Beyond the Wild Sea

(For update requests, find the author on Weibo: @Shi Sui Xie)

"The sun is shining in the sky, the flowers smile at me. Sing..."

"Teacher, that's so old-fashioned. We don't sing such childish songs anymore."

"Then what do you sing now?"

"Love you as you walk alone through dark alleys! Love how you never kneel! Love how you stood up to despair! Refused to cry!"

Chi Jiayu, the Northwestern campus big shot, calls himself a social menace. The phrase he says most often is, "Who could possibly not love your big bro Chi?"

It isn't until a twist of fate lands him in A University's postgraduate teaching volunteer group, sent to teach at Huashui Primary School, that he learns there are people who won't fall for the handsome Chi, no matter what.

That is, when he's the teacher and they're primary school students.

Su Jing, acting director of Huashui Primary School and former leader of A University's postgraduate teaching volunteer group, has been away from A University for a year, but legends of him as the "untouchable flower" still fill the campus. A year ago, when he requested to stay on at Huashui Primary School, plenty of students on the campus BBS changed their usernames from references to A University's campus heartthrob to references to Huashui Island's heartthrob, lamenting the loss. They say he's naturally aloof and has no idea how to deal with people who are naturally warm and outgoing.

On Chi Jiayu's first day at Huashui Primary School, he threw up all over Su Jing's quilt. The other members of the group said Director Su's face had gone dark on the spot.

On his third day, Chi Jiayu got into an enthusiastic duel with the students in his class. The group members watching said Director Su's face had grown even darker.

On Chi Jiayu's thirtieth day at Huashui Primary School, his dorm bed collapsed.

The group members: Uh-oh. He's done for.

Su Jing hurried over, glanced at Chi Jiayu standing by the door in a daze, sighed, and pulled him behind himself. "You can sleep in my bed."

Chi Jiayu: "Then where will you sleep?"

Su Jing: "Beside you."

A year later, Chi Jiayu returns to A University with the title of "Huashui Primary School's Most Popular Teacher."

A friend asks him, "How did you manage to stick it out?"

Chi Jiayu: "I guess it's because someone lit a lamp for me in the dark, gave me medicine when I caught a cold, and held an umbrella over me when it rained."

Roommate: "Please speak like a normal person."

Chi Jiayu: "I'm dating someone."

Much later, the "Imaginary Dating Diary with the Island Heartthrob" on A University's BBS gets a reply from the heartthrob himself.

"I'm taken. Please delete this, thanks."

Attached is a photo of Su Jing with his boyfriend.

His friend eagerly clicks on it, only to discover that the boyfriend in the photo is none other than Chi Jiayu.

Oh no! The untouchable flower has been picked by a menace!

[Reading Guide]

1. Untouchable-flower top x social-menace bottom.

2. Some of the work-related details serve the plot and differ from reality. Please don't overthink them.

3. A sweet romance. The author has never suffered hardship and can't write angst. That's the truth.

4. Feel free to discuss the plot, but mindless attacks on the characters are not welcome.

Special reminder: We support everyone who wants to contribute to education in the country's impoverished mountain and island regions. But please don't join a teaching program based on imagination and enthusiasm alone, without doing a background check, especially if you're a woman!

My new novel, The Synthetic Voice Lover Is Actually..., is open for advance follows!

Lu Xinyuan is a handsome guy who's determined to stay single until the end of the world. His biggest problem since childhood has been turning down people's confessions.

To put a stop to these constant advances, he carefully creates a whole new persona before starting at a new company.

Lu Xinyuan, male, twenty-four, has a boyfriend and is obsessed with showing him off.

Coworker: Xiao Lu, want to go to the cafeteria for lunch?

Lu Xinyuan: How did you know my boyfriend is an amazing cook?

Coworker: Xiao Lu, want to join us in buying mangoes?

Lu Xinyuan: How did you know my boyfriend just bought me a blender?

To make his persona more convincing, Lu Xinyuan keeps adding details to his imaginary boyfriend's backstory. He even invents a whole life for him, pays a hefty price to choose a voice he likes on an app, and signs up for its text-to-speech service. From then on, his boyfriend sends him one voice message after another. Not only does this fool his coworkers, it also lets him enjoy his love of fictional characters to the fullest.

Until one day, Lu Xinyuan realizes that this synthesized voice sounds exactly like the company's newly appointed CEO.

Of course, his coworkers realize it too.

Lu Xinyuan: Help! Is it too late to poison the CEO and make him lose his voice?

At the company annual dinner, Lu Xinyuan sneaks into a seat at the very corner of the room, ready to slip away as soon as the CEO finishes his speech.

"The employee sitting in the eastern corner by the pillar, stay behind." Shen Chengzhou fixes his gaze on the little animal with its shoulders hunched, his eyes dark. "Come to my lounge."

So much for that voice being synthesized!

[Here's a new novel by my good friend Sha Tang Xi Gua!]

When an Actor Meets a Flirty Beauty Top, by Sha Tang Xi Gua. A sweet romance set in the entertainment industry.

Cool, aloof actor bottom x doting, flirtatious, strong beauty top

Qi Mo, an actor who reached the top as soon as he debuted, never thought he'd fall for anyone.

Then a reality dating show and the newcomer playing his partner turn his principles upside down, time and again.

"He was once a god in the eyes of the world, untouched by earthly concerns."

"Then that person's arrival broke the god's chains."

"Pulling him into the mortal world and gathering him into their arms."

Theme: The ideal education is the whole of humanity.