lightning out of nowhere.
Vacation?!
Didn’t school just start?
Perhaps his expression was too confused and shocked, because the person who brought up the topic looked even more puzzled than him, their voice becoming uncertain, “The Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day holiday break… Did I remember wrong?”
Su Zhiyan’s mouth hung slightly open, his eyes blank. He looked like the perfect picture of someone struck by lightning.
“What’s wrong?” Everyone eating looked at him in confusion.
It was rare to see Su Zhiyan lose control of his expressions like this.
“It’s nothing, I’ve just been so busy these days that I didn’t process it.” Su Zhiyan took a deep breath, suppressing the string of “curses” surging in his chest like the Yangtze River.
When the moon is full, it wanes; when water is full, it overflows.[mfn]月满则亏，水满则溢 (yuè mǎn zé kuī, shuǐ mǎn zé yì) – literally translates to ‘When the moon is full, it wanes; when water is full, it overflows.’ It’s a common saying used to illustrate the idea that things tend to decline after reaching their peak. Think of it as a reminder that nothing stays at its absolute maximum forever, there’s a natural cycle of waxing and waning in life, and things are best at moderation. It often carries a subtle message of humility and the understanding of impermanence.[/mfn]
People really shouldn’t get carried away.
He just felt a tiny bit happy inside because Shen Nianjing was no longer avoiding him like the plague, thinking he could finally get good sleep every night from now on.
How did it suddenly turn into an eight-day vacation!
Talk about a small sailboat hitting a massive iceberg!
“Um…” he began hesitantly, “What are your plans for the break?”
Shen Nianjing was taken aback by the question.
Su Zhiyan: “I mean, are you planning to come back to school during the break? When would you return?”
A flash of confusion passed through Shen Nianjing’s eyes.
Su Zhiyan cleared his throat, trying to make his voice sound more natural, but why did he feel like his intentions were so obvious?
As they’d say online, his thirst was way too obvious.
“I’m just asking because everyone else is making holiday plans too, aren’t they?”
Shen Nianjing kept silent, and Su Zhiyan started getting annoyed.
What was so weird about asking about holiday plans? Wasn’t this something students always asked each other?
Whatever, speak if you want to.
Hmph.
“Not sure yet, but I’m not planning to travel anywhere,” Shen Nianjing answered quickly before turning his head away.
Su Zhiyan secretly let out a sigh of relief.
No plans probably meant staying in the city, which meant he could totally find excuses to invite him out every day.
Like eating together, playing basketball, or watching movies.
There was nothing wrong with friends spending more time together.
With his mind at ease, Su Zhiyan turned his attention back to the dining table, picking up his chopsticks to grab a piece of brown sugar rice cake.
That’s when he caught Shen Nianjing from the corner of his eye, quickly turning his head and grabbing a glass full of drinks from the table, chugging it down.
His movements were oddly stiff.
But Su Zhiyan didn’t have time to notice these details.
His pupils contracted sharply as he knocked the glass out of Shen Nianjing’s hand, staring at him.
His expression screamed “are you kidding me?”
“That’s grape juice mixed with wine, you idiot!”
I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. Please consider supporting the author directly.
You can also follow me on Ko-fi to get access to the latest updates on my translation progress and new projects. I appreciate your love and feedback.
