After a whole morning of shifting classes, Hu Xiujie stormed into the classroom for the first period in the afternoon, walking as if accompanied by the wind.

“Class meeting.”

The owls immediately sat up straight in unison.

Hu Xiujie stood firm at the center of the podium, her stern gaze sweeping across the entire class. “First, congratulations to everyone for entering the Science A Class.”

A burst of uniform applause rang out in the classroom.

Clap clap clap clap clap clap clap clap.

Starting and ending together, with an even rhythm. Sincere and restrained, exactly eight claps.

Xie Lan was confused, and so were the other three newcomers. Wang Gou joined the applause midway, but got it wrong. When everyone else stopped abruptly, he clapped two extra times, making it very awkward.

Xie Lan subconsciously glanced at Dou Sheng. Dou Sheng was also a member of the eight-clap army, looking very indifferent.

Hu Xiujie waited for the applause to end, then said, “Next, welcome the four new students joining us this semester: Xie Lan, Wang Gou, Feng Miao, Mao Lengxue.”

Clap clap clap clap clap clap clap clap.

Another eight claps.

Xie Lan whispered, “You guys practiced this?”

Dou Sheng gave a reluctant confirmation.

“With Hu Xiujie as the homeroom teacher, anything is possible,” he said speechlessly.

There were only four new students, but Hu Xiujie still initiated a round of self-introductions for the whole class.

“To save time, do it from your seats. No more than three sentences per person. New students can say a bit more.”

Class officers first, then by seating order.

Xie Lan estimated that three sentences per person would only be enough to say their name and hobbies, but he soon realized he was wrong.

Dong Shuijing was the first to stand up.

“Class Monitor Dong Shuijing, dedicated to serving everyone again this new semester. Prerequisite: speak up if you have issues, don’t pull my hair!”

The whole class laughed. Hu Xiujie, who had sat down to the side, also smiled faintly.

Dai You stood up next. “Study Committee Member Dai You. Not great at studying, always ranked second. Staying up the latest nights, drinking the sweetest coffee.”

In a trance, Xie Lan remembered that there seemed to be a whole row of coffee stacked on Dai You’s desk since the first day, never diminishing.

Then came a petite and cute girl with very fair skin and two pear dimples when she smiled. “Arts Committee Member Liu Zixuan. I thought I’d have to go develop my otaku dance skills in another class after this exam, didn’t expect to still be here suppressed by the big shots, sigh.”

Hu Xiujie laughed. “Class 4 can’t be without you.”

Coming from Hu Xiujie, this sentence was quite terrifying. In Xie Lan’s peripheral vision, Wang Gou shuddered all over, but the Class 4 students didn’t react much and even joined in the jeering. Even Yu Fei, who usually didn’t like to talk, mixed in with the crowd saying, “That’s a must.”

Xie Lan whispered to Dou Sheng, “What is otaku dance?”

“Just the kind of dance you do at home when you have nothing to do,” Dou Sheng said, flicking his wrist casually. “Just like that.”

Xie Lan: “Oh.”

Even Yu Fei couldn’t help turning his head upon hearing this. “One dares to say it, the other dares to believe it.”

With three-sentence self-introductions, everyone in Class 4 managed to make them flowery. Xie Lan couldn’t remember all the names, but miraculously remembered everyone.

When it was Dou Sheng’s turn, this bro stood up slowly—

“Hello everyone. I am Dou Sheng.”

He paused, seeming to struggle to think of a third sentence. After two seconds of silence, he simply gave up: “Thank you, everyone.”

Pretentious god.

Xie Lan thought to himself. Acting cold, but secretly capable of rambling fifty thousand words to a photo.

After Dou Sheng sat down, it was Xie Lan’s turn.

When he stood up, the people in front all turned around. The class was even quieter than before.

“I am Xie Lan, returned from the UK, and will be taking the Gaokao here.” After stating the basics, Xie Lan hesitated and added, “I left before I learned to read. My reading and writing are very poor, hope to improve quickly.”

A boy asked, “Why? Did your parents not teach you Chinese characters after going abroad?”

Sure enough, he was asked the question he least wanted to answer.

When he was little, Xie Jingming would occasionally take him to family gatherings of immigrant scholars. The children who came along all spoke both Chinese and English, mainly Chinese, chatting away happily. Xie Lan could only stand dumbly to the side, occasionally understanding the English parts, unable to make a single friend.

After three rounds of drinks, the adults would call the children back. Xie Jingming would then introduce his purely British education. Others would chime in with praise, but Xie Lan would never forget the surprised looks the other children gave him.

A little boy had even glanced at him sideways. “Why can’t a Chinese person speak Chinese? Long live Great Britain?”

That sense of shame accompanied him for many years.

But history did not repeat itself.

