700,000 likes—did he actually click each one open to check if she was there or something?!
What’s wrong with him!
Jiang Ran stood frozen for a long time holding the note, wanting to call him back and use the lighter in his pocket to burn this cursed thing to ashes right in front of him.
As she spaced out, Song Song, out of curiosity, peeked at the content on the note. Staring at the words “Shīfu Fu” (“Master”) for a long time, she finally couldn’t help herself and pointed at the note: “Who could possibly resist a young male dog who knows how to use reduplication?”
Jiang Ran expressionlessly tore the note into pieces and threw it into the trash can.
Song Song followed closely behind her like a little tail: “I thought he was the cold type.”
“No,” Jiang Ran replied with a genuinely cold tone, “he’s very good at acting cute.”
Song Song looked again in disbelief at the young black-haired guy not far away—who had already returned to his group of friends, casually leaning against a corner. He didn’t speak, but every person who spoke afterward instinctively turned their head to glance at him mid-sentence.
These small, unconscious actions easily revealed who the central figure among the group was.
Song Song sensed the real existence of “contrastive cuteness.”
“Why does he call you ‘master’?”
“Because two years ago, I foolishly showed mercy I shouldn’t have,” Jiang Ran said. “I picked up a stray dog, fed him, taught him how to put on ski boots, identified his leading leg, and held his hand to help him push down the slope—”
And then he bit me once…
Wait, no.
He bit me way too many times.
“You taught him how to ski?” Song Song blinked in surprise. “Yesterday I watched some of his other skiing videos, the serious ones. Honestly speaking, he skis pretty well, right? I was wondering who taught him—he’s actually got some skills.”
Jiang Ran felt a slight sense of pride, which she immediately felt ashamed about.
Slightly annoyed, she frowned and tucked some loose strands of hair behind her ear. She simply responded with a “Hmm” and said no more.
…
Once preparations were complete, the judges took the ski lift up the mountain first, and soon the competition was ready to begin.
Today’s event was the preliminary rounds of the men’s and women’s Parallel Giant Slalom.
According to the data, the Beijing Winter Olympics Giant Slalom course was 2029 meters high, 40 meters wide, 560 meters long, with a slope of 15.3 degrees.
This competition, however, managed to find a snowcourse configuration nearly identical to the Olympic venue: 2050 meters high, no wind but snowfall, favorable wind direction, 38 meters wide, 660 meters long, with a slope of 15.5 degrees.
The competition course even brought in professional equipment, featuring two intermediate timing devices in the middle of the tracks to accurately record each competitor’s race time.
In other words, except for the track length, this competition almost completely followed the Beijing Winter Olympics’ track standards.
Leaning slightly in her seat, Jiang Ran turned to Song Song beside her and said, “Did you bring your board and boots? After the competition, let’s give it a try while we’re free.”
Song Song: “You mean to see how far off we are from the Olympic level, only to be discouraged and never recover? What if I’m a full minute slower than them?”
Jiang Ran: “Even if you slid using your hands, you wouldn’t be a whole minute slower than them. Just look at those people up there—”
The two simultaneously looked up at the top of the hill dozens of meters away, where competitors were gradually arriving. The men’s group was going first. Due to the large number of participants, this round used a timed elimination system. About two hundred competitors would be ranked by their time, with the top 32 fastest advancing to the next round.
Right now, the hill was packed with people.
Jiang Ran spotted Bei Jiao immediately.
He was standing near the edge of the slope with his red snowboard. Right now, that 172cm ultra-long red board was upright and stuck in the snow beside the track. He had his elbow resting on the bindings, leaning on the board as if he had no bones in his body, chatting casually with someone beside him.
At that moment, as if he had sensed something, his speech gradually slowed down, then stopped altogether. He turned his head and looked directly over.
Their eyes met.
Bei Jiao gave her a quick up-and-down glance, then seemingly unbothered, turned his head away again.
Jiang Ran was puzzled when her phone suddenly rang.
It was a message from Qiu Nian.
