The Richest Man’s Boyfriend Lives in a History Textbook - Chapter 11

Friday was the day Xingyuan had originally planned to enter the Star-Scrying Device.

But he wasn’t as excited as he had imagined he would be.

His mind was filled with endless sand and dust, countless layers of exhaustion. He had gotten a taste of being a soldier, but when he discovered he couldn’t make it to the finish line, the entire experience had become meaningless.

Xingyuan looked at the giant Stahl figurine in his room, his eyes blank.

After a moment, he closed his eyes and kicked the compressed small backpack he had already prepared on the floor under his bed.

Then he stood up, ready to go to school.

He finally didn’t have to train anymore.

Xingyuan let out a breath of relief, but the dark cloud that had seemingly drifted away floated back and wrapped itself around his heart once more.

Xingyuan was clearly intelligent, but he was careless in class. He at least half-listened to his other classes, but as for the course History of Cosmic Civilization, there hadn’t been a single second since enrollment that he wasn’t asleep — he hadn’t even woken up during exams.

At 4 PM, his deskmate knocked on his desk.

Xingyuan jolted slightly, and only then did he drowsily open his eyes.

He slowly sat up and stretched, and upon seeing the time on the wall, a smile broke across his face.

Excellent, only two hours left until school let out! With two days off, he could really have fun.

His deskmate glanced at him and immediately knew what he was thinking.

Xu Mo coughed, and Xingyuan came to his senses. He quickly tried to coax his deskmate, “Don’t be so serious! We’ll be on break soon — where should we go play? As long as you come with me, it’s my treat!”

Xu Mo’s eyelid twitched. He took a deep breath, knocked on the desk, turned his head, and said with furrowed brows, “Xingyuan, you can’t spend every day just thinking about having fun — you need to make progress! I genuinely feel upset for you. With talent this good, if you put in the effort, you could absolutely place in the top hundred of the grade.”

Xingyuan blinked, waved his hand, and said, “Let’s not talk about that. We rarely get a break — wouldn’t it be great if we were just happy? Tell me, what should we go play? As long as you’re happy.”

Xu Mo was like a deflated ball; looking at the smiling, carefree boy in front of him, he genuinely couldn’t muster any anger.

In the end, he could only press his temples helplessly and say, exasperated at his friend’s lack of ambition, “I won’t even ask you to beat me — as long as you can make it into the top hundred of the grade, I’ll be happy.”

Xu Mo had a B+ mental strength, and his thinking ability was far better than the average person’s. Combined with his tireless day-and-night effort, his grades were stably around 50th in the grade.

Hearing this, Xingyuan felt a headache coming on. It wasn’t that he couldn’t meet this condition — he simply didn’t want to. It was an instinctive resistance.

Just then, a message scrolled across the classroom’s large screen, an automated mechanical voice playing it aloud.

“The annual rank assessment has begun. Please gather at the Information Center.”

Hearing this, Xingyuan blinked innocently at Xu Mo. “Let’s go, let’s go, the test is about to start.”

Xu Mo: …

Don’t think I don’t know you’re changing the subject.

****

Only one person remained ahead of Xingyuan in line, but he didn’t pay it much mind.

In fact, aside from the school’s organized testing, the Hua family also occasionally arranged for someone to test Xingyuan privately.

Coincidentally, the last test had been just last Friday morning, and the result needed no explanation.

Over a decade now, aside from small fluctuations in his mental strength, Xingyuan’s physical constitution hadn’t budged an inch — exactly like the Dead Sea — and it had also buried Xingyuan’s fantasy of a military career.

The flashing red light interrupted Xingyuan’s train of thought, followed immediately by the announcer beside him reading aloud.

“Next.”

The classmate ahead of him walked out of the chamber, looking completely calm, even stretching lazily, seemingly quite indifferent.

Clearly, this person’s data probably hadn’t fluctuated much compared to previous years.

No wonder — at this age, those whose data actually changed were a minority.

Once the classmate stepped down, Xingyuan went up.

The moment the door opened, the bright light made his eyelid twitch.

A few seconds later, Xingyuan had adjusted to the surroundings, and he also saw the staff member in a white coat standing before the control console.

The staff member looked at Xingyuan, smiled, and pointed to the stool in the middle. “You’re Hua Xingyuan, right? Sit down first.”

Xingyuan nodded, said his thanks, and sat down straight and upright on the stool.

The staff member opened his file and was a bit surprised to find he had been tested just a week prior, but quickly settled down.

In truth, quite a few families privately had their children’s ranks tested, and the vast majority of them were either wealthy or noble.

Just a quick glance at the boy earlier had been enough to tell that his background was no ordinary one.

Still, this wasn’t something he could aspire to himself.

The staff member’s attitude remained good though. He waved at Xingyuan, “Student, please relax now, I’m going to start the device.”

Xingyuan complied, closing his eyes and calming his mind. The next moment, even through his eyelids, Xingyuan could feel the brightness outside.

The staff member stared intently at the device, and saw the mental strength column’s data spike instantly, reaching A in less than a second.

The staff member’s eyes went wide, his hand clenching — but the next moment, the mental strength column went gray immediately, stopping right at A.

The staff member: ??

This…

He frowned and checked the screen, and only then noticed the past data.

It turned out the boy’s mental strength had always been A.

However, the staff member sensed something was off.

In his experience, a true A-rank mental strength would climb gradually during testing — it usually took 10 seconds to reach that figure.

