Chapter 7 Chapter 7: The Aloof Beauty?
In the end, neither of them said anything.
The girl inside only realized there were two people standing at the door after a moment’s delay. She let out a startled shriek, quickly pulled her legs down from the desk, and hastily pressed her hands over the hem of her T-shirt.
The two at the door reacted in perfect unison—turning their heads away, stepping back, and shutting the door.
Outside the room, Jiang Zixuan and Shu Yuxin exchanged a one-second glance before he asked, “Why did you come out?”
“Huh… Come to think of it, why did I come out?” Yuxin murmured softly to herself.
She could, after all, now openly look at other girls’ bare bodies without any issue.
After pondering for a few seconds, Yuxin opened the door again and wheeled her luggage inside.
The girl in the dorm had already abandoned her game and was frantically pulling on a pair of pants.
“Um… Sorry, we didn’t know you were in here,” Yuxin said quietly from the doorway.
The girl finally got her pants on and hopped up and down a couple of times to tug them up properly. Then, with a cheerful, carefree laugh, she said, “Ah, it’s fine! It’s my fault—I knew someone else hadn’t arrived yet… hehe, it’s just so hot today.”
Yuxin blinked, then tugged lightly at her own little vest.
“Oh—was that your boyfriend outside? Go ahead and let him in. I don’t mind,” the girl added, noticing Yuxin’s silence and waving her hand dismissively before plopping back down in her chair.
Yuxin nodded, turned, and opened the door. “Zixuan, come in.”
Jiang Zixuan, who’d been standing in the hallway under the intense scrutiny of every girl on the floor, instantly felt a huge weight lift off his shoulders and practically fled into the room.
The bed sheets and covers were things Yuxin had brought from home. After Zixuan helped her make the bed, they headed over to West District Square to buy a lightweight summer blanket. He also picked out a set of pastel-pink, all-in-one mosquito net bed curtains with a distinctly girlish flair. He paid so quickly that Yuxin didn’t even register what was happening—and by the time she realized, it was already too late to return anything.
Setting up Yuxin’s bed didn’t take long. Zixuan had initially wanted to help her sort and put away her clothes too, but then remembered that “she” was a girl now—and thought better of it. Once he confirmed there was nothing else left to do, he simply said, “Call me if anything comes up,” and left.
Yuxin continued tidying her desk. The previous occupant of this bed must have been a hardcore K-pop fangirl—the interior walls of the desk were practically plastered with posters of various handsome Korean idols. Fortunately, the posters had been up for a while and peeled off relatively easily. After about half an hour, she’d cleared them all away. Staring down at the small mountain of crumpled paper at her feet, she sighed resignedly. “Um… do you have a broom?”
“In the balcony,” came the reply. The other girl had stopped playing games and was now absorbed in funny short videos, occasionally letting out muffled giggles.
Yuxin fetched the broom from the balcony and began cleaning her little corner.
“Hey, beauty,” the other girl suddenly called out, “what’s your name?”
Yuxin paused. “Shu Yuxin. And you?”
“Peng Xiaoxiao—you can just call me Xiaoxiao.” Xiaoxiao swiveled her chair around and smiled at Yuxin. “Say, that handsome guy earlier—was he your boyfriend?”
“No, just a friend.”
“Just a friend? A ‘just a friend’ would go through all that trouble for you?”
“We’ve known each other a long time.”
“Hehe, I get it,” Xiaoxiao said with a knowing glint in her eyes, brimming with gossip-hungry curiosity. “He’s chasing after you, right? Or… is he your backup boyfriend?”
Yuxin gave her a puzzled look and corrected her firmly, “Really, we’re *just* friends.”
“Aaah—” Xiaoxiao drawled out the word skeptically.
Not knowing how to explain further, Yuxin simply lowered her head and kept sweeping.
She obviously couldn’t tell Xiaoxiao that she used to be a guy.
Seeing Yuxin wasn’t engaging, Xiaoxiao drew her own conclusion: She must be one of those aloof, goddess-type girls who thinks she’s too good to chat with someone like me. Xiaoxiao wasn’t the type to keep pushing if the other person clearly wasn’t interested, so she dropped the topic. “Alright, alright, I won’t bother you anymore. Oh—you haven’t checked in yet, right? After you finish setting up, remember to head over to the West District Library entrance to register and pick up your military training uniform. We’re meeting our drill instructor tonight.”
Was Yuxin really an aloof beauty? Of course not. If Yuxin could read minds, she’d probably burst out laughing at Xiaoxiao’s assumption. Unfortunately, she couldn’t—and neither could Xiaoxiao.
To her parents, their kid had always been outgoing and friendly, eager to make new connections. And indeed, Yuxin did often appear that way—but only with people she already shared deep bonds with. In truth, she wasn’t naturally good at socializing. Her approach had always been passive: she’d only interact if others took the initiative to reach out first. As a result, while she seemed to have lots of friends on the surface, only a handful were truly close to her.
This brings us to an important point mentioned earlier: up until the moment she became a girl, Yuxin—formerly Shu Yumo—had never even held a girl’s hand. That wasn’t hyperbole; it was literal fact. Now it’s easy to understand why: as a guy, Yumo was decent-looking but far from striking. Few girls ever approached him, and with his passive social style, opportunities to connect with girls were practically nonexistent. Truth be told, if “inner beauty” could be graded, Yumo would’ve scored quite high—but without any chance to interact, that inner beauty never had a chance to shine. Many friends had teased him about his complete lack of “girl luck.” We should clarify, though: true “girl unluckiness” means “no girls talk to you, and even when you try talking to them, they ignore you.” Yuxin only fulfilled the first part—the second, he never got the chance to test.
Enough digressing—back to the present. Because of her lifelong habits, Yuxin had almost zero experience talking to girls. Nearly all her past interactions with them dated back to childhood. Consequently, she had no idea how to strike up a conversation with other young women. When girls did talk to her, she usually just answered their questions directly, which often led to awkward silences—further reinforcing her difficulty in making female friends.
Case in point: right now.
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P.S.:
Didn’t you guys promise there’d be fewer SF keyword filters…?
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