Chapter 20 She never imagined that this road would lead to…

The campus during the summer vacation has lost its usual liveliness, with only cicadas chirping incessantly in the treetops.

Although Su Cheng has only officially graduated from Linda University for a month, she spent most of her second semester of senior year interning off-campus. When she occasionally returned to school to handle graduation matters, it was always during the day and she would come and go in a hurry.

The last time I had such a leisurely nighttime stroll around campus was last winter.

She walked side by side with Jiang Muzhou on the campus of Linhai University, and the feeling was completely different from when she returned to Linhai No.1 Middle School last time.

In the campus of No. 1 High School, the teaching buildings, the playground, the canteen... every familiar place has Jiang Muzhou's shadow; every corridor and every corner is imprinted with the footsteps she took in pursuit of Jiang Muzhou.

But Linda University is different; everything here is brand new.

The four years of university life and the three years of high school formed a wonderful complement, and all the attention that had once been directed at Jiang Muzhou now turned back to her.

She no longer subconsciously searches for him in the crowd, nor does she deliberately wait around the corner with a book in hand to bump into him.

On the campus of Linyi University, every step she took belonged only to herself.

Now, this solitary journey has undergone some subtle changes.

They entered the school from the north gate and headed south along the main road.

This road was all too familiar to Su Cheng. During her student days, she had walked this road back and forth between the North Gate and her dormitory countless nights.

The back street outside the North Gate is also known as a food street. In addition to the restaurant where they just ate Chaoshan hot pot, further in, there is another open-air square.

It is extremely quiet during the day, but magically becomes lively in the evening.

Food vendors pushed their carts out one after another, offering sizzling grilled squid, refreshing fruit shaved ice, and unique charcoal-grilled marshmallow ice cream...

When the bell rings to signal the end of evening classes, or when the library starts playing closing music, Su Cheng and her roommate exchange a knowing glance, knowing it's time to reward themselves for a hard day of studying.

Holding freshly made snacks, they walked back to their dormitory under the moonlight, chatting non-stop along the way. Their topics were as varied as the food in their hands: idols whose careers had collapsed on the trending topics, handsome juniors who were rescued from the confession wall, and the school bully cat who had just been neutered but went to fight again.

The dormitory area is very close to the north gate.

To facilitate management, the school arranged for all students staying on campus to be placed in the same enclosure during the summer vacation.

When they arrived, all the other enclosures were dark, but this one was lit, like an isolated island.

"Which building did you live in before?" he asked, somewhat curious.

Su Cheng pointed to the dark cluster of buildings in the distance, "I live over there."

The area with the lights on now is where the boys live; the area across the river from the arched bridge is where Su Cheng used to live, which is where the girls lived.

Jiang Muzhou followed closely behind her.

Although the dormitory building was dark, the lights of the shops along the street were still bright.

He seemed to see her from the past, carefully selecting her favorite fruit candies in front of the convenience store shelves, then weighing a pound of freshly picked strawberries next door, and finally carrying a bulging paper bag, walking back to the dormitory chatting and laughing with her roommate.

Because of her internship, Su Cheng did not spend her last days as a student in the dormitory.

The three local girls in my dorm moved back home one after another during their senior year, leaving only one roommate from another province, all alone in the empty dorm.

Returning to the familiar place, those fragmented memories of the dormitory suddenly came vividly back to life.

The university has a very strict schedule, with the power cut off promptly at 11 p.m. every night. Some clever students can modify the air conditioner power supply or connect electricity from the corridor, but Su Cheng and her friends don't have that ability. On nights when they can't sleep, they can only pass the time by chatting.

The four of them got along well and often squeezed onto the same bed to chat.

The topics we talked about most were the boys at school.

Su Cheng thought that if Jiang Muzhou were at Lin University, he would definitely be the subject of everyone's eager discussion.

After a quick tour of the dormitory area, Su Cheng led Jiang Muzhou along the tree-lined path toward the teaching building.

Su Cheng had walked this road countless times, through sunrise and sunset, through early spring and late winter.

But she never imagined that Jiang Muzhou would be traveling with her on this journey.

Compared to the still-popular dormitory area, the teaching area is much quieter.

The buildings at Linhai University feature a minimalist design, with the four red and white teaching buildings (A, B, C, and D) resembling four neat red velvet cakes, situated on the southeast side of the campus.

