[Coming of age | Mutual healing | Chasing dreams | Underdog academic comeback, sharp-tongued but soft-hearted heiress × seemingly icy big shot who pretends to be pitiful]
"Everyone deserves to see the dreams they had in their youth come true."
*
When her former schoolmate saw on the evening news that the "Legendary Duck Egg King," Li Zhao, had become a chief engineer on the Long March rocket program, their first reaction was:
What???
Had the Li family gotten rich enough for that already?
*
Li Zhao was dozing through class when memories of the future awakened within her. She would become a top engineer, the kind who received a government stipend.
She glanced at the red duck eggs and double underlines marked on her science exam.
6.
What kind of daydream was that?
She sank back into a deep sleep and dreamed she was on an observation deck, watching the Tianxun-3 lunar rocket roar into the sky. Beside her, a clear-eyed young man as cool as snow watched her, the corners of his mouth curling into a smile like clouds parting and snow melting atop a peak. And it was Chen Shibai.
Her archenemy, Chen Shibai?
She thought of the giant portrait of him at the top of the campus honor roll.
Li Zhao sprang up in indignation, all traces of sleep gone.
No more sleeping! She was going to study!
*
Years later, at a class reunion, everyone was swapping gossip.
Before long, the conversation turned to that couple whose compatibility was so low.
A drunk loudmouth shouted, "How did that school bully and academic failure from Class Eight manage to bring our Class One monitor down from her pedestal?"
"Quite the talent."
The man who had come over from the lecture hall took the seat of honor. His face was cool and composed, faint shadows under his eyes. His crisp white shirt accentuated his clean-cut shoulders. He looked like a man of moonlight and fresh breezes, but there was a red mark at the corner of his mouth, lending him a conflicting air of desire.
"She doesn't need to come."
"I'll go to her myself."
The journey leads to the stars and the sea, but the way home leads to you. I would venture toward all the world's grandeur, only to make my way to you.
