On the first day back after the break, Jiangcheng University once again came alive with its familiar bustle.
Freshmen dragging suitcases out from beneath the dorm buildings, upperclassmen rushing to their early-morning classes, and students hurrying toward the lecture halls with books in their arms packed the campus paths until they were overflowing.
Su Bai drove his Mercedes-Benz GLE and dropped Chen Yusheng off near the teaching building.
As soon as the car came to a stop, Chen Yusheng unfastened her seat belt and turned to look at him.
“You’re sure you want to come with me?”
“We picked the exact same class schedule. If I don’t go with you, why did I go to all that trouble?”
Su Bai smiled and walked toward the teaching building beside her.
The classroom was considerably livelier than usual on the first day of the new semester.
Some students had returned from trips and were crowding around their classmates to show off photos. Others were frantically finishing their assignments while wailing in despair. A few had already begun discussing how difficult this semester’s courses would be, their expressions growing more pained by the second.
“I heard we have a ton of major courses this semester.”
“I looked at the schedule. I feel like my life is already over.”
“Who was the one who said college would be easy? Step forward. I promise I won’t beat you to death.”
Su Bai had just walked through the door when he heard Chu Mingzhe sighing dramatically from the back row.
“I was planning to read a few more books over the break and elevate my spiritual awareness.”
Wang Haoran sat beside him without even looking up. “And then?”
“Then I realized the fastest way to elevate my spiritual awareness was still playing video games.”
“That’s called slacking off.”
“What do you know? I’m balancing work and leisure.”
Su Bai walked over and pulled out a chair.
The moment Chu Mingzhe saw him, he immediately sat up straighter.
“Brother Bai, you’re finally here.”
“What, now that the break’s over, you suddenly realized how empty your spiritual world is without me in the dorm?”
“Not exactly.” Chu Mingzhe coughed. “It’s mainly that without you around, there’s no one for Xue Tao to argue with. He’s been so quiet that I’m starting to feel uncomfortable.”
“Bullshit.”
A voice came from the front row.
Su Bai looked up, and his steps paused for half a second.
Xue Tao was sitting by the window with a thick textbook in front of him. Several notebooks and sheets of scratch paper lay beside it. He had his head lowered, his brows tightly furrowed, and the pen in his hand was constantly scribbling down formulas. There was even a sticky note attached to the corner of his desk.
It read:
THIS SEMESTER, I’M GOING ALL OUT!
Su Bai exchanged a glance with Chen Yusheng.
Even Chen Yusheng’s usually cool, delicate face showed a hint of surprise.
“Seriously?” Su Bai walked over and tapped Xue Tao’s desk. “Young Master Xue, what happened to you?”
Xue Tao didn’t even look up. “Can’t you see I’m studying? Don’t interrupt a genius’s train of thought.”
Chu Mingzhe nearly sprayed the soy milk in his mouth.
“Genius?”
Wang Haoran also raised his head and adjusted his glasses. “Taozi, maybe you should turn the textbook the right way first. It’s upside down.”
Xue Tao froze.
He looked down, and his face immediately darkened.
It really was upside down.
“An oversight.” Xue Tao calmly turned the book around. “I was reviewing the table of contents just now. Who says a book has to be held upright to read?”
“Your mouth is still as hard as ever.”
Su Bai pulled out the empty chair beside Xue Tao and sat down, glancing over his notebook.
It was filled with densely packed notes. The handwriting wasn’t particularly attractive, but at least it was clear he had put in some real effort. More than half the iced Americano on the desk was gone, and several unfinished energy bars were stuffed inside the paper bag.
This honestly didn’t look like a temporary act.
“You’re really planning to study hard?”
“Obviously.” Xue Tao looked up, his expression more serious than it had ever been. “This semester, your buddy is going to turn over a new leaf and study hard.”
Chu Mingzhe raised an eyebrow. “You said the same thing last semester.”
“Last semester was different.”
“How was it different?”
Xue Tao set his pen down and let out a long sigh.
“My grades were terrible last semester not because I wasn’t capable, but because Liu Yuanyuan held me back.”
The classroom fell silent for a moment.
Su Bai almost lost his composure.
Sitting beside him, Chen Yusheng also blinked lightly when she heard that name.
Xue Tao had clearly been holding this in for a long time, and the more he talked, the more animated he became.
“Think about what I was like last semester. I had to go shopping with her during the day, coax her to sleep at night, and whenever I played games, she’d complain that I wasn’t spending time with her. If I took too long to reply to a message, she’d say I didn’t care about her.”
“During exam week, I had just opened my book when she called, crying and asking why I hadn’t posted her on my social media.”
“You tell me—how was I supposed to study in an environment like that?”
Chu Mingzhe thought for two seconds, then nodded. “That does sound pretty tragic.”
“Exactly!”
Xue Tao slapped the desk, his voice rising.
“It wasn’t that I was bad at studying. I was being held back by emotional baggage! I was dancing in shackles!”
Wang Haoran lowered his head and opened a bag of potato chips, muttering, “When you failed your classes last semester, I seem to remember you saying the questions were too unusual.”
Xue Tao immediately turned around. “That was one of the reasons.”
“What were the others?” Su Bai asked with a smile.
Xue Tao began counting on his fingers.
“The classroom air-conditioning was too cold. It affected my brain.”
“The dorm was too noisy. It made it impossible to focus.”
“And Chu Mingzhe kept posting depressing updates in the middle of the night. That affected my mood.”
Chu Mingzhe instantly protested. “What do my posts have to do with you failing?”
“Your writing was too emotionally powerful.”
“Thanks, I guess.”
Leaning back in his chair, Su Bai couldn’t help laughing as he watched Xue Tao earnestly shift the blame onto everyone else.
