Regression—it had triggered.
With thick waves of shock, the entire world before his eyes transformed into a trembling black-and-white negative.
His consciousness welcomed emptiness, as if flying out of his body.
This was the phenomenon of "Regression."
Zhang Shutong was all too familiar with this. When consciousness returned, though his body hadn't yet regained sensation, his mind buzzed, instantly sounding the alarm.
Someone was trying to kill him!
He couldn't even spare time to think about the reason for the regression. The temporal jump points were often very close together, let alone with a sudden attack.
Was it a few seconds ago? Or a few minutes?
Would he return to the waters called the Forbidden Zone, or on the way there, or had someone already targeted him back at the hotel?
He struggled to calm his breathing, rapidly thinking through countermeasures.
He had to save himself first.
His mind rehearsed the upcoming scenarios, even preparing different contingency plans. When sensation finally returned, he took a deep breath, his hands and feet already moving subconsciously, then suddenly opened his eyes—
But...
Where was this?
The world before his eyes didn't match any of his imagined answers. That pitch-black winter night had already receded into the distance.
He seemed to be inside a classroom.
Unfamiliar scenes entered his vision one by one:
Directly ahead was a blackboard, in his peripheral vision he could see children in school uniforms, before him was a desk painted black, with an open exercise book spread out...
The surroundings were quiet, with only the rustling sound of pen tips sliding across paper.
Not a single thing related to the attack... no, it should be said nothing connected to his current predicament.
Looking down further, even these hands weren't his own anymore—a bit smaller, a bit paler, currently holding a pen.
But the faint white mark on the tiger's mouth was very familiar—a scar left from childhood.
A certain speculation suddenly surged into his chest.
Zhang Shutong turned his head in disbelief, his gaze finally fixing on the electronic calendar at the back of the classroom.
Red pixels displayed the current time:
December 5, 2012, Wednesday.
He... had actually returned to eight years ago!
...
It was probably a few minutes, maybe longer—he didn't calculate the specific time. Perhaps after his heart had thumped hundreds of times, Zhang Shutong slowly exhaled, confirming the reality before his eyes.
He had truly returned.
Different from rebirth, it was through the ability of Regression, crossing eight years in one leap.
He had also figured out the current time. He'd just counted on his fingers several times to confirm—it was the first semester of ninth grade.
It wasn't that his math was poor; these years of living had made him nearly lose his sense of temporal scale.
When recalling a specific year, he could at most vaguely remember what he was doing, like being in middle school, but which exact grade required careful recollection.
Then there was the current situation:
This was probably a self-study period, so everyone around was quietly doing homework.
His deskmate looked somewhat unfamiliar—he couldn't remember the name. He wasn't the type to ask everything either; when encountering unexpected situations, he preferred to think things through himself first.
What was most familiar was actually the exercise book spread before him. He flipped through it twice—English, blue cover, with "Five Years of High School Entrance Exams, Three Years of Mock Tests" written on it. Something truly unforgettable even if you wanted to forget.
Turning his head to look outside, through the iron-grated windows, he could see the ground outside the teaching building.
Eight years ago today, there had apparently been a snowfall. The red was the plastic sports field, surrounded by a ring of white snow.
This really wasn't good weather. The cloud layer was very low, the light dim, and all the fluorescent tubes in the classroom were lit—this point at least was similar to eight years later.
But accompanying this came more doubts:
Why did the regression occur?
Why eight years ago?
And who was trying to kill him?
There was also something that concerned him more than all these, even more than his own death—
Did he still have the ability to "Regress"?
Right now was the first semester of ninth grade, while that accident had happened during the summer vacation after the high school entrance exam.
With hidden excitement, he recalled a famous paradox:
If a person traveled through time and killed their grandfather before he married and had children, the question was: could this person succeed?
Zhang Shutong didn't care whether his grandfather died or not—he had returned anyway, which meant—
If he never went to that temple in the future, avoided that accident, he would welcome a normal life.
A normal life, the possibility of starting over...
This was a thought that had been buried in his heart for many years but never dared to hope for, and in this moment it became reality.
He pressed his lips together hard, but the smile at the corners of his mouth still couldn't be suppressed, gradually spreading. He simply buried his face in the crook of his arm, trying not to make a sound, yet his body trembled slightly.
