Ye Yang landed hard on his bottom, tears welling up in his eyes as he rubbed his forehead. Two people rushed out of the dormitory, each grabbing one of his arms to help him up. The one on the left picked up the long object and asked with concern, “Are you okay? How do you feel? Should we take you to the infirmary?”
Ye Yang waved a hand. “I’m fine, I’m fine.” Now he could see clearly that the long object was a sword sheath, which apparently belonged to the person on the left.
Speaking of which, this human was really strong. That hit had packed quite a punch…
The two helped Ye Yang into the dormitory. After a short while, Ye Yang finally figured out what had happened.
These two were his roommates. The older one was called Shen Xiuyun, and the one holding the sword sheath was Qin Zhi. They had known each other before and had some history, but neither expected to be assigned to the same dorm.
The two had never seen eye to eye. The moment they arrived, they started clashing over trivial matters, but they hadn’t meant to accidentally injure the innocent Ye Yang.
Qin Zhi put away the sheath and said apologetically, “I’m really sorry. Thank goodness you’re not hurt, or I’d never forgive myself.”
“Hmph. Two years have passed and you haven’t improved at all,” Shen Xiuyun sneered. “Still so reckless. Your hands move faster than your brain.”
That was harsh, and Qin Zhi wasn’t one to take things lying down. He shot back immediately, “Right, because you’ve got eyes on all sides and ears everywhere. I suppose you definitely didn’t dodge on purpose just so Ye Ye would get hit?”
Ye Yang: “Huh?”
Shen Xiuyun had already been fuming inside, only holding it back because Ye Yang was there. Provoked like this, he instantly exploded.
“Qin Zhi!” As he bellowed, the two started grappling again.
Ye Yang was startled and quickly stepped in to break it up. “Stop fighting, stop fighting! Let’s talk things through calmly!” Neither Qin Zhi nor Shen Xiuyun held back against the other. Even with Ye Yang’s strength, it took considerable effort to pull them apart.
Half a minute later, all three were sitting on the floor tiles, panting heavily.
Ye Yang was starting to get a little annoyed. “Why, why are you two even fighting?!” This was so bizarre!
After venting, Qin Zhi and Shen Xiuyun finally calmed down a bit, and Ye Yang eventually learned the story behind their grudge.
It turned out Shen Xiuyun was 22 and still in his third year of college because he had taken two years off after getting injured during his sophomore year. And Qin Zhi had played a major role in that injury.
Qin Zhi still felt guilty when talking about it. “I was too anxious back then. I didn’t realize Senior Shen was there, and I didn’t hold back enough.”
Although Shen Xiuyun had a hot temper and could be set off easily, he was reasonable and didn’t blame Qin Zhi entirely. “He didn’t mean it. I just can’t stand how impulsive he always is. Sometimes being too quick to act isn’t a good thing. If he doesn’t change this habit, who knows what kind of trouble he’ll cause in the future.”
Qin Zhi’s lips moved, but he held back from retorting.
Just as they were talking, the last roommate arrived.
A plain-looking, well-proportioned young man with a calm expression appeared at the door. Seeing the three of them disheveled and sitting on the floor, he didn’t look surprised nor ask any questions. He simply smiled and said, “You’re all here? Let me see… great, I really like the spot that’s left.”
This was another upperclassman—Zhuang Li, a sophomore in computer science.
Shen Xiuyun announced, “Now that everyone’s here, I’ll be the head of the dorm, Qin Zhi is second, Zhuang Li third, and Ye Ye is the youngest.”
No one had any objections.
Ye Yang nodded along. What a fascinating dorm. None of us are in the same major, and I’m the only freshman. But all three roommates seem pretty nice.
He started looking forward to the days ahead.
After tidying up his luggage briefly, Ye Yang received a notice from his advisor to go to the teaching building for a class meeting.
As soon as he left, the remaining people in the dorm stopped what they were doing.
Shen Xiuyun spoke with a rather unpleasant tone. “I assume we’re all on the same page. Let me make this clear first—I don’t have the time to babysit a little demon, but I’ll do what I’m supposed to do.”
The third roommate, Zhuang Li, smiled good-naturedly. “Let’s just get along well. I actually like him. He’s very cute.”
Qin Zhi remained noncommittal.
·
Ye Yang arrived at the classroom. Quite a few classmates were already there. No sooner had he sat down than a boy suddenly ran over, stopped in front of him, and started with zero hesitation: “Hello, I’m Li Chanyi. Nice to meet you.”
“Oh, hello. I’m Ye Yang.”
“It really is you! Thank you for voting for me!”
Ye Yang was stunned for a moment, then finally remembered. “Oh, that was you! Did you win?”
Li Chanyi was one of the two names on the ballot for class committee rep that Ye Yang had voted for earlier.
Today was actually the second class meeting. The first one had already taken place—they had set up the class group chat and voted for class committee members, but things had been rushed. Ye Yang’s dorm was also farther away, so he hadn’t had a chance to get to know the other students yet.
Li Chanyi plopped down into the seat next to Ye Yang and said cheerfully, “Nah, I didn’t win. But it’s fine. I just signed up on a whim anyway.”
