After My Secret Identity Was Revealed, My Crush Said He’s My Biggest Fan - Chapter 5

“What Yanchun Shendu? I have never heard of this school in Shenfeng. The sister schools we usually recognize are not them either.”

After returning to the dormitory following the group dinner, Lin Yu immediately called Sun Chen, who had attended the Hongda Summer Camp with him back then. Sun Chen, a graduate of Mengze Shenfeng who was currently studying at Hongdu University, listened in confusion for a long time before returning with such a question.

Hearing Sun Da’s extremely confused tone, Lin Yu was certain he was not lying. He exchanged brief pleasantries with Sun Chen, hung up the phone, and instead dialed another person’s number.

The voice call ringtone sounded for a moment. As soon as the call connected, Yang Yuanran’s cheap-sounding voice came through the earpiece:

“Hey, Xiao Chuan? What do you want with your dad?”

“Get lost. I want to talk to you about business.”

“What business? Is it that northeastern sunshine college student? Has he become important enough to you to count as real business?”

Hearing this, the veins at the corner of Lin Yu’s eyes twitched involuntarily. However, he was long used to Yang Yuanran’s habit of acting cheeky every now and then, so hearing this, he simply forced the topic toward the direction he was interested in:

“Under what circumstances do you think a northeastern high school student would become close with a student from Shenfeng Middle School?”

“Shenfeng? Which Shenfeng?”

No wonder Yang Yuanran found it strange. Yanchun and Mengze were practically far enough apart to form a diagonal line across China. Lin Yu let out a cold laugh:

“How many Shenfengs do you know? Of course it is the one in Mengze that has crushed other schools for decades. Shenfeng formed some kind of Beidou Alliance with my roommate’s alma mater, but I just asked Sun Chen, and this alliance seems to have no substantive purpose.”

“Oh oh, alright. But why ask about this?”

Lin Yu instantly felt a bit annoyed: “He seemed to have a really good relationship with a certain Shenfeng student before. That student seemed really important to him, and he still will not let people bring it up.”

Yang Yuanran immediately made an ambiguous sound: “Oh yo oh yo. Done for, this is a love triangle!”

Listening to the blank ambient sound on the other end of the voice call, Yang Yuanran had no doubt that if they were not separated by distance right now, Lin Yu could pull him by his school uniform collar and throw him straight off the roof of the senior high building. He heard Lin Yu say in a speechless tone:

“Why don’t you just ask him directly? I feel like even if it is an ex, most guys would not mind talking about these things with classmates?”

“I asked, but he said it is neither a romantic partner nor an ex.”

Another period of silence. Yang Yuanran, whose inner monologue was exceptionally rich, immediately began composing a script in his mind about the northeastern sunshine college student pining bitterly for a certain classmate for three years, which ultimately ended fruitlessly. After deliberating for a long time, he finally began to analyze:

“Uh. But to be honest, judging by his level of care, this Shenfeng student is definitely not an ordinary friend to him. Since he said that, it can probably only be a choice between a life mentor and an unrequited love target. Have you checked his WeChat Moments? There might be something hinting at it in there.”

This remark reminded Lin Yu. After all, he used to have too many people in his contact list, which led to the habit of being too lazy to flip through anyone’s Moments when adding them. He found 24 Prevention Xia Chenxuan in his contacts and tapped into this person’s personal homepage.

It was fine if he did not tap, but with this single tap, Lin Yu was given a fright. Xia Chenxuan used an ordinary anime profile picture, and the Moments background behind the profile picture appeared to be a tourism spot inside Mengze City that he was all too familiar with: a corner of Cuichi Lake.

“I found something interesting. Look at the chat box.”

“What, the moment you open it, you look. Oh crap.”

Sure enough, upon seeing the screenshot, Yang Yuanran could not help but exclaim in realization. The two of them together looked at Xia Chenxuan’s personalized signature named To the Edge of the Clouds, and Yang Yuanran said:

“Alright, then the life mentor possibility can basically be ruled out. Anyway, I would not specially treasure landscape photos of Qian Ying’s hometown and set that thing as my Moments background. But he is a bit pretentious, huh, putting the Cuichi photo right here.”

“Fair is fair, this picture is quite pretty. And I am telling you for real, if we had not just gone to this spot to feed ducks last week, just looking at this picture, it would be impossible to recognize where it is.”

“Fine, everything you say is right.”

Hearing Lin Yu’s retort, Yang Yuanran chose to give up speaking ill of Xia Chenxuan in front of him, and silently rolled his eyes at this good friend from far away in the Southwest.

The two continued their voice call. Lin Yu sat alone in his single small dorm room, browsing through Xia Chenxuan’s Moments to see if he could find any further clues about the Shenfeng classmate or Xia Chenxuan’s sexual orientation. Unfortunately, Xia Chenxuan had not posted many meaningful things during his three years of high school.

AlbumStar: Hello, Shendou High. Green Heart. Picture. August 23, 2021.

Inside the photo was a green university admission notice, with the nine characters Yanchun Shendu Senior High School written on it. The same blue and yellow large teaching building appeared inside and outside the paper.

Xia Chenxuan’s senior high school entrance examination scores must have been very good; as soon as he entered school, he was admitted to the top science experimental class of the provincial top high school, and without accident, he spent three years in it.

AlbumStar: Shendou Sports Meeting, very happy to win a gold medal. Let us continue to work hard together next year! Picture. October 22, 2021.

