After Qin Ao and Chen Jianghe left the equipment room.
While the students were present, Lin Wanxing could calmly analyze this and that with them. But once the noisy young people departed, the warehouse suddenly fell silent. The shelves at the far end were shrouded in dim light, and Lin Wanxing grew restless.
She picked up the red-and-blue heart-patterned wrapping paper and, steeling herself, read the advertisement again.
—Are you full of confusion about your life?
Do you still not know where your future lies?
Xiaolin from No. 8 Middle School specializes in treating difficult cases such as academic aversion, truancy, unwillingness to learn, and poor grades.
Address: Sports Equipment Room, Hongjing No. 8 Middle School
Phone: 18953418080
It did explicitly name Qin Ao and direct him to her, but why her?
Was it, as the ad claimed, to seek her out to save lost young students?
Lin Wanxing wasn’t sure. Chen Jianghe had received the "Ball Borrowing Card" the previous week, back when she was still in Yongchuan.
So it seemed that after she took over the role of equipment room manager, her name and phone number appeared on the cigarette box Qin Ao received, making her the target.
Then, could it really be as Qin Ao said—that there was something in this equipment room?
Lin Wanxing’s thoughts raced, but she couldn’t make sense of it.
She walked to the window of the equipment room and looked around. The teaching building, the office building… there were many spots from which the equipment room could be observed. School staff or even students could be suspects.
A gust of wind swept across the playground. Summer was nearing its end. Lin Wanxing rubbed her arms, feeling a slight chill.
—
No matter how many doubts and uncertainties she had, for now, the only clue Lin Wanxing possessed was that "⑩-".
To that end, she made a special trip to the No. 8 Middle School library, hoping to find books that might inspire "problem-solving" ideas.
The school library was only the size of a classroom, with a limited collection. A swipe of her meal card granted her entry.
Unsure where to start, Lin Wanxing stood before the bookshelves, scanning titles at random for inspiration.
Like many high school libraries, part of the collection consisted of student donations. There were many books like Elementary School Fun Problems and Brain Teasers, which didn’t quite match the high school age group.
Opening one, she saw the donor’s name scrawled inside—clearly a child’s handwriting. It seemed the books were no longer needed, so parents had agreed to "donate" them to the school.
But these books were quite enlightening for Lin Wanxing.
From a certain perspective, the nine sentences on the cigarette paper and the final blank resembled a cipher that needed decoding.
Her gaze drifted downward and landed on a book titled Elementary School Fun Cryptography.
Meanwhile, Brain Teasers and "fun problem collections" might fall under the "question bank" category and could also be helpful.
In any case, if this was a puzzle and the sender intended for them to solve it, the answer probably wouldn’t be too difficult.
Lin Wanxing gathered a total of seven or eight assorted books. As she left, the librarian gave her a few serious looks.
—
After 5 p.m., Lin Wanxing didn’t head straight to dinner. There was still a school-wide faculty meeting to attend.
It was a monthly routine.
As a peripheral figure, Lin Wanxing was among the last to be notified.
When she hurried from the library to the venue, the intern teachers were already seated together, with no empty spots nearby.
She casually found an unoccupied corner and sat down by herself.She first spread open the borrowed Fun with Codes, listening to the vice principal introduce the intern teachers while familiarizing herself with the basic types of ciphers.
There were only a few fundamental categories of ciphers, and after briefly attempting to decode them, she found none matched.
She set the book aside.
The principal’s speech had moved on to the section about "strengthening teacher ethics education," emphasizing that building teacher ethics and conduct was key to fulfilling the mission of fostering virtue and nurturing talent.
After this part of the speech concluded, the entire audience erupted in thunderous applause, and the school’s academic affairs office took over the microphone.
The academic affairs office announced that September would be the "All-round Development Education" month, requiring all grades and teaching research groups to carry out diverse teaching activities and strive to produce relevant achievements.
That was the extent of the meeting’s content. Though it seemed concise, it had actually lasted nearly an hour.
After the faculty meeting, the physical education group held a separate session, and this was Lin Wanxing’s first time meeting all the teachers in the group.
In the office, there were only four physical education teachers in total, and with her, it made five. Even sitting around a table, there were still empty seats, so she couldn’t hide in the back and pretend to be invisible.
The head of the physical education group was a lean middle-aged man with dark, glossy skin, clearly defined muscles, and sharp, spirited eyes, like someone practiced in martial arts.
The other three teachers were also male, and their surnames combined in an interesting way, coincidentally forming "Zhao, Qian, Sun, Li."
