Chapter 18 | ☼ Contents ☼ | Chapter 20
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Translator: Silvery
PR: Decadence
He took over half an hour of train ride and bought a pancake and a blasphemous pancake.
And then, he took another half an hour and so train ride to get back here.
Carrying the two steam-softened plastic bags wrapped up in his jacket, Yu Sheng pushes the dorm’s door again, wondering why exactly he’s going to-and-fro.
Jin Linkun is back in the room this time, cradling a book and leaning back in the sofa.
Yu Sheng was still under the impression he was reading a book. Only when he gets closer then does he realize. This guy is actually catching some Z’s while hugging that thick book with a high level of skill.
The dorm’s sofas are all quite standard. Given Jin Linkun’s height and lanky legs, it obviously gets a bit cramp when he’s seated in there.
The book is laid out on his lap. His entire frame sinks into the cradle of the sofa, his hunching back drawing a clear arc through the fabric of his blouse. His eyes are closed. His breathing is even.
Without his glasses, his lashes only become all the more visible.
They are long, almost like a girl’s. From this angle, they seem especially luscious. There’s a bluish tint beneath his eyes.
Yu Sheng closes the door up before going over to bend down and take a look at that book.
When he’s asleep, Jin Linkun turns out to be fairly quiet.
He doesn’t even have that usual shackle-raising blitheness, nor does he have that alienating feel like yesterday.
Before Yu Sheng can tidy up these thoughts which popped out of nowhere, Jin Linkun’s lashes flutter and his eyes open, close up.
Sensing the presence of someone before him, he shuts the book and leans back, dark pupils dilating and long, narrow eyes squinting close ever so slightly.
Yu Sheng lifts his head: “……”
He must be out of his mind from an hour or so of the train ride.
The room is quite silent. The moment their gazes connect, Yu Sheng briskly straightens and takes a large step away from the sofa.
He backed up too fast. Before he could take note of the objects behind him, a sharp pang of pain abruptly digs into his leg.
Last night, it was already quite late when Jin Linkun hauled all his things up here. Seeing as if Yu Sheng was utterly worn, he simply left it there without tidying it up. This morning too, they had left one after another and nobody bothered to clear up the mess.
With this one backward step, his left calf comes into solid contact with the edge of one of those thick hardbacks.
The edge of the book is piercingly sharp. His action causes the stack of books to tumble over, spilling across the ground.
Yu Sheng can’t help but draw a sharp inhale, squeezing his eyes shut.
This is his first-in-a-long-time, intimate reunion with the world of knowledge.
It sure makes quite the deep impression on him.
On Jin Linkun’s part, after his rather showy blink, he has actually yet to process anything.
Just newly awoken with the lurking dredges of sleep still tinting his eyes, he fumbles around for his glasses and tentatively calls out to that vaguely familiar outline before him:
“Yu Sheng…?”
Early this morning, Jin Linkun had fence-vaulted and made off initially with the intention of getting some breakfast for Yu Sheng. Upon receiving Yu Sheng’s text, he came back empty-handed and then proceeded to wait half an hour and some inside their living quarters.
Then, he slipped off with his belly still grumbling.
When he’s woken up by hunger again, his new roomie is wearing the familiar aroma of pancakes and has come quite close to him.
The just-awoken mind is still a bit scrambled. When Jin Linkun locates his glasses and puts it on, only then does he make sense of what had just happened. He jumps to his feet hastily:
“Were you hurt? Did you hit yourself—”
Yu Sheng retrieves that blasphemous pancake from his jacket-wrap and thrusts it at him:
“I’m fine.”
He tests out his left foot. Raking his eyes over the complete and utter mess of books scattered over the ground, he can’t hold it in and leans down to gather it up, stacking it upon the desk:
“Where were you this morning?”
Though he had clearly fence-vaulted out and back, he definitely can’t speak of this matter to his roomie.
Yu Sheng didn’t mean much by that. He was just intending to scope out Jin Linkun’s morning routine so he can align his own reason for going out and get this thing over and done with.
He was just asking on a whim, but who would have thought Jin Linkun would actually startle at his question and part his mouth, not answering immediately.
Squatting down on the ground, Yu Sheng picks up the last couple of books and furrows his brows.
“…I went out for a stroll.”
Jin Linkun gathered his wits and briskly thought out an answer. With one lengthy strut, he bends down and helps him pick up those last few books:
“What about you?”
Yu Sheng: “……”
Yu Sheng answers emotionlessly: “Jogging.”
In the subsequent days, a certain rumour makes its way through the Summer Camp, speaking about the two Boss Bros aiming for an all-rounded development in morality, intelligence, and fitness, and vigorously gunning for morning exercises at the crack of dawn.
