When people are tired, they get sleepy quickly.

After squeezing onto buses and subways all morning and then spending the entire afternoon at the amusement park, those with better stamina—like Lao Mei—could still drag a few people into games that hurt others just as much as themselves. But for those with less energy, it was a different story.

The first to feel sleepy was Peng Xiaoxiao. Finding Wei Zhanpeng’s hidden stash had indeed excited her for a while, but before she could open those video files, the mortified Wei Zhanpeng rushed over and deleted everything right in front of them. From his perspective, that was perfectly reasonable, but it completely killed Peng Xiaoxiao’s interest. His computer did have quite a few games on it, but most required an internet connection, and the hotel’s free Wi-Fi was far too slow for gaming. The remaining games weren’t to her taste either, so she quickly lost interest in the laptop—and then she got sleepy.

Noticing Peng Xiaoxiao yawning nonstop, Shu Yuxin thought for a moment and said, “Sleepy? How about we go back and sleep?”

“Huh? Sure, let’s sleep,” Peng Xiaoxiao yawned again. “There’s nothing else to do anyway.”

Shu Yuxin turned back and called out to Jiang Zixuan behind her, “We’re going back to sleep first.”

“Alright. If anything comes up, just call us,” Jiang Zixuan nodded.

After saying goodbye to the others as well, Shu Yuxin and Peng Xiaoxiao returned to their room.

As soon as they entered, Peng Xiaoxiao flopped straight onto her bed, stretched out dramatically, and let out an extremely satisfied groan. “Haaah… I’m exhausted…”

Shu Yuxin sat down on her own bed, pulled over the travel bag she’d casually tossed there earlier, and started looking for clothes to change into. “Are you showering first, or should I?”

“Mm… I’ll go first,” Peng Xiaoxiao reluctantly climbed off the bed, muttering as she sorted out her clothes. “So tired… don’t want to shower…”

“If you’re that tired, why didn’t you come back earlier to sleep?” Shu Yuxin asked while setting her clothes aside.

Peng Xiaoxiao tilted her head back and sighed. “Didn’t feel it at the time… ah, whatever, I don’t feel like doing anything now.”

Despite saying that, she still forced herself up, walked into the bathroom, and closed the door behind her.

Shu Yuxin sat on the bed, staring at Peng Xiaoxiao’s small bag in a daze.

The first time she heard they were going out together, she had imagined countless scenes of spending the night in the same room with Peng Xiaoxiao, even feeling excited about it. Back then, she’d even thought that maybe something secretly shameful might happen between them tonight. But now, she felt nothing at all.

Maybe she was just too tired. The only thought in her mind was to lie down and sleep.

And in reality, nothing exciting happened at all.

Both of them showered much faster than usual. As soon as they finished, they dove straight into their own beds, each holding a phone and doing their own thing. None of the fanservice scenes that often happen in anime or novels under such circumstances occurred between them—not even one.

Apart from sighing internally at how realistic things were, Shu Yuxin had no other thoughts about it.

Once she lay still on the bed, drowsiness came quickly. After playing on her phone for a short while, Shu Yuxin’s eyelids were already fighting each other. She yawned, tossed her phone aside, turned over, and prepared to sleep.

“Hey!” Peng Xiaoxiao suddenly shouted from the other bed, belatedly remembering something and startling Shu Yuxin, who was just about to fall asleep. “What is it?”

Peng Xiaoxiao stared at the ceiling for a moment, blinking, then said, “I forgot to take you to the haunted house…”

Shu Yuxin twitched the corner of her mouth. “That’s it?”

“Yeah! Let’s go tomorrow. The haunted house at Leiter Paradise is one of the most popular attractions. I’d been planning to visit it ever since before coming to Minghai City, and I actually forgot today…”

“Umm, I think… it’s fine either way. As long as you’re having fun, that’s enough. You don’t need to specifically go for something like that, and really, you don’t have to worry about me,” Shu Yuxin said sincerely.

“Mm,” Peng Xiaoxiao nodded and tossed her phone aside. “Go to sleep early. Tomorrow we’ll get up early and go to the haunted house while there are fewer people.”

“…You really don’t have to worry about me,” Shu Yuxin said helplessly.

Why was she so hung up on the haunted house?

Peng Xiaoxiao seemed to have made up her mind and didn’t continue on that topic. Instead, she shifted to another subject that gave Shu Yuxin an even bigger headache. “Hey, by the way, did you have fun today with Jiang Zixuan?”

“Huh? It was just so-so. Too many people— even without lining up, it still felt crowded,” Shu Yuxin replied indifferently, turning over.

“That’s not what I mean,” Peng Xiaoxiao lay curled up in bed, staring straight at her with a sly smile. “I mean you and Jiang Zixuan. You two were playing together, right? I saw you on the way. So? Such a great opportunity—did anything develop?”

