During the freshers’ military training at Nanfeng Drama Academy, the student union always organized water distribution.
Soon, senior students arrived at their class’s formation with a stack of bottled water.
Everyone stood up, thanked them, and took water, except for Jiang Xiao, who remained seated.
“Student, here’s some water.”
The vice president thoughtfully handed him a bottle.
“Someone is buying it for me.”
Jiang Xiao replied concisely.
The vice president paused, then simply said, “Okay,” and walked back with the water. Nearby, a cute girl with a bob haircut and pink-dyed hair, furtively glanced at him twice.
Then she twisted a bottle cap, pretending she couldn’t open it, and put on a troubled expression.
She stood up from the grass, walked in small steps to Jiang Xiao, tilted her head, and said softly, “Jiang Xiao, could you please help me open this?”
Jiang Xiao looked up at the sound.
Under his gaze, the girl gradually blushed from her neck to her entire face, and this flush quickly deepened from light red, becoming like a ripe little tomato.
The girl’s eyes were hopeful, but he quietly withdrew his gaze.
Lin An and Xie Zhuran, who were beside him, immediately saw through his thoughts: “Oh no, this kid looks like he doesn’t want to help!”
The other students in the class, however, were watching the show, cheering loudly.
“Can’t she really open it? I think Xu Tongtong’s intentions are obvious to everyone.”
“Oh oh oh, look at that red face!”
“A cute one and a cool one, isn’t that a good match?”
“You came all the way to find Jiang Xiao with so many people between you, do you need to be so obvious? Oh, what a sour smell!”
Instructor Bian Lianhai maintained a stern face, seeing through it but not saying anything.
The instructor from the adjacent formation walked over to him, jokingly fanning the flames, “What’s wrong, young man? The girl came to you for help herself, don’t be shy, go help her!”
“Go on, get out of here, this is none of your business. Take care of your own people!”
Bian Lianhai waved his hand dismissively at the other instructor.
Lin An calmly adjusted his glasses, turning to try and find any shyness on Jiang Xiao’s face.
As expected, he found none at all.
His expression hadn’t changed, had it?
Not far away, Song Qiuyu, who was returning with two bottles of mineral water, had witnessed everything.
The situation was too troublesome.
Jiang Xiao being popular was both a good thing and a bad thing.
If it were her in middle school, she probably would have thoughtlessly joined in the teasing.
Thinking this, had she really, in the past, knowingly teased Jiang Xiao when he was flirting with her female character online?
She swallowed, clutched the mineral water bottles tightly, and quickly walked forward, “Jiang Xiao, I bought the water back!”
“Oh, Song Qiuyu is back!”
Xie Zhuran’s eyes lit up as if he had seen a savior.
Jiang Xiao stood up and walked over to take the mineral water.
“Oh right, Xu, did you have trouble opening the bottle cap?”
Song Qiuyu suddenly tucked one bottle under her armpit, and while speaking, used the corner of her camouflage uniform to wrap around the cap of the other bottle.
She looked at Xu Tongtong earnestly and said: “If you don’t have enough strength, you can wrap it with your clothes like this to increase the roughness of the contact surface. See, it opens right away!”
“Xu, why don’t you give it a try?”
Still talking, she handed the opened bottle of mineral water into Jiang Xiao’s outstretched hand, “You’re welcome!”
Jiang Xiao extended his other hand to take the bottle cap, then quietly walked back and sat on the grass.
Before he could lower his head, a faint, warm lingering scent wafted from the bottle’s opening, lingering at his nostrils.
Jiang Xiao silently took a sip of water and screwed the cap back on.
Xu Tongtong nodded repeatedly, indicating she understood, then, with embarrassment and awkwardness, returned to her seat.
The cheering crowd, now bored, went back to their own business.
The instructor from the adjacent formation also stopped bothering them and returned to his own formation.
Song Qiuyu secretly sighed in relief, sat back down next to Jiang Xiao, and opened her own water.
A breeze carrying a faint orchid fragrance brushed her face.
Jiang Xiao looked sideways and saw her profile slightly tilted upward, the mouth of the water bottle against her lips.
Clear water like silver threads leaked from the corners of her mouth, flowing down her beautiful jawline, over a small section of her exposed white, tender neck, and disappearing into her collar.
“Cough cough!”
She suddenly choked on the water she swallowed, and quickly wiped away a large amount of water droplets from the corners of her mouth with her sleeve.
Only then did Jiang Xiao withdraw his gaze, pick up his phone, and prepare to transfer the money for the water to her.
“It’s only two yuan, no need to transfer it. Do our friendship need to care about this?”
Song Qiuyu saw Jiang Xiao’s action and immediately said.
Jiang Xiao’s gaze shifted back to her face.
He saw her smiling and starting to drink water again, seemingly avoiding his gaze intentionally or unintentionally.
In his opinion, all of Song Qiuyu’s actions today were too strange.
What on earth was this person thinking?
Being stared at by Jiang Xiao, Song Qiuyu panicked immensely, almost choking on her water again.
“Time’s almost up! Everyone, stand up!” Instructor Bian Lianhai’s deep, powerful voice suddenly rang out.
Immediately, everyone in the formation let out a groan.
Instructor Bian Lianhai was an exceptionally strict person.
After they started standing at attention, he seemingly casually walked around the formation, but in reality, his eyes were so sharp that he wouldn’t miss even a slight movement of a finger.
During this time, he constantly adjusted their posture, giving them no chance to be lazy.
The half-hour they had initially set became an hour due to the adjustments.
“Are you alright?” The instructor stopped in front of Song Qiuyu, looking at her face covered in cold sweat, his voice slightly softer and quite concerned.
“Mm…”
More cold sweat seeped from Song Qiuyu’s forehead.
From just now, she had been experiencing a severe pain in the center of her lower abdomen…
It was a sharp, downward-pulling pain that she had never experienced before.
She had initially thought that enduring it would make it pass.
But it only got worse.
As soon as the instructor spoke, the surrounding students all simultaneously looked at Song Qiuyu.
Her face was visibly pale.
“It’s nothing, I just… have a bit of a stomachache.”
Song Qiuyu seemed to be unable to bear it anymore.
She covered the center of her lower abdomen with her small hand, her back slightly bent, and she directly squatted on the ground.
Stomachache?
Some students looked at Song Qiuyu’s pretty face, their expressions becoming strange, “Stomachache? Could it be her period?”
This one sentence accurately hit Song Qiuyu’s sore spot, causing her expression management to lose control for a second.
Huh?
The instructor sighed deeply, looked at Jiang Xiao, and said seriously, “You two seem to be good friends? You take her to the infirmary.”
Jiang Xiao nodded gently, bent down, pulled one of Song Qiuyu’s arms over his shoulder, and with his other hand, grasped her shoulder, carefully helping her up from the ground.
“Uh, thank you, instructor…”
Tormented by abdominal pain, Song Qiuyu could only weakly squeeze out five words through gritted teeth.
She leaned almost feebly against Jiang Xiao, letting him support her.
The distance between their bodies suddenly became closer, and Jiang Xiao’s body stiffened slightly.
“Report, instructor, we want to go too!”
Lin An and Xie Zhuran simultaneously raised their hands.
The instructor rejected their request without batting an eye.
The sounds of people on the training ground gradually faded away.
The school infirmary was not far from the training ground.
Song Qiuyu’s abdominal pain was still intensifying, but thinking of what that classmate had said, she grew more and more apprehensive, feeling that she absolutely could not go to the infirmary.
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