It was an ordinary afternoon in September. A drowsy atmosphere permeated the campus after lunch, and the crisp sound of students flipping through test papers drifted in through the window.

Lin Wanxing stood at the podium for the first time in her life.

Although the eleven boys seated before her could hardly be called her students.

The young faces appeared childish, and no matter how they tried to conceal it with lazy, disdainful postures, their eyes betrayed curiosity and inquiry.

The scene froze.

Like a rubber band stretched taut, there was that moment of infinite stillness.

In the instant before the band snapped back, Lin Wanxing said, “In the spirit of fairness, openness, and justice, we’ll meet at the east gate of the school at noon on Sunday and go to the venue together. If anyone doesn’t plan to show up on time, please raise your hand.”

The boys exchanged glances, bewildered for a few seconds.

Then some troublemakers decisively raised their hands.

First was Qin Ao, who not only raised his hand but signaled with his eyes to Lin Lu and Yu Ming, urging them to raise theirs too.

Among all the students with raised hands, one person surprised Lin Wanxing.

“Now let’s hear everyone’s opinions,” Lin Wanxing smiled instead.

“Fu Xinshu,” her gaze swept across the room as she called the name.

The boy lowered his somewhat thin arm and said, “We need to familiarize ourselves with the venue. Meeting at 12 is too late.”

“Valid objection. Then let’s make it 11.”

Fu Xinshu nodded and put his hand down.

“Qin Ao,” Lin Wanxing continued calling names.

“People can’t play football with dogs,” Qin Ao said coldly, glancing toward Wen Chengye and Qi Liang.

“Indeed,” Qi Liang’s voice was soft yet mocking.

Hearing Qin Ao speak this way, he lowered his hand, clearly determined to oppose Qin Ao to the end.

“Screw off,” Qin Ao said.

“Barking again,” Qi Liang laughed.

With Qin Ao and Qi Liang taking the lead, the boys below started arguing again.

For them, there didn’t seem to be much willingness or unwillingness.

Lin Wanxing didn’t try to manage them. She looked toward the boy sitting in the farthest corner of the classroom. “Chen Jianghe, what about you?”

Chen Jianghe’s face was cold as ice as he stood up from his seat.

Although Lin Wanxing had seen his cold, silent demeanor many times before, his expression had never looked as awful as today.

Without a word, he left directly through the back door of the classroom, as if unwilling to stay a second longer.

Lin Wanxing watched the thin figure of the boy as he left. Qi Liang’s voice drifted from nearby.

“Ha, Mr. Cool.”

Overall, the “First General Assembly of Representatives for the Second Half of the 2019 Academic Year” of Anning City No. 8 Middle School Boys’ Football Team concluded with a great consensus.

To translate, most people didn’t have strong opinions about going to play a match on the weekend, but some expressed extreme dissatisfaction.

One of them was, of course, Qin Ao, who had been provoked by Qi Liang.

Another was Chen Jianghe, who had run off before the meeting even finished.

This result was unexpected for Lin Wanxing.

However, Lin Wanxing didn’t rush to find Chen Jianghe and Qin Ao. She returned to her desk in the sports equipment room.

On the desk were several puzzle books she had borrowed from the high school library.

She had already read part of them last night and this morning. With nothing else to do, she spent the entire afternoon reading, except when students came to borrow equipment.

Some brain teasers were decades-old clichés, but there were also novel, interesting problems that were captivating.

Before she knew it, she had filled several pages of notes on the blank paper beside her.

The first to arrive was Qin Ao.

Young Qin had a bruise on his cheek. It wasn’t severe, but it looked somewhat ferocious because it was close to the scar near his eye corner.

“Still got into a fight. How’s Qi Liang?” Lin Wanxing glanced at Qin Ao, then lowered her head to study the intelligence test before her.

“He’s already dead.”

“Huh?” Lin Wanxing feigned shock, mimicking Qi Liang’s tone.

Qin Ao wiped the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand, looking like he might ignite again.

Lin Wanxing quickly pulled out a cola gummy worm from her small snack bag on the desk, expressing an apology.

