I turned reality into a romantic comedy.

This week was their turn to be on duty. The duty rosters in their class rotate every week, and the rosters are divided into groups of eight according to the seating order. So Lin Mu, who was two rows away from Chen Junqian, was assigned to a group with him as he wished, and they could spend some time alone together while cleaning the area they were responsible for cleaning.

After quickly cleaning the area, the two of them took brooms and dustpans and went to sit down and rest in the nearby corridor.

I don’t know if every middle school has a corridor like this, with flowers and plants wrapped around the top and sides. The corridor in the junior high school section of Ningzhong is mostly purple in color, just like the modern prose called “Wisteria Waterfall” that they will study in their Chinese textbook.

However, the two of them wouldn't do the three-part process of appreciating, remembering, and understanding flowers as described in the teacher's slides. They came here simply because there was a place to sit and the scenery was nice. After all, Mu Mu wasn't someone who would really consider these things. All sorts of scenery had already become various images in her eyes. She was a literary girl who always got full marks in reading comprehension in Chinese.

"I bought Wen Yun's book, and I didn't expect that she was using her real name as a pen name."

Lin Mu, who possesses the talent of being able to dangle her feet in the air and swing her legs easily while sitting on most chairs, was also there carefree today, swinging her legs back and forth while chewing on the hamburger candy that Chen Junqian fed her today, and taking the initiative to talk to him about Zhu Wenyun.

Unlike Xu Youwei, who follows every issue, Lin Mu hadn't paid attention to Zhu Wenyun's serialized work before. Now that a combined edition had been released, he simply bought it, but it seems he hasn't read much of it yet.

"Although the book is titled something like 'ripe plums will be bitter, and unrequited love will be sour if it lasts too long,' when I read the content, it's clearly still about childhood sweethearts."

"The title is probably ironic, since the conditions are things like being too familiar and having been together for too long, so theoretically, as long as it doesn't drag on for that long, it should be fine."

Lin Mu, however, showed a disapproving expression towards Chen Junqian's explanation:

"But doing it like that wouldn't be considered childhood sweethearts, and overripe fruit doesn't necessarily taste bitter or sour; it just falls naturally from the tree, like the walnuts in our mountains."

"Hmm... I think it's better for Mumu to read the whole thing before asking the author. Anyway, Yun comes over every night now."

"Indeed, I'll read the book first, but could you give me a sneak peek, Qianqian?"

As he spoke, Lin Mu's expression shifted between nervousness and anticipation:

"So, in the end...did the childhood sweethearts end up together in the book?"

----------------------------------

"They'll definitely end up together. I feel like if I were to have a dramatic, sentimental outburst and write a story about a couple missing each other and regretting it for life, I'd probably get a lot of flak from readers, let alone publish it as a whole."

Sitting in the literary club's activity room, facing Lin Mu, who had spent an entire day of her spare time rushing to read the entire novel and immediately came over to have a long discussion about childhood sweethearts, Zhu Wenyun also unusually opened up and started talking.

After all, no author would refuse an invitation from readers to discuss the plot, especially since the one who came to the door was Lin Mu, whom Zhu Wenyun always regarded as her biggest enemy and who best represented the identity of her childhood sweetheart. It was a good opportunity to use this opportunity to test the other party's thoughts.

"Yes, yes, but that part in the middle was really scary. Suddenly a girl appeared and started spouting nonsense. She had only known the male lead for a few days, yet she dared to say things like, 'If they really liked each other, they should have been together a long time ago.' Being able to say something like that shows that she doesn't understand childhood sweethearts at all, because childhood sweethearts are supposed to be together all the time."

"Heh, so from the beginning, she was deliberately designed as a stepping stone for the two to take their relationship to the next level. Rather than saying that this is the meaning of the existence of such a character who falls from the sky."

Xu Youwei had also read the novel written by Zhu Wenyun, and she had been following the serialization since the first installment, so she quickly joined the discussion as well:

"I think Wenyun should have a side story or an epilogue later, like the topic of your last essay contest, 'Returning to her hometown after twenty years,' so that she can see the wedding scene and tell her how cheap the other person's feelings were back then, hmph."

It has to be said that the lively atmosphere of these three girls criticizing the newcomer character is even more intense than the first National Childhood Sweethearts Alliance Ceremony when Shen Nianqiu arrived. This is also one of the reasons why Zhu Wenyun is particularly concerned about when Shen Nianqiu and Chen Junqian reached their intimate relationship, to the point that she even wants to secretly log into the other party's QQ account to check the chat history.

