Even without Jin Qiang coming to find her, Jiang Mu couldn’t have stayed at Jin Chao’s place forever. First, because of the awkward relationship between her and Jin Chao, and second, because it troubled San Lai—though San Lai didn’t seem bothered and was quite enthusiastic toward her. Still, she felt guilty about making them start early and work late because of her presence.

Although she had moved her things back to Jin Qiang’s house, she still frequently visited the repair shop after school and on weekends. As Jin Chao had said, this was her second home, so she came and went freely.

Perhaps because her previous home had only her and her mother, with Jiang Yinghan busy at the lottery shop, she was often alone. This might explain why she so enjoyed the lively environment of the repair shop. Even when they were all busy and no one paid attention to her, just sitting in the break room and watching their busy or chatting figures through the glass gave her an inexplicable sense of stability.

Compared to Jin Qiang’s house, she felt safer studying here. She didn’t have to worry about Zhao Meijuan hovering outside her door, or Jin Xin suddenly barging in or running around with her test papers.

Although after returning to Jin Qiang’s house, Zhao Meijuan had tried to talk to her, Jiang Mu couldn’t be so magnanimous. Jin Xin’s situation made her feel sorry for the little girl, and while she felt less resentment about Zhao Meijuan’s hasty accusations that day, a barrier had formed. So except for sleeping at Jin Qiang’s house, she avoided spending time with them whenever possible.

When Jin Chao returned from his “business trip,” Jiang Mu noticed that the thing covered by the large tarpaulin was back. Once when she curiously wanted to check the shed again, she found the door from the repair area to the shed locked. She noticed several times that this door was usually locked during the day, so she had to let her curiosity go.

Though she claimed to come to the repair shop to study, showing an attitude of humble learning and willingness to ask questions, San Lai said she came following the smell, knowing they had good food there.

San Lai wasn’t wrong. Whenever she came over, the shop would have extra dishes, and these men didn’t skimp on food at all.

Ever since Jiang Mu snagged some beef nuggets from San Lai that day, she’d become addicted to beef jerky. When staying up late to solve problems, she’d pop one in her mouth, finding it more flavorful the more she chewed. Unfortunately, beef prices kept rising, and a small package cost over two hundred yuan, lasting only two days. She lamented that she needed to study hard to earn money and achieve “beef jerky freedom” in the future.

Her dream made Iron Rooster, San Lai, and the others laugh for days. After all, among their group, only San Lai and Jin Chao had attended regular high school, and even then, one hadn’t gone to university, while the other had only spent two and a half years at a third-rate technical college. Now that they finally had a promising seedling, hoping Jiang Mu would get into a prestigious university and bring them some glory, her goal turned out to be beef jerky.

When Jin Chao returned from the auto parts city, the men were still joking about this, continuously praising how promising his sister was. Jin Chao just smiled silently with his head down. Soon he walked to the break room door, leaned against the frame, and asked, “Is your chosen major heading in the direction of beef jerky? I don’t think you should focus on physics; maybe consider biology instead.”

He then took out a large bag of beef jerky from behind his back, placed it on her desk, and left. Jiang Mu stared at her source of happiness in surprise and called out to Jin Chao through the glass: “My real goal would shock you to death, so I won’t tell you. The beef jerky is just a smokescreen. While Xiao Yang and the others think I’m planning to open a beef jerky store, I’ll become the boss of the livestock industry, managing thousands of cattle and sheep. I’ll remember the kindness of this bag of beef jerky then.”

Jin Chao, searching for parts with hidden amusement in his eyes, asked: “How will you repay it? Make me a farm manager?”

“Hmm, I’ll consider it.”

Jin Chao looked up at her: “Did you figure out yesterday’s problem?”

Jiang Mu quickly lowered her head again. Shandie, wagging its tail, ran out of the break room and circled Jin Chao. Speaking of this black dog, it was strange—when the people from Wan Ji Auto Repair came to make trouble earlier, the guy with the crew cut had pointed at the fierce-looking Shandie and cursed, “Who are you trying to imitate, a Labrador?”

Whether it was this comment that motivated it or not, after more than a month, Shandie truly started looking more and more like a Labrador—broad forehead, ears hanging on both sides. Perhaps because it traveled daily between the pet shop and repair shop, scamming food from both places, its diet was exceptionally good. Compared to its siblings, Shandie had grown a full size larger, and when it sat there with its glossy black coat, it exuded an air of cool aloofness.

