Huang’a was already stimulated enough to turn around and rush into the warehouse not far away, fearing that witnessing too much inappropriate things might one day get him killed to silence him.
At this moment, Beijiao heard footsteps and turned his head—
At the very moment he saw Song Die, his face performed a sudden Sichuan Opera face-changing act. The gentle and considerate expression vanished completely, and his usual gloomy, sour, and dark face returned.
“Why are you here again?”
He asked, his tone revealing undisguised disdain.
“Rongchuang is a business open to the public, and I bought a ticket to go skiing. Who does that bother?” Song Die retorted.
With such a question, Beijiao naturally had no hesitation in responding, almost eagerly saying, “Mine.”
Song Die ignored him, greeted Jiang Ran, and approached to watch her wax the snowboard.
At this time, the waxing was entering its final stages. She lifted the board upright, patted off excess wax residue, then pulled over the bindings that had been adjusted to the correct angle, preparing to install them.
“This board looks pretty good,” Song Die said, reaching out to touch the logo on the base of the board as he asked Jiang Ran, “Is it your new board?”
Before his hand could reach the board, it was intercepted mid-air—
A hand extended from the side blocked his, pushing his hand aside not too gently. Song Die followed the line of sight and turned to meet a pair of pitch-black, unfriendly eyes.
“Don’t touch,” Beijiao said, “It’s my board.”
He sounded extremely proud, filled with a provocative sense of “admiring, wanting to touch? too bad, you can’t.”
Song Die knew this guy was a firecracker—quick to explode, full of tricks, and unreasonable. He decided not to stoop to his level and gave up on examining the board, preparing to withdraw his hand—
But both Song Die and Beijiao forgot there was still another person present.
Amidst the silent battlefield of male “green tea,” this embodiment of justice spoiled none of their bad habits.
Thus, just as Song Die was about to lower his hand, a slightly cool hand caught his wrist.
Soft as boneless, the woman’s hand firmly took his and placed it onto the surface of the snowboard.
Beijiao: “…”
Song Die: “…”
As Beijiao’s face twisted with the gradually collapsing expression of “my board is ruined aaa,” Jiang Ran emotionlessly pointed at the binding beside it, then at Song Die, adding fuel to the fire by saying, “All adjusted, just screw it in. You install it.”
Beijiao: “…”
Song Die: “…”
Now Beijiao felt his snowboard was completely ruined.
He glared at Jiang Ran, furious yet unable to speak out. She, however, simply ignored him, picked up the porridge he had bought but hadn’t had time to cool down, and went to sit aside to drink it.
Song Die picked up the binding and screwdriver, placing them on the brand-new snowboard to test the fit. However, at this moment, the gaze shooting from beside him was so intense it felt like it could burn right through his hand—
“Beijiao.”
“Shut up, don’t call me.”
“You should know what it means to defy an imperial decree.”
With his jaw clenched and temples nearly bulging from restraint, Song Die finally couldn’t help but whisper—just loud enough for the two of them to hear—”So, what did you do to her this time?”
Beijiao: “…I don’t know.”
He was silent for a moment.
Then he added, in a rather pitiful tone, “She might just favor you.”
Normally, it would be next to impossible for Beijiao to admit that Jiang Ran had favorites, but now saying it so openly, combined with his overly eager attitude upon entering earlier…
It was enough for Song Die to doubt there wasn’t something going on between them.
“Did you say something you shouldn’t have again?” Song Die asked.
As soon as those words came out, Song Die immediately sensed the atmosphere around the teenager inexplicably darken. The defiant and resentful vibe from the previous second instantly transformed into a defeated, lifeless aura, as if he had shrunk three centimeters.
Song Die held the binding, slightly shaking his wrist, lips twitching, almost empathizing with the poor pup enough to want to comfort him—
But before he could even open his mouth, the person in front suddenly glared at him, “What’s it got to do with you? Just install the binding!”
After throwing that line, he seemed to have steeled himself, not even glancing at his snowboard again as he stormed out of the ski shop.
…That resolute back view almost seemed to leave wide noodle-like tears flying behind him in the air.
…
Ten minutes later, Beijiao returned, and by then Song Die had already installed the binding for him.
He rummaged through his pockets for a while and finally pulled out an alcohol wipe from who-knows-where, proceeding to wipe the board inside and out. Fortunately, Song Die was in a good mood, letting him do his neurotic cleaning while even handing him the trash bin.
After throwing the alcohol wipe into the bin, Beijiao hugged his snowboard tightly, refusing to let go.
Jiang Ran finished her porridge, wiped her mouth, and stood up. Seeing that both boys had already changed into their gear and were ready, she approached, intending to tell them to wait while she put on her ski boots—
But before she got close, still two meters away, Beijiao immediately took a wary step back, staring at her.