The owls didn’t think in directions like “forgetting one’s roots” or “fawning over foreign things” at all. Without waiting for Xie Lan to answer, they started entertaining themselves.

“Discussing how crazy contemporary parents can be to make their children learn English well.”

“However, they didn’t expect the child would have to come back for the Gaokao.”

“A long sigh to hide the tears, mourning the hardships of the returnee!”

“Li Bai, Du Fu, Bai Juyi, Su Shi, Lu You, Xin Qiji! So much happiness is waiting for you!”

After his surprise, the corners of Xie Lan’s lips unconsciously turned up slightly. He whispered, “Thank you, everyone.”

After the self-introduction, his heart suddenly felt very light, as if he could fly on the spot.

Before class ended, Hu Xiujie cleared her throat, and the whole class of fluttering owls sat up straight and spiritedly again.

“A few final words. I believe everyone knows that the Gaokao questions in the past two years have been conservative. The advantages of many top math and science students were leveled, and their rankings dropped confusingly. You are the first Science A Class. The school’s intention is for students who excel in single subjects to secure bonus points in autonomous enrollment. So we will routinely conduct training with difficult problems. You must have the ability to withstand pressure.”

The students below nodded silently. Hu Xiujie continued, “Preparation for autonomous enrollment is just for one year. In the last semester of senior year, classes will be reshuffled again, canceling the Science A Class and unifying the all-subject ranking. So students with partial strengths must not slack off this year, strive to stay after one year.”

Class dismissed. As soon as Hu Xiujie left the classroom, the owls rejoiced again.

Che Ziming turned back and said, “Lan, there’s another reshuffle next year. You have to hurry up and catch up.”

Xie Lan nodded. “Mainly Chinese.”

Che Ziming sighed deeply. “Chinese, Chinese, my scar. My Chinese is also terrible. Let’s work hard together.”

Xie Lan gave a casual “Mmh” as agreement. When Che Ziming turned back, he looked down at the make-up class schedule.

Dou Sheng was sleeping on the desk next to him. Xie Lan poked him.

Dou Sheng lifted his head. “Hm?”

“Let’s go to the supermarket tonight,” Xie Lan said. “I thought about it again. You have to post the video on Sunday, so you must finish recording by Saturday. It’ll be too late to prepare after class tomorrow night. Might as well buy everything tonight.”

Hearing this, Dou Sheng’s expression gradually became solemn, and he sat up.

“What do you mean? You want to watch me make a pot of meat sauce too?”

Xie Lan shook his head. “I can even teach you how to make it.”

“?”

Xie Lan opened a screenshot saved in his phone album. “I watched a Chinese YouTuber talking about how terrifying British food is in the eyes of Chinese people. It was very interesting.”

Dou Sheng was silent. “……So?”

“He gained a hundred thousand followers with that video,” Xie Lan said. “Didn’t you want to make richer content? You can try it.”

Xie Lan’s suggestion was very sincere. He had been thinking about it since Dou Sheng mentioned his “bottleneck” last night.

Although this guy had pitted him several times, they were friends living together after all. He was good at making videos, so he could help out.

What was this called again? Repaying resentment with kindness.

Dou Sheng’s expression was a bit distorted. “Are you serious?”

“Yeah,” Xie Lan said. “Let Little Ma drop us off at the supermarket on the way tonight?”

Dou Sheng was silent for a long time, then slumped back onto the desk dejectedly. “Whatever.”

There was no difference between domestic and British supermarkets. The one Little Ma chose was an import supermarket. Most food items had bilingual labels, so Xie Lan shopped very smoothly.

He walked in front, while Dou Sheng followed behind with a long face, pushing the cart with one hand and holding his phone with the other, looking completely perfunctory.

Xie Lan looked back a few times and saw him looking half-dead, frowning involuntarily.

No ambition, no innovation; it would be hard to get ahead.

He talked about breaking through yesterday, but today he wouldn’t even take this small step. Weak.

“Hurry up.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” Dou Sheng nodded perfunctorily, tapping on his phone without even lifting his eyes.

Xie Lan was speechless.

Meat sauce was easy to make, especially since Xie Lan had a unique secret recipe.

Pork, needs to be streaky (fat and lean mixed).

Tomatoes, pick the flat, large-leafed ones for maximum juice.

There were also some ingredients whose Chinese names he didn’t know. Garlic was ‘suan’, onion was ‘yangcong’. Xie Lan memorized them while buying, feeling very satisfied, improving rapidly every day.

“Wait,” Dou Sheng suddenly said from behind. “Tomato meat sauce, why buy coconut oil?”

Xie Lan said “Oh”. “Adding a little coconut oil and yogurt to classic Italian sauce makes it richer and smoother. My British friends all said it was good.”

“……”

Dou Sheng looked like he had been beaten down by life. After looking at him for a long time, he lowered his head to poke at his phone, mumbling softly, “Creating sin (Zao Nie).”

