Yan Hao didn’t expect Zero to actually fall asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow, not even with her short hair still damp.
The same pinky promise, the same room—it made him recall the time back in eighth grade…
Back then, Zero couldn’t use spiritual power for some special reason, and Yan Hao rarely saw such obvious emotional turmoil in her.
Even when she’d been gravely injured or faced death, he’d never felt such intense agitation from the girl.
Perhaps the unknown was far more terrifying than death itself.
Though she put on a brave face, he could clearly sense her unusual caution.
He’d never seen Zero so lost and anxious.
At that time, he’d held out a half-clenched fist with his pinky finger curled toward her and said something he never wanted to think about again: “I won’t lie to you. Actually, you can try… to trust and rely on me a little.”
Just remembering that line made Yan Hao feel like a complete idiot back then.
Why did I even think I mattered?
What right did I have to ask someone to rely on me when I would just hide behind others at the first sign of danger?
Maybe the brain automatically forgets bad things—he couldn’t quite recall Zero’s expression then.
He only remembered that the look in her eyes seemed like she was also looking at a fool…
In the end, Zero naturally ignored his pinky promise, and he felt like a fool himself.
He just pretended it never happened.
Even though Yan Hao had embarrassed himself during the day, that night, trying to calm her down, he voluntarily activated his spiritual power to ensure their surroundings were safe so Zero could sleep peacefully.
But she still didn’t accept his kindness.
She just sat in the corner of the room on the bed.
Maybe using spiritual power was too exhausting—Yan Hao fell asleep in the middle of the night.
When he woke with a start in the morning and turned his head, Zero was still sitting there, glancing at him as he jolted awake.
This went on until the third night.
He made her watch two episodes of Boonie Bears with him.
In the peaceful atmosphere of the cartoon and under his relentless efforts, Zero finally fell asleep, exhausted.
But now, Zero just lay down and fell asleep like that.
Even in sleep, Yan Hao could sense the faint spiritual power inside her—so weak it was like all the items in this house that he’d marked with his spiritual energy imprint.
Yan Hao didn’t know what to do since he wasn’t sleepy.
He opened his phone and glanced at it.
Play games?
Or scroll through short videos?
He tapped into QQ, opened QQ Kan Dian, glanced at Zero sleeping on the bed beside him, and couldn’t be bothered to find earphones.
He just turned the volume to the lowest and started browsing posts.
Opening QQ Kan Dian, the first post’s title was still a classic—“He has Mark’s mobility, Mark’s true damage, and the crowd control Mark doesn’t have! Menglei says, ‘It’s simply unstoppable!’”
Yan Hao clicked in.
The answer in the post was “Mark with stun.”
Yan Hao almost couldn’t help laughing out loud.
This was why he loved reading these posts—he thought these people were hilarious, with their funny titles and funny content.
After scrolling for a while, he got really bored.
Drowsiness crept up on him.
He exited QQ and looked at the other entertainment apps on his phone: Honor of Kings, Hill Climb Racing, Terraria, Shuqi Novel, Hulu Xia…
After thinking it over, he checked the time—just past 1 AM—so he opened WeChat and started playing “Jump Jump.”
It was a wildly popular mini-game on WeChat that year.
You tap the screen to build up power, making the piece jump the right distance to land safely on the next platform.
Yan Hao didn’t have many WeChat friends—mostly relatives.
In the “Jump Jump” leaderboard, he was ranked second.
The number one had a lotus flower avatar with the username Huakai Fugui—it was Yan Hao’s aunt (Dayi).
Yan Hao was a loyal player of this game and knew a few special tips: stopping on a manhole cover earned five extra points, stopping on a gramophone earned thirty.
Seeing the small gap between him and his aunt, Yan Hao decided he’d take the top spot tonight.
After who knows how long, Yan Hao’s phone screen was still on the score summary page of “Jump Jump,” but he’d already fallen asleep leaning back in his chair, the phone still connected to the charger.
As Yan Hao drifted off, his spiritual power slowly faded.
Sensing the disappearance of the spiritual force surrounding her, Zero woke up.
She sat up on the bed, glanced at Yan Hao’s phone hanging precariously near the floor, and saw him slumped in the chair against the wall, head drooping almost to his chest.
A rare hint of amusement showed on her face.
It had been a long time since she’d slept soundly.
The last time she rested so peacefully was last year in this room, under almost the same circumstances.
At first, even with Yan Hao’s spiritual power active, she still couldn’t relax.