[Qiu Nian: …The little dog told you not to stare at him, or he’ll get nervous and fall.]
Jiang Ran: “…”
[Shi De Ran Ran Ya: Am I not a judge here?! Tell him, I’m sitting here freezing my ass off, am I here to personally commune with nature?! I’m here to stare at all of them!]
[Qiu Nian: …]
[Qiu Nian: This is just my personal opinion—please take him off your block list, okay? In 2021, with such advanced communication technology, why am I, someone far away in Jilin, acting as a messenger between two people at the same ski resort and on the same mountain in Tonghua?!]
Jiang Ran angrily shoved her phone back into her pocket.
Jiang Ran: “Look at those people up there—none of them can ski as well as you, yet they’re bravely standing here.”
She finished the sentence she had started earlier, even though in the past five minutes she had already done many things and completed countless exchanges of glances.
Song Song didn’t mind her five-minute absence and quickly picked up the conversation: “How do you know they can’t ski as well as me? That’s discrimination!”
“Because we’re teammates,” Jiang Ran said expressionlessly, “and my apprentice is standing up there waiting to compete, while we’re pointing fingers and nitpicking.”
“Where did ‘we’ come from? It’s only you! Only you! Be nicer to our future son-in-law!”
“Why are you using the tone of a Korean old lady scolding her daughter for favoring her son-in-law? You don’t even know the whole story! What if I’m the one locked at home washing his socks and living a miserable life every day?”
“…Washing socks?”
“Yeah?”
“You don’t think the whole team—including Nie Xin—started calling you ‘Princess Pea’ merely because you’re pretty, do you?”
“…”
Song Song twitched her lips, shook her hand, and decided not to argue with this woman who was oblivious to herself yet still insisted on playing the pitiful role.
During their idle chatter, the competition quickly started. With professional timers and monitors, Jiang Ran and the other judges’ role in the preliminary rounds was simply to watch for obvious rule violations—
Because the Parallel Giant Slalom competition was conducted simultaneously on two tracks, with everyone sliding at high speed within the designated area, it was very important to complete the race properly within one’s own track this time…
Unlike the amateur races at Rongchuang, where the snow tracks were too narrow, occasionally causing the following skier to be affected by snow kicked up by the board tail of the skier ahead—this was normal.
But in official competition tracks nearly forty meters wide, if someone still ended up affecting others while sliding, it would be an insult to the spirit of sportsmanship not to penalize them for rule violations.
Jiang Ran dragged the competitors’ sign-in sheet in front of her, flipped through it, and found Bei Jiao was scheduled in the second group.
The one sliding with him this round was also a quite skilled veteran carver, sponsored by OGASAKA snowboards, from a well-established domestic club, and considered a senior member of that club.
Jiang Ran tapped the registration form with her fingertip, somewhat satisfied in her heart—
Just like in a marathon, having a pacer in front is always better than running alone. Similarly, in short-distance explosive competitions such as sprints or speed skating, if the competition is judged solely by time rather than elimination in a single race, being grouped with a high-level competitor and having someone beside you to help set the pace often allows one to perform better than sliding with novices or even alone.
The first group quickly finished their race. Neither of them went particularly fast, with the slightly faster one finishing in 92.38 seconds, roughly a minute and a half.
Jiang Ran held her ballpoint pen and lightly noted the times behind the two athletes’ names on the competitor list in front of her.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Bei Jiao appear on the right track with his red board, leaning his head out for a look, then throwing his snowboard down at his feet.
Because it was a formal competition, the referees invited were also professional, so the commentary style leaned towards what could be directly broadcast on TV—
Few unnecessary words, minimal exaggerated exclamations, and absolutely no casual gossip about the athletes.
The commentators neutrally introduced the athletes’ names, where they were from, and which snowboards they used. In a calm tone, they briefly compared the two competitors—
[This group of athletes should be of above-average strength. The one on the left in the red course is Sukoshi, sponsored by the Japanese OGASAKA brand; the one on the right is Bei Jiao, a rising star recently gaining popularity and widely regarded as a genius in the carving community.]
