Longhair shouted in a panic, “It was wrong of us to insult him, but we didn’t lay a hand on anyone! No matter how you look at it, they had a reason to kidnap, but somehow it’s even more our fault for getting hurt?”

Brian Clark turned his head at these words, and as he lifted his eyes, he happened to lock gazes with Laura Bennett standing outside the door. The impatience in his eyes paused for a moment, as if he hadn’t expected Laura Bennett to show up.

But he quickly looked away, walked up to Longhair, and grabbed him by the collar.

Jack Harris immediately shouted, “Brian Clark, let go of him! Lawless!”

Laura Bennett stared at that hand—slender, fair, every joint tensed with strength as it gripped.

So good-looking. He couldn’t help but marvel inwardly.

After years of playing the violin, he always subconsciously observed people’s hands first. Brian Clark’s hands were the best he’d ever seen.

Brian Clark gave a mocking laugh, “You think you’re logical? You bullied him, you started the fight, and just because you insulted us in Chinese with a bit of dialect, you think you’re justified? I thought you were so tough, but now you’re whining about getting hurt? I was seriously injured, did I complain?”

Jack Harris was stunned, instinctively sizing him up. “You got hurt too?”

“I did.” Brian Clark let go, thought for a moment, and held his lower back. “My tailbone hurts.”

Samuel Grant, crouched behind Laura Bennett, muttered quietly, “That’s called the coccyx.”

Jack Harris was clearly getting nervous. “Your bone hurts?”

Longhair cursed, “Are you even human? I didn’t hit your lower back!”

“How did you not?” Brian Clark casually raised his hand and pointed outside the door. “He saw it all, even helped me check the injury back in class.”

Everyone in the room turned to stare.

Laura Bennett froze.

Jack Harris frowned, “It was during the exam—what were you two doing in the back row?”

Brian Clark drawled lazily, “Nothing much, just pulled down my waistband for him to take a look. Took one second.”

Laura Bennett: “??”

“Right?” Brian Clark looked back at him calmly.

Samuel Grant poked Laura Bennett from behind, “Oh my god, you even looked inside his waistband?”

Laura Bennett was numb.

After a while, he replied with a blank face, “Mm.”

Damn bastard.

He cursed inwardly in elegant Chinese.

There was still an English test during evening self-study, so Jack Harris didn’t keep them long, just said the matter wasn’t over.

When Laura Bennett and the others returned, the test papers were already being handed out. Brian Clark came in a few minutes later than them, returning to his seat under the watchful eyes of a group of “owls,” lowering his head to look at the paper, completely ignoring Laura Bennett’s friendly glance.

Jack Harris soon appeared at the front door, his face like he’d swallowed a handful of razor blades: “You’re all getting cocky, acting up—today I’ve heard nothing but complaints from every subject teacher about your bad test scores. Just wait, I’ll talk to each of you one by one!”

The classroom fell silent.

After a while, Jack Harris left, and everyone finally relaxed and got ready for the listening section.

The English test was kind of dumb.

Whether it was easy or not aside, some questions left even Laura Bennett, a half-Brit, completely baffled.

The mind-numbing test paper triggered his jet lag, suppressed all day. Laura Bennett finished the test at lightning speed, flopped onto his desk, and fell asleep in seconds.

He slept deeply, only waking when the shrill bell rang and the group leader came to collect the test paper from under his arm.

It took Laura Bennett a while to pull himself out of his half-dreaming state. He lifted his head in a daze, eyes not yet adjusted to the light, and saw a male teacher stride onto the podium.

He was in his forties, with gentle features and a lively spirit. He greeted the English teacher, patted the lectern, and said, “Hey, don’t leave yet, let me ask—where’s the new student, Laura Bennett?”

Half-asleep, Laura Bennett raised his hand.

The male teacher beamed, holding his thermos cup, “Only part of the papers are graded, but I couldn’t wait to come meet you. Impressive! This test, you got a perfect score! Famous in the math department already—making a name for yourself on your very first try.”

That was a lot to take in.

Still half-asleep, Laura Bennett was trying to process it when the whole room of “owls” exploded.

Samuel Grant’s eyes went wide, “Perfect, perfect score??!”

Finn couldn’t help but turn around, muttering with a complicated expression, “Damn.”

“This test is out of 150??”

“Damn, aren’t foreigners supposed to be bad at math?”

“What the hell!”

“Here to show us up, huh!”

“I’m losing it.”

Amid the uproar, only Laura Bennett’s left side was quiet.

—That was where a certain someone, who had also fallen asleep during the test at some point, was slumped over.

A few seconds later, that person woke up, slowly sat up straight, and rubbed his forehead, red from being pressed against the desk.

His dark eyes barely held any alertness. He glanced at Laura Bennett first, then looked up at the podium.

Brian Clark’s voice, still groggy, was lower and softer than usual.

“What do you mean, a perfect score?”

The emphasis was on “a.”

Old Martin raised his eyebrows, looking like a gleeful long-eared owl: “Don’t get your hopes up. I graded your paper first—on the last question, you didn’t simplify the square root of 243, so you lost two points.”

Brian Clark: “…Oh.”

That single, unenthusiastic “oh” was like a cool talisman slapped onto Laura Bennett’s forehead—more refreshing than a mouthful of mint.