Heading for the Plains - Chapter 13

Xia Chao discovered that once the subject choices were settled, everything moved forward much more smoothly.

Ping Yuan had drafted a study plan for her. Drawing from experience, she divided the exam syllabus into three major categories.

The first category consisted of “rote memorization”: classical poetry, prose, and English vocabulary. With time being of the essence, Ping Yuan didn’t waste breath explaining these; she simply set a daily KPI and held a quiz the next day.

The second category focused on “conceptual understanding”: formulas and scientific principles. This was where Ping Yuan concentrated her nightly lectures, striving to ensure Xia Chao grasped the core logic behind every concept.

The final category was “comprehensive application”—the bridge between average and elite students, testing both foundation and critical thinking. Sitting at the desk, Xia Chao watched as Ping Yuan looked at last year’s exam paper and let out a “tsk.” Clearly, Ping Yuan felt Xia Chao’s current level wasn’t ready for this yet, so it was shelved until her practice scores improved.

When Ping Yuan showed her the finished schedule, Xia Chao found the approach entirely novel. In school, lessons were taught period by period, and subjects were kept in their own silos. No one had ever dismantled the Gaokao into three strategic blocks based on the nature of the content.

It was a total reversal of traditional thinking—a “backward design” approach. When she told Ping Yuan this, the older woman simply gave her a calm pat on the head and said, “You’ll understand when you get to university.” After all, this was the basic self-study strategy for finals, English certifications, or graduate entrance exams.

Ping Yuan felt lucky she had studied Finance. Dealing with numbers daily since graduation meant she hadn’t forgotten the basics, even if her own high school days were nearly a decade old.

She hadn’t actually gone to graduate school. During her senior year of college, the top students were tearing each other apart for a “guaranteed admission” slot. Based on GPA, she had quietly landed in the top three. Everyone was watching her like a hawk, but she had simply smiled and told the professor, “I’m passing on the recommendation.”

She had been dirt poor back then. Her only goal was to pay off her student loans as quickly as possible. Graduate school was a luxury her survival instinct couldn’t afford—especially since the monthly stipend was only 600 yuan. At twenty-one, she had pragmatically decided: I can’t afford this. I’m going to work.

Of course, there was no need to tell the kid these things. The twenty-seven-year-old adult was now a master of redirection. She smiled at Xia Chao and said, “You still have 50 words to memorize today.”

Xia Chao scrambled away in a panic.

Thus began the days of waking early to memorize vocabulary. Xia Chao carried her small wordbook everywhere, reciting all the way until the milk tea shop opened, then switching to classical prose.

While she was frantically adding ice and pounding lemons, she would mutter under her breath: “Alas, how high! How perilous! Is it much? Not much at all…”

“?” The only employee in the shop with a junior college degree walked past, certain she had misheard a bizarre mashup of Li Bai and Lu Xun.

But she didn’t have time to ask, because Xiao Zhen was already lining up nine receipts at the register, shouting at the top of her lungs, “Xia Chao! The platform is flagging us! Move it!”

“Coming, coming!”

Xia Chao hurried over, handing off the tea so Xiao Zhen could fire off the labels and pack them into thermal bags. Amidst the hum of the blender, a few middle-school girls walked in. Xia Chao immediately put on a bright smile and took over the register, asking about ice levels and sugar preferences.

The delivery riders were already impatient. The moment Xiao Zhen handed over a bag, they vanished like a streak of light.

Turning back, Xiao Zhen saw Xia Chao leaning over the screen. The receipt printer chattered as it spat out thermal paper. The schoolgirls were nudging each other, whispering and giggling while stealing glances at Xia Chao.

Tsk, tsk. Xiao Zhen watched the bustling scene with amusement. Being good-looking really pays off. Since the “Little Xia” started, the daily revenue had increased by at least twenty percent.

While the summer rush helped, who could deny the power of a “honey trap” when facing Xia Chao’s fresh, fair face? Xia Chao was beautiful, but not in the way a celebrity is—intimidating and remote. She had a frank, bright kind of approachability. Even in the shop’s uniform white T-shirt, she looked more graceful and upright than anyone else. With her dark, shining eyes and a smile that made you want to upgrade to a large cup with extra toppings, she was a natural.

Xiao Zhen thought to herself: No wonder the boss told us to let Little Xia handle the orders from day one. She felt quite brilliant for seeing through the strategy. When I’m a big boss and open my own shop, I’m hiring a handsome face for the front too.

While she was dreaming of her future empire, Xia Chao finished her rush. Xiao Zhen nudged her with an elbow, gossiping like a detective. “Hey, you know you’re pretty, right? Did people chase you back in school?”

“I know. I guess so,” Xia Chao said, adjusting her hairnet while stirring toppings. “In middle school, I punched a boy from the next class until he cried. The next day, he stuffed a love letter into my desk.”

“Whoa,” Xiao Zhen chirped, sensing a classic “enemies-to-lovers” trope. “And then?”

