Jiang Yi looked at the three people opposite with resentment and couldn’t help but point at them with her fingers, extremely annoyed: “Alright, you all bully me; join forces to bully me.”

As a young girl, when faced with a situation she couldn’t argue her way out of, she unexpectedly used her unruly tactics to the fullest.

Ji Ran quietly watched and suddenly approached slowly, frightening Jiang Yi, who couldn’t help but step back.

Until Ji Ran gently extended a finger, pressing it lightly against her chest: “Dealing with you, no need to team up; I alone am enough.”

Ji Ran is usually gentle and quiet, almost invisible at home. On the other hand, Jiang Yi always puts on airs with a hot temper. To the point that other family members feel that this young lady might be overly soft in character?

The results were clear to the two maids today.

She wasn’t soft in character at all; she was just exceptionally well-mannered. She usually didn’t want to argue with people like Jiang Yi. When she really got angry, her imposing manner was quite frightening.

Ji Ran said coldly, “Aunt Zhao, Aunt Qian, even if you are live-in maids, there are rules regarding working hours. If anyone forces you to do unreasonable things beyond the time limit, you don’t need to pay attention. If anyone dares to force you, you can come to me.”

In fact, the two maids didn’t mind making supper at night. After all, the pay they received for working in the Ji family was much higher than outside.

It’s just that Jiang Yi knew there was no swift nest, yet she made a fuss about wanting to eat it now, clearly making things difficult for others.

The two maids looked at each other and immediately said in unison, “Understood, Miss.”

Listening to the maids, Jiang Yi’s eyes turned red with anger. However, in the end, she just glared at Ji Ran. Before her mother left, she said she would seize the opportunity this time.

Her mother would definitely have a child with the Ji surname.

By then, Ji Ran would never dare to be so arrogant in front of her.

So Jiang Yi turned around in frustration, forgetting about supper; she was too angry.

Soon, the day before the exam arrived. In order to increase students’ attention to this exam, all exam rooms were set up according to the standards of the college entrance examination, with thirty students in each room.

As a result, each class had many extra desks.

Mr. Qiao stood at the front door and shouted, “This time, the tables from the first and second groups need to be moved upstairs.”

Below, there were sighs and complaints.

Many girls began to complain, “Teacher, the tables are so heavy, and you want us to carry them upstairs. We can’t handle it.”

“At this time, boys, show your gentlemanly spirit and lend a hand,” Mr.Qiao appealed again.

However, for boys of this age, not to mention gentlemanly spirits, even refraining from snatching the last portion of sweet and sour pork in the cafeteria from girls was impossible.

Complaints aside, when it came time to move the tables, everyone still managed on their own.

Ji Ran and Shen Zhi were seated by the window, exactly in the area where tables needed to be moved. Wen Qianxia, who was sitting in front of Ji Ran, turned her head and said, “Ranran, let’s lift the table together later; it’ll be easier that way.”

Ji Ran nodded. “Sure.”

She cleared all her books from the desk, and when she finished organizing, Shen Zhi lazily stood up beside her.

Xia Jiangming and the others shouted, “Zhi-Ge, are you going to the playground to play ball?”

Xia Jiangming and the others belonged to the bottom of the class, the type that relied on last-minute cramming before exams. It was impossible for them to make a significant improvement of three to four hundred points.

It was better to take advantage of everyone organizing the exam hall to sweat it out.

“I’m not going,” Shen Zhi said lazily.

Xia Jiangming wondered, “Zhi-Ge, why not?”

Shen Zhi glanced at him with the look one would give to an idiot. “Didn’t you hear the teacher say that the tables from groups one and two need to be moved upstairs?”

Xia Jiangming thought it was nothing important and said, “Just find someone to move it for you.”

Did Zhi-Ge need to personally handle such a trivial matter?

However, Shen Zhi gave him a cold look. Xu Yihang laughed on the side and quickly pulled him towards the door. “Alright, just shut up.”

Xia Jiangming was puzzled. “What did I do?”

But soon his voice disappeared at the staircase.

Ji Ran stood up, ready to call Wen Qianxia to lift the table together, when a hand pressed on her desk and a low voice said, “Alright, I’ll handle it.”

She looked up at Shen Zhi, her sparkling black eyes filled with confusion.

Shen Zhi chuckled at the suspicion in her eyes and said softly, “Can’t I show some gentlemanly spirit?”

When he stood on this side of the aisle, about to lift the table and leave, he couldn’t help but lower his head and say softly, “Just moving a table, I really won’t eat you.”