[Yes, I really like this athlete’s style. I’ve heard he approaches the extreme sport of skiing with great seriousness. He remains grounded amidst the adulation, steadily improving… His potential will only be higher than it is now.]
[Sukoshi is also an established veteran, having consistently promoted winter sports over the years. …Okay, we can now see both athletes getting into position.]
[Let’s wait and see whether they can achieve their personal bests here in Tonghua today.]
The two hosts’ voices had almost no inflection—
Exactly like the calm and fair tone used in international competitions when commentating on athletes from other countries.
But still, someone’s nerves were affected.
Jiang Ran originally intended to stay calm, but after the hosts introduced Bei Jiao, she found herself inexplicably getting nervous, her heart beating faster…
It was like an aging grandmaster, old and frail, leaning against the doorframe, stubbornly seeing off her little apprentice—armed with a sword—for his first solo journey down the mountain. She could only accompany him to the gate of the mountain temple, while all along the path down were wolves and tigers!
She gradually became anxious.
Watching Bei Jiao adjusting his goggles, she thought, why is he adjusting his goggles so late now?!
Watching Bei Jiao tugging at his snowsuit, she thought, why is he messing with his snowsuit at this point?!
Where’s his face guard! He didn’t even bring it!
Why did he just step into the bindings once and stand up? Did he make sure they were tightened properly? Step in a few more times, what if they loosen while he’s sliding!
Her anxious atmosphere affected Song Song, who leaned over and said, “You look like you want to run up the mountain to help him put on his boots right now.”
“He’s taking this too lightly!” Jiang Ran snapped, “If he didn’t want to participate, he shouldn’t have come! Why come here just to embarrass himself!”
“…He hasn’t even started competing yet and he’s already embarrassing himself?” Song Song said, “When you become a mother, won’t your kid jump off a building from the pressure you give him?”
“…”
Jiang Ran took a deep breath, suddenly recalling Bei Jiao had just, damn it, sent her a flirty look from afar and told her not to watch him. Hesitating for a moment, she forcefully covered her face with both hands and turned her head away, refusing to look at him—
“I’m more nervous now than when I used to compete myself.”
She said, emotionally overwhelmed.
“This is way too heartfelt,” Song Song remarked, “Your hobby is heavy, Master Fu.”
…
As Song Song finished speaking, at the exact moment the electronic timer beeped, the two athletes on the red and blue tracks simultaneously set off!
At the first gate, they were completely neck and neck. Compared to the previous pair, their speeds were significantly faster!
[Oh, this pair is fast.]
[Comparatively, Sukoshi’s route looks slightly better.]
[Now they’ve passed the third gate—]
Jiang Ran and the other judges were positioned relatively high on the track. By the fourth gate, they could already see the competitors sliding right in front of them. In no time, she saw Bei Jiao in the number two jacket rushing straight toward her!
“Woah, impressive! My team’s future son-in-law!” Song Song energetically raised both hands in cheer.
Other athletes from different teams turned their heads in confusion to look at her, but Jiang Ran didn’t even bother to cover Song Song’s mouth. Her eyes were locked onto Bei Jiao’s trail—
” impressive? His route is terrible!”
If there had been an overhead bird’s-eye view, it would have been clear to see that on the left track, Sukoshi not only skied faster but also more steadily. His carved trail consisted of one smooth, round half-circle arc after another, following the gates in a fluid motion according to his personal ability limit.
But on the right side, compared to the symmetrical and smooth arcs on the left, Bei Jiao’s trail, although also closely hugging the gates at close range, his turns were neither round nor symmetrical, especially during the front-to-back edge transitions—
This wasn’t just obsessive-compulsive observation of his tracks.
When his turns became flattened during front-to-back edge transitions, it indicated that during the exit phase of the turn, he had once again developed the habit of forcefully pushing off the board!
