After staring at each other for a while, Ye Zhizhou forced himself to say, "We're only in high school, it's too early to talk about these things now."
"You're right." Qin Xuan walked over, leaned close to her, almost touching her ear, "Then we'll talk about it later."
After he finished speaking, he pushed open the door and went out. Ye Zhizhou felt her whole face burning up. She had the heart of an old aunt, yet she was speechless after being flirted with by Qin Xuan.
That evening, Huo Qingyan took Ye Zhizhou back to the Ye family home as agreed. Ye Huaibin hadn't arrived home yet, so she didn't linger. She exchanged a few polite words and left, reminding Ye Zhizhou to go to bed early before she left.
Ye Huaibin was busy all day and didn't get home until 11 p.m. When he opened the door, the living room was dark except for the television, which was on and emitting a faint light. Ye Zhizhou was asleep on the sofa.
"Xiao Zhou, why are you asleep? Go upstairs to your room to sleep. Sleeping on the sofa isn't good for your health." Ye Huaibin gently patted Ye Zhizhou's back.
Ye Zhizhou woke up with blurry eyes. Knowing that she was Qin Xuan's fiancée, Ye Zhizhou was so worried that she couldn't sleep. She ran to the living room with her blanket to watch a drama, but the plot became boring and she fell asleep without realizing it.
"Dad, am I really engaged to Qin Xuan? Can this engagement be canceled?"
Since it was an arranged marriage since childhood, it couldn't have been finalized without her father's consent, so she had to test her father's thoughts.
Ye Huaibin sat down next to Ye Zhizhou and sighed softly, "Actually, the engagement was arranged by your mother and Qin Xuan's mother. They were best friends back then and had a very good relationship, which is why they hoped that you two could be together. However, if you really don't want to, Dad will talk to your Aunt Huo personally, and she might not object."
It turned out that the engagement was arranged between the original owner's biological mother and Huo Qingyan. Ye Zhizhou felt a little sad when he thought about how the original owner lost her mother right after birth, and he couldn't bring himself to say that he wanted to break off the engagement with Qin Xuan.
"Dad, let's not cancel it for now. We're still young anyway, let's wait until we go to college. I'm going upstairs to sleep, Dad, you should go to sleep early too."
Ye Zhizhou was about to take the blanket upstairs when she noticed her father staring motionless at the TV, which was playing the horror movie she had chosen.
"Xiao Zhou, you... can fall asleep while watching horror movies?" Ye Huaibin wasn't afraid of these kinds of movies, but he felt that Ye Zhizhou was only seventeen years old and yet he was so brave.
Ye Zhizhou nodded, "To be honest, horror movies these days aren't very interesting. Dad, do you like watching them too?"
Ye Huaibin shook his head. He was so busy with work that he wouldn't participate in any entertainment activities that would take up too much time.
"Your brother seems to enjoy watching it. He probably knows a lot of good shows. You can ask him."
Ye Zhizhou hummed in agreement, then carried the blanket upstairs, thinking to herself, "Ye Qian usually looks so flashy, but he actually likes watching horror movies to relieve stress, just like me. I should have a good chat about my viewing experience."
After washing up upstairs, she sent a WeChat message to her brother. She didn't expect him to reply that day, but he replied instantly.
[Ye Qian: Your brother actually has quite a few good movies to recommend to you, just wait.]
Looking through his messages, Ye Zhizhou suddenly thought of something and replied to him: Did you know all along that Qin Xuan and I were engaged, so you arranged for Qin Xuan to be my tutor?
Ten long minutes passed, and Ye Qian still hadn't replied. Ye Zhizhou waited and waited until he fell asleep.
"Brother Ye, what should we do?"
Ye Qian was touching up his makeup at the moment, and his assistant helped him reply. He was usually too busy to reply to messages, but he always tried to reply to Ye Zhizhou's messages as quickly as possible.
This time, he fell silent. Of course, he knew about Ye Zhizhou and Qin Xuan's engagement. His sister had been missing for so many years, and he wanted to give them a chance to be childhood sweethearts, so that Qin Xuan could get more exposure in front of Ye Zhizhou and make up for the years he had wronged him.
More importantly, once Ye Zhizhou is engaged, Ye Huaibin will not be so insistent on urging Ye Qian to get married.
Of course, Ye Zhizhou couldn't know these things, otherwise Ye Qian felt that it might ruin his lofty image in his sister's heart, although it might also be a 'peacock' image.
"Leave it there for now, I'll reply to you when I'm done with this." He decided to reply the next day.
The assistant found it strange. Ye Ge, who always replied to his sister instantly, wasn't replying today. Was he... chickening out? No, her artist had never chickened out. He must be too busy!
The next day, Ye Zhizhou discovered that her brother, Ye Qian—a human alarm clock—not only didn't reply to her last night, but also didn't wake her up for class this morning!
Something was definitely amiss. She quickly changed into her school uniform, washed up briefly, and took the breakfast Zhang Ma had made to school. After sitting down, she took out her phone and sent a message to Ye Qian.
Ye Qian had just woken up when a pop-up appeared on his phone. Ye Zhizhou had sent him a single word: "Brother?"
He seemed to sense Ye Zhizhou's questioning and immediately woke up, typing on the screen with both hands: "I fell asleep instantly last night, I didn't know, Zhouzhou, don't overthink it, I only invited Qin Xuan because he's good at math."
After sending it, Ye Qian breathed a sigh of relief. He had sacrificed so much for this family, and it was his old man who should do such an important thing.
In the classroom, Ye Zhizhou saw the message sent by Ye Qian and was skeptical, but she didn't have time to reply as class was about to start.
"The results of our quiz are in. Our class performed very well overall, and of course, a few students stood out. I'm very happy for everyone!"
There was a thick stack of test papers on the homeroom teacher's podium. After giving a general praise, she asked the class monitor to distribute the test papers.
"I want to give special praise to Ye Zhizhou and Qin Xuan. They both transferred to our school last month, but their grades are excellent. Qin Xuan scored 684 points, ranking first in our class, while Ye Zhizhou, though slightly behind, still did well, scoring 675 points and ranking second in our class. Please give them a round of applause."
After the homeroom teacher finished speaking, a burst of enthusiastic applause rang out in the class. Shu Qiong felt resentful; her grades were also very good, so why did the homeroom teacher only praise Ye Zhizhou and Qin Xuan?
Ye Zhizhou held the test paper in her hand and looked at Qin Xuan's report card. She couldn't understand why Qin Xuan could still get the first place in the class when he only got 90 points in English.
Upon closer inspection, it became clear that Qin Xuan's scores in every subject, except English, were higher than hers, especially in math, where Qin Xuan had achieved a perfect score...
Ye Zhizhou's fighting spirit suddenly ignited. If her math scores were better, wouldn't she surpass Qin Xuan?
"Xiao Zhou, you're amazing! Some people turn around and become second place, while others disappear without a trace. There's no harm in comparison." After class, Xu Huimin took the initiative to run over to congratulate Ye Zhizhou.
Upon hearing this, Shu Qiong glared at Xu Huimin and stormed out in a huff.
Ye Zhizhou ignored her and lowered his head to study where he was inferior to Qin Xuan.
After a while, a classmate told her that the teacher wanted to go to the office, so Ye Zhizhou had no choice but to put down her test paper and go.
As soon as he pushed open the door, he saw the homeroom teacher's serious expression, which left Ye Zhizhou a little confused.
"Ye Zhizhou, some classmates say you cheated on the exam, and they even have a note as evidence. Explain yourself!"
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