Back to 17, My Brother is the Cult Leader

Huang Xiaoming lit another cigarette, put it in his mouth, and mumbled:

"By the way, school had already started while you were in the hospital."

"I know," Fang Yuan said. "I'll go to class tomorrow."

"You're really going?"

Huang Xiaoming glanced at him.

"Didn't you used to hate going to school the most?"

"I have to go, even if it's annoying," he said. "I can't stay here forever."

Huang Xiaoming looked at him without saying a word.

It was getting dark outside the window. The streetlights came on, and the orange light shone through the gaps in the curtains, casting a beam of light on the floor.

Fang Yuan leaned back on the sofa, staring blankly at the beam of light.

Let bygones be bygones.

Huang Xiaoming stubbed out his cigarette, lifted his leg, which was in a cast, off the coffee table, and stood up with the help of his crutches.

"I'm going back," he said. "Let me know when you go to class tomorrow; I'm getting bored being home alone."

"OK."

Huang Xiaoming hopped toward the door with his cane, and Fang Yuan opened the door for him.

Huang Xiaoming hopped into the corridor and glanced back at him.

"Xiao Yuan," he said.

"Um?"

"Let me know if you've decided what to do."

Fang Yuan leaned against the doorframe and smiled, "Fine. If there's really no other way, I'll stick with you from now on."

"I'll give you a powerful backer from now on, so you can cling to him."

Huang Xiaoming turned around, leaning on his crutch, and hopped into the opposite door.

Fang Yuan closed the door and stood in the corridor for a while, stunned.

The corridor lights were voice-activated; he stood there for a while without making a sound, and the lights went out.

In the darkness, only a thin, yellowish ray of light shone from under the crack of the opposite door, like a golden thread.

Fang Yuan stood there for a while, then stomped his foot, and the light came on again.

He turned and went back into the house.

Fang Yuan walked into the school gate with his schoolbag on his back. Looking at the students in their blue and white school uniforms, he felt a little dazed.

He studied here for three years in his previous life, and now he's back.

Qingdao No.1 Middle School has a small campus, the teaching buildings are a bit old, and the playground is paved with cinder tracks, which make it dusty when you run on it.

Fang Yuan's classroom is on the third floor of the teaching building, in Class 3 of the second year of high school.

After this semester, they will be seniors in high school.

When Fang Yuan entered the classroom, quite a few people had already arrived.

They chatted in twos and threes about their winter break; some were catching up on their homework, while others were copying it.

Fang Yuan walked to the last row and sat down by the window, putting his schoolbag away.

"Fang Yuan? Is your head better?" a voice came from the side.

Fang Yuan turned his head and saw his deskmate Liu Kai looking at him.

Liu Kai is tall and thin, wears glasses, is an above-average student, a nice person, but a bit of a chatterbox.

"Alright," Fang Yuan said.

"I heard you and Huang Xiaoming were hit by a car while riding bikes? Huang Xiaoming broke his leg?"

"A fracture, not a break."

"Oh, a fracture." Liu Kai nodded. "And your head? A concussion?"

"Mild concussion, nothing serious."

"That's good." Liu Kai leaned closer and said in a low voice.

"Let me tell you, our homeroom teacher said at the end of last semester that the seating arrangement would be rearranged this semester. I don't know if we'll still be able to sit together."

Fang Yuan smiled and said, "That depends on your grades."

"Your grades aren't even as good as mine," Liu Kai rolled his eyes.

The school bell rang.

The homeroom teacher, Jiang Shan, walked into the classroom. She was in her forties, taught Chinese, was tall and thin, wore glasses, and spoke slowly and deliberately, but every word she uttered was barbed.

"This semester is the second semester of the second year of high school."

Jiang Shan stood on the podium and glanced at the whole class.

"There's less than a year and a half until the college entrance exam. From now on, if anyone is still thinking about having fun, dating, or just wasting their time, I advise you to give up that idea as soon as possible."

The atmosphere in the classroom suddenly became tense.

"This semester we will rearrange the seating according to last semester's final grades."

Fang Yuan's heart sank.

Seating is arranged according to grades. He ranked 38th in the class at the end of last semester. Where can he sit?

It's probably in the corner of the last row against the wall.