No matter what happened, that guy could always make himself sound like the victim.
Still, being willing to sit down and study seriously was a good thing.
“So how are you going to do better this semester?”
At the mention of this, a smug look immediately appeared on Xue Tao’s face.
“Because this semester is different.”
“I have a girlfriend now who doesn’t cause trouble.”
Chu Mingzhe blinked. “Huang Ran?”
“That’s right. Huang Ran.”
Xue Tao nodded, his tone filled with certainty.
“She’s considerate and mature. She never checks up on me, never starts arguments, and she doesn’t call at two in the morning to ask whether I love her.”
“She even told me yesterday to study hard this semester and try to pull my grades back up. Now that’s what I call a good woman who supports her man’s career.”
The corner of Wang Haoran’s mouth twitched, but in the end he managed to hold back his comment.
Chu Mingzhe looked at the textbook on Xue Tao’s desk, then at the confidence written all over his face.
“So how exactly are you planning to win?”
“How am I planning to win?”
Xue Tao peeled the sticky note off and stuck it back on, this time more neatly.
“Starting today, I won’t be late for early classes, I won’t skip major courses, I won’t put off my assignments, and I’ll be in bed before midnight.”
“What about video games?” Wang Haoran asked.
“I’ll play a little on the weekends.”
“What about bars?” Chu Mingzhe asked.
“I’ll see how things go.”
“What about dates?” Su Bai asked.
Xue Tao paused.
“Obviously I’ll still have to make time for those, but I’ll schedule them reasonably.”
Chu Mingzhe burst out laughing. “Your plan is already falling apart at the seams.”
“What the hell do you know?”
Xue Tao refused to back down.
“Don’t you understand the importance of balancing work and leisure? This is sustainable studying. Last semester, Liu Yuanyuan was the one dragging me down. This semester is different. With a girlfriend who doesn’t cause trouble, I’m definitely going to win big!”
He delivered the declaration with such force that even several students in the front row turned around to look at him.
Some were struggling not to laugh, while others perked up their ears to listen to the gossip.
Chen Yusheng pursed her lips and turned to ask Su Bai in a low voice, “Can he really hold out?”
“Hard to say.”
ive and Ruthless] Before his transmigration, Ye Xuan was playing a game called "Severing Emotions to Attain the Dao." The game's core wasn't about leveling up by fighting monsters, but about conquering various "bad women" with wicked personalities and cold, fickle natures. There was only one method to conquer them: stay unwaveringly by their side, then die at a critical moment, driving them to madness after losing the protagonist. The higher their level of regret, the higher the player's score. To dominate the server, Ye Xuan conquered all the bad women. In the early stages, he showered them with boundless tenderness, only to choose to sacrifice himself for them later, making them weep bitterly and drown in regret. Among them were: Xia Lengyue, the unfaithful immortal wife who chased after powerful men and discarded her husband like trash. Ye Qingcheng, the Demonic Venerable of the Joyous Union Sect, who appeared pure and innocent but was, in reality, promiscuous. Wu Lingxiao, the Empress of the Great Xia Dynasty, who lusted after men and loved maintaining a harem. Bai Qiangu of the Endless Demonic Sect: a bloodthirsty mass murderer. However, when the protagonist transmigrated into the game world, he made a horrifying discovery. Eight hundred years had already passed. The bad women he had conquered had now each become deities and revered ancestors. Faced with the endless stream of toxic women coming for him, Ye Xuan could only rely on his god-tier acting skills to carve a path of survival through this world of treacherous women.
e school belle recognized by the whole school, a genius girl from the kendo club. She also has a hidden identity, the youngest legendary demon hunter. Chen Shuo just transmigrated and found himself turned into a weak, helpless little vampire. He was caught by Su Xiyen and taken home at the very beginning. Since then, Chen Shuo's life creed only had two items. "First, classmate Su Xiyen is always right." "Second, if classmate Su Xiyen is wrong, please refer back to item one." Many years later, Chen Shuo, who had turned back into a human, led a pair of twins to appear in front of all the vampires to share the secret of how he turned back into a human. "It's simple, I tricked a female demon hunter into becoming my wife!"
ts me of treason?" "Correct. The host must return to the capital and gradually build up influence." "Wait—I have half a million soldiers, and you want me to go back to the capital to 'build influence'?" "Host, you are currently the Northern Garrison General, loyal to the Great Xia Dynasty." "Of course I am loyal to Great Xia! Absolutely loyal!" "But you keep referring to yourself as 'We'..." "Never mind the details! Summon all the regional commanders and military officers! We suspect treacherous officials are manipulating the court! They shall march with Us to the capital and purge the corrupt!" "......"
ut it can buy an entire year of absolutely perfect training results! Su Yu stared at his empty wallet and decisively opened up various online loan platforms. “Borrow a thousand bucks! Recharge my vitality!” Boom! His vitality broke a hundred points, shattering the limits of the human body! “Borrow ten thousand bucks! Recharge my combat skills!” Boom! A basic punching technique so common it was everywhere instantly maxed out, revealing the ultimate assassination technique of Five Elements Unity—Inner Force! When a rich kid hired assassins for a midnight ambush, aiming to break both of his legs, they instead ran headfirst into a monster—a human-shaped tyrannosaur, brimming with dragon-like vitality. With just two fingers, Su Yu snapped a steel staff reinforced with alloy. Staring at the killer’s stash of stolen cash—a staggering quarter-million dollars—he showed a corporate-sincere smile: “Thanks for the pre-exam gift pack, Mr. Zhao! I’m gonna go re-invest this!” Three days later, at the National Martial Arts College Entrance Exam, while everyone else struggled just to reach the passing line, Su Yu threw a single punch—and more than a thousand vitality points literally detonated the entire arena!