At the speed he’d just seen, wouldn’t it have kept climbing toward S?

The staff member clicked on the gray bar, wanting to check the details, but a line of text appeared on the interface instead.

[Insufficient permissions to view. Employee ID K94076, you must keep this secret.]

The staff member’s gaze sharpened, his hand gripping the controller tightening, and at the same time his confusion found its explanation.

He pretended nothing had happened and told Xingyuan he could open his eyes now.

Xingyuan opened his deep blue eyes, lowered his head to say thanks, and was about to leave, but the staff member called out to stop him.

“Student Hua, please come over here for a moment,” the staff member said, seeming to have noticed something.

Xingyuan looked puzzled.

He really couldn’t think of what could possibly be special about data that had remained stable for over a decade. Could it be that his mental strength hadn’t been hidden well enough?

Though confused, Xingyuan still obediently walked over.

The staff member didn’t beat around the bush, and instead pointed to the physical constitution column and said, “Student Hua, I wonder if you’re aware of your physical constitution growth?”

In an instant, Xingyuan’s pupils contracted sharply.

He trembled, immediately bending down to stare unblinkingly at the screen.

However, he was too nervous, and genuinely had no idea where to look.

An unfamiliar finger pointed at the screen, and Xingyuan’s gaze followed the finger’s movement.

The staff member explained, “Because you were tested just a week ago, the magnitude of your physical constitution growth is relatively clear.

As for how to describe this magnitude — if we were to draw a progress bar between your last test’s data and the B-rank standard, then this time’s growth is equivalent to advancing one-thousandth of the way along that progress bar.

However, this figure is very small, please don’t get your hopes…”

The staff member was about to offer comfort, but saw that the boy’s attention wasn’t on that at all.

The boy was focused on only one thing.

“You mean… it moved?” Xingyuan said, his eyes having not blinked for so long that they had gone dry, a glimmer of moisture now welling at the corners.

The staff member paused. After a long moment, he nodded.

He hesitated for a bit, then pointed at the testing device not far away. “Fortunately the interval between the two tests wasn’t long, so I can try to help you trace back the changes in your physical constitution over this period.”

Xingyuan nodded firmly.

A data table was quickly produced. The staff member stroked his chin, speaking as he thought it through.

“Over the seven days, the data changed across roughly two days, and remained completely unchanged the rest of the time.

That period was roughly from Friday night to Monday morning. Although there was change in the data, it was extremely minor.

The real major change happened on Sunday afternoon — that stretch accounted for about 97.6% of the total increase.

You should try to recall what you were doing during that time. Most likely that was the trigger for your physical constitution’s growth…”

Xingyuan stood frozen in place, but his slightly reddened eye rims and the complex emotions in his eyes had already revealed his inner turmoil.

Once the staff member finished speaking, Xingyuan’s lips moved. He steadied his voice and said “thank you” to the staff member, then bowed deeply.

Before leaving, Xingyuan wiped at the corners of his eyes, then rubbed his face, trying hard to bring himself back to normal.

The moment the door opened, the sky stretching out before him filled Xingyuan’s heart with ease.

In this moment, the joy that had been pressing on his chest burst forth with a “pop,” impossible to suppress.

Xingyuan’s eyes and brows both curved with his smile.

He looked up at the sky — yes, the sky was truly blue, beautiful.

He walked down the steps, pondering as he went.

Ah, how had these steps been designed so well? They fit his stride perfectly.

Sunlight shone down on the top of Xingyuan’s head, and Xingyuan raised his head, sighing at the golden light in his palm.

Just look at this sunlight — shining in just the right place. The sun was so gentle too, so understanding.

Xingyuan pressed a hand to his chest, trying to keep his excited heart from leaping out.

He wished he could dive straight into the Star-Scrying Device right now, but school hadn’t let out yet — he still had to go back to the classroom.

Ah, Xingyuan sighed repeatedly, even his complaints carrying a note of delight.

As he walked back, he sent a message to Yue Xi, asking him to bring the small backpack from under his bed when he came to pick him up.

Yue Xi was confused, but once Xingyuan explained the whole sequence of events clearly, Yue Xi’s joy was no less than his own.

He told Xingyuan not to worry about it — he would handle everything properly for him.

Xingyuan felt thoroughly satisfied, because someone understood and shared in his feelings.

Xingyuan didn’t tell his parents. He wanted to wait until the day he scored well on an exam or got into a military academy to give them a surprise.

****

After another wave of dizziness, Xingyuan, backpack on his shoulders, found himself once again on this barren stretch of land.

Yellow sand swirled up; there was no one around in any direction.

Xingyuan didn’t know which way to go, but he cleverly opened up the positioning system.

A small red dot blinked in one direction, and Xingyuan rubbed his hands together, stars lighting up in his eyes.

The data floating in the air showed he was still 16 kilometers from the man.

This time Xingyuan didn’t feel tired at all — instead, his fighting spirit soared. He tightened his backpack straps and walked toward his target, feet pressing into the earth.

Aisley wasn’t one to spend money, yet these past few days he had bought alcohol several times.

This half-month had passed without incident. Fred came by in his idle time to joke around with Aisley.

Fred said, “At your age, you still won’t find yourself a wife? Tubei Bisang is about the same age as you, but his wife has already given him several children — the oldest is even old enough to enlist.”

Aisley poured himself a drink, eyes dim and smiling without any real light in them. “No point. No fun in it.”