When Xu Sui had just started university, social media apps like WeChat had only recently become widespread. It was in October of that year that Xu Sui formally intersected with Zhou Jingze.

In early October, the autumn heat hadn’t dissipated yet. Hot air churned, the atmosphere was sticky, and if people stood outside for a little too long, sweat from their elbows would drip to the ground and quickly melt and evaporate.

After ending military training, this batch of medical students officially entered university life. Originally, anatomy was a course for the second semester of freshman year, but their professor went against convention and had them learn this course early.

Today was only their second anatomy class, and the professor had already assigned them homework – in group collaboration form, dissect frogs and record neural responses.

Novices getting started, the laboratory was in complete chaos.

“Damn, sister, hold it down!” a male student said irritably, “Don’t let it run away again.”

“Wu wu wu wu, no, I can’t, I’m scared just looking at it.” The female student’s voice trembled.

The two were collaborating, but the girl didn’t dare reach out to touch it. She accidentally bumped the frog, and this green creature directly peed all over the male student.

The air went still, then burst into laughter. The male student at the adjacent lab table was laughing so hard his shoulders were shaking: “Bro, what an opening!”

The experiment failed multiple times. Students from other groups were even more dramatic – they hadn’t even touched the frog yet, just seeing its appearance sent them to the bathroom to vomit several times.

On the other side, several people surrounded a female student, watching her dissection experiment. The girl had a slender figure with her hair tied back, revealing a section of fair neck. She wore a white lab coat, and under her protective goggles was a pair of calm, clean eyes.

She fearlessly grabbed the frog, fixed it in place, took a steel needle in her hand and pierced it through the back of its head without fear, directly extracting the mashed contents, then severing the spine. With her other hand, she used scissors to cut open the neck, used forceps to clamp its tongue, and observed.

The entire process was smooth and flowing, her movements clean and skilled. Small applause rang out around her. A male student praised: “Impressive, Xu Sui. Looking at your appearance, I thought you’d be the well-behaved type who wouldn’t dare do much. Who knew that when it comes to dissection, you’d be so bold and efficient.”

A girl nearby was so amazed her mouth hung open: “Xu Sui, you’re amazing! Aren’t you scared?”

Xu Sui’s jet-black eyelashes lowered, rippling into a shallow arc as she smiled calmly: “Not scared.”

“Your operation just now was so beautiful, could you teach me?” The girl speaking was called Liang Shuang, Xu Sui’s classmate.

“Sure.” Xu Sui nodded.

Under Xu Sui’s guidance, Liang Shuang grasped the key points. Having finally overcome her psychological barrier, she held the large steel needle and was about to pierce the frog’s brain.

Then the ceiling shook slightly, followed by a considerable airplane roar, a buzzing sound that continued endlessly. Liang Shuang was startled, her steel needle went off target, directly piercing the frog’s thigh, and blood spurted out.

Failed again.

Liang Shuang was furious and began complaining: “I really don’t understand why the principal who originally built this medical university chose to relocate the campus next to an aerospace university, just separated by a street. Those pilots practice at the airfield, noisy morning and night, it’s really annoying.”

Hearing Liang Shuang’s complaint, a girl teased: “Hey, Liang Shuang, I remember when you first came, didn’t you say you wanted to find a pilot boyfriend? How did you change your mind so quickly?”

Hearing the words “pilot,” Xu Sui’s heart tightened, then she returned to the lab table as if nothing happened to observe the data.

Liang Shuang replied: “That’s two different things. I just haven’t found one yet.”

Xu Sui returned to the lab table to continue the experiment. Her group partner was a girl named Bai Yuyue, who throughout the entire process, except for passing tweezers, steel needles and other tools, made no contribution to their group assignment.

Because Bai Yuyue looked at her phone every few minutes, her mind wasn’t on dissection at all. Suddenly, her phone lying nearby made a “ding” message sound. Bai Yuyue opened it and revealed a sweet smile.

Xu Sui was bent over observing the frog’s brain neural response on the computer when Bai Yuyue called to her: “Xu Sui, I have something to take care of and need to step out. Can you help me finish the rest? Help me do it together.”

Meaning she would do the assignment alone, but the final completion would have both their names.

Xu Sui saw that the experiment was mostly complete and nodded without much emotion. She didn’t really care about this kind of thing, because she was lazy about confrontation.

Bai Yuyue left happily. Since Xu Sui was alone, completing the experiment naturally took longer than usual. When she finished, she discovered Liang Shuang was still waiting for her.

“You haven’t left yet?” Xu Sui took off her disposable gloves.

“Of course I’m waiting for you.” Liang Shuang pinched her face – tsk, the texture was quite nice.

After Xu Sui changed clothes, Liang Shuang dragged her running wildly down the stairs, muttering non-stop: “Hurry up, my braised pork ribs with potatoes will be gone.”

In the first dining hall, the two finally got their food and sat down. A bespectacled male student approached with his tray, hesitantly asking if he could sit with them.

Xu Sui, with her innocent-looking face, mercilessly rejected his request.

Liang Shuang sat across from her, appraising Xu Sui – palm-sized face, fair with a hint of pink, bright almond eyes, two dimples when she smiled, hair properly tied back with disobedient bangs falling down.

Typical southern features, looking fresh and lovely from every angle.

Liang Shuang took a bite of pork ribs and sighed: “Tsk tsk, how many is that this month? Sui Sui, do you know our department forum is holding a department beauty vote, and you’re on the candidate list.”

Xu Sui didn’t show much reaction to this. She inserted a straw into her milk box and said with puffed cheeks: “But I was really ordinary in high school.”

The kind of existence that would be buried in a crowd.

