Restart button (Part 3)
Train until you drop dead, train until you drop dead.
To be honest, Zhou Zeyu hadn't heard those words in a long time since she left that terrible team. Of course, things were different now. Back then, Coach Huang forced everyone to hear those words by holding up the microphone, but now, she was telling them to herself.
In just a few years, even Coach Xu had to admit that Zhou Zeyu had grown a lot. Although no one knew whether this growth was a good thing or not, Zhou Zeyu didn't care anymore.
If Zhou Zeyu's motivation back then was patriotism and external pressure, her motivation now is much simpler. After all, no one would turn down money, and she happens to be someone who has some ambition and is also a bit greedy.
Then let's get started!
Because Zhou Zeyu's sense of responsibility controlled her brain, she reflexively ignored everything unrelated to training. Her original plan to go to Beijing for a follow-up examination was also put on hold and postponed until after the next round of the competition.
Anyway, she's always been the type to live for the moment, so she doesn't care about the follow-up check. As long as her knee doesn't hurt, she's fine. If she used to cherish her artificial bone, now she doesn't care at all. She'll just make do with it. Her knee is already in terrible shape, and she doesn't believe anything else can go wrong.
Nevertheless, Zhou Zeyu still obediently went to the local hospital to get some more medicine. After all, the competition was precious, but life was more valuable. She had already suffered too much from this, and she really didn't have the guts to completely ignore it.
After resolving her biggest concern, everything became simple, because Lee Sun-hee, that lunatic, inexplicably started a new arms race.
Zhou Zeyu sometimes felt that Li Shanxi hadn't changed at all in the past few years. Even though she was a mother of two, she was still incredibly immature, and even less mature than Zhou Zeyu, who had been unmarried, childless, and single for half her life.
However, they're not exactly mature yet.
The early spring weather was still chilly, but the heating in the training field was a bit too strong, so Zhou Zeyu started sweating profusely after only a few movements. He stood aside, took off his long down coat, pulled off a thick turtleneck sweater and a down vest, and then struggled to take off the two base layers underneath, revealing the short-sleeved training clothes underneath. He immediately felt light all over, as if he had been reborn.
Lee Sun-hee, who was only wearing a shirt and a jacket, was stunned. "Why are you wearing so much?"
Zhou Zeyu twisted his neck and moved his wrists and ankles, starting to stretch his muscles like an old man, "because I'm weak."
Li Shanxi's disdain was palpable. "I've had two children, and I don't look as weak as you. Zhou Zeyu, you're really too weak."
"Alas, of course, I can't compare to your vigorous old age."
For a moment, Zhou Zeyu was certain that she heard Li Shanxi laugh in exasperation, but fortunately, she had excellent self-regulation skills and quickly let it go. She sat down on the mat where Zhou Zeyu was training without any hesitation and reached out to pat her bottom.
Zhou Zeyu was doing a plank with his head down and his face flushed when she was suddenly ambushed by her. He almost collapsed because he couldn't catch his breath. "Hey!"
"You do your thing, don't interfere with me."
Whether it was because of the plank position or because Li Shanxi's hand was still on her buttocks, Zhou Zeyu was still holding her breath with difficulty and almost spoke through gritted teeth.
"What do you want to ask? Speak quickly."
Li Shanxi didn't stand on ceremony, chuckled twice, and then suddenly lowered his head, looking at her sweaty face with great interest.
"What's your relationship with that young man who asked me to record a video for you before?"
Zhou Zeyu was staring intently at the floor when her large face suddenly appeared in her field of vision. She was so startled that she almost couldn't hold on. Her elbow trembled slightly, and she said angrily, "This is not important! Don't bother me, I can't hold on anymore."
As soon as she finished speaking, the timer next to her beeped, and she immediately felt relieved, collapsing there limply and pretending to be dead.
However, Li Shanxi would never let her off so easily. Zhou Zeyu caught a glimpse of the other party's malicious smile out of the corner of her eye, and even had an ominous premonition that she had been planning to find out about this matter for a long time.
“We have no relationship whatsoever, so don’t overthink it,” she said firmly.