Because if the other party really did arrive even earlier than them, then Shen Nianqiu could turn around and say, "You are the ones who are the ones who have fallen from the sky and the challengers."

Of course, even if that time comes, they can at least come up with some stubborn arguments like "childhood sweethearts definitely have to be together in real life to count" or "what kind of childhood sweetheart relationship is it?" to defend themselves, and who knows, they might even start another discussion about the true childhood sweetheart archetype.

After the three girls, still full of enthusiasm, elevated the "childhood sweetheart" archetype to its pinnacle, adopting an air of certainty that if the childhood sweetheart theme didn't ultimately succeed, it must have been orchestrated by capital or the author's intervention, everyone turned to look at the male protagonist himself, who was tidying up the bookshelves on the other side of the classroom.

"Finished talking?"

Noticing that the noise in the classroom had suddenly subsided, Chen Junqian, who had almost completely reorganized the bookshelf, came over and sat down. He picked up a bag of puffed snacks from the coffee table next to him, tore open the packaging, poured a bite into his mouth, and crunched away.

What is Qianqian thinking?

Sure enough, after the woman reached an agreement, the focus of the problem was once again shifted to Chen Junqian.

"What do you mean, what are you thinking? Childhood sweethearts? Yun asked me this question when she was writing this book, and of course I'm supportive. Childhood sweethearts should be together, and true love will prevail in the end—"

Chen Junqian himself felt no psychological burden at all about saying such things. After all, the girls around him were all his childhood sweethearts. They had known each other since elementary school at the latest. By the timeline moved to high school, where most romantic comedies take place, everyone could say something about how they had been together since childhood.

Ultimately, if we really followed the system's strictest, most traditional childhood sweetheart standard, Mu Mu would be eliminated along with them. After all, she and Chen Junqian had never been neighbors, and they were the kind of neighbors who were separated by only a crack, and could shout and chat across each other's rooms just by opening their windows.

After stating his position, Chen Junqian immediately changed the subject. After being reborn for so long, he had come to understand more and more that the identity of the male protagonist in a romantic comedy is essentially no different from that of a scumbag in reality. And being a scumbag means trying to control the words and actions in every moment of the relationship.

While romantic comedies often feature male protagonists who are so oblivious they seem like wooden blocks, with events and girls constantly approaching them just by standing there, doing so in reality would only lead to certain doom, especially after realizing that more than half of the girls around him have difficult personalities.

Without exaggeration, Chen Junqian had no doubt that if he couldn't take the initiative to manage the relationship at all times, what awaited him would definitely not be a romantic comedy, but a real-life hellish situation, not to mention that there was Cheng Ge as a bloody example to follow.

"Now that the literature club's work on the surface is all done, our club's real activities can officially begin. Everyone should be free this Sunday, right?"

After receiving affirmative answers from everyone, Minister Chen Junqian clapped his hands in satisfaction:

"Okay, let's meet at my house this Sunday. If things go smoothly, our club's first long joke can be officially released this week. If the response is good, everyone can also get an advertising fee."

"Advertising fees?"

"Yes, because this joke will be sponsored by the Three Fierce Xus."

Upon hearing this name, both Xu Youwei and Zhu Wenyun instinctively looked up at Lin Mu beside them.

The former subconsciously recalled the conversation the other person had made about squirrels and trees atop Jingting Mountain around this time last year.

The latter, however, requires even more thought.

She is currently just a rising author who has just published her first book, but Three Fierce Xu has already swept through the entire nut market with unparalleled speed and is moving towards the even larger snack market.

This is why Zhu Wenyun found it troublesome.

She absolutely refused to believe that the relationship between Chen Junqian and Lin Mu would be like that of childhood sweethearts in most stories, ending in separation for various reasons.

Because by then, if any one of them walks into any snack shop along the road, they will immediately see the two squirrels standing together on the packaging. Those two squirrels were designed based on the two children when they were first created.

Memories always need a carrier, which could be a thing, a landscape, or a smell. When you come into contact with them again, it's like unlocking a safe with a combination lock, and all those memories come rushing out all at once.

After all, human thought and memory will eventually be overwhelmed by the torrent of time, which is why we need to solidify the most irreplaceable memories into reefs and build castles. These are landmarks that are even more conspicuous than those diaries, and even indelible.

But... it belongs only to the two of them.

Chapter Thirty-Three: She Became Shy (Part Two)

There will be an open class session this Thursday.

