Chapter 10    First day headaches, High school blues  

"Poisonous! Simply poisonous!"

The system was confused. Nani?

"The male leads face is simply venomous. How does he have the audacity to play with this old woman's heart?"

Su Qingtang cursed under her breath as she entered the classroom. She was very upset with herself for getting carried away while staring at Lu Yexuan. No one payed much attention to her except for a few stray glances here and there. This would've been weird for the original Su Qingtang with her peculiar fashion taste but the current Su Qingtang was used to the current attention and so didn't even notice it.

With her hair neatly done and flowing past her shoulders she seemed to give off a warm aura. Her peach blossom eyes staring at everything with a slight inquisitiveness which made her seem adorable.

What she does notice is a lonely figure walking into the classroom. Since when was Wen Xingshen in this class? No wonder he seemed vaguely familiar. He was a part of her class!

The system smacked its forehead. "Host, this shows how much of a blockhead you are. How could you not remember him? His death created such a big stir in your last life and a lot of important people went under fire."

Wen Xingshen? Big stir? Wen Xingshen… Wen Xingshen… OH!

"Wasn't that the upcoming actor who it was said that he took drugs and engaged in other illegal stuff and got kicked out of the film industry by angry netizens?"

"Yeah~ He's the same one… Don't you remember how later it was revealed that everything was a deliberate setup with many brainless netizens and water armies manipulated into drowning him in hate even though they didn't even know the entire truth. They sent an innocent youth to his death. His suicide created quite a stir and a lot of netizens felt bad about it for a while. They realized that they killed a good person. Which was pretty something with their goldfish-like memory." The system lamented.

A strange emotion flashes through Su Qingtang's eyes. She turns and watches him sit at the furthest desk in the classroom by the window and gets up from her seat to sit beside him.

"Hey." She wasn't totally sure why she did it but she did it anyway, but somehow she felt like it was the right thing to do.

The handsome boy looks up a blank look on his face, he stared at her for a few seconds in confusion. "Su Qingtang?"

She nods and smiles brightly, her small fanged teeth showing. She was being as friendly as she possibly could. "I knew you looked familiar but now I know why."

He doesn't take offense at her candor and just accepts the statement with no change in expression. He seemed to be rather used to comments like these and just casually brushes it off.

"Tang Tang!" A ruffled Song Meishi walks into the classroom. Her clothing in slight disarray as if she had been doing strenuous exercise. She sees Su Qingtang and her face brightens making chills go down Su Qingtang's spine. Why is she so hell bent on scheming against me?

In the corner of her eyes she sees Wen Xingshen visibly recoil as if he saw something dangerous. A bit of surprise appears in her eyes. It seems that this guy is perceptive enough to realize that something is off with Song Meishi it was quite the trait to see in a teenager.

"Tang~ Tang~ You left me I had to walk all the way over here. Sob Sob." Song Meishi had a pitiful expression on her face as if she were bullied. A+ for acting.

Su Qingtang felt the atmosphere around her faintly shift as some classmates glanced at her with a bit of an accusing look. Song Meishi had a good relationship with almost everyone which made it easy for the balance to be tipped in her favour. Her innocent persona was pretty hard to shake in the mind of most.

"I'm so sorry Meishi~ I'll make it up to you okay." The best thing to counter this attack was to stoop to her level. Apologize even if you didn't do anything wrong. If she chooses to pursue the matter after the apology she'll be seen as petty which will cause her well built image to collapse. A win-win situation for me.

"Host, where is the face slapping? Aren't you supposed to attack in this situation?"

Su Qingtang rolls her eyes. "Do I look like some sort of stupid female lead? I'm going into the film industry where reputations can kill if you make the slightest wrong move. Why would I ever try to break all forms of pretense this early? Its best to lay low and gradually raise their opinion of me so that I can have an easier life in the future. Even with that said, Song Meishi will get her due return if she doesn't lay low." A small smile sneaks onto Su Qingtang's lips. It seems to send a shiver down Song Meishi's spine when she sees it. It was not like the jovial smile she normally sees on Su Qingtang's face. It seemed to be a cold to the very bone which sent a hint of fear into her heart.

High school opinions are easily breakable as they are easily formed. Its best to not let peoples impression of you drop to ground zero as a public opinion swayed in your favor helps to stay out of unnecessary trouble. The original Su Qingtang's quietness helped a lot of people view her in a good light. This helped Su Qingtang easily dissolve the problem by admitting her mistake.

The accusatory stares dissipate, and people return to minding their own business as if nothing happened. Just like that the situation was de-escalated.

The Song Meishi who was prepared to make a scene was also countered efficiently and has to give up the conflict to avoid the situation turning against her favor as Su Qingtang had already apologized. Her gaze gets a bit severe, but she turns away to hide it by turning to talk to someone else.

"That friend of yours sure is something isn't she." Wen Xingshen comments, as he takes a book from his bag.

Su Qingtang nods. She could feel that this Wen Xingshen was a pretty nice person to be around even if he wasn't good conversation most of the time and had the aura of an invisible wall flower.

A middle-aged man walks into the classroom and the talking quickly stops. Students were generally more restrained and well behaved during the first week of a new semester.

"Good Morning everyone. I am teacher Wu. Let's have a good semester together." He was just like his appearance, plain and unassuming pretty easy to forget. His voice was monotone and seemed to have sleeping medicine coating his every word. Simply torture to the Su Qingtang who had sat in the same class before.

Life for Su Qingtang seemed to get impossibly harder.