Lee Sun-hee narrowed his eyes thoughtfully, staring at her with a sinister look that seemed to say, "You're talking nonsense, I don't believe you," as if trying to force her to submit through psychological warfare.
However, Zhou Zeyu was no ordinary person either. He squinted his eyes in the same way she did and said, "Watch less Korean dramas. We really have nothing to do with each other."
Lee Sun-hee shrugged, but remained silent as he looked at her.
Zhou Zeyu was about to start the second set of planks when she was stared at so intently that she felt a chill run down her spine. She felt she couldn't let her interfere with her training any longer, so she sighed and, in a fit of despair, spread her hands and said, "I did want to know if there was any connection, but there really isn't. I'm not lying to you."
After she finished speaking, she shook her head with a sigh, didn't say anything more, turned on the timer, got up and started the second set of training.
The soreness in her lower back and abdomen had become almost unbearable. Zhou Zeyu gritted her teeth, lowered her head, and felt as if all parts of her body below her chest were screaming at the same time, but she decided to pretend to be deaf.
Unfortunately, she really wasn't deaf.
Then she could hear Lee Sun-hee's voice coming from beside her, "Oh, but he likes you."
With a bang, Zhou Zeyu couldn't stop in time, and the power he had painstakingly gathered in his waist and abdomen instantly dissipated into pieces. He crashed onto the mat in a very disheveled manner, like a building collapsing. He closed his eyes and painfully covered his chin, "Ouch, are you sick?!"
Lee Sun-hee kindly helped her up, but what she said had absolutely nothing to do with "kindness".
"Then why don't you date him? Don't you like his type? Or do you simply not like men at all?"
Seeing that what she was saying was getting more and more bizarre, Zhou Zeyu didn't care about her painful jaw anymore. She got up and begged her to stop talking. If she was allowed to continue her wild imagination, Zhou Zeyu might become sexually frigid in her mouth.
"What are you talking about? Of course I like men!" Zhou Zeyu quickly clarified, only to realize how strange her words sounded after she finished speaking. Several teammates who were also training around her even cast strange and confused glances at her, which startled her so much that she looked away and playfully punched the culprit.
The culprit, completely oblivious to the fact that he had caused the disturbance, remained nonchalant, saying, "What's wrong with saying this? Don't you like him?"
Zhou Zeyu was momentarily speechless. He decided not to respond directly and decisively ended the plank exercise. Instead, he picked up the medicine ball next to him and pretended not to hear, starting to practice spinning and throwing the medicine ball.
Seeing that she was deliberately avoiding the issue and was using training as a cover, Lee Sun-hee shrugged and didn't pursue the matter further. She then turned around and began training as well.
For a moment, the two were silent. Zhou Zeyu was finally able to focus her attention on the training program. The five-kilogram medicine ball was a bit heavy, and when she swung and threw it, it engaged the muscles in her forearm. She had done this kind of basic training often before, but it didn't seem to be that strenuous. It seemed that she had become quite rusty.
When she finally got used to the intensity, her entire arm began to ache slightly. After doing three sets of exercises, she couldn't take it anymore. Panting and drenched in sweat, she walked to the side to drink water.
Plank exercises and medicine ball throws both train core strength, which can't be rushed. Fortunately, there's still a reasonable amount of time before the next round of competition. If she makes the most of her time to catch up, she might be able to make a significant improvement.
As she pondered this, her thoughts drifted off to some obscure corner. In fact, if Li Shanxi hadn't suddenly brought up Sorkov today, Zhou Zeyu would have almost forgotten that such a person even existed.
It seems that people are always like this: when they have free time, they think about this and that and are sentimental, their minds holding as much as half the earth. But once they get busy, everything else is thrown aside, including emotions.
Since that brief video call, Zhou Zeyu has had no contact with him. Or more precisely, since she returned to China, their only contact has been that phone call; everything else is blank.
If it weren't for the fact that Sorkov didn't show any surprise when the call connected, Zhou Zeyi would have suspected that he had forgotten about her. After all, how could he not send a single text message?
So Lee Sun-hee was just talking nonsense.
