Winter Time Rendering

Chapter 20: Chapter 6: Excuse Me, Can I Rewind?

Watching this incredibly unreliable scene unfold, Zhang Shutong felt a sense of familiarity.

When he was younger, he always thought the man was nothing like an adult. He’d smoke in front of them on weekends without a second thought. Then, trying to quit, he stuffed his desk drawer full of lollipops. Whenever a student felt wronged, he’d slap one into their hand. He also never used their full names, preferring to call them "Shutong," "Ruoping," or "Qinglian." And while Zhang Shutong still couldn’t define what it meant to be mature, he sincerely believed Song Nanshan was an excellent teacher.

’But you didn’t actually lose the test papers, did you?’

Thankfully, after rummaging for what felt like an eternity, Song Nanshan finally found them and projected them onto the large screen. Some questions were marked with numbers, probably to track how many students got them wrong. You could even see a small, red, greasy stain in the bottom-left corner.

’The tragedy of a single man.’

He understood because he, too, had often worked while eating.

But the moment Song Nanshan started explaining the material, that unreliable aura of his would suddenly vanish. He became like a commander before a great army, in complete command:

"This question looks tricky, but you just have to pay attention to the tense..."

"And this one here. It has a pretty obscure word, but it’s fine if you don’t know it. I’ll teach you a trick. Whenever ’but’ is used to show a contrast, you can just treat everything that came before it as... ahem, just ignore it completely."

He really did have a method for going over tests—fast and detailed. But for Zhang Shutong, these questions were all child’s play.

So instead of listening to the lecture, he took the opportunity to mentally go through the test on his own.

There was one other person not paying attention: Lu Qinglian. Her head was down, and she was writing something with her pen.

"Now look at this one. A classic problem. I can’t even be bothered to explain it again. Didn’t I go over this countless times before the exam? I’ll explain it one last time." You could never take a teacher’s "one last time" seriously. "Oh, right. This type of problem was also in this week’s homework. The students who did it carefully should have noticed. Let’s just go over it all at once."

After saying that, Song Nanshan started rummaging through his briefcase again. He had been right in the middle of an enthusiastic explanation, but as he searched, he started to get impatient. He finally grabbed the top workbook from a stack on the lectern:

"Forget it, let’s just look at someone else’s. I already wrote my own notes; I’ll write them on the board later. Pay attention, everyone..."

Zhang Shutong had just finished his first carton of school milk and was about to start on the second. He tore off the plastic wrap and put the straw in his mouth, watching the scene with amusement.

’The same old formula, the same old flavor, the same old unreliability.’

Song Nanshan had no idea his "star pupil" was bad-mouthing him in his head. He walked back to the projector, turned his back to the class, and flipped open the cover. He seemed quite pleased:

"Perfect, it’s Shutong’s. I’ll have him come up and explain it to you all in a bit."

Zhang Shutong froze at his words.

Although he had no memory of what the English homework even was, with his level of proficiency, he could genuinely get up there and explain it on the spot. He could guarantee it’d be even more detailed than the teacher’s explanation.

’So, explaining the problem was never the issue.’

’The issue was... why was that workbook his?’

The workbook was placed under the projector, like a bound prisoner being sent to the guillotine, just waiting for the blade to fall and its head to roll.

A sudden chill ran down the back of Zhang Shutong’s neck. He had always trusted his intuition. He shot to his feet instinctively.

"Wait—"

But it was too late.

The classroom was quiet. Some students stared intently at the blank projector screen; others were whispering amongst themselves.

The teacher, Song Nanshan, was hurriedly flipping the workbook to the homework page. The student, Zhang Shutong, had shot to his feet. The girl sitting in front and to the side of him, who had been looking down, happened to raise her head at that exact moment. His own deskmate jumped, turning to him in surprise.

The scene seemed to freeze.

Then, under the gaze of countless eyes, the image that appeared on the projector was not yesterday’s homework, but a piece of scratch paper.

Written on the scratch paper were three names: Zhang Shutong, Lu Qinglian, and Gu Qiuyan.

And the three names were connected, drawn into a triangle.

All eyes turned to Zhang Shutong.

The look of surprise seemed to freeze on Gu Qiuyan’s face, but then her cheeks visibly flushed red. She shot him a vicious glare.

"Give it here!"

Without another word, the girl reached out and snatched the still-unopened carton of school milk.

Zhang Shutong bit the inside of his cheek. It hurt.

He slowly sat back down, the flimsy straw still in his mouth. He unconsciously sucked in a sharp breath, only a single thought remaining in his mind.

’Is it possible to rewind time?’