“I’ve already said it. Zixuan and I are just ordinary friends,” Shu Yuxin felt mentally exhausted.

“Ordinary friends my ass. You’re that close and you expect me to believe I’m blind?” Peng Xiaoxiao scooted closer, gossiping enthusiastically. “You don’t look like you’re treating him as a backup either. Or is he just your ‘male best friend’?”

For a moment, Shu Yuxin couldn’t find an answer.

Her relationship with Jiang Zixuan was very special, and it involved her own identity issues. No matter what, she couldn’t possibly explain it. But without knowing that, it really was hard for outsiders to understand what kind of relationship she had with him.

Still… Peng Xiaoxiao was paying way too much attention to her relationship with Jiang Zixuan, wasn’t she?

Was this just one of those special topics between girls?

“Uh, he counts as my male best friend,” Shu Yuxin hesitated for a few seconds before giving the answer that best fit reality. “Anyway, we’re close, but not the kind of relationship you’re thinking of.”

“Oh, I see…” Peng Xiaoxiao muttered softly to herself, then suddenly laughed. “Hey, then you should work harder and turn that male best friend into a husband~”

“…Why does a male best friend have to turn into a husband?”

“Don’t you want that?”

“Not really. I don’t have plans for that right now. Being good friends with him is fine,” Shu Yuxin shook her head.

Peng Xiaoxiao pouted. “I think Jiang Zixuan is pretty great—handsome, gentle, and he treats you well… If I had a male best friend like that, I’d do everything I could to turn him into my boyfriend. If you just keep leaving him like that, won’t you feel bad if someone else snatches him away someday?”

As she spoke, she sighed softly. “Sigh… I really want to find a boyfriend too.”

Shu Yuxin fell silent for a while.

After turning into a girl, she seemed to have never truly thought seriously about dating. Maybe because she had always known she was unremarkable before and unlikely to attract anyone, she’d felt that romance was something very distant from her. Aside from occasionally imagining daily life with an ideal partner, she had never deeply considered the reality of being in a relationship.

And lately, she hadn’t even been imagining it anymore.

Thinking about it now, if she really wanted to date, just like she’d asked Jiang Zixuan before, the first thing she needed to figure out was this—should she be looking for a boyfriend, or a girlfriend?

As she’d said before, she was fairly conservative. If she were to date, she definitely wouldn’t choose someone of the same sex. But now her body was female, which meant she couldn’t really go looking for girls either. Besides, she had no idea how to flirt with girls—she was even worse at that than she used to be at exchanging those gross yet self-amusingly cheesy jokes with guys.

But finding a boyfriend… somehow, that just felt strange.

Shu Yuxin had a good habit: if she couldn’t figure something out, she wouldn’t dwell on it. Since she couldn’t make sense of it now, she shifted her attention back to the present. Peng Xiaoxiao was still staring wistfully at the ceiling, seemingly lost in her own fantasies.

Sure enough, once people got to college, it was all springtime hormones…

In the past, Shu Yuxin might have jokingly said something like, “If you want Zixuan, I can help you chase him,” but today, she had no mood to say that.

Maybe she really was just too tired.

With a sigh, Shu Yuxin changed the topic to Peng Xiaoxiao. “By the way, you spent the whole day playing with Wei Zhanpeng today, right?”

“Hm? Yeah, I played with him all afternoon.”

“You’re getting pretty close with him,” Shu Yuxin flipped over and lay on her stomach, teasing. “Don’t tell me you’re interested in him?”

At that, Peng Xiaoxiao’s eyes widened instantly, her face full of disbelief. “Me? Interested in him?! Are you kidding? That deadbeat otaku? Who would like him? Don’t be ridiculous!”

“Tsk, aren’t you an otaku too…”

“I—I’m different!” Peng Xiaoxiao blushed. “I’m way better than him, okay!”

“Hmph. Then what do you think of him?” Shu Yuxin indulged in a bit of gossip herself for once.

Peng Xiaoxiao pursed her lips, thought for a moment, then shook her head. “Him… he’s just like that. A typical shut-in, only knows how to play games… and his skills aren’t even better than mine. What could I possibly like about him?”

“Who knows.”

After Shu Yuxin said that, an odd silence filled the room.

Then Peng Xiaoxiao leaned over and turned off the room light. Shu Yuxin’s vision instantly plunged into darkness.

“Go to sleep. We still have to get up early tomorrow to go to the amusement park,” Peng Xiaoxiao said.

Shu Yuxin smiled silently and closed her eyes. “Mm.”

Just when she thought the day would end like this, Peng Xiaoxiao added one last little twist to the night. “Don’t forget—tomorrow morning, after we get up, we’re going to the haunted house together!”

“…Go to sleep. We’ll talk about it tomorrow.”