The first day of school, Liu Chen wasn't the only one arriving just in the nick of time. Merely making it on time was an achievement, let alone having breakfast.
The moment the plastic bag for the hand-grabbed pancake was opened, its aroma instantly filled the entire classroom. For a moment, people couldn't help but turn their heads towards the source of the enticing smell.
Liu Chen hadn't expected that a simple hand-grabbed pancake could be so tempting. However... his mother had only made one, and dividing it into so many portions wouldn't be easy.
But... seeing Mi Zhuzhu and Ren Mo's throats working overtime, Liu Chen ended up dividing the already small pancake into four portions, and even gave one to Lai Jielun, Mi Zhuzhu's deskmate.
Thus, the iron quadrangle of Class 3-4 was born. Years later, in an interview, Lai Jielun would always say:
"I'm grateful to my mother for arranging my seat, allowing me to reach the pinnacle of life!"
Of course, the current Lai Jielun wasn't yet the hugely popular multi-talented star he would become. After finishing his quarter of the hand-grabbed pancake, Lai Jielun clenched his right fist and pounded his left chest, then gestured towards Liu Chen.
"Since I've accepted your hand-grabbed pancake, I declare that from now on, you, Liu Chen, are under my protection!"
Having made his declaration, he looked at the three people sitting beside him.
Liu Chen was looking down at his English book, memorizing words. Ren Mo was looking down, tracing the lines of the mandatory ancient poetry collection provided by the school with his finger.
A sense of foreboding washed over Lai Jielun. He slowly turned his head and found his mother standing by his deskmate's desk.
"Heh heh, student Lai Jielun, you will come to the office with me. We'll have a good chat later about how you're going to 'protect' our class's top student, Liu Chen."
Top student?
At this, Liu Chen stopped pretending to memorize words and looked up at Teacher Lai, who was standing diagonally in front of him and smiling even more kindly.
Teacher Lai smiled at Liu Chen, nodded, and then turned back to the podium.
"As you all just heard, yesterday's college entrance examination papers were a modified version from our school. The question types were the same, but the questions themselves were changed. We finished correcting the papers during last night's self-study. The total score for the three subjects was 450 points.
Our class's Liu Chen scored 430 points, ranking first in the class and third in the grade. I'll hand out the papers later, so you can check your weak areas and focus on them. Alright, class dismissed. Senior year is important, but so is your stomach. Go eat!"
With the homeroom teacher's order, the students of Class 3-6 rushed out of the classroom. To accommodate the needs of the senior students, all the senior grades were located on the first and second floors. Their class, 3-6, was on the second floor.
The school's breakfast cafeteria operated from 7:00 AM to 8:30 AM, serving over 3,000 students and teachers of the affiliated normal university.
As soon as the morning self-study bell rang, the cafeteria staff immediately entered battle mode, ladles in hand, positioned behind vats of congee or behind the griddles.
The first student to reach the cafeteria window panted and said:
"Give me a hand-grabbed pancake!"
"What?"
Meanwhile, the second, third, and fourth students rushed to other windows.
"A hand-grabbed pancake!"
After the students reluctantly accepted their pancakes and millet porridge, several chefs gathered in the kitchen, their expressions grave.
Chef One: "They're asking for hand-grabbed pancakes. What exactly is a hand-grabbed pancake?"
Chef Two: "I don't know. Never eaten one. Sounds like some kind of flatbread?"
Chef Three: "Could it be some new trend from a street food vendor outside the school?"
In the end, the three chefs decided to go out and scout the situation.
---
"Sis, can you look at this for me? Why is it wrong again? I used the formula from my cram school to solve it!"
Ren Mo bit his pen and pushed his barely passing test paper towards Liu Chen.
Liu Chen glanced at it.
"The data you derived here, you wrote 0 as 6. All the subsequent data substitutions are incorrect."
Ren Mo looked down.
"Damn it! This question is worth ten points. Does that mean my paper should have been a hundred?"
Liu Chen then used a blue gel pen to circle several places on the paper. "If you had checked more carefully, you could have gotten points on these questions too. Hmm, with those, it would be a hundred and ten."
Because a handsome guy was behind her, Mi Zhuzhu, too shy to turn around and ask her "Chen Chen" directly, immediately turned around upon hearing this and handed her test paper to Liu Chen, looking at him with wide eyes.
"Chen Chen, Chen Chen, can you look at mine too? Oh, and why does student Ren Mo call you 'sis'?"
Hearing this, Lai Jielun, who had just returned from being lectured in the office, also quickly turned around to join the fun.
"Because Liu Chen is my adopted daughter, Ms. Ren, making her my adopted sister. So, what's wrong with me calling her 'sis'?"
"Oh? That very pretty lady is your mom? Wow, I envy you, student Ren Mo."
Perhaps it was Mi Zhuzhu's straightforward envy, but even the usually direct Ren Mo showed a rare moment of shyness for two seconds before managing to stammer out:
"Th-thank you."
After the five classes in the morning ended, Liu Chen felt a sense of longing for more for the first time.
"If every teacher praised me for a minute, I'd feel the same way. Okay, okay, what are we eating for lunch?" Lai Jielun immediately turned to Liu Chen as soon as class ended.
In the span of one morning, Lai Jielun had already figured out that among the four of them, Liu Chen was the real decision-maker.
All four were day students and could eat off-campus for lunch. Previously, Ren Mo used to eat at restaurants with two friends, while Lai Jielun was supervised by his mother to eat heated bento boxes in the office.
"I want to eat KFC..." Mi Zhuzhu proposed first.
As soon as she spoke, Teacher Lai appeared at the classroom door.
"Jielun, come to the office to eat."
Lai Jielun's face flushed, and he frowned. "Mom, I told you not to call me that. People will laugh at me, and besides, I'm going to eat KFC with my new friends today!"
"Got it, got it. Do you have enough money? Come to me if you don't."
Lai Jielun's ears turned bright red as he quickly waved his hand. "Enough, enough! You go eat!"
The affiliated normal university was located on the first ring road of C City. Walking out the back gate and through a small alley led to a crossroads.
Turning left at the crossroads and left ahead were C City's two most famous luxury shopping malls. The large LV, Dior, and Gucci advertisements on the first floor exuded an aura of opulence, and the air conditioning blowing out felt like being in a cold storage.
However, perhaps due to the exorbitant prices, there were always few people outside the malls.
Turning right down the alley was a five-story open-air food court. This was where Liu Chen and her three friends were headed for KFC.
As soon as the four were seated, Mi Zhuzhu cheerfully pulled out her Sony phone, adorned with several charms, from her schoolbag.
"Heh heh, this is our first meal together, let's take a group photo."
The two girls sat on the KFC sofa seats, and the two boys stood behind. They all made a V-sign with their fingers. When Lai Jielun wasn't making funny faces, he was actually quite a handsome little boy.
After taking the photo, Mi Zhuzhu posted the picture of the four of them in their affiliated normal university uniforms onto the Class 3-4 group chat.