With Teacher Xiao Xu, Lin Wanxing could remain calm and composed while defending the students’ “lies.”

But when she locked the door after work and walked to the old stadium, seeing the students by the field, she couldn’t help but feel angry.

Standing at the stadium entrance and looking from a distance, only Chen Jianghe was running laps around the plastic track by himself. Qin Ao sat majestically in the stands with a cigarette between his lips. At the edge of the field, Yu Ming and Lin Lu had their heads together. One was squatting while the other sat on the ground, both holding phones, seemingly playing a game together.

Stepping onto the grass and walking toward the students, Lin Wanxing could hear intense words like “idiot,” “this won’t work,” and “this jungler’s mom is dead” coming from the boys’ mouths.

As the current supervising teacher, Lin Wanxing should have felt gratified by the students’ enthusiastic attendance at training, but she took out her phone and checked the time—

5:08 PM.

It’s worth noting that non-teaching staff like her got off work half an hour earlier than when students were dismissed, which meant the students had indeed skipped class again for training. However, for the students, there was no actual causal relationship between training and skipping class.

Lin Wanxing put away her phone. Her bag still contained the student test papers that the grade leader had given her to “take a good look at.”

She stood behind Lin Lu and Yu Ming. The two teenagers hadn’t noticed her arrival as they were in the middle of a “5v5 fair competitive mobile game” match, and the battle was quite intense.

But after Lin Wanxing watched for a short while, the game characters in Lin Lu and Yu Ming’s hands both died, their screens turned black, and the crystal exploded. Accompanied by a resounding “defeat,” the boys looked dejected as they opened the settlement panel and began to curse their useless teammates.

Lin Wanxing noticed that Lin Lu seemed to have a plaster or bandage wrapped around his ankle, hidden in his sock, but she could see the thick layer bulging out.

Meanwhile, Lin Lu also noticed her.

“Teacher, you’re here?” Lin Lu quickly broke away from the phase of angrily greeting his teammates’ mothers, his eyes wide as he looked up.

“You came to train today, is your leg better?” Lin Wanxing sat down beside them on the ground.

“Much better! Just my mom who got scared to death. Did she go to school to find you?”

“Yes, she wants you to study hard and improve every day.” Lin Wanxing ruffled Lin Lu’s hair, not mentioning her promise to the parents to guide their studies. “We also held a general meeting. Did they convey the main spirit of our meeting to you?”

“They did, they did! It’s that we still have a match to play on Sunday!” Lin Lu said excitedly.

The evening breeze grew gentler. Around 5:30, the students gradually arrived at the field. They didn’t seem intent on training immediately; instead, everyone sat down on the grass. Some chatted idly, others played on their phones, and even Lin Lu and Yu Ming pulled Zheng Feiyang into another game.

Until Fu Xinshu arrived.

Little Fu came at the normal time after school was dismissed and teachers had finished their extended lectures.

The rest of the students were sitting scattered on the field’s grass, and Lin Wanxing smiled and waved at Fu Xinshu.

The slender silhouette of the youth was backlit by the setting sun, his expression solemn, and he definitely didn’t look happy.

Upon meeting, Fu Xinshu put down his backpack and said straightforwardly, “Let’s warm up first.”

Although his personality tended to be soft, he had leadership qualities when handling matters, so the small players who had been lazily lounging on the grass all stood up as if by prior agreement.

Lin Wanxing was sitting on the grass and was stared at by Fu Xinshu for a while, realizing she was in the way. She hugged her bag and walked toward the stands, where Wang Fa was already seated.

As the students warmed up under Fu Xinshu’s leadership, Lin Wanxing didn’t pay much attention to them.

The sunlight was fading but still clear enough. Lin Wanxing watched the students jogging around the plastic track while taking out their test papers from her bag and looking through them.

She had a total of 10 students’ unified test papers for this senior high school year, namely: Qin Ao, Lin Lu, Yu Ming, Fu Xinshu, Chen Jianghe, Zheng Feiyang, Feng Suo, Qi Liang, Zheng Ren, and Zhi Hui.

Chen Weidong was a temporary substitute they had found and was not on the official school soccer team roster, so Lin Wanxing didn’t have his test paper. Then there was one more student, if she remembered correctly, called Wen Chengye.