Although Shandie shuttled between the pet shop and repair shop daily, it knew clearly where its home was, usually returning straight to the repair shop after conning some freeze-dried snacks from San Lai.

The mystery of Shandie’s father had been solved through Shandie itself. San Lai suspected it was the Labrador from above the bun shop. That Labrador’s owner would occasionally travel for business and board the dog at San Lai’s shop. San Lai’s boarding business charged by the day, and he usually kept large dogs in separate cages, letting them out for walks at feeding time.

He never imagined that dog would manage to mate with his Shih Tzu right under his nose. Because of this, San Lai especially took Shandie to the bun shop upstairs for family recognition. The Labrador’s owner kept apologizing for his dog’s romantic indiscretion and promised to welcome Shandie for father-son reunions anytime.

Thus, Shandie gained another place to scam food besides the pet shop and repair shop, becoming the most carefree dog in the Tongren area, bar none. Whenever Jiang Mu came from school or Jin Qiang’s house, she could see its flaunting figure on the street before even entering the repair shop. The surrounding Poodles, Schnauzers, and Corgis were all mesmerized by its majestic presence whenever they passed the repair shop, barking at it and attempting to forcibly court the underage Shandie.

Jin Chao seemed to disapprove of its overly flamboyant dog life, maintaining a cool attitude toward Shandie. But dogs, as creatures, seemed to have a special sensitivity to human auras. For instance, Shandie sometimes treated San Lai with indifference, sometimes with excessive enthusiasm, jumping on him with dirty paws. With Jiang Mu, it was always quiet and gentle, perhaps aware that her small frame couldn’t handle its increasingly robust body. No matter how excited Shandie got around Jiang Mu, it would never jump on her, at most rubbing against her legs begging for pets and hugs.

Only with Jin Chao did it show absolute submission. The innate instinct in animals naturally made them defer to stronger beings.

Shandie clearly understood the importance of pleasing Jin Chao, so even though Jiang Mu treated it well, whenever Jin Chao approached, it would eagerly run to fawn over him.

Jiang Mu often saw Jin Chao smoking at the shop entrance with Shandie sitting straight beside him, never lounging around as it did with her. Jin Chao’s cold demeanor, combined with Shandie’s increasingly majestic appearance, created such a harmonious scene that Jiang Mu couldn’t help taking a photo and setting it as her phone wallpaper.

Jin Chao was very busy, not always at the shop, and even when he was, he had too much work to attend to Jiang Mu. So he never actually agreed to tutor her.

However, sometimes when Jiang Mu didn’t understand something, she would ask him. After this happened several times, seeing her struggle made him anxious, so he found time to go through her books again and showed her how to solve problems.

After a few days of this pattern, Jin Chao had almost mastered Jiang Mu’s weak points. He occasionally gave her problems to solve, and after several rounds, Jiang Mu noticed that the problems he chose were very targeted.

Though he was busy, even when Jiang Mu finished the problems, he might not have time to explain them. Sometimes when she came to the repair shop, she would find extensive notes beside the problems he had given her last time, including proof processes, analysis, and clear references to which laws and formulas from which textbook pages applied. Jiang Mu would then slowly work through these notes on her own.

Finally, one Sunday afternoon, Jin Chao handed his work over to Xiao Yang and the others, and after lunch, pulled up a chair to systematically help her fill in the gaps. He planned to spend the afternoon helping her understand the problems. If Jiang Mu could absorb it, he wouldn’t mind teaching her differential equations, definite integrals, limits, series, double integrals, and even triple integrals when he had time. If she couldn’t absorb it, he suggested she abandon her so-called shocking goal and change direction early to avoid wasting time.

However, Jiang Mu was puzzled by something else: “Since you could self-study university courses, why didn’t you get a degree?”

Jin Chao kept his eyes lowered, simply pointing at the paper with his pen, his tone indifferent: “Every stage has its tasks. Your task at this stage is the college entrance exam. For me, there were always more urgent matters.”

Jiang Mu rested her chin on her hand and asked, “What were they?” Car repair?

Jin Chao raised his eyes and gave her a meaningful look: “If you think chatting with me will make your science scores take a qualitative leap, I can chat with you for three days and three nights.”

“…” Jiang Mu obediently lowered her head to work on the problems.

As she solved each problem, Jin Chao would help her organize concepts and key points related to that type. Half-correct answers were fine, but the real challenge came with problems she couldn’t solve at all. With Jin Chao sitting across from her watching her pen, Jiang Mu felt immense pressure, and all formulas became blank in her mind.