“Creating what?” A word he hadn’t heard before.

Dou Sheng looked dispirited. “It means ‘whatever’, ‘as long as you’re happy’.”

“Sigh.” Xie Lan was a bit depressed. “Show some ambition. Acting like you’re accompanying me to record a video.”

“……”

Only when Xie Lan turned away did Dou Sheng lift his head again.

He looked at Xie Lan, who was carefully reading labels and checking the dictionary at the same time, and sighed silently.

Owed him.

A destined calamity in life, couldn’t be avoided.

Dou Sheng weighed his options for a moment, and finally opened the Pink TV App (Bilibili), tapping open the chat box with “Food-Loving MR.X” from his private message list.

In the past month, this grandson (jerk) had initiated conversations at least ten times, and he hadn’t replied to any.

The main reason was that he received two punch-worthy blessings during the New Year.

X: Happy New Year, Douzi. You carried this brother so many times when he was transparent. You are the 1 before the 000000. Really, grateful, thankful, etched in my heart. If you need anything in the future, you must ask.

This one didn’t look too jerky.

Look at the next one.

X: Ahem, although this brother got the Top 100 first, in my heart this honor also belongs to you! Half of my trophy is yours. In the new year, I’ll wait for you in the Top 100!

Look at this.

Is this human language?

At the time, Dou Sheng replied very calmly and composedly, “Happy New Year. Get lost.”

Dou Sheng looked up at the back of Xie Lan’s head again—even the back of his head looked a bit happy. Xie Lan turned his head to pick yogurt from the refrigerated shelf, his dark pupils reflecting the shelf lights, very bright.

Dou Sheng took a deep breath, lowered his head, and quickly typed two words to send.

Dou: Here?

If he didn’t reply in a minute, forget it, Dou Sheng thought. He expressionlessly pulled up the stopwatch, deciding that if there was no reply, he would just confess to Xie Lan, telling him he was the cousin Douzi in the hearts of a million people.

The numbers jumped cheerfully. Just as it hit 59, a notification popped up on the phone.

Dou Sheng’s heart thumped.

X: Holy shit, Brother Douzi finally replied to me! What are your orders!

Great, it really was unavoidable fate.

Dou Sheng couldn’t describe the feeling. After brewing for a bit, he started his scheme.

Dou: Just, suddenly missed you.

X: …

X: Is this the person himself?

Dou: Yeah. Isn’t today the… anyway, some anniversary of over a year since I recommended your video to fans?

X: …Is… it…

Dou Sheng wittily fell silent, pushing the cart behind Xie Lan past two more shelves, and casually tossing a box of cookies into the cart.

Until the phone vibrated again.

X: Sigh, not talking anymore? Really just suddenly thought of me?

X: I’m a little touched.

X: Brother, I miss you too. Your update frequency has been a bit low recently. My happiness is gone, sob sob.

Grandson.

Being weirdly sarcastic again.

Dou Sheng typed with a numb face:

Dou: I watch your videos every day. By the way, eating a basin of meat sauce on Sunday? Your taste is getting heavy.

X: Huh?

X: Oh! Sigh, missed a word in the teaser. A basin of meat sauce NOODLES. Who eats meat sauce alone? Are they bored/salty (pun on ‘idle’)?

Isn’t it salty?

Dou Sheng had a tsunami inside, but remained calm on the surface.

Dou: Then I’m a bit disappointed. Really wanted to watch you eat meat sauce.

X: What do you mean??

X: Wait, are you giving me a job? Is that what you mean?

X: Is there some ketchup brand daddy who wants to watch me eat meat sauce? I can do it!

Dou: No.

Dou: Only your Daddy Douzi wants to watch.

X: WTF?

Dou Sheng finally smiled at the screen. While Xie Lan wasn’t paying attention, he quickly reached over the cart and took a photo.

He took a screenshot of X’s New Year messages “You are the 1 before the 000000” and “If you need anything in the future, you must ask” and sent it over, along with the photo of the shopping cart.

Dou: Custom video. Eat a basin of tomato meat sauce, add coconut oil and sugar-free yogurt. Post it on Sunday. Requirements: pure white bowl, stainless steel spoon, table covered with black cloth, white wall background. Wear a gray hoodie, show only the cuffs at most, cuffs cannot have logos.

X: ???

X: If you want me dead, just say it?

X: Is this some new Top 100 assassination list?

X: And what the hell is this recipe of yours??

X: Hello? Still there?

Dou Sheng glanced at Xie Lan’s little head.

Dou: Yeah, here. It’s called “Lan-style Recipe”.

Dou: Grateful, thankful, etched in my heart. Next time I need you, I’ll definitely ask you again.

Dou: I’ll toss you coins. Two of them.