LRTH - 10

“Obedient.”

She knew he meant that she was more introverted and didn’t talk much, but her heart still fluttered because of those two words for the entire day.

In the following days, she would always think of Li Yizhou from that morning and look forward to going to his house to do her homework on the weekend.

The days passed one by one, and Saturday arrived.

After lunch that day, she received a message from Xu Tingyou, who said to meet at the door in ten minutes.

So Fang Nanzhi’s mind, which had been a bit calmer these past few days, began to get nervous again. This state made her doubt if she would be able to study properly at his house, but she couldn’t bring herself to say she wasn’t going.

“Fang Liaoliao! Hurry up, I’ve been waiting for you for two minutes. Why are you so slow?” As soon as she walked out, she saw Xu Tingyou waving at her from a distance.

“I’m coming!” Fang Nanzhi quickly sped up, walking to her side.

Just a moment ago, she had been staring at herself in the mirror at home to make sure nothing was wrong before coming out, which was why she was a little late.

“It’s okay if you’re a little slow. I’m hoping someone will be late so we can go to Brother Yizhou’s house a little later,” Xu Yuanhao said with a sulky face.

Xu Tingyou: “Then why didn’t you be late yourself?”

Xu Yuanhao: “Do I dare?!”

Xu Tingyou let out a little snort. “If you’re so afraid of Brother Yizhou, you should have just let Mom hire a tutor.”

Xu Yuanhao rolled his eyes. “If we had a tutor, we’d have to stay at home, and Mom would be watching us like a hawk. I’d rather go to Brother Yizhou’s house. Although that guy is also scary, at least it’s not under Mom’s nose.”

Xu Tingyou also knew this, or else she wouldn’t have pleaded with Li Yizhou with her eyes before. She was just deliberately antagonizing her brother.

Fang Nanzhi was a little confused. “Scary?”

Xu Tingyou sighed. “I forgot to tell you, Brother Yizhou is very strict. He’s incredibly demanding when he teaches. He used to tutor us in middle school.”

Xu Yuanhao nodded repeatedly. “That’s right, that’s right. If you make a mistake on a problem he’s already taught you, he’ll definitely scold you. Oh, and if you don’t listen carefully, he’ll scold you even more.”

Fang Nanzhi: “...”

She still couldn’t imagine it.

The three of them chatted as they walked. After about ten minutes, they finally arrived at Li Yizhou’s house.

Xu Tingyou and Xu Yuanhao were very familiar with the place. The front door was unlocked, so they walked right in, and Fang Nanzhi followed behind. After entering, she couldn’t help but look around.

Li Yizhou’s house was in the same complex as theirs, so in theory, the layout should have been the same. But after walking in, she realized that his house was very different from theirs, both in design and layout.

It was likely that he had knocked down some walls and put up new ones during the renovation.

The two families’ villas were in a luxurious European style, while Li Yizhou’s house was a vintage American style.

The living room was very large, with coffee tones as the main color. Light streamed through the huge floor-to-ceiling glass doors onto the floor, creating a romantic and lazy afternoon atmosphere.

Black was used as a complementary color for the fireplace, sofa, and cabinets... The colors had a strong texture. Walking in felt like walking onto a movie set, as if it were the residence of a certain protagonist.

The entire interior had a rich sense of design but also felt very lived-in. No wonder it was a place where an architect lived.

Just as Fang Nanzhi was carefully admiring the house, she heard footsteps on the stairs. She looked up and saw Li Yizhou walking down.

The heating inside was on full blast, and he was only wearing a white crewneck long-sleeved t-shirt and dark gray casual pants. His hair looked like it had just been washed and blow-dried. It was a little fluffy, and some loose strands hung over his forehead.

He was a young man somewhere between a boy and a man, with a mature yet vibrant boyishness. It was a contradictory combination, but on him, it was especially attractive.

“You’re here,” he said, walking down and standing in front of them. He pointed toward the study. “Go inside. First, take out your homework from this week, and the test papers from the last few exams.”

Xu Yuanhao sat down on the sofa. “Are we starting right away? Brother Yizhou, why don’t we have some fruit and rest for a bit first?”

Li Yizhou glanced at him. “Don’t make me say it a second time.”

His tone wasn’t heavy, but his eyes somehow held a sharp edge.

