The classroom buzzed with idle chatter as students filtered in, the scent of chalk and ink saturating the air. Yan Xiyan sat at her desk, posture perfect, fingers laced atop her notebook. To any onlooker, she was the image of a diligent student. But her ears were tuned to every shuffle, her eyes catching every twitch.
"Psst. Hey, sniper girl," Qiao Zeyan muttered from the seat behind her, his voice low but smug.
Xiyan didn't turn. "I told you not to call me that."
"Oh, sorry. 'Totally-normal-and-not-suspicious-at-all transfer student,'" he said, resting his chin on his hand. "Better?"
She exhaled, resisting the urge to stab his pen through the desk. "Do you want detention?"
"Only if you're the one giving it to me."
Before she could fire back with a snarky retort, the classroom door slammed open. Mr. Guo, the Physics teacher with the temper of a ticking bomb, strode in holding a stack of papers.
"Pop quiz," he barked. Groans rippled across the room. "No notes. No cheating. No mercy."
Yan Xiyan's heart rate jumped not from the test, but from what she spotted out of the corner of her eye. The reflective glint of a scope… on a nearby rooftop?
Her instincts screamed danger. But she couldn't move. Couldn't react.
Not in front of thirty students and a sharp-eyed teacher.
Her pencil snapped in half from the pressure of her grip.
Qiao Zeyan raised an eyebrow. "That into Physics, huh?"
"Shut up," she whispered sharply, eyes scanning the window again. But the glint was gone.
A phantom? Or a warning?
The test paper landed on her desk with a thud. She didn't flinch. But Qiao Zeyan didn't miss the way her shoulders tightened.
The quiz dragged on, her mind calculating more than just formulas. She scribbled answers automatically, years of sniper math translating into perfect physics. But her thoughts stayed fixed on that glimmer and the prickling on the back of her neck.
When the bell rang, she was the first to her feet.
"Running from your feelings?" Qiao teased.
"Running from you," she shot back.
He laughed, but his eyes followed her too closely.