Chapter 53

Upon hearing this, Wu Qi suddenly stopped in his tracks, frozen in place.

He paused for a moment, momentarily stunned, when he turned his head.

Zhou Huai remained silent for a long time, gazing at me meaningfully. His eyes held a mixture of heartache, helplessness, and an unspeakable pity.

He pushed me toward Wu Qi, saying only, "Don't you dare get me into trouble. If I really had that ability, would I be a pawn of the demon race?"

"Tch." I wasn't really expecting anything anyway, and turned my head to say, "I knew you couldn't be relied on."

When we arrived at the building where the rental apartment was located, I waved goodbye to them.

Wu Qi can't be with me tonight. He's worried that Zhou Huai will go out and do something bad under the cover of darkness, so he's decided to keep an eye on him himself tonight.

Zhou Huai, however, felt it was unnecessary, since Wu Qi was clearly capable enough to detect whether he had done anything wrong from afar.

I watched them bickering in front of me and couldn't help but laugh out loud.

When they turned to look at me with suspicion, I turned to go upstairs and said, "Alright, get lost, don't keep me from doing my homework."

Zhou Huai readily agreed: "Alright, I'll get going right away. Our A-Yue is destined for Peking University and Tsinghua University, so we can't afford to waste a single minute of her potential."

Me: "Where did you learn that from?"

“The old men at the school gate,” Zhou Huai said, “they just stand there and start pointing and gossiping—this girl is good at studying, she was sure to get into Tsinghua or Peking University, but dating, oh dear, it’s all ruined her career—that kind of thing.”

"..."

All I heard was utter nonsense.

Wu Qi grabbed him by the back of the neck and started to walk away, pointing at his head as he went, and then waving his hand.

It means: This person has a problem with his brain, I'm taking him away first.

Zhou Huai hadn't finished talking yet, "Hey, don't pull me away before I'm done. Sister Yueyue, call me when you make a wish tomorrow. I've never seen what making a wish is before. Do you draw talismans? I need to learn."

Wu Qi couldn't stand it anymore: "Do you only learn useless things?"

Zhou Huai: "..."

-

Back on campus, the sound of students reading aloud fills the air again during the day.

After the neighboring class stopped causing trouble, Class 5 seemed particularly united and even a bit relaxed.

It feels like something's suddenly gone.

This "leisure" was particularly evident in Xu Feng. After writing 87 wishes in the morning, he continued his efforts in the afternoon and wrote another 76.

I wrote a whole page of papers.

After hearing this, Wu Qi whispered to me, "He always manages to redefine my understanding of humanity."

"You've never seen anything so boring, have you?"

Wu Qi nodded: "Mm."

Xu Feng's seat was a bit far from us. From a distance, we could see him examining his masterpiece, carefully reading each line, and occasionally erasing and rewriting lines that didn't make sense.

This person was so meticulous that they wrote with a pencil.

With that in mind, why not make a bet with Wu Qi?

I moved closer to him and asked, "Guess, is there more about you or more about me inside?"

Wu Qi turned around and instantly understood what I meant.

It's started again.

These two deities are about to start comparing their merits again.

It all depends on whether Xu Feng wants a good marriage or a sudden windfall. We overheard this, and if it comes true, we'll put it on our tab from now on.

Then it suddenly occurred to me that the last plane we flew over in the Celestial Realm was because of this.

Seemingly finding it amusing, Wu Qi rarely showed a serious expression, and then said two words to me decisively: "Mine."

"You're being stubborn." I retorted, not to be outdone. "What boy this age wants to get rich quick? Don't you understand what it's like to be young and confused?"

There's no point in us arguing here; we'll have to wait until tonight to find out the answer.

The clock struck past six in the afternoon, and the night had already fallen.

Evening self-study sessions are generally poorly managed. Looking around the last row, you see people playing on their phones, sleeping, or passing notes.

The phone in my pocket buzzed.

As if they had exchanged a secret code, without even checking their phones, they simply looked up and exchanged glances with a few others, and a plan to skip class and run away was born.

The newly opened wishing well is some distance from the teaching building, requiring crossing a large square in between. However, the large square faces the dean's office directly, and a group of people crossing it would be too conspicuous, so they ended up having to go around through the grove of trees.

The ground was covered with scattered peach petals.

These people acted like thieves. Li Guangheng covered his head with his school uniform, ready to stage a sneak attack at any moment.

I couldn't help but complain in my mind.

Brother, this makes you seem even less like a good person.

Wu Qi immediately spoke up: "If you keep going like this, we won't even know if someone has been switched inside the school uniform."