Zhou Zeyu grew increasingly frustrated, and before he knew it, he had almost bent the plastic water bottle in his hand. He only snapped back to reality when he heard a cracking sound, and belatedly tried to put it back together, but of course, he obviously failed.
Are you angry?
Zhou Zeyu was startled again, clutching his left chest and glaring at her: "What are you going to do now?"
Lee Sun-hee still looked completely innocent. "I was just curious."
"Take back your curiosity."
Fearing she might say something else outrageous, Zhou Zeyu left without hesitation and went to another training area to warm up and prepare for sliding step training.
When you're focused, time flies by. After finishing four sets of sliding step training, rope ladder training, plus two sets of rapid arm swings with resistance bands and rapid chest presses with weights, it was already dinnertime before she knew it.
She was already drenched in sweat, having finished the remaining half-bottle of water. Feeling somewhat exhausted, she sat in the corner, lost in thought. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught sight of a familiar figure getting closer and closer, and immediately knew something was wrong. She got up and prepared to slip away.
However, she was too slow. Lee Sun-hee pressed her back down and sat down next to her: "Why are you always thinking about running away? Can't we catch up?"
What's there to reminisce about? They're not the kind of people who can't live without each other. Besides, Zhou Zeyu really has nothing to say to her. Is she supposed to go on and on about how they used to be at odds and how she beat Zhou Zeyu to a pulp?
Of course not, Lee Sun-hee would definitely kill her.
Zhou Zeyu gasped with lingering fear, shook his head, put the empty bottle aside, casually wiped the sweat from his forehead, and said, "I haven't even asked you yet, why did you suddenly decide to return to the competition? Haven't you suffered enough?"
Seemingly surprised that she asked this question right away, Lee Sun-hee paused for a moment, then casually tossed her curly hair aside and smiled indifferently at her: "Can't I suddenly remember that I still have unfulfilled ideals?"
Zhou Zeyi scoffed, "Really? What's your dream?"
"Defeat you."
“Oh,” Zhou Zeyu nodded calmly without any surprise, “Then you’ve come to the wrong place. Given our current relationship, even if you become the number one in the universe, you still can’t defeat me.”
"I was just kidding. Who would pin their dreams on someone else? Besides, given your current state, there's nothing to be proud of about beating you."
Seeing that the conversation between the two was about to veer into an argument, Zhou Zeyu decided to put it on the spot. After all, she was so tired that she could faint at any moment, and she would definitely be no match for her in an argument. She would be crushed.
The two remained silent for a while, both sweating profusely and exhausted, sitting in this quiet corner, staring blankly at the large, even somewhat glaring, lights in the venue. It was a rare scene of them coexisting peacefully.
"To be honest, I never thought I'd be playing a game with you one day."
Lee Sun-hee gave a soft hum: "Surprised? I'm the one who's surprised. I thought you'd just give up like that, but who knew you'd..."
What again? Did it struggle to get back up again, like a cockroach that refuses to give up?
Zhou Zeyu immediately covered her mouth, saying, "You're overthinking it."
After freeing herself from her grasp, Lee Sun-hee spoke again, "But are you really alright with your health right now?"
Zhou Zeyi shrugged. "Do you think I know that?"
Before she could say anything, Zhou Zeyu gently interrupted her.
“It’s okay,” she said, looking up at the ceiling of the venue with a somewhat blank expression. Her voice was very weak, and it was unclear who she was talking to. “I have a feeling that we can really finish the competition smoothly this time.”
What's going on here? Is it that even God couldn't bear to see the suffering she's endured over the years, so He gave her another chance at this juncture—a precious and rare opportunity?
No one puts pressure on her anymore; the burden on her shoulders is so light it's almost negligible. She no longer has to be exhausted by the competition, nor does she have to carefully share training equipment with others. All those hypocritical calculations and backstabbing seem to have become distant. Here, right now, it seems like she's the only one left in the whole world, stubbornly persisting alone.
Is this paradise?
Zhou Zeyu slowly let out a breath, closed his eyes, and felt a smile slowly appear on his lips.
It seems so.
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