“Then? I punched him again.” Because he had told her she’d “only be good for cooking and having his babies” one day.

“Ugh, boring,” Xiao Zhen pouted, unaware of the context. “You’re going to die alone!”

Xia Chao laughed at her disappointment, not bothering to explain further. She hauled a bin of lemons over to the sink. “I’m only on the early shift today.”

“You’re not staying for dinner again?”

“Nope,” she said, the water splashing as she rinsed the fruit. “I have to go back and cook for my sister.”

“Taking the time you could be dating and using it to cook instead!” Xiao Zhen teased, wagging a finger. “You’re a ‘Twenty-Four Filial Sister’!”

Xia Chao just laughed again.

The summer was busy and staff was tight. If the day-shift workers stayed for overtime, they got extra pay and a 15-yuan meal box. Everyone usually stayed for the free food, but Xia Chao bolted home the second her shift ended.

Totally whipped, thought Fang Baozhen, who had left her family at sixteen and considered herself a pillar of independence. “Go live with your sister forever then!” she teased.

Giving a mock gesture of surrender, Xia Chao ran back to the register.

It’s not that I’m obsessed with Ping Yuan, she thought gloomily. It’s that the homework is too much!

Ping Yuan was a good teacher, but she was by no means a gentle one. She was too smart; a brain that had been an “elite student” since birth couldn’t fathom how a “dim-wit’s” brain worked. After just a few days of lessons, Xia Chao felt a bit withered.

She feared the pop quizzes most. Foreign words felt like earthworms crawling across the page, and the ancient prose was no easier to digest. She had recited The Red Cliff until she was dizzy. When Ping Yuan asked her for the line following “the cinnamon oars and orchid sweeps,” all she could think was “one lemon and three pumps of syrup.”

She wasn’t being lazy! It was just that work was so intense during the day. She’d been reciting the poem while making a drink, added the wrong syrup, and got chewed out by Xiao Zhen.

Xia Chao felt like crying. To make matters worse, Ping Yuan was looking at her with a playful, smiling gaze. She had those beautiful feline eyes—cool when silent, but sharp and alluring when she smiled. Now that she was both “Sister” and “Teacher,” her aura was overwhelming.

Xia Chao watched her lounging on the sofa in her pajamas, her pale chin lifted lazily, even her chuckle carrying a hint of a nasal hum. It was a bit cold, a bit soft, and more than a bit provocative.

Annoyed until her face was red, Xia Chao sometimes wanted to just pounce and pin her down on the sofa. As for what she’d do then? She hadn’t thought that far. Maybe bite her, or cover her mouth and beg her to leave her some dignity.

Of course, she didn’t dare do any of that. If you didn’t memorize it, you didn’t memorize it. The exam paper wouldn’t listen to excuses. Xia Chao stood there dejectedly, staring piteously at her own toes.

Ping Yuan, amused by the girl’s “defeated soldier” look, set the textbook down. She tilted her head toward the window. “Open the window in the living room.”

“Why?”

“Just do it.”

“Oh.” Xia Chao walked over and slid the window open.

The summer night breeze blew in, filling the white gauze curtains. Holding the frame, she looked back at Ping Yuan.

“Don’t look at me,” Ping Yuan said. “Look outside.”

Xia Chao obeyed. The living room looked out over the courtyard. The old complex didn’t have fancy landscaping, just a small parking lot, a swing set, and a few large trees surrounding a brick-and-mortar pond. The pond was tiny, the water barely knee-deep. During the day, you’d see kids with nets catching tadpoles.

But now, it was night. Outside was nothing but the dissolving darkness and the dissolving moon. The lush shadows of the trees hid the small pavilion by the water, leaving only the sharp tip of its roof visible. Xia Chao looked at the water; the clear moonlight lay across the surface like scattered silver ripples.

The same moon that had been gazed upon a thousand years ago was still hanging there today.

Behind her, Ping Yuan’s voice rose—soft as a bird landing on a branch: “With cinnamon oars and orchid sweeps, we strike the translucent water and row through the reflected moonlight.”

She let out a quiet laugh. “But this pond is too small. It can only hold a paper boat and the moon.”

Her voice was clearer than the moonlight. Xia Chao turned back and saw Ping Yuan’s smiling eyes. “You see? It’s important to understand a text through its atmosphere.”

Ping Yuan lowered her voice. “It was my fault. I thought classical prose only required ‘muscle memory.’ But thinking back, that was a bit arrogant of me.” After all, back in high school, she too had needed the annotations to understand words from a millennium ago.

But her apology ended there. Ping Yuan gave a small, self-conscious shift of her toes, her adult pride preventing her from saying more. She sat back down on the sofa. “Let’s go over them again this week. What do you think?”

She looked up, and Xia Chao looked back. The billowing white curtains swayed in the wind, and Ping Yuan’s face, bathed in the hazy moon, had a soft, luminous glow.

The bright moon is elegant… Xia Chao suddenly remembered the next line of the poem.

Useless, she scolded herself inwardly. Why is my brain working perfectly NOW?

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