Maintaining the Dignity of the Female Supporting Character - Chapter 7

Lin Sizhe blushed from his neck to his ears, not hesitating to put himself down: “No, no, no, we’re the ones who aren’t worthy.”

Wen Shuangmu, however, patted Lin Sizhe’s shoulder: “Why are you getting nervous? I was just joking with you.”

Wen Shuangmu walked out of the gymnasium, and Lin Sizhe’s classmates from Class 10, who were waiting for him, immediately swarmed around.

“Didn’t you say earlier that the long-haired one was not to be messed with? She doesn’t look that fierce, and it seemed like she even smiled a bit when she left.”

Lin Sizhe hadn’t recovered yet and replied in confusion: “Don’t ask me, I don’t know either.”

The last two classes of the afternoon were self-study periods.

It wasn’t the official start of the school year yet at the end of August. Arriving at school a week early for registration was Mingli’s unique “adjustment week.” During this week, the school didn’t schedule evening self-study sessions, and teachers didn’t assign too many teaching tasks. The main purpose was to let students readjust to being back at school, making it relatively relaxed.

Wen Shuangmu stacked a pile of workbooks she planned to complete today on the right side of her desk. She didn’t rush to start writing immediately. Using her textbook as a shield for her phone, her fingertips tapped and clicked on the screen, constantly switching keywords in the search bar.

Wu Xiaoqi felt pleased seeing the host search for “Villain Identification Guide” and “On the Self-Cultivation of Villains,” thinking that she was finally putting the character development task on the agenda.

But gradually, the keywords changed style, becoming somewhat off-topic.

Wen Shuangmu suddenly leaned back in her chair, discouraged: “I can’t do it. I don’t think I’m worthy.”

Wu Xiaoqi: “?”

It had been fifteen minutes since class started, and she was still hung up on the “who’s worthy and who’s not” issue from PE class?

Wen Shuangmu said: “You said I’m a textbook-level villain, but I don’t have that ability.”

Wu Xiaoqi understood. It scanned the browsing history on Wen Shuangmu’s phone related to the MacDonald triad and criminal psychology profiling, feeling the intellectual low point of its host: “I asked you to develop into a villain, not a psycho killer.”

Wen Shuangmu sat up straight, seeming to come alive a bit, but after a moment, she asked puzzled: “But you said I’m textbook-level?”

Wu Xiaoqi watched the conflicting expressions flash across Wen Shuangmu’s face, from “If I’m not ruthless enough, I won’t live up to this title” to “You’re making things difficult for me.” It had never felt so exasperated: “Host, you’ve seen the Big Bad Wolf, right? He’s considered a classic villain too, but have you ever seen him eat a sheep? When I praised you as textbook-level, I meant that the Big Bad Wolf has been around for over 2000 episodes without being written off, and in the original story, you stubbornly persisted, making the author turn a high school campus novel into a college campus novel. If it weren’t for your car accident, the author would have even introduced a graduate school storyline.”

“……”

“You should have said that earlier.” Wen Shuangmu looked disgusted and flipped her phone face down.

Wu Xiaoqi: “This is common sense. As a campus novel villain, if you don’t focus your energy on breaking up the main couple and instead try to steal the job of a mystery novel villain, aren’t you just making a fool of yourself?”

Wu Xiaoqi muttered: “I knew when I introduced the task earlier and you didn’t ask a single question, you hadn’t understood the nature of the villain system at all.”

Wen Shuangmu coughed lightly, and after a while, leaned back in her chair again: “If that’s the case, won’t the task become very simple? Xia Zhili is so popular, I could just pick one of her pursuers as my development target, and successfully break her and Su Qiyan up, right?”

Hearing Wen Shuangmu’s casual tone, Wu Xiaoqi felt choked and had to approach it from a different angle: “If I were to persuade you now to stop liking Su Qiyan and find someone more obedient and suitable, to turn back, how would you react?”

Wen Shuangmu replied without thinking: “Of course not! Why should I?”

Wu Xiaoqi was satisfied: “Similarly, Xia Zhili won’t fall for just any guy. Of course, you need to develop a villain with equal competitiveness to rival Su Qiyan.”

“Alright.”

This time, Wen Shuangmu humbly accepted the lesson. After two seconds, she spoke up again: “Actually, I was just joking with you earlier. Did you think I wouldn’t understand such simple logic?”

Wu Xiaoqi: “……”

Please don’t try to save face.

Wen Shuangmu felt good about herself and pulled out a workbook from the side of her desk to do exercises.

After breezing through five multiple-choice questions, she felt something was off and suddenly raised her head again: “Wait, if it’s about obstructing the main couple, why did you recommend my brother earlier!”

Wu Xiaoqi didn’t answer immediately, acting coy and bashful for a while before saying: “If we don’t consider the age factor, I think a younger male lead pairing actually has potential…”

“…”

By the window, Lu Jing held a thermos, occasionally sipping hot tea, and correspondingly shaking his head and sighing at his neighbor.

In the twenty minutes since class started, his genius seatmate had been vigorously sitting up straight one moment and slumping back the next, constantly doing “forward and backward bending” exercises, condensing the ups and downs of life into these short “90°” swings.

What’s the use of knowing Lagrange if your life is still full of anxiety?

Lu Jing sympathized but couldn’t offer any constructive comfort regarding studying.

He glanced at Wang Chengshuo’s broad back in front of him.

Wang Chengshuo hadn’t started today’s homework yet, still studying Lagrange from the class placement test math paper.

Lu Jing patted his back and said: “Stop ‘pulling,’ being happy is the most important thing in life.”

Wang Chengshuo turned around, pushing up the glasses on his nose bridge in confusion: “…?”

The dismissal bell rang.

Students from various classes darted between floors, and the corridors became bustling and noisy for a moment.