He thought the sixteen-year-old Zhang Shutong would have rushed out of the classroom in one stride, charged up to the rooftop, and released his uncontainable joy in the place closest to the sky.
But the twenty-four-year-old him only wanted to sit quietly in his seat, savoring this moment of excitement, recalling the face of his sixteen-year-old self.
Although there was no mirror at hand, he could still recall his appearance then: hair that would never lie flat, still youthful features, a straight nose bridge and clear lip line, and eyes that always shone with spirit.
He used to think the future held countless possibilities. Though after many years he discovered he'd been walking in one direction all along, ultimately he had returned to the starting point, hadn't he?
He recalled another passage, forgetting its source:
"A person at thirteen or fourteen, in summer, picked up a real gun. Because of youthful ignorance, he pulled the trigger. No one died, no one was injured, and he thought he'd fired a blank. Later, when he was thirty or older, walking down the street, he heard faint sounds of wind from behind. He stopped, turned around, and the bullet struck right between his eyebrows."
A bullet from eight years ago struck right between his eyebrows.
Zhang Shutong sincerely thanked this bullet.
After organizing his emotions and raising his head again, everything before his eyes seemed lovely:
The oversized school uniform jacket was a symbol of youth, in the center of the snow-covered sports field was a pool of clear water, even the Five-Three spread open on the desk...
Well, he looked at it twice and found it still wasn't lovely.
Zhang Shutong had experienced quite a bit, so after the initial excitement, he quickly calmed down.
Although he wanted to enjoy this second chance at life without worries, some things had to be understood.
Like what this strange regression was all about.
After thinking for a moment, he had a pretty good idea.
Known: he had been killed.
The trigger condition was: "something bad happened around him."
He'd always thought the ability didn't work on himself.
Now he discovered that perhaps it was just that the degree wasn't enough.
Being injured, feeling terrible... psychological or physical problems were far from meeting the standard. Only his own death could trigger the regression.
Thinking of this, Zhang Shutong didn't know what to say.
All these years he hadn't died, hadn't discovered you had another use—well, that's really sorry.
The second question was easily solved:
Each time jump returned to the critical node before the incident.
Did this mean his cause of death traced back to eight years ago?
There was still phantom pain at the back of his neck. The attacker's strike had been precise and ruthless, basically coming straight for him.
But with such a vast time gap, even if he wanted to do something, he was left only with bewilderment.
Today was December 5th. He had died on December 12th, eight years later. To be precise, he'd returned to eight years and eight days prior.
This date made him inevitably sensitive.
"It's already spread everywhere. Now it's not a question of whether you know, but which version you believe..."
The conversation from a few hours ago still rang in his ears, and an extremely absurd guess surfaced in his mind—
Could he have been silenced?
Zhang Shutong's feelings were complex.
He didn't like off-the-cuff deductions, but if he took Du Kang's words seriously, everything actually became quite logical.
Assume the murderer killed that missing girl eight years ago.
Eight years later, for some reason, struck at Lu Qinglian.
Then, the perpetrator heard several absurd rumors—like informing the killer of information or whatever—passed around by a bunch of people until it seemed true, and finally targeted him.
It seemed only this way could explain why he'd returned to the node eight years ago before the case occurred.
He tore off a sheet of scratch paper, first writing down his own name, then filling in Lu Qinglian, and finally the murdered girl—he thought for a moment, she seemed to be called Gu Qiumian.
He drew and wrote some more symbols, using them to help organize his thoughts, comprehensible only to himself, like a suspect relationship diagram when solving a case.
Connecting the three names formed a triangle. Zhang Shutong stared at the triangle for a good while, thinking his death was unjust enough.
As everyone knows, triangles are the most stable structure—stable enough that his death was inevitable, the three people like grasshoppers tied to the same rope.
However, at least the result was good. He had a second chance at life and an opportunity to prevent two murders.
Thinking of this, he subconsciously searched for those two figures.
He couldn't find Lu Qinglian—there was an empty seat in the class, perhaps she'd gone out.
He did find the other one. The pretty girl named Gu Qiumian sat by the window, with medium-length hair and an oval face, wrapped in a thick scarf.