The sports meeting in the first year of senior high was the first set of nine-grid Moments Xia Chenxuan posted. A fifteen- or sixteen-year-old Xia Chenxuan smiled unrestrainedly under the camera, holding two gold medals in his left and right hands respectively, with an even larger one hung around his neck. The bright sunlight of the distant north shone upon his slightly upturned hair strands, casting a golden border over the handsome teenager’s dark brown hair. A group of classmates dressed in purple school uniforms crowded around him, lifting and supporting him into the most dazzling point of light on the track and field.

Unawares, Lin Yu stared blankly at this photo for a long time. The appearance of Xia Chenxuan inside the photo was still very tender and youthful, but the high-spirited, sunny vibe on him was already about to burst out of the screen, crashing straight into him full force and full embrace.

It was like a bright summer suddenly invading.

“Hey, why is there no sound? Did our Xiao Chuan get dumbfounded looking at the handsome guy?”

It was not until Yang Yuanran’s teasing voice came over that Lin Yu slowly recovered his senses. He gave an indifferent, light laugh, and then long-pressed the photo to forward the freshman-year Xia Chenxuan over:

“Get lost. But if you say he is, then he is. After all, he really is handsome. Look at how fierce he is at the sports meeting.”

“Oh crap, this is too awesome!”

Unsurprisingly, as soon as Yang Yuanran saw the photo of Xia Chenxuan winning three gold medals at the same time, he cried out in shock. He enlarged the photo, carefully recognizing it over and over, but in the end, he could only ask Lin Yu with a head full of confusion:

“What kind of event is this medal for? The picture is too blurry to see.”

“You ask me, who do I ask?”

Although his mouth mercilessly rebuffed Yang Yuanran, Lin Yu still analyzed a thing or two from the other eight photos Xia Chenxuan posted.

Most of the pictures Xia Chenxuan posted were group photos with brothers or large class photos. There were two photos centered on a single person: one where he held a bow and arrow standing in front of the target, raising an eyebrow at the camera and making a victory sign, and another where he had a bib number attached to his body, supported by friends at the finish line of the running track, smiling brightly. Ten to one, his individual events were archery and some kind of long-distance running. As for the third medal, it was probably the product of participating in group events after hitting the entry limit.

Still, Shendou High School was quite magical to actually have such rustic events. Mengze No. 1 High School’s sports meetings all used the most common track and field events, and the rarest one might only be shot put.

Casually sketching in his mind what Xia Chenxuan looked like fully equipped while drawing a bow and fitting an arrow, Lin Yu continued to scroll upward through his Moments.

Xia Chenxuan only posted Moments when encountering major activities, but he did not post photos of himself every time. Moreover, WeChat Moments were not like QQ Space; what Lin Yu could see now was just a bare, blank comment section. He scrolled past a bunch of rock music shares that he felt should not have any deep meaning after careful confirmation, scrolled past photos of Yanchun scenery popping up once every few months, and scrolled past Shendou High School’s cultural week and other small activities.

Midway, his gaze was attracted by a video of Xia Chenxuan playing the guitar at the New Year’s Eve party, and he shared it with Yang Yuanran. After that was a large group photo of the volleyball team inside a gymnasium in the Three Northeastern Provinces. Xia Chenxuan, standing together with his teammates, his face was not particularly clear, but he still possessed the youthfulness and handsomeness that people could not ignore.

“My god, his conditions are really good. These facial features are so handsome they look like a Eurasian mix, and his eyes are sparkling. No wonder you fell in love at first sight when you saw him at Hongda back then. If it were me, I would love him too.”

After enlarging and viewing that group photo of Xia Chenxuan’s volleyball team, Yang Yuanran made such a review. Lin Yu replied:

“Yeah, and it looks like their school activities are pretty good too. Actually, I am quite curious why he would say Shendou is inferior to Shenfeng. Theoretically, Xueyin Province’s educational quality should be better.”

Speaking of this, Lin Yu’s words trailed off again. His fingers suddenly paused at a certain spot on the screen, his pupils dilating slightly in disbelief, and he instinctively opened his lips, but only let out a single sound:

“Ah.”

“What is wrong, Xiao Chuan?”

Lin Yu did not speak again this time. He could feel his hands trembling slightly. A scene that made it forever impossible for him to remain indifferent suddenly broke into his vision. His heart began to beat wildly, and his eye sockets abruptly grew a bit damp.

“Hello? Xiao Chuan? Oh crap, what did you scroll into? It is fine, it is fine, even if he really did date before, it is most likely in the past by now.”

Hearing his breathing become heavier, Yang Yuanran grew a bit anxious, even starting to guess whether he had come across Xia Chenxuan’s official announcement photo with an ex-boyfriend or ex-girlfriend. He asked with concern on the other end of the phone several times, but Lin Yu kept silent, making Yang Yuanran feel somewhat frantic.

Until roughly a century later, Lin Yu gently shook his head. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, only then gathering his courage anew to look at the Moments while replying to Yang Yuanran:

“Relax, it is not a relationship. He did not post about a partner even by the end of senior high year two, and he does not have any ambiguous Moments either.”

“Strange, then what is it? Alright, I get it.”

During this brief pause, neither of the good friends spoke. Lin Yu sat in the humid and sultry air of the southeastern coast, looking at that small, faintly shimmering lake inside the screen, feeling that even rolling his Adam’s apple up and down made him feel like he was about to choke up.

It would be fine if it really were Xia Chenxuan’s ex-boyfriend or ex-girlfriend. As long as it was a romantic partner, he would not react like this. But unluckily, what Xia Chenxuan posted in this particular Moments post was Hongdu University.

It was the Hongdu University where they first met, the Hongdu University that Lin Yu had yearned for with all his heart for many years, and it was something else entirely.

It was the dream university that they ultimately missed out on, falling from the altar in the gaokao exam room, leaving them forever unable to struggle and touch it again: Hongdu University.