Jiang Ran stared back at him expressionlessly.
His shoulders tensed, then slumped, as he rubbed his nose and surrendered, “What now? Don’t tell me you want me to lend my board to Song Die?”
Jiang Ran naturally wouldn’t make such a ridiculous request.
“The board is yours now,” she said calmly, bending down to open her board bag and take out her ski boots. “Actually, earlier when I had Song Die install the binding for you, if you didn’t like it, you could’ve just refused.”
Her tone was so calm that no one would doubt her indifference toward the matter.
In other words, all of Beijiao’s previous swallowing of his anger was for nothing.
…This was even more painful than enduring it again.
As the two tall teenagers, each holding their own snowboards, followed the young woman into the ski resort, the person in front walked proudly, while the two behind, once sworn enemies, now whispered to each other—
“What exactly did you do this morning? I rarely see her kill someone with words and then come back for a finishing blow?”
“You don’t want to know.”
“I do want to know.”
“…Song Die, have you ever heard of the saying: the less you know, the longer you live?” Beijiao said in an unusually friendly tone, almost as if talking to himself, sighing, “My mistake was knowing too much.”
“…”
…
Entering the ski resort, Guangrong Snow World was as crowded as ever today.
Even the queue in front of the advanced slope lift was long.
Snowboarders with one foot strapped in dragged their boards to the end of the line, and sometimes beginners lost control and accidentally hit others’ boards or hands with their own…
Even more so were the complete newbies wearing alpine skis, who had no idea about the rules of the slope, casually dragging their skis over other people’s snowboards and then simply saying “Sorry” in a nonchalant tone after being scolded—
They were using rented boards from the resort; scratches or damage meant nothing to them.
Beijiao had sharp eyes. Holding his new board, he witnessed about five collisions within just three minutes. So before the other two could speak, he bent down and said to Jiang Ran, “Let’s warm up on the intermediate slope first.”
Jiang Ran didn’t reply.
Song Die leaned over from the side, “Since when did our lessons have such a strict warm-up routine?”
Jiang Ran casually tossed her board onto the ground, stepped into the binding with her front foot, glanced at Beijiao, and said indifferently to Song Die, “He’s just afraid someone might scratch his board getting on or off the lift… or that he’ll fall and scratch it himself.”
Beijiao wasn’t even embarrassed at being exposed.
He stubbornly insisted on going to the intermediate slope for a gentle ride.
He was always stubborn about what he wanted. Jiang Ran knew arguing wouldn’t work, but she had other ways to deal with him. She smiled now and said, “You’re seeing alpine beginners stepping on other people’s boards, but how come you didn’t see all the beginner torpedoes charging straight down the intermediate slope?”
By “torpedoes,” she meant those who couldn’t ski, brake, or turn, who took the lift (magic carpet) to the top and then charged straight down the slope on their snowboards, going wherever fate took them—
On the slopes, they were like fearless little torpedoes, causing chaos wherever they went.
Every winter season, there were always a few unlucky people who didn’t get hurt themselves while skiing, only to be knocked down and fractured by one of these torpedoes.
As she spoke, Jiang Ran pointed toward the intermediate slope, and just by coincidence, in the direction she pointed, there was indeed a double-plank torpedo guy yelling “Ahhhhhh!” as he charged down the slope, shouting “Move! Move! Move!”—
He crashed into the protective netting near where Beijiao and the others were standing, “Plop!” His skis, poles, helmet, and goggles all scattered, clattering to the ground.
Beijiao: “…”
Jiang Ran: “Still going to the intermediate slope?”
In the end, Beijiao obediently boarded the advanced slope lift. This time, he didn’t even stick close to Jiang Ran, willingly letting her sit with Song Die—
“You always swing your legs around for no reason on the lift,” he said, completely indifferent. “Last time we sat together, your board hit mine several times. I just didn’t say anything.”
“…”
Jiang Ran pointed at him wordlessly with a thousand words of disbelief.
“Ride at the front.”
She said coldly, stepping away from him and returning to stand shoulder to shoulder with Song Die.
…
After the previous lessons on single edge carving, folding, and basic stance, Beijiao was now basically able to go down the advanced slope one edge at a time.
In the slightly flatter areas below, he could barely switch edges with an unstandardized posture.
Jiang Ran followed behind him, watching as his hands in front kept waving around restlessly instead of touching the front binding as she had instructed. He even seemed to be leaning forward to touch the snow deliberately. When she scolded him, he wouldn’t admit it, so she simply took out her phone and started recording from behind—
While others usually needed a GoPro or some other professional stabilizing camera to film skiing, she didn’t need one. Her hands and feet were steady enough…
Beijiao’s skiing speed was like child’s play to her.