In other words, he hadn’t even completed the front-edge turn yet, but due to some psychological reason only he understood, he felt out of control and instinctively forced himself to push off the board mid-turn to switch to the back edge!
Jiang Ran tapped the ballpoint pen in her hand on the form in front of her, marking Bei Jiao’s name, and amidst Song Song’s cheers and flattery, she emotionlessly predicted, “He’ll fall behind within three more gates.”
As if to prove her right—
Just past two more gates, Bei Jiao, due to excessive forced push-offs, gradually lost control of his speed. At the next gate, if he didn’t control his board, he would fly off!
He had no choice but to make his arc slightly wider than the gate, deviating from his originally tight path. Just this one gate’s delay caused the previously neck-and-neck Sukoshi to instantly gain half a gate’s lead!
[We can see that Sukoshi is now leading!]
[It seems Bei Jiao temporarily adjusted his route, causing him to fall behind half a gate… Well, it’s okay, since this isn’t an elimination round within the group, the problem isn’t too serious.]
[The two competitors are about to cross the finish line—]
[Speed Star crosses first. Let’s check the timer: 68.31 seconds. That’s pretty good!]
[At the same time, Beijiao from the right lane also crosses the finish line, clocking in at 70.66 seconds. For a new-generation slider, that’s quite an impressive result. Personally, I think both of these times should be sufficient to advance to the next round.]
[Let’s congratulate both competitors.]
“…Congratulations, my foot!” Jiang Ran flung the ballpoint pen in her hand, her expression icy. “She’s had the same problems with pushing off the board and twisting it for three years and still hasn’t fixed them. What kind of sliding is that! If this were a professional JSBA competition, I’d deduct all her points for posture and route alone! Zero points!”
Sonsong blinked in surprise at the outburst from the woman beside her, thinking that if Jiang had truly abandoned the girl after their breakup, then without any guidance, she probably developed those bad habits easily enough. Why was she so angry about it anyway—
But she didn’t dare say it.
“Oh come on, you’re really too strict,” Sonsong showed her namesake cowardice, saying meekly, “On the bright side, she was more than twenty seconds faster than the first group. What more could you want?”
…
Soon, around noon, the men’s group preliminaries wrapped up after hundreds of participants competed. With many SAJ non-traditional speed competitors appearing later in the rounds, Beijiao eventually ranked 12th and smoothly advanced to the next round.
Seeing the results, Jiang Ran’s lips curled upward slightly, then quickly resumed their neutral line.
She disdainfully shook the list of competitors for the next round in her hand and haughtily remarked, “This competition’s standard is a bit lacking.”
“Oh please, I saw you smile, big sister,” Sonsong waved her hand dismissively. “What do you mean ‘lacking in standard’? Are you expecting the Winter Olympics or something?”
“He could improve by at least 3 seconds if he fixed that pushing-off-the-board issue, moving up at least two places!”
“One point in the college entrance exam can crush thousands of students”—how nostalgic, you sound exactly like an aging head teacher.
Sonsong snatched the competitor list, quickly signing her name with flourish in the confirmation section… then looked closer and saw that Jiang Ran had already signed neatly above her.
Rolling her eyes dramatically at the woman who couldn’t be honest about her feelings, Sonsong handed the form to a male team member from the neighboring Liaoning Province team.
Next was the women’s main event. Staff came to distribute the updated competitor name list. Jiang Ran casually glanced through it and spotted Liang He’s name.
—Oh, there’s someone familiar after all.
Her gaze passed indifferently over that name, not giving it a second thought.
But an unexpected incident occurred anyway.
Liang He was in a middle position, not particularly front or back. By the time it was her turn, the snow conditions were already deteriorating. The earlier JSBA competitors had left deep grooves on the course, and such terrain wasn’t particularly fair for SAJ competitors like Liang He, who didn’t focus on high speed and relied on shifting their center of gravity during transitions to control their routes—
But such unfairness was even present at the Winter Olympics: from a certain point onward, skiers on one particular part of the course repeatedly slipped, flew off the course, or missed gates.