Today was actually Ye Yang’s first time meeting Li Chanyi, and he could immediately tell why Li Chanyi hadn’t won the election. With that small frame—thin and short, soft features, slightly long hair—at first glance, he almost looked like a girl.
He wasn’t that short, actually—1.75 meters. But in Dongzhou, boys were generally very tall, which made Li Chanyi look quite short by comparison.
As Ye Yang silently made this assessment, he completely forgot that he himself was only a little over 1.7 meters.
Li Chanyi pulled a milk candy out of nowhere and placed it in front of Ye Yang. “Thanks for voting for me.”
“Thanks.” Ye Yang took it, then suddenly realized, “Hey, wait a minute. How do you know I voted for you?”
“Well, here’s the thing…”
When the class was voting for committee members, Li Chanyi had enthusiastically run for sports rep.
Despite his appearance, he actually loved sports. Unfortunately, his build wasn’t very convincing, and he didn’t have any impressive athletic achievements to show for it. He had a congenital heart condition—he’d get winded after two steps of running, so of course, he couldn’t exactly rack up any accomplishments.
Unsurprisingly, he lost the election.
Li Chanyi hadn’t thought much of it at first—until he discovered that the person who’d been elected class president, who also happened to be his roommate, had used third-party software to see exactly who voted for whom.
The class committee vote had been conducted in the class group chat using an anonymous polling mini-program. The class president had actually paid for an external tool to view the list of names, just to see who voted for him and who didn’t.
When Li Chanyi saw what the class president was doing, the guy showed no shame—in fact, he was proud of it. He even showed Li Chanyi the list of people who had voted for him.
Apart from the class president himself, the only vote came from Ye Yang.
Ye Yang? That guy even shorter than me? Thin and small, but with a round, baby-faced cuteness? Kind of quiet, sits alone in the corner?
“So, that’s how it is. As for our class president… yeah, you should probably keep your distance from him from now on. You didn’t vote for him, so he’s probably got his eye on you.”
“Oh, okay. Got it.” Ye Yang agreed verbally, but he didn’t think much of it. With his simple demon clan mindset, he figured—he’s just an ordinary human. It’s not like he can kill me. What’s the worst he could do?
Li Chanyi asked for Ye Yang’s dorm number. When he heard that Ye Yang wasn’t in the C block where their class was housed, but in the faraway G block, his face immediately filled with sympathy. “So you’re the one living with those three upperclassmen. Man, that’s rough.”
“Rough? Why?” Ye Yang was puzzled. Sure, a lot had happened in that brief first meeting, but he thought all three roommates were pretty nice.
Li Chanyi said, “You didn’t know? Normally, classmates live together in the same dorm. Unless there are two or three extra people, you might room with students from other classes, but they’d still be in the same major and same year. And there are exactly twenty boys in our class. Who would’ve thought there’d be a system glitch that stuck you in a dorm with a bunch of upperclassmen?”
“Oh, so that’s how it is?” Ye Yang finally understood, but he still had a question. “I get that living with upperclassmen isn’t as convenient as living with classmates, but all three seem like decent guys. What’s the problem?”
Li Chanyi’s eyes suddenly filled with admiration. “Decent?! You’re something else. Those three are known throughout the school for being difficult. You should try to switch dorms as soon as possible, or these four years are going to be torture.”
The oldest, Shen Xiuyun, was a Religious Culture and Communication major. Before taking his leave of absence, he’d always been class monitor—great grades, but notoriously bad-tempered. He’d made quite a few female students cry. Even after two years away, his legend still lingered on campus.
The second, Qin Zhi, was a famous eccentric. He was a top student in the Martial Arts Department of the Physical Education College, rumored to come from some martial arts family. Mysterious, with looks and physique that were one in a million, but his emotional intelligence was seriously lacking. He was like one of those sword cultivators from novels who’d rather spend his whole life with his sword than with another person. Everyone also knew he and Shen Xiuyun didn’t get along.
Even the third, Zhuang Li, wasn’t simple.
His personality and temperament were fine, but his problem was that he was too famous.
He had already become a renowned esports player right after turning eighteen. In his first year in the industry, he won a world championship. He played top lane and was known as the “Ghost of the Rift”—he’d quietly farm and scale up without anyone noticing, turning the tide of major matches multiple times.
In the team comms released after matches, he was never like the others, yelling excitedly. His calm tone and concise, powerful words always helped his teammates settle down. He was a truly unique player.
The esports club had offered him extremely generous terms to stay, but he insisted on finishing his university degree. He was willing to break his contract and pay penalties just to go to college.
For a while, half of the trending topics online were about Zhuang Li.
In the end, the club and he reached a compromise. Zhuang Li became the first part-time starter player in esports history—professional in skill, amateur in training. Sometimes, on match days, he’d have to attend his daytime classes before heading to the venue.
As Ye Yang listened, his eyes slowly widened in adorable surprise. Li Chanyi, seeing this, felt quite proud of himself and rambled on even more energetically—how Zhuang Li’s crazy fans surrounded the school after the championship, how they packed his lectures, and all the rest.
Finally, he sighed again. “The school system really outdid itself putting those three in one dorm. It’s a disaster.”
Leave a Reply