If Liang Shuang had seen her high school photos, she wouldn’t have said such things. During high school, due to frequent illness and long-term Chinese medicine consumption, she was bloated, her complexion too pale, constantly wearing monotonous oversized school uniforms – a very ordinary girl.

Fortunately, after her health improved, she lost twenty pounds when she started university. Combined with her fair skin and delicate, refined features, she seemed to have truly transformed, and everyone’s attention to her increased.

It was indeed because university was really different from high school – diverse aesthetics here accepted people of every different personality type, which is why she gained attention.

“Hey, who wasn’t disheveled in high school? It was all for studying,” Liang Shuang put a piece of meat in her bowl and asked, “But I’ve seen you reject several guys. What type do you actually like?”

Xu Sui bit her straw without moving, a playboy’s face appearing in her mind, which she quickly suppressed, shaking her head: “I don’t know either.”

“No worries, there’s still time,” Liang Shuang poked at her vegetables with chopsticks. After a while, she reacted, realizing she had gotten spinach, and said with a bitter face, “Damn, I can’t do this anymore. Now whenever I see anything green, I want to vomit. It’s too disgusting.”

“I’ll help you eat it, I’m not afraid.” Xu Sui smiled and transferred the spinach to her own bowl.

At five PM, Xu Sui stood on the rooftop of the school’s political science building, letting the wind blow. The evening breeze made her test papers spread on the railing flutter like white doves ready to take flight.

Xu Sui plugged earphones into her phone and stood on the rooftop doing listening comprehension exercises. Hardly anyone came here – it was quiet with good scenery. She often came here; it was a good place to relax.

When tired from studying, Xu Sui would lean her elbow on the papers and gaze into the distance to rest her eyes. At these times, she would consistently look in one direction – the school’s northeast corner, pointing directly at Jingbei Aerospace University’s playground.

There, students from the flight academy practiced day after day. From the rooftop, she could only see a sea of green with masses of heads below.

She couldn’t see anything clearly, nor did she know what she was expecting.

Xu Sui was spacing out when her phone vibrated – a call from her mother. Xu Sui answered, and her mother inquired about her studies and life, then shifted the topic to weather.

“Frost’s Descent is coming soon. After Frost’s Descent passes, the weather will turn cold. Remember to buy another comforter.” Her mother nagged.

Xu Sui laughed, her tone light: “Mom, we’re nowhere near that yet. It’s still very hot here. Besides, it’s not like I haven’t lived in the north before.”

Hearing this, her mother sighed. Xu Sui had grown up in a single-parent family in the south, in a small town called Liying in Jiangzhe. Her mother was an ordinary middle school Chinese teacher. When Xu Sui was in high school, worried that the teaching resources in small places weren’t good enough, she planned to send her away to study.

It happened that Xu Sui’s uncle was doing business in Jingbei City and suggested she come study there. For her child’s education, her mother gritted her teeth and sent her over.

Xu Sui transferred to Tianhua First Middle School in the second semester of her sophomore year and stayed in the north for two and a half years.

When it came time to fill out college applications, her mother had discussed with Xu Sui that she could pick any southern university. Who knew she was determined to apply to this medical university in Jingbei.

Thinking of this, her mother complained softly: “You’re in university now and still so far from me, with no one to take care of you. You get cold hands and feet in winter and can’t stand the cold. I really don’t know why you insist on going there.”

Xu Sui could only change the subject, coaxing her mother with a few words before finally hanging up.

Standing on the rooftop in a daze, Xu Sui couldn’t help asking herself: why did she insist on coming here?

She must have gone crazy.

While spacing out, she suddenly heard a seductive moan from a nearby corner, tinged with coquettish meaning. Xu Sui looked toward the source of the sound.

Two people stood against the wall at the corner – a tall girl with seductive looks pressed against him in an ambiguous posture, while the boy leaned against the wall with loose-fitting clothes.

Xu Sui was separated from them by an abandoned iron frame covered in mottled red rust. Through the small frame, her line of sight gradually narrowed, but their actions became more obvious.

The boy didn’t move much, but the girl pressed very close, her fingers unconsciously moving downward, hooking onto the waistband of the boy’s black pants with obvious suggestive meaning.

When she wanted to go further, the boy easily clamped her knuckles with his hand, preventing her from moving, looking at her with an ambiguous smile.

The girl’s face heated up under his gaze, so she took the opportunity to confess: “I really like you so much.”

The boy showed no reaction to this, lazy in his bones, accompanied by a low chuckle: “How much do you like me?”

After speaking, the boy’s slender fingers played with the red bow at her chest, his clean fingertips touching an inch of skin, teasing but not undoing it, full of controlling meaning. The girl’s chest gradually rose and fell unsteadily as she began to pant.

Hidden expectations surged in her heart. She looked up to meet the boy’s teasing gaze, her face flushed red, and simply buried her entire face in his broad chest, saying in a sweet voice: “You’re so annoying.”

The wind stopped. The evening’s fiery clouds were intense and bright. Xu Sui felt somewhat scorched – hot, stuffy, she could hardly stay any longer.

Fish-scale orange clouds moved across the sky, and the light became clear at this moment. The boy suddenly turned his head and looked over. Their gazes collided in mid-air.

The boy’s hair was extremely short, revealing dark stubble. His eyelid creases were shallow, pupils jet-black and careless. His jawline was smoothly curved, and his slightly raised prominent Adam’s apple rolled slowly up and down.

His eyes rested on her without emotion.

A fierce evening wind passed through, pouring into her throat, making it too dry to speak a word. Xu Sui fled in panic. The conversation between the girl and boy drifted to her ears on the wind, very clearly.

She heard Bai Yuyue ask softly: “What are you spacing out about? Did you see someone you know?”

The boy’s voice was ice-cold, nearly metallic in texture, as three words rolled from his throat: “Don’t know them.”