Fang Nanzhi’s heart tightened, and she instinctively sat up straight.

Xu Yuanhao reacted even faster. He grabbed his backpack and scurried toward the study.

She felt like she knew what he meant by “strict” now.

The study was very large, with a long desk. With a few more chairs brought in, it was more than enough room for the three of them.

Li Yizhou walked in after the three of them were seated in a row. He first picked up Xu Yuanhao’s test paper and looked at it for a while, then Xu Tingyou’s. After reading them, his eyebrows were furrowed.

When he got to Fang Nanzhi in order and picked up her test paper, she didn’t dare to breathe and secretly tried to watch his expression. Although her grades were not bad here, she had no confidence at all in front of Li Yizhou.

“Fang Nanzhi, come with me and go write outside,” he said suddenly, putting down her test paper.

Fang Nanzhi: “Huh?”

Li Yizhou: “Your level is completely different from theirs. You go write your homework outside first. I’ll tutor them so they don’t disturb you. When they’re done, I’ll come over and teach you if you have any questions.”

Fang Nanzhi was stunned, frozen by the word “alone.” After a long while, she stammered, “I’m okay... You don’t have to teach me. I can just write by myself.”

Li Yizhou said, “Your grades are very good. It’s no trouble.”

He then looked at the siblings. “These two are the trouble.”

In the end, Fang Nanzhi was left alone at a desk in an open work area outside, doing her homework.

Li Yizhou was tutoring the two of them in the study. The door was half-closed, and she could only hear faint voices.

At first, her mind wandered, but then she thought she shouldn’t make Li Yizhou think she wasn’t doing her homework properly, so she focused on solving the problems.

After about an hour and a half, she finished two assignments, English and math, but she was stuck on the last big problem in the math test paper.

“Your approach is wrong,” a voice suddenly said from behind her.

Fang Nanzhi trembled and quickly turned around. She had been too engrossed in the problem earlier and hadn’t noticed that Li Yizhou had already come out of the study and was standing behind her.

“What?”

Li Yizhou pointed to the last big problem. “From here, your approach is wrong.”

Fang Nanzhi looked at the place he was pointing to. This was the second time she had tried to solve this problem, but she still couldn’t figure it out, and she felt a little embarrassed.

“Do you need me to explain it?”

Fang Nanzhi spoke with difficulty. “...Can you?”

Li Yizhou dragged a chair over and sat next to her. He said casually, “Auntie Huang asked you to come over so you could ask questions. There’s nothing you can’t ask. Hand me a piece of scratch paper.”

“Okay.”

He took the pen and paper and didn’t say much else, just bent his head and started calculating.

There were still two fist-lengths of distance between their elbows, but for Fang Nanzhi, it was too close. She didn’t even dare to look at him, only staring at his scratch paper, trying to concentrate.

Soon, she saw the complete approach to the problem written out by him.

It hadn’t even been ten minutes.

“Try calculating it again with this,” Li Yizhou said. He knew her math grades were good, so he didn’t break it down too much, thinking she would understand just by looking at it.

Sure enough, after Fang Nanzhi took his scratch paper, she was able to solve it in no time.

“All done,” Li Yizhou said, leaning forward and putting both hands on the desk. “Take out your English homework.”

“Is this right?”

Li Yizhou: “Yes.”

Fang Nanzhi was surprised by his certainty. Did geniuses just know the answer by looking at it?

Li Yizhou seemed to have read her mind and chuckled. “I also wrote this test paper in my first year.”

Fang Nanzhi’s eyes widened even more in surprise. “You still remember the answer after all this time?”

Li Yizhou: “No, but the answer you got was three-fourths. It’s not a complicated number. As long as your approach isn’t wrong, it’s most likely correct.”

“...Oh.”

Originally, she hadn’t planned on having him teach her anything, but now that he asked to see her English homework, she was nervous but did it anyway.

In the small town where Fang Nanzhi grew up, English wasn’t taught from a young age. It only started in the third grade of primary school, and back then, there wasn’t any equipment to listen to or practice speaking with, so her foundation had always been weak.

Li Yizhou was different. Both his parents spoke English. In order to have a bilingual environment, his mother had even hired a foreign nanny. He also often traveled abroad with his parents and was able to interact with foreigners, so it was impossible for his foundation to be weak.