Was this some kind of black magic?
Of course not.
It was simply related to the snow conditions.
And even at the largest-scale competitions, they wouldn’t send out snow groomers after every single run. In this non-sports-bureau-organized but relatively formal large-scale event, how could they expect such treatment?
So when it was Liang He’s turn, Jiang Ran watched helplessly as she was thrown off balance by a snow bump, veering off her route and crossing the center line. This startled the female Gray-sponsored slider in the adjacent red lane, who slammed on the brakes so suddenly she nearly fell. Fortunately, she regained her balance and shot Liang He a furious glare before speeding off again—
Jiang Ran clicked the button on her ballpoint pen and said expressionlessly, “Blue lane violated the rules. Disqualify her. Red lane will have a re-run… What bad luck. This morning I even told her in the Gray slider group chat to eat two eggs and a youtiao for good luck, and she still gave me a question mark? Hmph! Silly girl!”
She casually noted her decision on the form in front of her, then signed her name dramatically under “Opinion Holder”—
Her voice seemed to settle the matter. The previously stunned judging panel snapped out of their daze, nodding along with “Oh right, that was a foul,” and ticking the “Agree with Handling Opinion” box after receiving Jiang’s completed form.
The forms were quickly submitted to the referee group.
After a brief discussion, the referees appeared to agree with her judgment. Eventually, the decision notice made its way into Liang He’s hands.
From a distance, Jiang Ran first heard the female voice shout in shock—
“I fouled?!”
Then came a furious roar.
“How could that be? I didn’t even touch the adjacent lane!”
Jiang looked over and saw Liang He arguing with the staff. Casually cleaning her ear, she turned to Sonsong and said, “Why not? Stubborn girl.”
Her tone was cold and merciless, like a ruthless female tyrant.
She was still in the mood to make sarcastic remarks to Sonsong when she heard someone shouting her name from the mountain above. Instinctively, she turned with a blank expression and saw Liang He pointing down the mountain:
“Jiang Ran?! What gives her the right! Half a year ago she was just an amateur like us, and now she gets to sit there with a provincial professional team title and boss us around! I’m asking again! What gives her the right!!!”
That voice was so loud it echoed across half the open snowy mountain.
Above, on a tree branch, a squirrel was startled into abandoning its lunch, scurrying away into the treetops. Snow from the branch rained down with a rustling sound, and a pinecone flew out and hit Jiang Ran on the head.
Jiang Ran: “…”
Jiang Ran asked blankly, “The squirrel was so startled it abandoned its lunch.”
Sonsong couldn’t help but snort and cover her mouth to suppress a laugh.
Meanwhile, not far away, Liang He was already charging over with the decision notice in hand, full of fury.
Jiang Ran kicked Sonsong under the table: “Stop laughing. Hurry up, protect your princess.”
…
On the mountain, the men’s team hadn’t left yet and were watching the women’s event nearby.
A group sat under a tree, one of them stretching his neck to look at the nearby commotion and muttering, “Liang He,” hesitating slightly before turning back to look at the young black-haired man leaning against the safety net, curiously peeking down at the scene.
“Beige?”
The person leaning on the net responded lazily, “Hmm?” and turned his head slowly, “What’s up?”
“Aren’t you going to do something? Liang He and Jiang Ran are clashing—”
His logic was innocent and clear-cut: Who was Jiang Ran anyway? Regardless of her connections and status in the circle, for Liang He to confront her like this was practically asking for trouble.
Although Liang He had been scolded by Beijiao just yesterday, at least they were loosely part of the same friend group. Even if it was self-inflicted, they couldn’t let outsiders push her around!
As soon as he finished speaking, he heard Beijiao give a mocking laugh. Narrowing his eyes slightly, his black eyes curved into a beautiful arc as he broke into a charming smile.
With his chin resting on the safety net, he lazily hung there like a sloth, swinging slowly.
“Why should I interfere?” he said lightly, “I can’t do anything about it. Don’t drag me into this.”
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