The surrounding classmates were busy either moving tables or carrying their textbooks to the teacher’s office. After all, with so many books, no one wanted to bring them home.

No one noticed the fleeting embarrassment on Ji Ran’s face.

She watched as Shen Zhi, effortlessly carrying the table, left. She gritted her teeth slightly; she really found this person annoying.

After Shen Zhi moved Ji Ran’s table upstairs and then moved his own, he turned his head to look at the tables piled up everywhere. Since everything had been moved, most tables looked the same.

It wasn’t until Shen Zhi saw someone writing their name on a table that he looked around. A guy walked in, holding a marker. When he bent down to write his name on his table, he realized that someone in the classroom was staring at him.

The guy was almost scared out of his wits because he recognized Shen Zhi.

Shen Zhi nodded at him and pointed to the pen in his hand. “Can I borrow this pen for a moment?”

The senior wanted to borrow a pen from him?

The guy looked down at the marker in his hand, was stunned for a moment, and quickly nodded. “Sure, use it, use it.”

After Shen Zhi got the pen, the guy left without looking back.

Shen Zhi didn’t pay much attention and turned to look at the two tables side by side. When he started writing, the pen paused on the surface. After finishing writing on the table, he admired it for a while, holding the marker.

In theory, it would be enough to write their respective names on each table, but he wrote the characters “Shen” and “Ji” separately on his table and Ji Ran’s table.

Ji Ran’s name was then written side by side with Shen Zhi’s underneath, each name on a separate table.

In the end, Shen Zhi’s table had the characters “Shen” and “Ji,” while Ji Ran’s table had “Zhi” and “Ran.”

Shen Zhi smiled—not bad; it looked quite like a couple’s names.

During exams, everyone was relatively relaxed. Even the discipline director, who usually enforces the dress code, seems to avoid addressing it these days, fearing it might affect the students’ focus.

As a result, many, especially girls, spared no effort to showcase themselves.

The day before, Wen Qianxia had asked Ji Ran to wear a skirt together, as she didn’t dare to do it alone. After all, in high school, people were still quite conservative. Ji Ran originally didn’t want to wear one, but she couldn’t resist Wen Qianxia’s persuasive voice.

In the morning, Ji Ran chose a white T-shirt and a red plaid pleated skirt. After some thought, she also took out a pair of white knee-high socks.

When she came downstairs, Aunt Zhao was preparing breakfast for her. Seeing her outfit, Aunt Zhao immediately smiled and said, “Miss looks so pretty in this.”

It was a particularly youthful and lively look, making her seem very girlish.

Aunt Zhao usually saw her in the school uniform, blue and white clothes, which could be a bit monotonous.

“You should wear like this more often,” Aunt Zhao said. Since the day Ji Ran stood up for Aunt Zhao and the others, they thought highly of her, even though she was a bit too quiet and didn’t talk much.

So now, they occasionally engage in small talk with Ji Ran.

Ji Ran smiled and said, “Today is the exam, and the teachers won’t care if we wear our own clothes.”

“I see,” Aunt Zhao said regretfully.

After finishing breakfast, Ji Ran took the bus from her doorstep to school. When she got off and entered the school gate, many students on their way to school couldn’t help but look back at her.

Some recognized her as the school flower of 4th Middle School, Ji Ran, who had recently gained the approval of everyone.

Since Ji Ran arrived early, she went straight to the last exam room. The distribution of exam rooms in 4th middle school was the same as in other schools, divided according to grades. The first exam room naturally consisted of the top-performing students in the grade, from the first to the thirtieth.

The last exam room, on the other hand, was for students at the bottom of the grade.

As Ji Ran had just transferred, she didn’t have grades from the previous semester, so she was assigned the last number.

And coincidentally, the person sitting behind her happened to be her deskmate, Shen Zhi.

The school had organized everything neatly; each desk had the basic information of the examinee posted. When Ji Ran received her exam room information yesterday, she casually glanced at her deskmate, only to discover that he was very similar to her in both exam room and seat number.

When she confirmed from Wen Qianxia’s words that Shen Zhi had indeed ranked last in the entire grade last semester, she couldn’t help but take a deep breath.

Although Shen Zhi had fought, raced, and skipped class before, Ji Ran always thought he might be a hidden academic achiever. After all, in their previous lives, someone working in investment banking couldn’t possibly have had terrible grades.

Investment banking was a gathering place for the elite, where even throwing a brick might hit someone from Tsinghua, two from Peking University, and another from Harvard.