Thinking of how Little Wen’s mother had refused to let her son participate in soccer matches because he attended tutoring classes, and considering that his test paper wasn’t among those she had, perhaps “Wen Chengye” was aptly named—a good student with excellent grades?

Lin Wanxing sorted the students’ test papers by name, organizing them on her lap. She looked at the names, occasionally glancing up to see the students warming up. Today, 9 people had shown up, meaning only Zheng Ren and Zhi Hui, who never attended training, were missing—a fairly good attendance rate for the day.

The wind gently rustled the test papers. Lin Wanxing sensed someone’s gaze on the papers and looked over.

Wang Fa had his long legs crossed over the front row seat, wearing a baseball cap as usual. In the sunset, his pupils were very light in color, and his gaze at the test papers was quite calm.

Although Wang Fa hadn’t asked anything, Lin Wanxing started talking about the papers on her own: “They had their senior high school preliminary unified exam a couple of days ago, and today I was called in by their grade leader for a talk.”

Lin Wanxing happened to be looking at “Qin Ao’s” test paper, with “0 points” in the score column and two large “Absent” marks that looked quite alarming.

“Hmm.” Wang Fa responded, which was already considered a good attitude, indicating she should continue.

“The little bastards told their parents that they didn’t take the exam or did poorly because I called them to play soccer.” Lin Wanxing had intended to maintain the good demeanor of an educator, but when she saw the next paper—Lin Lu’s, covered with red “×” marks—she couldn’t help but grit her teeth.

Wang Fa was amused, his expression relaxed and playful: “Well, that is indeed your problem.”

“What the hell does it have to do with me!” Lin Wanxing patted the test papers, saying angrily, “I never told them what they should or shouldn’t do from beginning to end. I don’t force them to play soccer, nor do I educate them that they must train seriously to try to win the championship!”

“So, why don’t you tell them?”

Wang Fa’s tone was leisurely, landing in Lin Wanxing’s ears. She always had the illusion that he could see through her inner thoughts. But even she wasn’t clear what those inner thoughts were.

Lin Wanxing continued to look down at the test papers, not answering Wang Fa’s question. The vast stands were always quiet, with the sunset shining on her, casting the shadows of her hair strands onto the papers.

Fu Xinshu’s test paper was also among them, and this was probably the most serious one of all the test papers Lin Wanxing had received.

Whether it was the reading comprehension part of the Chinese language test, the composition in the English test, or the history answers, Fu Xinshu’s handwriting was neat, and he had filled in everything carefully. The only part not filled was mathematics, where apart from writing “solution” and one or two formulas, he couldn’t write anything else.

But even so, Fu Xinshu’s performance was still not satisfactory. “Not satisfactory” is a relative term, referring to the gap between the effort Fu Xinshu put into the exam and the actual results he obtained.

Lin Wanxing looked through them very slowly. Firstly, it had been many years since she had seen high school test papers, and the current approach to questions and testing points differed quite a bit from her time. Secondly, the test papers, whether done seriously or not, could to some extent reflect the student’s level of understanding of the knowledge.

Before she knew it, the light on the open-air stands had dimmed, and Lin Wanxing finally returned to awareness from the test papers.

The students had finished warming up and were probably coming to ask Wang Fa about today’s training method and goals. When they first came up, they were noisy, but after gathering around her, they all quieted down.

The tall figures surrounding her had a silent, oppressive feeling.

The test paper Lin Wanxing was currently looking at had changed to Chen Jianghe’s, English, 29 points.

The red characters were large and probably carried a strange meaning in the students’ eyes.

“What are you doing?” Chen Jianghe glanced at the test paper, his expression stern and his voice very unpleasant.

“Huh? I’m looking at your test papers from this exam.” Lin Wanxing answered naturally.

“I’m asking why you’re looking at them?” Chen Jianghe said.

“Because today I was called in for a talk by the grade leader, and the teacher gave me your papers.” Lin Wanxing placed her hand on the test papers and answered.

Hearing this response, the students were also stunned. Lin Wanxing hadn’t mentioned them lying to their parents, but the students may have associated it with the excuses they gave to their parents. Some averted their eyes, but most maintained a righteous and indifferent demeanor.

“Interesting?”

Lin Wanxing smiled instead: “It’s okay, anyway, I don’t have anything else to do now, so I’m taking some time to complete the work task assigned by the leadership.”