Qin Ao raised an eyebrow, and took it after a moment, indicating great mercy in forgiving her.

Lin Wanxing ignored Qin Ao and continued studying the intelligence puzzle she had just turned to.

“What are you looking at?” Qin Ao leaned over. Only then did he notice the intelligence tests and code books on the desk.

The nine sentences from the cigarette paper and the final “10□□□” had been copied onto a single white paper placed in the upper right corner of the desk, so she could glance at it and study it anytime.

Lin Wanxing rotated the puzzle she had just turned to 180 degrees and showed it to Qin Ao.

A German doctor who lived in China for many years used a simple method to test whether elderly people had dementia and its severity.

For each of the following five characters, add one stroke to transform it into another character.

If you can only answer one, you may already be ill.

If you can only answer 2 characters, you have average thinking ability.

Answering 3 characters indicates a very healthy brain.

Getting all of them right means you are an extremely intelligent person.

If you can’t answer any, then you’re already an elderly person with dementia.

“Diao, Ya, Kai, She, Yu?” Qin Ao read each character aloud. “Is this related to that?”

“No,” Lin Wanxing said.

“Then why are you doing it?”

“Because it’s related to intelligence.”

Qin Ao “…”

“So, why did you come looking for me?” Lin Wanxing added the first stroke to “Diao,” turning it into “Xi.”

“I still think there’s something wrong with you.”

Qin Ao chewed the gummy candy, which softened his originally sharp tone.

“That direct?” Lin Wanxing asked. “What’s wrong with me?”

“Why are you the one taking us to the competition?”

“Because Teacher Qian said I have a good relationship with you and Chen Jianghe, so he asked me to lead the team.”

“You didn’t propose it yourself?”

“Kid…” Lin Wanxing put down her pen. “Let me repeat this. I am myself, a master’s graduate from Yongchuan University, a provincial top scorer in the liberal arts college entrance exam, with 9 published SCI papers, 6 as first author. Why would I voluntarily propose to take you to the competition site, such a thankless task?”

“…” Qin Ao was silenced again for a while. Suddenly, he pointed at the white paper in the upper right corner of the desk and said, “So why can’t a top college entrance exam scorer solve this?”

“There are only two possibilities if I can’t solve this problem,” Lin Wanxing twirled her pen.

“What?”

“First, this isn’t even a puzzle yet; second, I haven’t tried to solve it yet.”

Qin Ao was shocked. After a moment, he said, “How are you so good at showing off? Teach me.”

Lin Wanxing smiled, added one stroke to each of the remaining four characters, then pulled the white paper from the desk and placed it underneath.

“All puzzle-solving begins with observation,” she pointed to the nine sentences copied from the cigarette paper. “Observe, what common points can you find in these sentences?”

“They’re all stupid?” Qin Ao ventured.

“What else?”

“Each sentence has a number and a dash in front. Is that a dash?” Qin Ao hesitated.

“Yes, continue.”

Qin Ao hesitated for a while. “Could the numbers at the beginning have an internal connection with the character count that follows?”

“That possibility can’t be ruled out.”

As she spoke, Lin Wanxing wrote the sequence numbers in front of each motivational quote and the character counts as two rows of numbers.

Qin Ao read it twice and couldn’t help but sigh, “This is too complicated!”

“Yes, it’s too complicated,” Lin Wanxing pondered.

Qin Ao looked at her suspiciously. “So, have you not solved it yet?”

“Ha, you found me out,” Lin Wanxing laughed awkwardly.

“Hehe,” Qin Ao sneered.

“However…” Lin Wanxing raised her head.

In the evening, the sunlight slanted westward, making the entire equipment room warm and stuffy.

“If this is a puzzle, then the puzzle-maker certainly hopes you can solve it. So, it definitely won’t be too difficult,” she said.

At the door, Chen Jianghe stood holding a football, looking serious.

The youth’s features were stern, his hair neatly combed.

“Nice use of idioms.”

Hearing this, Chen Jianghe’s posture stiffened. He paused in his steps, caught between advancing and retreating.

“Look, I didn’t force you to participate in the competition because going or not going is your freedom.”