Health is the greatest wealth when it comes to studies. Old Wan is quite delighted. Thinking this to be a matter worthy of encouragement, he even proposed and specially set up an optional Morning Studies @ Full Throttle!-event, getting the many Team Captains to notify the others about it.
“Friend, let’s talk about something.”
After another day of crawling up from bed at 5.30, Jin Linkun has finally reached the limit of his endurance. His arm slackens and his entire body flops back onto the bed:
“I can’t wake up early anymore. It was my bad. I didn’t go out for a stroll that day.”
Yu Sheng gropes around for his phone and turns off the alarm.
He has yet to fully awaken. Prying apart the arm that is slung over his eyes, he cracks his eyes open with much difficulty and catches a glimpse of the still-slightly-dark skies outside the window.
Jin Linkun has already resolved to call it a truce. He pulls his blanket back over himself:
“I went out to play games.”
“……”
The entire dorm falls dead silent for a beat.
Yu Sheng props himself up and shoots him a cold look.
Jin Linkun turns to gaze at him, looking incredibly heartfelt: “It’s the truth.”
Yu Sheng “Oh~”s: “I didn’t go out to jog that day either. I went out to memorize my vocab.”
Jin Linkun: “……”
Having competed for the past few days over who would wake the earliest, their alarm had swiftly backtracked all the way from 7.30 to 5.30. Exhaustion pushing him to the end of his line, Yu Sheng half-heartedly sniped down this pretentious little shit who has to feign even right after getting up, and he lays on his side, closing his eyes.
Even though he said the truth too… It’s taken for a lie. Jin Linkun muses his hair, feeling a little troubled. He sits up with the intention of explaining himself again.
The sounds of him getting up is quite muted. Nine out of ten times, Yu Sheng will actually not notice if he is sleeping soundly. By the time his eyes blink open, the opposite bed is often more than naught already empty.
But even if it’s subtle, his motion still carries some noise.
Yu Sheng is right at the brink of drifting off to sleep. Upon picking up on the soft shifting sounds of the other getting off the bed behind him, he pins his blanket down and barrels himself into it, turning around in a practiced manner to close his eyes and shrink into it.
Jin Linkun falters unknowingly.
The youth was much too uninhibited when covering himself with his blankets. Even though most of his face is buried in the sheets, he remains uncovered from waist down and the bottom of his shirt’s even lifted up half way through.
Wearing the blanket over his head, Yu Sheng’s voice slips out slightly muffled:
“Not sleeping?”
“…Ah.” Jin Linkun falters a bit. His reaction comes slow, “I am.”
Yu Sheng buries himself deeper in his sheets and covers his eyes with his arms in reply.
Jin Linkun stands off to a side for a while before tiptoeing over to soundlessly draw the curtains tight.
Then he lies down. And he goes back to sleep too.
The two Boss Bros who are supposedly aiming for an all-rounded development in morality, intelligence, and fitness sleep through the entire morning.
The Academic Overlords who have been strictly following the Study Gods’ working and resting regime to a T keep their eyes peeled for the whole morning, but come up empty. In the shadows of Team 7, the tension left unchecked swiftly increases and has everyone in its grip.
【HELPMEITRULYCANTWAKE: Doomed. I’m DOOMED! Didn’t bump into him when jogging today. Was I really up that late?】
【QuitCoffees&AllNighters: Also didn’t catch up to God Kun when strolling on my side. OTL】
【Sleep_Early_Wake_Early: As expected of the Gods. They must have finished their morning exercises before 5.30.】
【É-early-bird-catches-É-worm: Wrapping up at 5.30. That’s a total of 6h 30mins till lunch at noon. Even if you cut off the ½ hour needed for breakfast and to freshen up, that’s plenty of time for enriching one’s wealth of knowledge and improving oneself. In contrast, we’re far too lazy.】
【Dreaming-of-Being-Provincial-NO.1: …Before we talk about laziness, can you guys stop changing your names so frequently? Who exactly are the ones speaking now??】
【Full-Throttle-Up-In-Morning! ☼: Let it be. It’s all good. Just act like you know us. We’re not gonna meet irl anw ¯\_(ツ)_/¯】
……
As a teacher, Wan Yongming’s way of education is not quite the same as the other educators. As a direct result of that, the Team 7 he leads is also vastly different from the other teams.
It remains a question whether too much water has truly drowned the miller. Though he finally managed to get to a fairly non-restrictive place like the Summer Camp, Old Wan prioritizes the students’ all-rounded development instead and frequently whips out some original or untried methods of educating to use on them.
For example: He staunchly believed that the potential of self-introductions can only be brought out after everyone has got a general impression of each other. Therefore, such things must not be rushed.
And thus, while the other teams have already undergone self-introductions on the very first day, only Team 7 let go of all friendship right from the start and were released into the WeChat group and anonymous forums to make independent progress.