Especially when she looked up and saw Jin Chao’s indescribable expression, Jiang Mu began to doubt herself. She thought Jin Chao would start looking down on her, but he didn’t say anything. Instead, he moved his chair next to her and slowly guided her through the solution step by step.

Fortunately, it didn’t take long for Jiang Mu to get back into problem-solving mode. Perhaps worried about putting pressure on her, when she worked on problems later, Jin Chao would look at his phone instead of watching her, simply waiting to check her work when she finished.

Jiang Mu’s foundation wasn’t too bad, and she was quite quick-witted. After doing similar problems Jin Chao explained in different variations two or three times, and she mastered them.

After several hours, Jiang Mu finally understood the source of Jin Chao’s talent. He had a precise way of expressing many abstract concepts. For instance, concepts like sequence limits and inverse sine functions, which Jiang Mu had spent considerable time trying to grasp, Jin Chao could directly explain with proofs to strengthen her understanding and application. The dry text and ethereal symbols she had struggled with in her previous learning became concrete through Jin Chao’s explanation. Compared to her school teachers’ orthodox methods, Jin Chao’s approach was much more straightforward, but it worked very well for Jiang Mu.

In just a few short hours, Jiang Mu could express previously obscure concepts in mathematical language and symbols, establishing initial connections in her conceptual network—a level she had never reached in her previous studies.

The biggest difference in their problem-solving styles was that he would skip complicated processes and strike directly at the core, while Jiang Mu often needed rounds of brute-force calculations, leaving her constantly trapped in endless practice problems and frustrated by time constraints.

For the same problem, if she needed ten lines to find the answer, Jin Chao could do it in five, or even less than half the work.

It was like they were both climbing a mountain—Jin Chao could identify all possible paths and the peak’s coordinates before even starting, simply choosing the shortest route to the destination, while Jiang Mu was like an ox pulling a cart, laboriously exploring each path.

Not even two hours had passed, and Jiang Mu was ready to surrender. She felt their thought patterns were on completely different levels.

Jin Chao sensed this too, but he wasn’t impatient. He maintained a steady pace and neutral expression.

He could judge how much she understood from her facial expressions, and if she showed any confusion, he would immediately switch to a different approach until she grasped it.

Though Jiang Mu had to admit the afternoon was quite productive, Jin Chao’s low, magnetic voice surrounding her had a hypnotic effect. By just past five o’clock, she was resting her chin on her hand, staring at his moving jaw, following the rhythm of his speech, his profile stretched impeccably. In her hazy consciousness, she kept wondering: after she went to university, would they ever interact again?

Jin Chao noticed her distraction, and when he turned to look at her, he saw her eyelashes trembling, her eyelids fighting to stay open. He softly asked, “Is there something on my face?”

Perhaps because she was too tired, Jiang Mu’s expression was somewhat dazed, her soft face looking pitiful when sleepy. She blinked and asked, “Can I sleep for ten minutes?”

Jin Chao chuckled lightly and didn’t stop her, so Jiang Mu lay down. Jin Chao pulled out a piece of paper to note down her remaining problems, afraid he might forget.

Jiang Mu fell asleep quickly, seemingly twitching once. Jin Chao watched her—she was curled up in a small ball, quiet and docile with her eyes closed.

Five minutes later, perhaps because her arm had gone numb, she moved her head to rest directly on Jin Chao’s arm. He paused and looked up to see San Lai standing in the repair area saying, “Look what you’ve done to the kid.”

Jin Chao made a shushing gesture and was about to gently pull his arm away when Jiang Mu furrowed her brow and made whimpering sounds.

He looked helplessly at San Lai, who shrugged to indicate he couldn’t help.

So when Jiang Mu woke up, she found that Jin Chao’s right arm had been hanging down the whole time, and he was eating with his left hand. She asked concernedly, “What’s wrong with your right hand?”

Jin Chao lifted his deep gaze to stare at her, saying nothing.

After Jin Chao’s guidance, Jiang Mu’s most noticeable change was in her thinking pattern. She gained a new understanding of many abstract concepts, could apply them more naturally, and no longer feared large calculations.

During that period, Jin Chao was like a god in her heart. No matter how difficult the problems she gave him, even if he couldn’t provide perfect solutions that day, he would always explain the problem-solving approach in a way she could understand by the next day.

Jin Chao awakened her unprecedented enthusiasm for mathematics, physics, and chemistry, giving her momentum toward her goal.

Until one day in late October, when someone unexpectedly came to the repair shop.