Her school uniform was draped over the chair back. She wore a beige checkered sweater. The sweater wasn't particularly flashy, but on her, it was so refined it seemed out of place with the surroundings.
So much so that Zhang Shutong couldn't tell whether she was cold or not.
If cold, she should put on her jacket. If not cold, why wear a scarf?
Zhang Shutong could no longer remember her appearance clearly. The reason he could spot her at a glance, besides being pretty, was that she was truly too conspicuous.
Everyone else was studying, while she had nothing to do and breathed on the glass, her fingertips dancing out a bunch of messy lines. Anyway, after she finished drawing, Zhang Shutong couldn't tell what it was—a funny face?
In the entire classroom, only she seemed to be doing nothing proper... perhaps adding himself made two.
Staring at that funny face, he recalled more things.
Just as the girl's pretty face and the funny face she drew weren't the same style, Gu Qiumian had never been in the same style as these classmates either.
Qiumian, Qiumian—as the name suggested, autumn rain continuous, but the person herself had never been the lingering, graceful type. On the contrary, she was more like frozen rain at the turn of spring and winter.
When she was in a good mood it was fine, but if someone provoked her, they'd be painfully pelted by ice-cold raindrops.
Zhang Shutong knew the term "young miss" was somewhat distant from this remote island, but in fact, she truly was one.
Gu Qiumian's father was a wealthy merchant, one of the first batch to make their fortune after Reform and Opening Up.
Father Gu's business empire spread quite wide—if not everywhere nationwide, at least famous throughout the province.
He'd originally been developing in the neighboring provincial capital. Perhaps finding life lonely after achieving success, he took a fancy to this small island, very optimistic about its potential to become a 5A-level scenic area, and prepared to start from scratch.
The resort village, shopping plaza, and such that Zhang Shutong heard about when attending school were likely all Father Gu's handiwork.
Even within campus, traces of Father Gu could be seen:
If you went to the administrative building, along the long corridor, you'd find the most prominent thing was the other party's giant photo frame as an "Outstanding Alumnus."
Although her father had never attended a single day of school here, since the only plastic sports field in the school was donated by him, so be it.
If you went to the library—supposedly their school's scale couldn't really be associated with a library—next to the imposing main entrance was a string of gilded characters: "With sincere gratitude for Mr. Gu Jianhong's donation."
The library was thus named "Jianhong Hall."
If student enrollment weren't insufficient, there would probably be another "Jianhong Building."
And because his precious daughter attended school here, probably not wanting to be too ostentatious, regrettably no "Jianhong Statue" could be seen at the school gate.
As for meeting Gu Qiumian herself, it was on the first day she transferred.
That day, Zhang Shutong rode his newly bought bicycle through the walking students and saw a black sedan blocking the school gate.
Then the car door opened, two round-toed little leather boots emerged, and a girl got out wearing a red-and-black checkered skirt. She tossed her hair spiritedly, the pendant hanging from her hair tips bouncing.
When he was young, he didn't understand cars, only knowing that sedan had very high-quality paint. Of course, he still didn't understand them now—his past experiences had basically made him bid farewell to driver's licenses—but at least now he knew four circles meant Audi.
At the time, he'd followed behind Gu Qiumian into the same classroom.
The girl first swept an appraising gaze around the surrounding classmates, then asked him who the class monitor was.
He calmly answered that he didn't know either. The other party probably felt he wasn't giving her any face, stopped pulling things out of her bag, and her flying, pretty eyes glared at him.
Then Zhang Shutong learned they were both transfer students, and moreover, transferred on the same day.
That day, Young Miss Gu brought an entire bag full of chocolates, preparing to use them to "capture Pokémon."
That's right, the whole class were Pokémon in her eyes.
Later, the chocolates were distributed, but unfortunately the effect wasn't great. In the end, she never integrated into any circle, hitting nothing but walls.
Gu Qiumian thus welcomed her brand-new campus life, clearly very unwilling.
Zhang Shutong at most missed the McDonald's from the city. Young Miss Gu, on the other hand, never got along well with her Pokémon friends.
Actually, no one ostracized her at first. Mainly, the students on the small island had never seen such a proud girl—they were somewhat timid, somewhat inferior, not knowing how to interact with her.
