The Nth Day of Being Able to Read Minds

For the whole of next week, Tao Ran continued to avoid Jiang Yu Heng.

To be honest, the situation wasn’t that far from how it was before. If he bumped into Jiang Yu Heng, he would turn around and leave still. Simply because he didn’t want to see him, so he would avoid him.

But now, his mindset did shift a little. Tao Ran felt like he had to stay away from Jiang Yu Heng. If something this unbelievable could happen to him, shouldn’t he be worried that more unfortunate things would happen next?

The subtle difference lies in the fact that it was purely dislike before, but now it has upgraded to dislike and fear.

In the past few days, Tao Ran had tried to use his ability to read minds that appeared out of nowhere. He experimented on Wu Hao and other students repeatedly but realized he could not hear a single thing.

Due to the fact that he kept staring at Wu Hao throughout the entire class, Wu Hao thought he had gotten possessed or something. “What are you doing? If you’re daydreaming, do it while facing the front. Don’t look straight at me, it’s terrifying.”

Tao Ran replied with a serious expression, “Wait. Don’t talk to me for now.”

Heavens rewards those who work hard. After a while, he did hear something.

“Grumble…grumble…”

“You…” Tao Ran’s smile paused and slowly faded, “Hungry?”

“Yeah.” Wu Hao let out a goofy laugh, “Can we talk yet? What should we eat for lunch?”

Tao Ran: “……”

Wu Hao: “What are we having?”

“Anything’s fine.” Tao Ran took a deep breath to try to calm down his extremely frustrated mood. “I’m not going back to the dorm at noon. I’m heading to the library.”

He had a profound realization moment that his special ability of mind reading only applied to Jiang Yu Heng.

“Going to the library again. Tsk, tsk.” Wu Hao shook his head.

In order to ensure his contact time with Jiang Yu Heng was minimized, Tao Ran hung out in the library every day when there was no class. He would stay there until the closing time before taking his sweet time making it back to the dorm.

However, since they lived together, it was inevitable that they would bump into each other from time to time.

Tao Ran demonstrated a great example of what it meant to be turn a blind eye. Jiang Yu Heng was also very sensible so both of them barely had any exchanges.

A few days passed by again and Tao Ran gradually figured out how this ability worked. It seemed like reading minds had a distance limit, about two to three meters.

For example, if Jiang Yu Heng was by the dorm entrance or the toilet, he couldn’t hear what he was thinking. But the distance between their beds would be just right for him to read it.

Every night when the lights go out, Tao Ran could hear the only heart voice coming from Jiang Yu Heng in the day, [Good night.]

Of course, by no means was Tao Ran so self-absorbed that he would think that was said to him. He thought it was simply Jiang Yu Heng’s weird little habit, talking to himself.

But even with such a short sentence like that, Tao Ran still couldn’t help but shiver a little every time. He really struggled to accept the fact that he could read minds.

On the way to the cafeteria after a Thursday class, he saw Jiang Yu Heng again.

He was playing basketball on the court, only wearing a sport singlet and surrounded by a lot of girls watching him.

Jiang Yu Heng’s movement was fast and sharp. The basketball rarely missed every single time it was in his hands, which attracted bursts of screams.

Tao Ran couldn’t hold back rolling his eye even through the iron net before he quickened his pace.

He felt like he was being too kind.

What could have happened to Jiang Yu Heng anyways. It was only staying out in the cold wind, washing his shoes in cold water. Even if he stripped naked, he doubts he would catch a cold that easily either.

Wu Hao immediately saw Jiang Yu Heng, who was the focus of the crowd and after noticing Tao Ran’s extremely obvious avoidance, he asked curiously, “You two haven’t reconciled yet? There’s no need to avoid him that much regardless, right?

Tao Ran gave him a vague reply, “It is what it is.”

Wu Hao grabbed Tao Ran’s shoulder with quite a bit of force. “Tao Zi, why don’t the two of you just stop sulking at each other? I think he’s quite a great guy. Of course, I know you won’t dislike someone for no reason either. Let’s talk about it.”

“Fuck off.” Tao Ran got away from his grip, “Who’s sulking now. We were just…”

Wu Hao acted like he was all-knowing. “Look, the two of you were schoolmates from junior high to high school. Then, you were assigned to the same dorm room too. This has to be fate, right?”

“Stop right there.” Tao Ran massaged his temple with one hand then raise his other hand to stop him, “Even if we were really meant to be, this fate would only be a sinful one.”

Otherwise, why would he be able to read minds? And why would it only work with Jiang Yu Heng?

Every cell in his body resisted that fact even just from thinking about it. Tao Ran felt like he had to take certain measures now.

Therefore, he took into his own hands and put it into action the next day during class. He went to the counsellor’s office and made his intentions very straightforward and obvious.