Unlike the typical open classes in elementary school where students sat in the back row listening to other teachers, the open classes at Guoning Middle School always have a sense of adapting to new situations, embracing new technologies, expanding new changes, implementing new curriculum standards, and empowering new classrooms. They seem to be innovating for the sake of innovation, in order to prove that current educational forms and methodologies are also keeping pace with the times and striving to cultivate good students of the new era.

In this situation, the classroom location is naturally not the usual classroom. After all, the filming effect is not good, and the older generation of teachers here are not used to using electronic technology such as whiteboards for teaching. They tend to continue writing on the blackboard while writing. Therefore, the open class will be held in a classroom specifically for open classes.

Ningzhong has several classrooms specifically prepared for open classes. Chen Junqian's literary society activity room was originally used for this purpose, so it is also equipped with the most advanced projection equipment and network system. It can be considered as his preparation in advance for Gu Lingguo, who will be enrolling in school.

Besides needing to use electronic courseware and whiteboard projectors as much as possible to prove that they are not conservative, rigid, or unchanging, the classroom format also has a performance-like requirement. In the words of Chen Junqian's English teacher, who was the subject of this open class, it is to stimulate students' enthusiasm and interaction in class, so as to make the new classroom format closer to the university campus.

For Chen Junqian, who actually attended university, all he wanted to say was that if it were really like a university, the classroom scene would probably be even more chaotic. He had heard his close teachers complain about the atmosphere in university classrooms more than once during his university years. It was even worse than in high school, with the upper-class teachers talking while the lower-class students played games.

However, Lin Mu, who doesn't think about these things at all, still likes this kind of open class. Just like the computer class in elementary school, after arriving at the new classroom, she doesn't force each student to sit in the same fixed seat as before. On the contrary, the teacher even encourages familiar students to sit together, because there will be a serious group discussion in class.

To be honest, this is another word that gives Chen Junqian a bit of a headache.

With her textbooks and stationery in hand, Mu Mu was different from elementary school this time. There was no other girl sitting on the other side of the computer class, so she had complete privacy. Even on the way there, she seemed to be skipping and jumping, as if she was going on a spring or autumn outing rather than attending a public class.

"Qianqian, should we sit in the front, the middle, or the back?"

"Where would Mu Mu like to sit?"

"Hmm... The first part feels too close to the teacher, the middle part makes it easy to be called on to answer questions, and the last part is too close to the teachers who come to observe the class. If I really have to choose, I feel the first part is better. Besides, the whiteboard will definitely be used more today, so I won't get too much chalk dust."

Lin Mu, who has always sat in the front row and has plenty of experience in consuming chalk dust, is probably the student who supports whiteboard teaching the most. He quickly picked out seats for the two of them and pulled Chen Junqian to sit in a seat near the front after entering the classroom.

As the preparatory bell rang, a group of new teachers carrying lecture notes and lesson plans poured in through the back door of the classroom. The photography equipment was also set up at the same time. With such a scene, even the students who were originally excited about the new classroom and environment began to feel a little nervous, and they sat there upright, not daring to move.

As the school bell rang, the English teacher walked into the classroom with a smile on her face. After the class monitor, Lu Cheng, called out "Stand up," both the teacher and students bowed to each other in the most standard manner since they enrolled last year, before the lesson officially began.

To be honest, Chen Junqian always felt that their English teacher, surnamed Zhou, was very competent and capable in teaching. It is rare to find a teacher who is willing to spend all his after-school time having students memorize texts and pass tests one by one. So, although the students in their class were tormented for almost a year, their academic progress was obvious. Even Mu Mu, who was always bad at English, was helped to improve, although she soon became bad at biology and geography again.

After a peaceful ten-minute lesson, the performance segment, unique to open classes, began. It was just like a scene from a "Fruit Ninja Mecha Combination" movie. At the English teacher's command, the students, who were originally seated separately, had to assemble themselves and then engage in a tense and exciting classroom discussion in the form of classroom groups, focusing on the question she had just raised.

Watching Mu Mu excitedly approach him, eager to openly engage in a classroom chat he'd never had before, Chen Junqian suddenly understood why his childhood sweetheart had placed their seats in the front. After all, the teachers in the back couldn't hear what they were saying, and the English teacher in front of them kept her hands clasped in front of her chest, displaying a business-like fake smile the entire time.

However, to Chen Junqian's surprise, Lin Mu actually came over this time to seriously discuss the question raised by the English teacher earlier, and even asked him for a couple of appropriate answers, practicing his spoken English quietly.