But soon, things took a turn for the better:
One day, several girls finally worked up the courage and brought a bag of gold coin chocolates to share with her.
As a result, she glanced at them, oh-ed, and said indifferently that it wasn't necessary—these were cocoa butter substitutes, the taste was too poor, she never ate them, but if they wanted to eat she could bring them some good ones.
The atmosphere froze just like that. The girls were immeasurably embarrassed, their self-esteem shattered on the ground—not just because of the rejection, but because they fundamentally didn't understand what "cocoa butter substitute" meant.
For girls that age, if they were craving some "sweets," gold coin chocolates were the most cost-effective choice. From the small supermarket, ten-something yuan could get you a big bag.
And their monthly allowance was only worth a few such bags.
Just when everyone thought this was a plot of the young miss looking down on small-town people, who knew the next day Gu Qiumian actually brought over a bag of Godiva—a Belgian brand. Zhang Shutong didn't recognize it then, but when chasing a senior girl in high school, he bought it once. One box cost several hundred yuan, making his heart bleed.
Just as the island's children were all used to cocoa butter substitute chocolate, Young Miss Gu probably thought carrying gift boxes to school was too stupid, and was also used to carrying several-hundred-yuan chocolates in a white plastic bag.
Then she smiled matter-of-factly, as if yesterday's awkwardness never existed, and said:
You all try these, they're delicious. My dad often buys them for me.
As a result, no one took any, treating her like air. Her outstretched hand just froze there.
Thinking about it now, she was somewhat spoiled, didn't know how to interact with people, but more than that, she was clumsy.
The matter didn't end there:
How could Young Miss Gu tolerate this? That day after school, it was Zhang Shutong's turn for cleaning duty. Just as he was about to finish, a girl suddenly burst through the front door, startling him.
The girl's eyes were red, fists clenched, coming before him and tossing out a white plastic bag, asking if he ate chocolate or not.
At the time, he hesitated—the meaning of this question wasn't whether he wanted to eat it.
Rather, among the girls who'd had a conflict with her, the ringleader was unfortunately called Feng Ruoping, a member of their small group.
Zhang Shutong had never been someone who valued romance over friendship. Moreover, the night before, Ruoping had vented her anger in front of them. Therefore, he hesitated a few seconds before firmly refusing.
Then that whole bag of chocolates was thrown into the trash. Gu Qiumian walked out without looking back. Naturally, Zhang Shutong wouldn't do the despicable thing of retrieving them to eat secretly, but throwing them away felt wasteful. The matter ended with him turning them over to the homeroom teacher.
But after this incident, they had completely formed a grudge—one-sided, of course.
Perhaps in Gu Qiumian's eyes, "traitors" were more detestable than "enemies."
Although Zhang Shutong never understood how he became a traitor, or rather, why she considered them on the same side.
Maybe because they both transferred from the city?
Thinking about it this way, compared to other classmates, she did strike up conversations with him a bit more.
But his younger self was completely oblivious to this. Rather than calling it dullness, his mind simply wasn't on such matters at all.
His favorite after-school activity was fishing, and his favorite in-class activity was pondering how to catch an even bigger fish.
This led to, over the years, when chatting about his childhood self—he did have some social interactions, like chatting with Du Kang a few hours ago—he often got the image of being aloof from others' perspectives, repeatedly surprising Zhang Shutong.
Aloof, really?
During his student days, except for those two years when he was in the worst state, he didn't remember giving anyone the cold shoulder. He simply sometimes wasn't interested in topics and felt there was nothing to say, so he proactively kept quiet.
Anyway, that's how things were. Back then, he didn't think he was particularly aloof, so being treated as a "traitor" by Gu Qiumian didn't bother him, but there was no need to go chasing after cold attitudes either.
However, later another incident occurred where they had an even more serious conflict. He'd forgotten the specific reason, but anyway it made his younger self quite angry, and from then on they never spoke again.
And by the time he'd mostly gotten over his anger—
She was killed.
Until the very end, Gu Qiumian never made any proper friends.
Zhang Shutong was just thinking about this somewhat wistfully when a bespectacled girl walked up to the podium.
She cleared her throat:
"Don't forget we're switching seats during the break. Students who haven't cleaned up should hurry."