Lin Wanxing spoke as if it was natural, and the boys found it difficult to clearly express their true thoughts. So they could only stand there stubbornly. They didn’t want her to look at the papers, but they didn’t know how to respond to her question.

Qin Ao sneered: “I knew you had some ulterior motive, saying you don’t care about us on one hand, and wanting to look at our papers on the other. If you want to look, go back and look, don’t do it in front of us.” Qin Ao commanded in a cold tone.

The boy’s fist was slightly clenched, with a hint of blue veins.

Lin Wanxing knew they were very angry, and she also knew why they were angry.

But she said very calmly, “Look, since our principle is non-interference, I don’t manage you, and you can’t interfere with my work, right?”

The students were even more speechless.

They were at a standoff, with the students not dispersing and Lin Wanxing not willing to give in.

At this point, Wang Fa leaned back a bit in his chair. He slightly raised his head, his lazy gaze sweeping over the boys standing all around the stands, then turned to her and said: “That sentence just now sounded a bit familiar.”

Lin Wanxing was stunned for a moment, realizing he was referring to the content of “non-interference,” so she said: “I borrowed your words a bit, no copyright fee needed, right?”

“Oh, that’s not necessary.”

With Wang Fa’s interruption, Fu Xinshu immediately caught on. He quickly changed the subject, asking Wang Fa about training content and purposes, then pulled the students back to continue the same intra-team training as yesterday.

Although the boys were very reluctant, they followed Fu Xinshu’s words and jumped down from the stands in twos and threes.

Lin Wanxing watched their backs, then continued to look through the test papers.

In the wide old field with cold gray concrete stands, today’s training atmosphere was different from yesterday. Yesterday, the students were like puppies let out of their cages, running all over the place, enthusiastic and excited. But today, the atmosphere on the field has become somewhat depressing, with few sounds of passing the ball and running. Lin Wanxing could even hear the crisp sound of her turning off the test papers.

She was very clear about why the students had become depressed and unhappy, but she was not prepared to compromise on this matter.

So the next round of arguments erupted more than half an hour later, probably when physical energy reached a certain limit, and feelings of irritation and dissatisfaction accumulated together. It wasn’t clear who was the first to throw down the soccer ball and run up to the stands, but when Lin Wanxing looked up again, she was faced with the tense, angry, and irritated faces of the boys.

Lin Wanxing’s gaze swept over their faces, noticing that Fu Xinshu was also there, so while holding down the test papers, she asked him: “What’s wrong, any problems with the training?”

Hearing this, the students all looked toward Fu Xinshu, waiting for him to speak.

Fu Xinshu’s brows were slightly furrowed, but he still began as if he had made up his mind: “Teacher, could you, not look at our test papers right now, this is our training time.”

“Yes, it’s your training time, not mine.” Lin Wanxing responded very calmly.

“But you looking at our exam papers here is quite annoying.”

For a student like Fu Xinshu, using the words “quite annoying” probably already expressed strong emotions: “I know what you said, that looking at the papers is your work. But I want everyone to train well.” He said, “Sunday’s match is the most important thing.”

Fu Xinshu’s logic was simple: you looking at our test papers here makes everyone uncomfortable, so stop looking, because training is most important.

“Why do you care about me looking at your papers?”

“Just f***ing stop looking! Isn’t it annoying? If you want to aggravate us, just say so directly, is it necessary?” Qin Ao completely lost his temper and burst out.

Lin Wanxing was instead very patient: “Oh, it’s aggravating?”

This sentence probably sounded too sarcastic to the students, and they were completely angered.

Chen Jianghe turned and left.

Qin Ao angrily snatched his school uniform jacket that had been draped over the chair back and strode away, jumping directly down from the stands. The remaining students looked somewhat at a loss, with some quietly asking: “Not training anymore?” Qi Liang, that sinister little troublemaker, directly sneered and called out “Dismissed~~” and went to get his backpack.

With a “big brother” taking the lead, the students dispersed quickly, leaving only Lin Lu and Fu Xinshu in the end.

Lin Lu looked left and right, appearing cautious as he asked her.

“Aren’t you leaving?” Lin Wanxing smiled and asked.

Lin Lu poked at the papers resting on her leg and asked: “Teacher, can I take my test paper home?”