Buildings A and B have a U-shaped structure and are connected by an aerial walkway. Su Cheng took most of her general education courses here during her freshman and sophomore years. However, since it was the holidays, the doors of the teaching buildings were locked.

The trees lining the teaching area are different from those on both sides of the main road; the plane trees have been replaced with goldenrain trees.

Su Cheng was walking when she suddenly cried out, "Ouch!"

A pebble got stuck in the sole of my shoe sometime during the night, and I almost twisted my ankle.

Her little leather shoes had a very unfortunate day.

Just as Jiang Muzhou was about to help her up, Su Cheng had already regained her balance on her own.

She stomped her foot, rubbing off the small pebble on the sole of her shoe, and angrily kicked the unlucky pebble far away.

Just as she was about to take a step, Su Cheng suddenly noticed a small, uneven pothole on the road ahead, and she immediately became furious.

"This road is terrible, it's full of potholes!" She complained to Jiang Muzhou with her hands on her hips and her brows furrowed. "When I was a sophomore in college, I was almost late for school one morning. My roommate was giving me a ride on his electric scooter, and we got jolted off by a huge pothole on this lousy road. We flew off together!"

“That fall was horrible; our legs were covered in blood.” As she spoke, she lifted a corner of her linen Tencel dress, pointing to a faint scar on her knee. “Look, you can still see the scar now.”

Jiang Muzhou crouched down and looked in the direction she was pointing. Although the pale white scar was not conspicuous, he could imagine that it had taken a long time for the wound to heal.

The thought of her legs covered in blood from the fall made his chest tighten.

His fingers twitched slightly, as if he wanted to gently touch the scar, but then he felt it would be too abrupt and ultimately didn't dare to touch it.

Su Cheng hadn't expected him to observe her so closely. His warm breath hovered over her knees, and she couldn't help but shrink her legs.

With a flick of her fingertips, the skirt cascaded down, like a curtain falling at the end of a theatrical performance, shutting out the audience's view.

She took two steps to the side and continued to recount the embarrassing incident with great emotion, trying to mask her racing heartbeat with an increasingly loud voice.

Seeing her lively and energetic now, Jiang Muzhou breathed a slight sigh of relief.

He couldn't help but recall the cat cage that had almost hit her that afternoon. Luckily, he had stopped it in time to prevent her from getting hurt, otherwise she would probably have had another scar.

The campus is shaded by green trees and has a shallow, man-made lake, which is like a small ecological park and is much cooler than outside the campus.

After walking for a while, Su Cheng still felt a bit hot, and after talking so much, she was thirsty.

She stopped in front of the vending machine on the east side of the teaching building, turned around and asked, "What would you like to drink?"

“Just like you is fine,” Jiang Muzhou replied naturally.

A few seconds later, the vending machine dispensed two bottles of iced mineral water.

Su Cheng handed a bottle to Jiang Muzhou, then suddenly remembered that he had an injury on his hand, so she helped him unscrew the cap.

As she handed it over, she raised her chin, a smug expression on her face that screamed "girlfriend power."

Jiang Muzhou took the water and thanked him with a smile.

He smiled somewhat shyly.

Yes, it's the word "shy".

This was the first time Su Cheng had used this word to describe him.

Perhaps because of his injury, Su Cheng felt that Jiang Muzhou looked particularly different today, with an inexplicable sense of vulnerability like a "little man".

He pursed his lips to the bottle, tilted his head back slightly, revealing his sharply defined jawline.

His prominent Adam's apple bobbed up and down, a crystal-clear drop of water slid down from the corner of his mouth, along the blue veins on the side of his neck, past his collarbone, and finally disappeared into his collar.

Drinking the ice water only made Su Cheng feel hotter. She dared not look down any further and quickly pressed the cool mineral water bottle against her burning cheeks to cool herself down physically.

The teaching area consists of four isolated teaching buildings, without even a single bench for resting.

Su Cheng thought that only academic superstars like Jiang Muzhou would specifically look at the teaching buildings when visiting a university.

She winked at Jiang Muzhou, "Come on, I'll take you to an interesting place."

However, once they arrived at their destination, Su Cheng immediately regretted it.

For some unknown reason, the school leaders spent a lot of money to build a small island in the middle of the artificial lake, where they raised a large flock of black swans and released a few peacocks.