Moreover, in her previous life, she had seen Shen Zhi’s educational background; he had a dual degree from Tsinghua and Princeton.

In other words, he did his undergraduate studies in China and then went to the United States to further his education at Princeton.

Ji Ran pressed her forehead; could it be that her rebirth had caused such a significant butterfly effect, turning Shen Zhi from an unparalleled academic overachiever into an underachiever?

Oh, that was truly embarrassing.

When Wen Qianxia came to school, she went straight to the last exam room to find Ji Ran. She was wearing a red T-shirt and denim overalls, showing off her beautiful and slender legs, making her look effortlessly stylish.

Initially, Wen Qianxia thought she looked pretty good today, with an increased number of glances from passersby.

When she arrived at the back entrance of the last exam room and saw Ji Ran already seated, her eyes lit up.

She knew Ji Ran was naturally beautiful, but usually she saw her in a plain school uniform. Even at the birthday banquet, Ji Ran had only worn jeans and a T-shirt.

Wen Qianxia stared at Ji Ran’s pleated skirt and knee-high socks, nearly going crazy. “Ranran, your outfit is so beautiful, like those pretty girls in Japanese magazines. My goodness, why are your legs so slim and so fair?”

Hearing her exclamation, Ji Ran quickly pressed her index finger against her lips.

Although most people in the last exam room hadn’t arrived yet, there were a few, and Wen Qianxia’s loud voice made others feel awkward.

Wen Qianxia giggled, covering her mouth.

After a while, as the exam time approached, Wen Qianxia went to her own exam room first. Her grades were average in the class, so her exam room was in the middle.

As the exam drew near, the classroom became more lively.

However, few people took advantage of these last few minutes to study. Instead, there were often strange conversations heard.

“Bro, how’s your math? My Chinese is okay; I got over eighty last time. How about I copy my Chinese for you, and you copy your math for me?”

“No way, my math is really bad; I barely got over fifty last time.”

“Hey, buddy, during the English exam, remember to put your answer sheet to the side.”

“Oh, the girl sitting at the back is Ji Ran. I thought the photos on the forum were photoshopped, but she’s really beautiful in person.”

“You think she’s pretty? How about asking for her number after the exam?”

“Damn, you think I won’t dare?”

Ji Ran looked at her Chinese textbook in front of her. Honestly, even though she was a top student in her previous life, she hadn’t really studied in this life. Even if she used to get perfect scores in math, now she has forgotten many basic formulas.

As she was contemplating how many points she might score this time, there was a moment of tranquility in the classroom.

Ji Ran turned her head and saw Shen Zhi entering the room. He was wearing a black hoodie and blue jeans. Perhaps it was because black made people look fairer that Ji Ran felt that his face seemed to have that kind of pale, never-seen-the-sun complexion. The denim-clad long legs were straight and slender. When he walked in, there was a dazzling feeling.

The talking in the entire classroom suddenly lowered a few decibels, and everyone involuntarily looked at him. Clearly, Shen Zhi was used to this kind of attention. There was no expression on his face, but when he met Ji Ran’s gaze, he showed a casual smile.

However, the next second, he walked to the desk behind Ji Ran. He didn’t sit down immediately, but he lowered his head to take a look at the girl sitting in front of him.

When he entered just now, he saw her, feeling that something was different.

Until he walked up and saw Ji Ran in a pleated skirt and white knee-high socks, her calves were exceptionally slender, especially appearing more delicate with these socks on.

Shen Zhi endured for a moment and finally sat down.

Although Ji Ran was the last number in the exam room, due to the staggered arrangement of exam numbers, she ended up sitting in front of Shen Zhi.

With a few minutes left before the exam started, they could even see the corridor of the rear teaching building from the window, where invigilators were walking towards the classrooms with exam papers.

Ji Ran lowered her head to close her book, preparing to place it at the front of the classroom, when suddenly her chair was kicked from behind.

Initially, Ji Ran didn’t want to turn around and bother with him.

But the next second, Shen Zhi kicked her chair again.

So, Ji Ran turned around and stared at him directly, somewhat annoyed. “What’s up?”

Was he going to follow suit and let his exam paper rest to the side like those people?

Unexpectedly, Shen Zhi looked at her quietly, opened his mouth, and with a voice that still carried a bit of the hoarseness of not having fully awakened, he said, “Hey, why are you dressed like this?”

Ji Ran couldn’t help but be stunned. How was she dressed?

It wasn’t until Shen Zhi stared at her intently, his black eyes as deep and inky as ever, that he spoke in a low voice, “Like this, it will affect my exam.”