Sure enough, after the seating arrangement was completed, Fang Yuan was moved to the last row, the seat closest to the wall.

Next to him was Chen Xia, a student whose grades were even worse than his; she basically slept through class.

Fang Yuan didn't say anything, picked up his backpack and moved to a different spot.

He doesn't blame Jiang Shan.

Seating is arranged according to grades; this is a school tradition.

If you want to sit in the front, you need to improve your grades yourself.

Complaining and blaming others is useless.

Class begins.

The first lesson was math, specifically about conic sections.

Fang Yuan opened his textbook and looked at the formulas for ellipses, hyperbolas, and parabolas, and his mind started to go blank again.

He was bad at math in his past life, and now, decades later, these things seem like gibberish to him.

But he gritted his teeth and listened, even if he didn't understand, and copied down every step the teacher wrote on the blackboard.

After one class, he had copied two full pages of papers.

Although he still didn't quite understand most of the content, he felt that he should be able to understand it after listening to it a few more times.

During break, Liu Kai ran over to him: "Fang Yuan, are you alright?"

"I'm fine, what's wrong?"

"Why aren't you sleeping in class?"

Fang Yuan paused for a moment, then laughed: "I don't want to sleep."

Liu Kai glanced at him, a little confused, but didn't ask any questions. He just said, "Good luck," and ran off.

Fang Yuan sat in his seat, opened the two pages he had just copied, and looked at them again.

I still don't understand.

He closed the notebook, leaned back in his chair, and looked out at the playground.

In late February in Qingdao, it was still a bit cold, and there weren't many people on the playground.

Several physical education students were running laps in shorts, panting heavily as they ran.

The last class in the afternoon is Chinese.

Jiang Shan stood on the podium and lectured on the classical Chinese text, "Zhu Zhiwu Retires the Qin Army".

Fang Yuan had studied this text in his previous life, but he had long forgotten it. Now, listening to Jiang Shan retell it was like hearing a completely new one.

"Zhu Zhiwu was never given an important position in his entire life. It wasn't until he was over seventy years old and the country was in trouble that people thought of using him."

Jiang Shan said, "You're only seventeen or eighteen years old now, you have plenty of time. But time is meant to be used, not wasted."

Fang Yuan felt that Jiang Shan was talking about him when he heard this.

Perhaps it wasn't meant to be directed at him, but those words certainly struck a nerve.

He wasted all his time in his past life.

I can't waste this life anymore.

However, he didn't find Chinese class difficult to understand, and it seemed like he could remember things after reading them only once.

That's good news.

Fang Yuan was least worried about English and Chinese, after all, he had spent more than ten years in his previous life dealing with articles and English, and translation and adaptation were his main tasks.

Familiarize yourself with the course, and I believe you'll achieve good results.

When school was over, Fang Yuan called out to Chen Xia.

"What?" Chen Xia asked arrogantly.

Fang Yuan paused, unsure how to begin.

The two didn't interact much in their previous lives. It seems that Chen Xia didn't take the college entrance exam, and her parents divorced in the second semester of her senior year of high school.

She went abroad with her mother and did very well there. Once when she returned to China, she even asked around about him.

The two only had contact during the first semester of their senior year of high school.

He hesitated for a moment before finally speaking, "Chen Xia, how...how's your family been lately?"

Chen Xia paused for a moment, her eyes flashing slightly, then sneered, "What's it to you?"

Fang Yuan didn't back down, and lowered his voice: "If you need help, you can ask me."

She froze, her gaze lingering on his face for a few seconds before she suddenly turned away, saying, "Mind your own business."

She didn't say anything more, she just pulled her backpack strap up a little.

"Are you just going to give up on your studies like this?"

"Holy crap, Fang Yuan, did you break your head?"

Chen Xia looked at him in surprise.

"Did the sun rise in the west? Are your grades better than mine?"

"I'm going to study hard, and you shouldn't give up on me!"

In his previous life, Fang Yuan's first reaction to difficulties was to give up.

For some reason, his first reaction in this life became "give it a try".

Perhaps it's because I had too few chances to try in my past life.

Perhaps it's because he already knows what giving up feels like.

"You must have lost your mind. Let's talk after you surpass me."

Chen Xia curled her lip in disdain.