Following behind him, she could even adjust the camera angle to zoom in or out based on his mistakes.
Halfway through the descent, Beijiao suddenly heard a loud “shhh” sound of a board carving through the snow behind him.
He perked up his ears, didn’t even need to look back, and the next second, he saw the woman who had been filming him effortlessly catch up, then perform a sharp stop right in front of him with a kick, sending up a wall of snow two or three meters high.
Several passing newbies were left stunned.
However, she didn’t care about the admiring glances others threw her way. She simply stared at Beijiao with a blank expression: “Move to the side.”
It was time for a scolding.
Beijiao was like a kindergarten student being pulled aside to the edge of the slope.
“If you lean down to touch the snow again, I’ll print out this ugly move of yours and post it at the entrance of Snow World.”
At the edge, her tone was cold and harsh. “I told you where to put your hands. Where are they now?”
“The new board feels different from the old one. Even with the same pressure, it seems faster—”
“That’s because your old boards, the entry-level one and the rented OGASAKA, were both round-nosed. This RX is a real professional carving hammerhead board, with a longer effective edge and a stiffer board. Of course, it’s faster.”
“I didn’t feel it was faster when I used Huang’s blue tree board.”
“That day you were pushing the slope. How fast can you go pushing?”
“…”
Faced with his silence, Jiang Ran waved her hand coldly, “Continue. Think about where your hands should be and where your hips should go. Use your brain before you slide. You looked great on the first day, so impressive. Now you’re getting worse and worse—”
Today, Beijiao dared to be angry with her but didn’t dare to speak out. After being scolded, he was almost ready to beg her, “Don’t be angry.”
At this moment, he could only lower his head and accept the scolding, not daring to act up again or ask her to pull him up from the ground… For the first time, he used his own strength, pushing with his hands and using his ankles, his back edge digging into the snow, struggling to stand up by himself.
He looked at Jiang Ran.
Jiang Ran: “What are you looking at?”
Beijiao: “I stood up by myself.”
Jiang Ran nodded indifferently: “Oh, good job.”
Beijiao: “…”
If it weren’t for his current guilt, he would already be cursing her.
At this moment, Jiang Ran glanced behind Beijiao, as if seeing something dirty, slightly frowning and saying “Wait” with a hint of disgust—
However, her voice wasn’t loud enough, and the ski resort was noisy, so Beijiao didn’t hear her and set off directly.
After two front-side turns, at the bottom of the gentle slope, he completed his third front-side turn and was attempting to stand up and switch to a back-side basic stance before exiting the turn—
However, just as he managed to adjust his posture, he heard someone shouting from behind, “Watch out!”
He had just lifted his eyes when he saw a figure in all-black ski clothes, dark as pitch, coming straight at him!
He wasn’t the type of person with a slight build, but the impact of being hit like that at speed left him stunned. He felt a huge force slam into him, sending him spinning like a little top on the slope for three full rotations.
By the third rotation, he finally stopped, his head spinning as he struggled to get up. His entire body ached as if it had been run over by a truck.
Jiang Ran and Song Die both rushed over.
Jiang Ran took off her face guard. At this moment, the face that had been so cold just a second ago now clearly showed worry. She leaned in and asked him, “Are you okay? Did you hit anywhere? Does it hurt?”
He couldn’t remember ever hearing her speak like this before.
Seeing his silence, Jiang Ran thought he might really be hurt. She immediately took off her skis, scooted over, and with both hands cupping his face, began checking where he might be injured—
He obediently lifted his face for her to check, looking at her face so close to his, her lashes dusted with a bit of unmelted snow.
It hurt.
But his mind was racing.
Beijiao glanced at Song Die standing nearby, thinking how annoying this person was. Couldn’t he just leave?
He probably wouldn’t leave.
Should he just go all out and, in front of Song Die, throw away his pride and act cute to gloss over the morning incident—
He was still thinking.
Suddenly, from the corner of his eye, he noticed Song Die’s expression change slightly as he looked down and then up again, hesitating as he looked at him.
“What?”
Beijiao’s face was still in Jiang Ran’s hands, and he slightly turned his face to look at him, though his voice wasn’t very cold.
Song Die didn’t speak, just pointed downward.
Beijiao looked down and saw that the side of his board had been cracked from the impact, a roughly three-centimeter-long split revealing the core, with a sliver of wood from the edge lifting up.
Beijiao: “?”
Beijiao: “!!!!!!!!”
JPG: Regarding the matter of wanting to act cute one second and wanting to kill someone the next.
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