A few dull “thump thump” sounds of a basketball echoed in the corridor.

Wen Shuangmu walked out of the classroom with her backpack, seeing Liu Yiheng and a few other boys approaching, laughing and joking from afar.

As they reached the door of Class 2, Liu Yiheng finally hugged the basketball back to his chest and raised his hand to greet her: “Sister Shuang.”

Wen Shuangmu nodded, unusually leisurely standing there to chat for a couple of sentences: “Who are you looking for? Do you need me to call them for you?”

“Wang Chengshuo and Lu Jing.”

Liu Yiheng’s eyes glanced at Xia Zhili through the corridor window while reporting the names of the other two boys.

Wen Shuangmu admired men’s ability to multitask.

From her angle, she could see Su Qiyan packing his bag through Class 1’s back door. One exuded scholarly elegance, dignified in motion and stillness; the other was restless, a youthful lad. In comparison, Liu Yiheng seemed like part of the “rendering group” highlighting the female lead’s irresistible aura, making it hard not to feel sympathetic.

She couldn’t help but pat Liu Yiheng’s arm consolingly: “It’s a pity there’s no way to compare, otherwise I’d give you a hand.”

Liu Yiheng was distracted and didn’t hear clearly. His gaze followed Xia Zhili’s movements, and when she went to her locker, her figure just hidden by the wall, he regretfully withdrew his eyes and said: “Sister Shuang, what did you just say?”

Wen Shuangmu shrugged, stepping aside and tilting her head to indicate: “I said the people you’re looking for are coming out.”

Lu Jing wore his bag slung across one shoulder, walking out one after another with Wang Chengshuo.

Lu Jing usually looked relaxed overall, but with his broad shoulders and long legs, paired with the gentle and reserved Wang Chengshuo, they looked like a campus power duo on the move.

When ordinary boys gather to show off, it’s basically no different from Causeway Bay gangsters hitting the streets.

But with Lu Jing in the middle, it added a comfortable atmosphere, unconsciously becoming the focus of the group.

It’s only this level of “enticement” that’s worthy of Xia Zhili.

Wen Shuangmu moved a few more steps towards Class 1, making room for this group of “gang-forming boys” and their daily meeting.

Liu Yiheng’s companions, seeing Lu Jing come out, immediately rushed over to put their arms around his shoulders and pat his back:

“Brother Jing, it’s awesome that you tested into Class 2.”

“You don’t understand, this is Brother Jing’s standard operation, he just doesn’t usually let people see it.”

“That’s right, if our Brother Jing got serious, would anyone else be able to claim the top spot in the spring semester?”

Top of the spring semester?

Isn’t that Su Qiyan?

Wen Shuangmu looked up at Lu Jing.

She hadn’t expected that someone would still hold back during the placement test.

It’s worth noting that Su Qiyan is a terrifyingly well-rounded talent. Even with Wen Shuangmu’s memories from two lifetimes, she wasn’t sure she could beat him.

Liu Yiheng and the others casually compared Lu Jing to Su Qiyan, yet Lu Jing’s face remained impassive, even showing a hint of “please be quiet and stop talking” low-key zen-like attitude. It seemed he was far more profound and inscrutable than she had imagined.

Wen Shuangmu thought for a moment, then felt something was off.

In her previous life’s three years of high school, she had never heard of a top student named Lu Jing.

Wu Xiaoqi popped up at the right moment to keep her on track: “Host, don’t jump to conclusions too quickly. Be careful not to cut off other possibilities in the plot.”

Wen Shuangmu: “What do you mean?”

Wu Xiaoqi: “Do you remember who were the students that consistently ranked in the top twenty of the entire school?”

Wen Shuangmu rattled off names almost instinctively: “Su Qiyan, Li Maozhen, Xia Zhili, Wang Chengshuo, Lin Sen, myself, Yin Xingzhu from Class 7, Yu Zhengzheng from Class 11…”

After listing eight names, Wen Shuangmu’s voice suddenly faltered. Even racking her brains, she couldn’t recall the names of the others.

She realized with a chill that it wasn’t because her memory had faded over time, but because many of the figures in the grade rankings beyond their group were simply blank in her mind.

Wu Xiaoqi spoke with an air of mystery: “Now you understand, don’t you, host? In the original novel, when describing the school rankings, it only briefly mentioned your names, leaving the rest blank. In other words, Lu Jing could be in the top ten of the school, or he could be at the very bottom. Anything is possible.”

Anything is possible.

Wen Shuangmu automatically skipped over Wu Xiaoqi’s other words, repeating this phrase over and over in her mind.

Li Maozhen and Su Qiyan from Class 1 came out.

Li Maozhen waved and said, “Shuang-jie, let’s go.”

The hallway was bathed in orange light of the setting sun, with people coming and going around them. Su Qiyan stood to the side waiting for her, his clean-cut short hair slightly tousled by the wind across his forehead, like a freeze-frame from a movie.

Wen Shuangmu had seen Su Qiyan at eighteen, at twenty, at twenty-two.

It had been so long that she had almost forgotten what he looked like at sixteen.

How wonderful it was to see him again like this.

The cool summer breeze blew past, and Wen Shuangmu’s heart seemed to swell with it, like a sail catching the wind, almost bursting out of her chest.

You see, I’ve known you for so long, and I love every version of you.

There’s no reason you shouldn’t choose me in the end, right?

Wen Shuangmu smiled brightly. She ran up in a few quick steps, grabbed Su Qiyan’s backpack to stop him, and said cheerfully, “Let’s go!”

Su Qiyan swayed back and forth from her sudden movement, seeming puzzled by her excited mood. He glanced down at her but didn’t say anything, just adjusted his backpack strap. The three of them then walked together towards the stairwell.