In the past, after class, she would stop by the lakeside pavilion to sit, enjoy the breeze, and hope to be lucky enough to see a peacock display its plumage.

When Su Cheng reached the lakeside, he suddenly realized that the peacocks were all resting at night.

She rubbed her sore calves; she had really overdone her workout today.

Based on the principle of "since we're already here," she thought it would be good to rest for a while at the lakeside pavilion.

As a result, we didn't see a single real peacock, but we did encounter several male college students displaying their plumage.

They walked past several couples lingering by the lake, finally reaching the pavilion in the middle of the lake, only to find that this auspicious spot had already been occupied.

The boy was hanging on the girl's neck, calling her "baby" happily.

Su Cheng was so embarrassed that she scratched her toes on the ground. Before they could start arguing, she grabbed Jiang Muzhou and pulled him back.

The return journey seemed more difficult than the way there.

Those couples who were just spending time together have now shifted into fifth gear and are on the highway.

She spent four years at the university, and no one ever told her that the young couples would come to the artificial lake for team building activities at night!

Su Cheng's face instantly turned red to the roots of her neck. She raised her hand to shield her temples, wanting to get through quickly, but accidentally kicked a backpack next to the bench.

"I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry."

She quickly steadied her backpack, ignoring her aching legs, and hurried away.

Jiang Muzhou didn't deliberately block his view with his hand, because as long as Su Cheng walked in front of him, his gaze couldn't be diverted.

Perhaps it's because of the hot weather, she's been wearing her hair in a high ponytail a lot lately.

He loved seeing her like this, not because her hairstyle was pretty, but because when her hair was tied up, her delicate ears would be fully exposed, like a luscious pineapple, white with a soft pink tinge.

At this moment, the pineapple strawberry turned into a fragrant crimson strawberry, its deep crimson color staining the entire earlobe.

He quickened his pace to catch up with her, his voice laced with laughter, "Is this the interesting thing you said you were going to show me?"

Su Cheng explained somewhat awkwardly, "I originally wanted to take you to see the peacocks. I heard that seeing a peacock displaying its tail feathers brings good luck. In the end, we didn't see what we were supposed to see, but we saw quite a few things we shouldn't have."

Jiang Muzhou smiled upon hearing this, but the smile quickly faded.

Because he suddenly thought of a question he had never considered before.

Given Su Cheng's qualifications, she must have had many suitors in university. Apart from those with mediocre talents like Lin Yang, there must be even more outstanding ones.

So why hasn't she been in a relationship?

Jiang Muzhou suddenly asked, "Do you have someone you like?"

A note from the author:

Hey everyone, the next chapter is going to be a paid chapter! Please add it to your favorites! [cat emoji]

I highly recommend my next novel, "After Mistakenly Connecting with the School Heartthrob." If you're interested, please add it to your favorites!

A seemingly warm but actually cold and manipulative girl x A self-confessed, sharp-tongued master

At the start of her freshman year, Lin Qing quickly became an internet sensation on the S University forum with a photo of her without makeup during military training.

She received a constant stream of confessions of love, but rejected them all.

"Sorry, I'm an intellectual homosexual; I like people who are just as intelligent as they are physically strong."

“Hey classmate, you have a real talent for comedy, just like Mr. Shen Teng now. But unfortunately, I was a fan of his looks when he was 20.”

My best friend's crush must be this person, right?

-

Eighteen-year-old Xue Haizhou was a prodigy, enjoying a smooth and successful life.

I never imagined that one day I would fall for a woman.

The school beauty, who was the talk of the boys' dormitory, stopped him, but he never received any further news from her.

He humbled himself and took the initiative to show concern, only to receive one reply:

"Sorry, I mistook you for someone else. Could you please give me your roommate's WeChat?"

Xue Haizhou looked in the mirror eight hundred times a day, but he couldn't find any resemblance between himself and his roommate.

Except for their hair, which is all black.

-

One day, Lin Qing bumped into her best friend and Crush holding hands, looking sweet and affectionate, when she returned to her dormitory.

Her eyes welled up with tears, and she felt incredibly gratified.

Turning around, he saw the usually carefree and unrestrained young man with dazzling blond hair, looking as dejected as a puppy.

He pressed her against the wall, his eyes reddening, and he spoke accusingly:

"Where exactly am I inferior to him?"

"He's not worth your tears..."

I don't want you to cry.

-