In response to Chen Junqian's doubts, Mu Mu whispered something in his ear:

"Actually, Qianqian, let me tell you, the most awkward situation in this kind of open class is when the discussion session ends and the teacher asks everyone to answer, but no one raises their hand. Then she can only repeat it twice and finally has to call on people. I think Teacher Zhou is very good, so if it turns out like this, at least the two of us should support her. After all, it's an open class and there are cameras filming it."

Hmm, very good. Now, little Mumu, have you ever thought that the whole scene of you whispering and muttering these things in my ear right now has also been filmed?

Well, if there weren't actual cameras rolling and it wasn't a real public lecture, Chen Junqian would have really wanted to reach out and rub Mu Mu's head. After forcibly suppressing the urge, he nodded in agreement.

"Alright, discussion time is over."

The English teacher, estimating that the time was almost up, clapped her hands, and the students in the classroom, who had been rustling and seemingly discussing something, fell silent again.

Sure enough, when the English teacher smiled and asked the students about the discussion results and the answer to the question she had just asked, everyone fell into an awkward silence. For a moment, only the teacher's kind voice could be heard in the classroom. It felt like the classroom was about to turn into a preschool teacher's mode, like coaxing kindergarten children with phrases like "It's okay if you answered wrong" and "It's brave of you to raise your hand."

Realizing this, along with Lu Cheng, the oldest and strongest class monitor who never steals the spotlight but also never embarrasses the teacher, Chen Junqian and Lin Mu also raised their hands, making three more people in the classroom willing to answer questions.

In theory, the most stable course of action for an English teacher who already knows each student's situation and grades would be to choose Chen Junqian, then Lu Cheng, and finally the little idiot, since it's a public lesson where mistakes are unlikely.

But it can only be said that Lin Mu is usually the one the English teacher likes to call on the most in class. In a sense, the two of them are like Zhou Yu and Huang Gai, who are willing to hit and willing to be hit. Suddenly, there is an interactive mode where you dare to ask me a question and I dare to raise your hand.

This time, however, she didn't need to urge Lin Mu's answer with "loudly, loudly, I can't hear you" like she did in class. This wasn't because she remembered that it was the open class session, but because Lin Mu standing in front of her was indeed showing his best side.

If there really were such a concept as God in the real world, Chen Junqian would still be willing to vote for 'Mu Mu in public'. Unlike Zhu Wenyun, who is a perfectionist who gets stuck on details, she has always subconsciously held herself to high standards. This is due to her excellent upbringing and her own personality. In fact, she has quite the noble demeanor of a rich young lady, which is common in romantic comedies. She would never disgrace her family's traditions.

...No, how come my way of thinking is starting to become this strange?

Starting from this point, for most of the class that followed, Lin Mu acted as if he had been pre-arranged as a classroom assistant or a shill. He perfectly executed all sorts of interactions with the English teacher. In the situational dialogues they had together, and the classroom mini-drama segment unique to open classes, he even brought up his childhood friend. He was completely in a state of full-on energy, so much so that he was still a little reluctant to leave after the bell rang.

"This is really interesting, an open class."

Walking back to the classroom, Lin Mu couldn't help but sigh again, looking quite happy.

"Mu Mu did a great job."

"It's probably because Qianqian is next to her. But they were only deskmates for one class. I can probably understand why Weiwei's grades improved when she and Qianqian were deskmates before."

Lin Mu asked Chen Junqian to hold his stationery and textbooks for a moment, then stretched lazily in the outdoor sunlight, a very satisfied expression on his face.

"I need to do better in my exams this semester. Next year I'll have to take extra physics and chemistry courses, which I've heard are very difficult subjects. So I need to improve my current poor biology and geography first."

"Yes, I believe Mumu can do it."

The two barely exchanged a few words when Lin Mu was quickly called away by the English teacher. Two minutes later, she returned with bright, sparkling eyes, proudly displaying her clasped hands to Chen Junqian, revealing what was inside:

"Ta-da! Teacher Zhou just gave this to me."

"Lollipop?"

Although this wasn't the first time Chen Junqian had freeloaded off his teacher, not every student had the audacity and courage to do so. Lin Mu, on the other hand, was clearly receiving a gift from a teacher for the first time, so she was overjoyed and even took the initiative to introduce it to him:

"This isn't an ordinary lollipop; it's a starry sky lollipop, it's really pretty."

As she spoke, she reached out and unwrapped one of the lollipops, revealing a dreamlike star pattern inside. The one in Lin Mu's hand was Saturn with its huge rings, which twinkled beautifully in the sunlight.

"Teacher Zhou asked me to give this to you, Qianqian. Why don't you open it and take a look?"