Even now, save for Jin Linkun and Yu Sheng who everyone knows, there are still people in their team who don’t know the full names of the Captain and the Vice-Captain.
But with all that said, these Academic Tyrants aren’t too concerned with names. That’s because their glass hearts have currently been scattered into a million pieces on the ground due to their passion falling short of the Study Gods. While embracing each other and exchanging a round of consolations within the chat group, they end up pinning the last ray of hope on the only one who knows where those two dwell – Vice-Captain Kong Jiahe.
The students of Team 7 who were greatly dealt a grievous hit decide to stalk after Student Kong to see what exactly the Great Gods who must have finished exercising at 5.30 are doing.
Kong Jiahe is the most typical sort of good student who has never dared to relay a false message. His head whips around in fervent refusal a few lines of explanation in. Only when the Captain personally pulls out a hardcover, out-of-print Hubei Question Collection and slams it on his desk, then does his eyes gradually turn round with twinkling excitement.
……
Close to noon, under the silent yet fervent encouragement of his peers, Vice-Captain Student Kong knocks on the door, full of jitters.
Two light raps later, the door’s pulled open by the person within.
Jin Linkun stands at the door and runs his eyes over the stampede of some ten people. His brows rise slightly:
“Yes?”
His voice was low to begin with, but for some reason, his tone is even softer than usual. Behind the glass of his spectacles, his long, narrow eyes are curved lazily at the edges. It’s hard to read his emotion.
Kong Jiahe instantly turns into stone:
“Th—There’s…”
This bunch are all very heartless. Abandoning Kong Jiahe to face the Boss Bro by himself, they try every means possible to covertly spy through the crack of the door.
In the dorm room, the curtains are tightly pulled shut for some reason, trapping everything within in a pitch-black darkness.
Jin Linkun’s desk is close to the door. One can easily see the 7 or 8 books laid out, opened on the desk. In the corner, there’s even a table lamp shining dimly.
It’s almost like some black sorcery used to call upon the knowledge.
His guilty conscience is barraging him so badly, Kong Jiahe can’t possibly quail anymore in his shoes. With a hard gulp, he tries his best to recall his lines:
“There’s…”
Jin Linkun doesn’t want to wake Yu Sheng. Stopping all of them in their tracks, he blocks the crack with his body and makes the universal sign with his hand, lowering his voice:
“Shh.”
Kong Jiahe’s mouth clamps shut.
Seeing the spluttering boy before him so anxious he can’t even say a word, Jin Linkun lowers his gaze and brings a hand up to the base of his neck, kindly helping him out:
“Is there another Group Activity today?”
Kong Jiahe nods rapidly, taking the opening he gave to spew out everything he memorized:
“R-Right. Teacher Wan – Teacher Wan said everyone should deepen our bonds, so he recommended for us to have lunch at the cafeteria’s top floor today, to get to know each other better—”
Jin Linkun raises a brow.
Despite appearing lackadaisical and careless, his aura is clearly on a whole ‘nother level of intensity that’s just impossible to disregard. It’s simply out of the bounds of what an average, studious high schooler can deal with.
He’s all out of the courage brought to him by that o.p. Question Bank. Under his eyes, Kong Jiahe is frozen to the spot.
Team 7’s Captain makes a light cough and bravely steps up for the finisher:
“God Kun, everyone’s just thinking of making friends and getting to know each other. We can help to better each other along the way…”
Jin Linkun smiles, nodding along: “Sounds great.”
Team 7’s Captain sighs in relief: “So, are you coming?”
Jin Linkun: “No, thanks. I’m still more used to improving on my own.”
Captain: “……”
His polite refusal comes too smoothly. Those present look at each other in speechless despair, but before they manage to come up with something else, a faint noise slips out of the room.
The room was too dark and so, no one expected there to be another person in there. They all jumped, scared witless.
By contrast, Jin Linkun is quite blasé about it, leaning back ever so slightly:
“Awake?”
“No.”
They’ve competed over the ridiculous matter of who wakes first over the course of several days. In the midst of the overly comforting darkness, Yu Sheng’s lethargy has also yet to bate in the slightest. He yawns:
“You up?”
Jin Linkun chuckles softly, his voice falling into a whisper as he closes the door.
“Not yet.”
The deep voice is soft as it slips through the gap in the door, its last syllable going lighter for some reason. Then, just like the last ray of light from outside, it’s all completely blocked out.
“I’m still in bed. Go back to sleep.”
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Next Time on DTTM!
Chapter 20: <“Want to go for the Group Study?”>
Preview: What will our adorkable Team 7 think now? 🙃
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Chapter 18 | ☼ Contents ☼ | Chapter 20
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