“Teacher, I want to change dorms.”

The counsellor, of course, did not forget that Tao Ran was an outstanding student that he loved…’s roommate. After persuading him for a whole hour, he still couldn’t manage to pry the reason he wanted to change dorms out of his mouth.

Tao Ran’s attitude was unusually resolute. “I want to change dorms.”

The counsellor had no choice but to give him an application form, asking him to submit it to the office himself next Monday to see which other room was vacant for him to change to first.

Tao Ran held this flimsy white paper in his hand and felt an unprecedented sense of relief in his heart.

He remembered that when the dorms were assigned during their first year, he did think of changing rooms. But in the end, it didn’t work out. Because he felt like even if he had to change rooms, the one to leave should have been Jiang Yu Heng. Otherwise, it would look like he was afraid of him.

But now, Tao Ran really didn’t care about all those nonsense anymore. He only felt like it was a wonderful thing if he could finally get rid of Jiang Yu Heng.

Tao Ran’s pace back to the dorm was a lot faster for the first time. He was even humming a little song along the way.

His subconscious told him that it was an unmistakably right decision to change dorm rooms now.

When Tao Ran entered the room, Jiang Yu Heng was collecting his clothes from the balcony and was obviously surprised to see him.

[Why is he back so early today?]

See? Wasn’t it obvious that Jiang Yu Heng didn’t want him to come back sooner either? Since the two of them did not like each other, it would work out if they go separate ways.

Tao Ran was now in a very pleasant mood and had no intention of arguing with Jiang Yu Heng. He ignored his gaze and went on his way to change into his own pyjamas.

When the lights went out, he could hear Jiang Yu Heng’s heart voice saying good night as usual.

Tao Ran had more or less gotten used to that after a few days. He was stunned for a bit, but immediately rolled over to the other side.

The thought of hearing two more good nights and he could finally change dorms and get away from Jiang Yu Heng and that annoying voice of his made him so happy he couldn’t control the corners of his mouth from curving upwards.

Before he fell asleep, Tao Ran planned out his day tomorrow very well – getting up in the morning to pack his luggage, camping in the library for the whole day after that. Tomorrow’s going to be great and he was in a good mood.

Tao Ran woke up feeling refreshed. Everything rubbed him the right way. Even when he got out of bed and saw Jiang Yu Heng sitting at his desk reading a book in Italian, he didn’t feel like he was acting pretentious like usual.

Jiang Yu Heng closed his book with a thud, then stared at Tao Ran’s back as he pretty much skipped his way into the toilet. He laughed a little at that sight.

[Seems like he’s going to the library again.]

Tao Ran was satisfied with how observant Jiang Yu Heng was. He happily washed up and even gelled up his hair in front of the mirror.

“Going to the library?”

Jiang Yu Heng’s voice appeared very suddenly.

Tao Ran glared at the person behind him through the mirror, but the tone of his voice was kept flat so the excitement wouldn’t show. “Duh?”

Wasn’t it obvious already, why was he still asking such nonsense question?

Jiang Yu Heng raised an eyebrow, “Don’t go.”

“Why not?” Tao Ran continued to fiddle with his bangs, “Who are you to dictate that? Go live on by the sea if you’re going to care about things so far and wide.”

[My family has a few villas in Sanya.]

Tao Ran: ‘Can you be any more annoying than this?’

Tao Ran felt like Jiang Yu Heng was deliberately spoiling his good mood. Although he didn’t verbally say that sentence out, but he could still hear what he was thinking inside!

“Crazy.” Tao Ran pushed him aside and was ready to head out and start packing his luggage.

He didn’t want to argue with Jiang Yu Heng over unnecessary things anymore. He no longer need to share a room with him anymore the day after tomorrow anyway.

Jiang Yu Heng’s shoulder was bumped into by Tao Ran. While he moved his joint around, he proposed, “How about…you look at the group chat?”

Tao Ran immediately jerked to a standstill. He hesitantly looked back at him, “What do you mean? Is the library not open?”

Jiang Yu Heng returned to his spot and flipped open his book, answering calmly, “Go see for yourself.”

[It’s not that the library isn’t open. But the dormitory isn’t.]

Tao Ran: “?”

Confused, Tao Ran went to his desk to get his phone and the moment he tapped into their batch’s group chat, his whole body froze in place.

[Counsellor @ everyone: Group announcement – due to the pandemic, the university is temporarily closed. We require all students to stay within the dorm. Please cooperate with the pandemic prevention team for now. Volunteers will go door-to-door to deliver necessities and meals. For online class related arrangements, it will be notified later on. Please contact me if you are lacking any other supplies.]

Tao Ran’s heart went cold right there right then.