Li Guangheng: "..."

After hesitating for a moment, he slowly took off his school uniform. Then he looked around, afraid that someone might come out and catch him red-handed.

After feeling a little safer, she said, "I am, after all, the class monitor. I have always had a good reputation and upright character. I don't want my image to collapse."

"Wow, nobody knew you had this persona if you hadn't told us," Meng Xiaoqiong joked.

Li Guangheng: "Get out, get out, get out!"

The wishing well is hidden at the end of the grove.

It's called a wishing well, but it's really just a small pool with no lights around it. If you use your phone's flashlight to see, you can see that there are already a few coins at the bottom of the pool.

Xu Feng had been devoutly praying all day, and he almost knelt down the moment he saw the wishing well.

He shakily took out a coin from his pocket, then took out the draft he had been working on all day, and was about to put it in when Tian Qingqing stopped him.

"Honey, don't tell me you wrote down all these wishes just to pay one dollar."

Xu Feng didn't seem to think there was anything wrong with this logic; on the contrary, he thought Tian Qingqing's thinking was strange.

“No, no, no,” he said. “You have to understand it this way: I can make so many wishes for only one dollar. Isn’t that great value for money?”

Tian Qingqing: "..."

It's not cost-effective at all.

Xu Feng began reciting from top to bottom, "First of all, bless us all to get high scores in the college entrance examination, all to get into 985/211 universities, and to pass the exam with flying colors."

Upon hearing this, Li Guangheng immediately replied, "Copy and paste."

Xu Feng: What are you doing?

Li Guangheng: "Well said, I'll agree."

Xu Feng: "...All you do is plagiarize other people's ideas."

Xu Feng ignored him and continued reading, "Secondly, I hope that everyone is in good health."

Li Guangheng: "Copy and paste."

Meng Xiaoqiong: "Copy and paste."

Tian Qingqing: "Copy and paste."

Even Wu Qi and I couldn't help but say "copy and paste" together.

Xu Feng was completely speechless; it turned out he had become a mouth double.

"Fine, fine, fine." He laughed angrily, "Give me two dollars each for the patent later, don't just take it for free."

After saying that, he shook the test paper, cleared his throat, and said, "Finally—"

Xu Feng turned around and said, "May our friendship last forever."

Upon hearing this, Tian Qingqing added, "It not only needs to last, but also needs to be a soulmate."

Li Guangheng: "With three or five close friends, we chatted and laughed."

“You’re really cultured; it’s not like you can put it into words,” Meng Xiaoqiong said.

"Stop trying to discourage me." Li Guangheng called us together. "Come on, let's put the coins in together."

We followed and approached, each taking out a coin.

"To our friendship—"

Long live friendship!

Several coins traced a beautiful parabola in the air before landing in the pool, creating small splashes.

Cheers followed, celebrating this grand and splendid friendship.

In a corner where no one is paying attention.

A small, jet-black snake hanging from the old tree branch nearby also shed a few soft tears.

It turns out that the way to express emotions in the human world is not just through the frangipani flower on one's ear, but also through the coin in the wishing well.

Zhou Huai thought of the phrase, "The world is you and me."

In the end, the scales tipped in favor of "you".

We all hope that others are doing well.

-

We went crazy for a long time, making all the wishes we could and flipping all the coins we wanted.

Tian Qingqing discovered that she might have a bad memory. She clearly remembered that she only took two coins with her when she went out, and that they should have been gone after she threw them into the pool, but two more appeared in her pocket.

She said it was haunted.

But I knew it was the God of Wealth who had appeared to me.

Finally, we simply sat on the steps next to us, talking about dreams and life, then about everyday things, as if we had endless things to say and countless stories to tell.

After talking for quite a while, Xu Feng finally read out his 103rd wish.

Li Guangheng was tired of sitting and had just stood up to ask Xu Feng about the progress of his wish when he heard the school security guard rushing over, his flashlight beam shining as he stumbled along: "—Who's mumbling something?! Stop right there, don't run away."

The group scattered in a flurry of activity, apologizing as they ran.

By the time the security guards arrived, there was no one left by the pool, only a lonely wish list filled with countless trivial wishes.

As I ran, the phrase "Long live friendship" kept repeating in my mind.

In the very end.

Neither Wu Qi nor I remember the bets we made during the day; it's as if they're all meaningless now.

All I remember is that the stars filled the sky that day, and the boys stepped on the branches, looking forward to a promising future and looking back to like-minded people.

Light emanated from the teaching building, extending outwards, covering and enveloping us.

The youthful years are both hasty and passionate, like a raging fire that spreads and never goes out.