He quickly went through her homework and easily circled several mistakes.

“There’s no real trick to English. It’s about developing a sense for the language, listening and speaking more. For exams, memorizing vocabulary is the most important thing,” Li Yizhou said.

Fang Nanzhi was embarrassed by how many mistakes she had made and mumbled a quiet “mhm.”

“Don’t be discouraged. Once you build a solid vocabulary, the rest will follow. I’ll first explain the correct answers to these problems and why you got them wrong.”

What Xu Tingyou and the others said was right. In this moment, Li Yizhou looked very serious, completely different from his usual smiling self.

“Okay, thank you.” Fang Nanzhi sat up straight.

Li Yizhou turned sideways, pointing at her first mistake with the pen he was holding. “For this one, ‘One of the requirements for a fire is that the material...’“

Since he was explaining a problem, he leaned slightly toward her. At this distance, his breath was closer, and so was his scent.

Fang Nanzhi smelled a very pleasant scent, like mountain cedar—clear and clean. But it was most likely from the incense that had been lit in the room earlier, and it had just lingered on his clothes. It was very faint, almost nonexistent.

No one would be able to smell it from a different distance.

And when he spoke English, he sounded really good, just like she heard in American movies, with a very authentic accent.

Fang Nanzhi finally couldn’t help but glance at him, but as soon as her eyes met his, she quickly turned her gaze back.

She was bold and timid at the same time, and her heart was pounding in her throat.

“...So, the answer to this problem is B, not A. Do you understand?” Li Yizhou finished his explanation and asked her.

Fang Nanzhi’s eyes were already on the test paper, and she stammered, “I... I understand.”

Li Yizhou looked at her. “Do you really understand?”

Since she had only glanced at him and not heard the most important part, Fang Nanzhi hadn’t understood at all.

She clenched her hands, remembering what Xu Yuanhao had said not long ago: if she didn’t listen carefully when he was explaining a problem, he would get angry and scold her.

A thin layer of cold sweat immediately appeared on her back. She turned to look at him, feeling extremely nervous and not daring to lie. “I... Can, can I not understand?”

Li Yizhou was stunned for a moment.

The girl in front of him looked timid, her lips were pressed together, and her eyes flickered as she looked at him, as if she was scared.

Was he that scary when he taught?

Li Yizhou was a little confused, but he also found her words amusing.

If you don’t understand, you don’t understand. What did “can I not understand” even mean?

How could this girl be so obedient?

“Yes, you can. Of course you can.” Li Yizhou couldn’t help but laugh as he spoke. He propped his head lazily on one hand, his shoulders shaking slightly. “If you don’t understand, just say so. I can explain it to you again.”

Fang Nanzhi’s face turned beet red at his laugh, and she hung her head, not daring to move. “Okay...”

This time, Li Yizhou spoke a little slower, but the problem wasn’t difficult. Fang Nanzhi hadn’t paid attention earlier, which was why she hadn’t absorbed it. This time, she listened carefully and understood immediately. She quickly nodded. “I get it now.”

“Then go back and memorize these two words. You won’t get them wrong next time.”

Fang Nanzhi: “Mhm.”

“So, can we continue with the next problem?”

“Okay.”

The time he spent explaining the problems to Fang Nanzhi wasn’t very long. She was easy to teach. Often, he only had to get her started, and she would understand where she went wrong and why.

Li Yizhou quickly and smoothly finished going over her homework.

“Let’s take a break. What kind of fruit do you want? I’ll get some for you.”

He said this and got up to walk toward the dining area. Fang Nanzhi didn’t want to trouble him and quickly followed him. “No, no, I’ll get it myself... I mean, I don’t want any fruit.”

“Then what do you want?”

He turned around.

Fang Nanzhi was a little flustered and hadn’t expected him to suddenly turn and ask her. She accidentally ran into him.

“Ah...”

He was solid.

Fang Nanzhi realized what had happened and quickly backed away. “I’m sorry!”

Her eyes started to flicker again. Was she scared again?

Li Yizhou found it all very entertaining. He lowered his eyes to look at her, a smile flashing across his lips. “Let me ask you a question.”

“Mhm?”

“Am I that scary?”