“What are you going to do with the paper at home?”

“Well… I…” Lin Lu stammered, unable to say anything. “Then I won’t take it.” Finally, he said as if having made up his mind, then ran off like a flash.

For students, training was originally something they came to do when the mood struck, so it was also normal to disperse when their mood was spoiled.

So the person left was only Fu Xinshu.

The actual training time, including warm-up, had lasted less than an hour.

Fu Xinshu’s face had a slight sheen of sweat, now being blown by the evening wind, making his complexion cold. The half-dry soccer jersey clung to his thin shoulder blades, making him appear particularly frail.

Fu Xinshu also didn’t speak, standing very rigidly in the wind, half-turned, looking in the direction where the other classmates had dispersed.

Lin Wanxing had no choice. She threw her bag that had been placed on the seat beside her to the ground, and patted the space, indicating for Fu Xinshu to sit beside her.

Little Fu turned his head, not understanding why the perfectly fine group training had ended in discord, and because he didn’t understand, he was unwilling to speak.

Lin Wanxing didn’t initiate a conversation with him. After Fu Xinshu sat down, she was still looking at those papers.

How to put it? Although these test papers were from the same exam, and many were directly given 0 points for absence, the students would actually occasionally write something seriously, though what they wrote might not be the correct answers, and very possibly they had only drawn a little turt…

“Teacher.” Fu Xinshu finally spoke.

Lin Wanxing gave a faint “hmm,” appreciating the turtle-drawing technique.

What followed was another awkward and long silence.

“It’s not that we don’t want to study well, it’s…” This sentence probably seemed problematic even to Fu Xinshu himself, so he couldn’t continue.

“Take your time, you can say whatever you want.” Lin Wanxing saw how difficult it was for him and turned to look into the student’s eyes. She picked up a half-drunk bottle of mineral water from the ground, opened the cap, took a sip, and said soothingly, “Don’t worry that I’ll be unhappy after hearing it.”

The daylight had changed from evening to night, and the occasional loud and soft croaking of frogs could be heard from a distance.

Fu Xinshu: “Teacher, many times, I don’t know what you want to do. You’re different, anyway, you’re different from many people I’ve met before.”

This might have been a compliment. Lin Wanxing looked at the student’s complex gaze and said, “Thank you.”

“Teacher, you always give us a lot of hope. The first time you came to find us, you said you wanted to organize everyone to participate in a soccer match. Don’t look at Qin Ao like that, he was very happy too. You know that feeling of having something to look forward to, right?”

Lin Wanxing nodded, in response.

“Then we won, I never thought we would win, we even have a chance for another match, everyone can still play soccer together, this is important! This Sunday’s match is really important!”

“I know,” Lin Wanxing said.

“Then why are you so indifferent, why do you act like you don’t care about us?” Fu Xinshu suddenly changed his tone and questioned, “You care about our grades, right? You told their parents you would guide us well, you even look at our papers, you care about us. But you just do this much!”

Fu Xinshu’s fist was half-clenched, pressed tightly on his leg, his head lowered, staring hard at the cement ground in front of him.

Lin Wanxing could probably feel the resentment in Fu Xinshu’s heart. This was difficult to express in words, like a drowning person suddenly encountering a floating boat, but the other person just stood on the boat watching you—it was probably this kind of feeling.

“Then what should I do?” She leaned back gently against the chair and asked the student.

“You know that Zhi Hui and Zheng Ren never come to training, you don’t ask, and you won’t actively help us call them to come together, you don’t even ever manage our training times. We’re quite chaotic, but we’ve tried hard too, so why do you still act like today?”

“Like what today? When you want to train seriously, I shouldn’t look at your test papers, spoil your good mood, make you irritated, or cause everyone to be unable to train well?” Lin Wanxing very calmly asked Fu Xinshu, “Why should I be responsible for your behavior?”

“Why can’t you be responsible for our behavior, why can’t you help us more?” By this point, Fu Xinshu’s voice already carried a crying tone. It was probably words he had held in his heart for a long time, finally revealed, and this sentence was loud and impactful.

But Lin Wanxing didn’t pat him or comfort him, she just waited until Fu Xinshu’s emotions were slightly calmer, then said: “I can help you, but the question is, what do you want?”