She had already met Teacher Qian at noon, so he took the initiative to introduce her to the others: "This is our new Teacher Lin, a master’s graduate from Yongchuan University, currently in charge of managing the sports equipment room."
Lin Wanxing, seated, tried to stand up to greet them, but Teacher Qian stopped her: "No need to be so formal."
She could only smile and nod in agreement.
The other three teachers were surprised: "What sport does Teacher Lin practice?"
"Did you win any medals? Did you get into Yongchuan University through a sports scholarship?"
Lin Wanxing felt a bit embarrassed and could only say, "I studied a different major in university, not sports."
"What major?"
"Psychology."
The four teachers exchanged glances, momentarily unsure why she was sitting there.
"It’s fine, it’s fine. The retired Teacher Zhang’s major wasn’t related either. He was a veteran in the cafeteria and later transferred to manage the equipment," Teacher Qian reassured her.
"What kind of talk is that? Psychology is closely related to our field of sports!" Group Leader Zhao declared sternly.
"It’s good that Teacher Lin is here. We finally don’t have to take turns managing all that messy equipment," another teacher added.
The teachers all agreed, and Lin Wanxing relaxed a little.
She had never attended a physical education group meeting before and found the process quite straightforward.
First, the teachers discussed their class schedules. Since no one had any special leave requests, they would proceed as planned.
Then, Group Leader Zhao assigned some minor tasks, such as reviewing the equipment replenishment form she had submitted.
Finally, came the main event—
"Regarding the activities for the All-round Development Education month, the principal has spoken to me privately. Our physical education group must deliver results."
"How did this change? When he took office, didn’t he say that former Principal Kong’s 'Sports-oriented High School' policy was ineffective and that we should focus on academics, with the three-year goal of being recognized as a provincial model high school?" Teacher Sun remarked coolly.
"Goals must be updated frequently, comrades, to keep everyone motivated."
"So, does that mean the model high school goal is off the table?"Group Leader Zhao cleared his throat: "Teacher Lin is here, let's maintain proper teaching conduct."
The four teachers simultaneously picked up their teacups and took a sip. Lin Wanxing pretended not to have heard their earlier complaints about leadership.
The subsequent meeting naturally revolved around the direction of "how the Physical Education Department can achieve results."
Coincidentally, autumn was the season when various sports events at different levels concentrated their registrations and competitions. There were events such as the Anning City Middle School Sports Meet, Anning City Sports League High School Basketball Competition, Anning City Middle School Badminton Championships, and a series of other tournaments.
The Physical Education teachers were all experienced.
They organized the main events to focus on and specialized categories where they had potential to achieve good results, then assigned each teacher the competitions they would be responsible for.
From September to October, almost every weekend was packed with events they needed to lead students to attend.
The sky had already turned completely dark—for the Physical Education Department, this was quite a rare overtime night.
When it came to Lin Wanxing's turn...
"How about this—I've noticed Teacher Lin gets along quite well with Chen Jianghe and Qin Ao. For next Sunday's National Youth League East China Division preliminaries, let Teacher Lin lead the team," Teacher Qian's soft voice spoke up.
Lin Wanxing was at that moment flipping through a stack of competition regulations downloaded from the Anning City Student Sports website.
After consecutive meetings throughout the evening, she had only managed to eat a few biscuits and was feeling dizzy from hunger, so she just mechanically looked up and replied: "Ah, okay."
"Have the students gather at the school gate, and you can take them to the venue together," Group Leader Zhao added.
Only then did Lin Wanxing process this: "What venue? What competition?"
"Don't worry, it's nothing to be nervous about," Group Leader Zhao reassured her. "It's just a football match. Since our school is still a 'National Youth Campus Football Characteristic School,' we didn't participate in last year's preliminaries and directly forfeited. This year, higher-ups have given strict orders—some important leader is coming, so no matter what, the team must show up. Forfeiting again would be unacceptable. Just treat it as taking students to an extracurricular activity; results don't matter at all."
Lin Wanxing didn't quite understand: "So it's not an important competition?"
"Well, it's not unimportant, but even important competitions need some extras to fill out the numbers. Just consider our school team as the extras."
"The key point is that the extras need to show up?" Lin Wanxing asked. "But why did we forfeit last year?"
"There was a last-minute issue—some students didn't want to play, so we ended up forfeiting," Group Leader Zhao arranged casually. "In a couple days, I'll have Old Qian gather those kids together so you can get to know them."
"But if they didn't compete last time, will they be willing to go this time?"
"You're the teacher. If you say so, can the students not listen?"
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