It wasn’t until she hadn’t slept for two days without any spiritual power running—and Yan Hao saw her just sitting there with nothing to do—that he inexplicably dragged her into watching a cartoon together.
Yan Hao was thoroughly absorbed, but Zero grew sleepier and sleepier.
Finally, amid the sounds of Guangtouqiang’s shouts and Yan Hao’s laughter from the show, she fell asleep.
She didn’t know how long she’d slept, but instead of sitting in the corner of the bed, she had somehow ended up lying down.
She struggled to activate her spiritual power a little and sensed Yan Hao’s energy.
He was leaning back in the chair with his charger and wired earphones, playing on his phone.
As if suddenly detecting Zero’s faint spiritual power, Yan Hao flinched, put down his phone, and walked over to check on her.
For some reason, sensing him approach, Zero instinctively closed her eyes—and unexpectedly fell asleep again.
When she woke up again, it was just after Yan Hao had fallen asleep in his chair, and his spiritual power was gradually fading.
Zero discovered that she had grown accustomed to his spiritual energy and could feel at ease within it.
So during that period, she had the most peaceful sleep in a long time.
Shaking herself out of her reverie, Zero adjusted her sitting position, spread out her own spiritual power, and began to activate it.
Slowly, the sun crawled up from behind the mountains, and the sky began to brighten…
“Yan Hao!!! Where are you?!”
The shout from Yan Hao’s mother shattered the dawn’s peace.
Zero glanced at Yan Hao, who was slumped lifelessly in the chair, completely unresponsive.
His phone had slipped from his hand and was dangling in the air, still attached to the charger.
Just as Zero was debating whether to go over and wake him up, footsteps came from the stairwell, heading upstairs.
Abandoning any thought of Yan Hao, she grabbed the blue Patrick Star slippers from the floor and teleported directly to the rooftop.
The roof was covered with tiles, thick with moss.
She didn’t have time to put on the slippers, so she stood barefoot on the moss-covered tiles, the slippers in her hand.
With a look of disgust, she dropped them onto the roof and put them on.
Only a few seconds had passed when some less-than-pleasant sounds came from the room below.
Then came footsteps leaving and a door closing.
After a while, Yan Hao’s spiritual power met hers on the first floor, and she returned to the room.
Yan Hao was now scrambling to wash up and get ready.
Last night—or rather, early this morning—after who knows how long of struggling, he still hadn’t surpassed his aunt in “Jump Jump.”
Instead, he’d accidentally fallen asleep.
Waking up to his mom’s face right in front of him had given him quite a scare.
He didn’t see Zero in the room, so he opened his spiritual power detection, sensed her energy, and then hurriedly started washing up and packing.
The high school was a fair distance from Yan Hao’s remote home.
Afraid of being late on the first day, he wolfed down a couple bites of breakfast, loaded his luggage into the car, and climbed in.
Soon after, Yan Hao’s father, who had finished breakfast, sat in the driver’s seat and drove Yan Hao toward the school.
Maybe because of what happened last night, the atmosphere in the car was still a bit awkward.
Neither father nor son spoke; they just quietly headed to their destination together.
Yan Hao opened his phone to check the group chat messages.
After the class division, the class group had been set up early, but almost no one talked in it.
It wasn’t until today, the first day of school, that messages started popping up.
“Has anyone found where the dorms are?”
“No, still on the way.”
“Is it okay to arrive a little late, Teacher?”
Yan Hao’s class name was 1807—Class 7, Grade 18.
Apparently, class division was based on grades.
There were seven classes total.
Class 1 had the batch with the highest admission scores, while the other classes were randomly assigned.
Except for English, Yan Hao’s junior high grades were pretty “balanced.”
His English was terrible—so bad it might even be worse than his Otherworld language.
His other subjects were passable.
But for some reason during the high school entrance exam, his English scored a passing C for admission, while his math, normally a B, and science composite only got a C.
So Yan Hao ended up at what locals called the “worst” public high school—Liuyang No. 13 Middle School.
After nearly an hour and a half of driving, Yan Hao finally arrived at the school gate.
The entrance was already packed with all kinds of cars.
Yan Hao’s father had to pull over to a spot far from the gate where parking was easier.
Seeing the car stop, Yan Hao got out, opened the trunk, and started pulling out his boxes, bucket, quilt, and other belongings, setting them on the ground.
He planned to make several trips to slowly move everything into the dorm.
Once Yan Hao had unloaded everything, his father, who hadn’t spoken the whole ride, finally said something.
No lengthy speech—he just handed Yan Hao a red hundred-yuan bill, told him to buy anything he was missing, and then drove off toward the factory.