Lin Nan felt like he was the so-called "group favorite" in the dormitory.
Whether it was because he was a year younger than his roommates, or because he looked particularly approachable, in any case, from the first semester of freshman year, Lin Nan felt that his roommates all took special care of him.
Needless to mention Chen Yao—this guy had known him since middle school. Since their parents were often away, they were good brothers who looked out for each other. Although Xiong Da and Tu Junhui were respectively cold on the outside but warm inside, and loose-lipped, and they had only known each other for a year after all, Lin Nan always felt that both of them usually accommodated him quite a bit.
In elementary school, Lin Nan lived with his maternal grandparents in the countryside. Perhaps because elderly people had different concepts, he wasn't sent to kindergarten but was sent to elementary school a year early. This meant that despite studying for so long, no matter which class he was in, he was always the little brother who got bullied by everyone.
Fortunately, he met Chen Yao.
No matter how many times he thought about it, Lin Nan felt Chen Yao was simply his lucky star. He suspected he must have done some great deed in his past life to meet Chen Yao and be pulled out of the abyss of campus bullying.
It was a new week.
The dormmates all seemed lacking in energy, each lying in bed like salted fish.
"Get up, get up." After washing up, Lin Nan returned to the dormitory and patted each of the three's bed frames one by one.
However, Tu Junhui and Chen Yao had drunk too much celebrating Tu Junhui's birthday last night, and Xiong Da habitually stayed up late grinding mobile game events. Groggily awakened, he half-opened his eyes to look at Lin Nan, then quickly buried his head and made a hoarse, muffled sound: "Skipping, skipping. Help me with attendance."
"No way, you three can't all skip class, right?" Lin Nan's face darkened. "Skipping is fine, but don't ask me to help with attendance. How can I answer for four people by myself?"
"Just shout 'here' four times." Tu Junhui suddenly interjected.
"If you're awake, get up quickly."
Lin Nan glared angrily, but saw Tu Junhui wrap himself in his blanket, cover his head, and refuse in a muffled voice: "Headache, drank too much, can't get up."
"What about Chen Yao?"
Without turning around, Lin Nan knew Chen Yao was also awake.
"Hey, don't nag like an old mother..." Chen Yao sighed on his bed. "I can't get up either."
Lin Nan couldn't understand why people who were clearly awake still claimed they couldn't get up. If it were winter and they were sealed by their beds, that would be understandable, but this was a coastal summer with temperatures above thirty-five degrees.
Even though it was October, this place probably wouldn't cool down until November or December.
With no one to attend class together, Lin Nan could only take his books, put on his white sun protection jacket, and go out alone.
Just as he reached downstairs from the dormitory building, he discovered the basketball court in front of the dormitory was full of students wearing military training uniforms.
"So they're doing military training? This year's military training is quite late." Lin Nan muttered to himself. When he had just officially started school, he had endured military training under the scorching sun, but this year's students were lucky enough to have it postponed until October.
After standing at the dormitory entrance for a moment, a familiar voice came from behind: "Lin Nan? Just you alone?"
Lin Yuan slowly passed by Lin Nan's side, with three of his roommates following behind him.
"Boss! You're even more handsome today than yesterday!" Big Dog eagerly rushed forward.
"Big Dog... don't you guys usually arrive just in time for class?" Lin Nan thought for a long time but still couldn't remember his name, so he could only follow others in using the nickname.
Big Dog didn't mind his nickname at all. His face always wore a cheerful, naturally familiar expression. He even put his arm around Lin Nan's neck and asked with a smile: "You guys have your competition next week, right? I'll go to the field and hold up a banner to cheer you on!"
"Let's skip the banner, shall we?"
Lin Nan awkwardly tried to inconspicuously break free from Big Dog's arm. Ever since his body became feminized, he tried to avoid physical contact with males, not only afraid of being discovered, but more importantly, due to Lilith's influence, being too close to males would cause him to have some uncontrollable behaviors.
But this masculine gesture of putting arms around shoulders still made Lin Nan feel comfortable, giving him the illusion of returning to the past.
He couldn't break free...
His face darkened, and he could only continue walking toward the teaching building under Big Dog's restraint. Big Dog beside him was like another Tu Junhui, never able to keep his mouth idle. People who disliked him would find him noisy, but those who liked him could chat very happily with him.
Although Lin Nan had often gone to Big Dog's dormitory to borrow computers, he was actually only familiar with Big Dog and Lin Yuan. The other two seemed to be introverted types who rarely spoke whether walking or in class.
Although Lin Yuan looked aloof, after getting familiar with him, Lin Nan found he actually talked quite a bit.
"How's Cola doing?" He came to check on Cola about once a week. "Did you deworm and vaccinate it?"
"I’m a bit poor..." Lin Nan felt guilty mentioning this. "We've done both internal and external deworming, but we don't have enough money for vaccines yet."
"It's fine. Cola looks only two or three months old, so vaccines aren't urgent." Lin Yuan walked ahead, thought for a moment, then instructed: "In a couple days I'll bring some toys and snacks for Cola. I also bought a cotton nest, which should be much better than cardboard boxes plus clothes."
Lin Nan felt he really wanted to adopt Cola, but his roommates didn't quite agree.
Since he had wasted time trying to wake up his roommates earlier, Lin Nan couldn't eat breakfast today either. He followed Lin Yuan's group directly to the classroom, sat in the same row as them, and then began to feel drowsy.
Tomorrow, he would go to that traffic control uncle's house.
Lin Nan needed to think ahead about how to deal with the traffic control uncle's shut-in son.
Actually, if he wanted to be simple and rough, it would be easy—call two strong men to lift up that shut-in and throw him out the door. But that was really too unrealistic. Then there was psychological counseling... but the traffic control uncle and his son communicated so little that Lin Nan hadn't obtained much information and had no place to start.
If only he could know what the son liked.
Lin Nan leaned over the desk, pressing his cheek against the cool surface while thinking about this thorny problem.
Also, going to someone else's house alone—wouldn't that be a bit unsafe?
Only now did he realize the safety issue.
In his previous eighteen years, he hadn't encountered any truly evil people. He hadn't even been in car accidents. At most, as a freshman, he had been fooled by "deaf-mute" people at the train station and ended up buying a red string for ten yuan. (TN: Some people fake disabilities to garner pity from strangers to sell a cheaply bought item.)
The key point was that previously he was male and basically didn't need to worry much about safety issues. In that other three-hundred-year memory, Lilith only harmed others and was rarely harmed by others.
There shouldn't be any problems, right? Even if a shut-in had bad intentions, he probably wouldn't have the courage.