“Don’t you think that you should go to take a shower first? You’ve changed from a lovely Young Pioneer into an ugly, dirty nestling from the desert.” Someone sneered behind Lin Wenxi. Lin Wenxi turned around and saw Zhang Dong standing on the withered grass. It was late autumn, but Zhang Dong just wore a red vest and black shorts.

Lin Wenxi looked down at himself and discovered that his olive green camouflage suit was smeared all over with his sweat and the mud that Zhang Dong had poured onto him. He thought to himself, “Wow, it has turned a muddy colour. It’s indeed suitable for concealment in the desert.

He stood upright and slightly lifted his chest while saying, “Well, you should say, ‘You’ve changed from a marine into a desert eagle.'”

“Stop showing off your flat pecs. Don’t embarrass yourself.” Zhang Dong smiled teasingly and added, “You haven’t had a good rest for days! Go to take a shower now. There’s a dinner party tonight. After dinner, you have to go to sleep in a mixed dorm. There’s no single room reserved for you!” He paused for a moment and continued, “You’ll go back to your university tomorrow. Hey, you know what. You’ll fall into my hands again.”

Lin Wenxi watched Zhang Dong walking away and made a face toward him, while thinking. “You can never manipulate me by threatening me with violence, Robber Zhang Dong!” After that, he took his basin and sat in a daze in front of a public bathhouse, which was located in the southwestern corner of the depot. Upon seeing the boys laughingly walk out of the bathhouse with their toiletries, he went into the place to take a shower.

He enjoyed the hot shower so much that he felt slightly dizzy.

He wondered, “During the past two months, things really didn’t go as I had expected. Every time I think back to the first day when I came to this university founded by my father and those roommates in my dorm, I feel as if I just had a dream. Where are Zhao Yuan and Zheng Kai now? When will they reach the destination?” When Lin Wenxi slowly rubbed his soap on his skin, he thought of something else. “That day, when Zhao Yuan treated my skin wound, he just hastily applied some medicine on it, but Shu Xiaoman was different. She moved gently and slowly. Wait, did she touch me somewhere where just shouldn’t be touching?”

When be began to rub the soap on his buttocks, he felt a dull pain and immediately stopped rubbing. He placed one of his hands on the shower wall panel to keep balance, sighed and then pounded on the wall panel with the other hand.

Suddenly, the light flickered and went out. Lin Wenxi immediately tensed up and continued to rub soap on himself in the dark. After a while, when the light was on again, Lin Wenxi could see that his shower door was locked. He felt much relieved. A few seconds later, the light was dimmed, and everything seemed to quiet down except for the sound of running water. Lin Wenxi saw a hat above his shower door, but it quickly disappeared. He let the shower run full blast, trying to calm himself down with the loud sound of running water. The next moment, he felt something wiggling on his feet and could not help but scream. He shrank into a corner while panting heavily, and then he heard some people running into the bathhouse. The light was on, and some student asked, “How are you? Is there anything wrong inside?”

When Lin Wenxi was about to speak, he heard Zhang Dong’s voice. “I came here to check the bathhouse. When I was about to turn off the light, some boy suddenly screamed. I was really startled! Hey, who’s inside this shower room? Which class are you from? Have you washed for two hours? Get out now!”

“Are you saying that this person has stayed inside that shower room for two hours?”

“Wow, he must’ve scrubbed a layer of skin off himself.”

“Maybe he’s not alone.”

“Yeah, there are probably a boy and a girl or two boys inside this shower room.”

“Hey, the people inside, I saw you!”

…

Upon hearing that, Lin Wenxi thought to himself, “Well, not only girls like to gossip.”

He slowly rinsed the soap off his body. After that, he slightly opened the door and reached out his hand to grab his clothes hanging on the other side of the shower door. To his surprise, he failed to grab anything. He took his hand back and shouted, “Give my clothes back to me!”

The students outside burst into laughter. “You know what, you must’ve made this door shake too much, so your clothes fell to the floor.”

“Hey, how many bonus points will I get by filming this and uploading it to Caoliu website?”

Lin Wenxi saw a finger above his shower door pointing toward a side wall panel of his shower room, He turned his head to the side and saw his clothes there.

Lin Wenxi put on his clothes and hesitated for a long time before opening the door and walking out of the shower room. He was greeted with curious students, who were smiling meaningfully at him. He nodded and smiled back at them. The boys imagined that they would see an embarrassed girl, who was not properly dressed, in the shower room. They hurriedly stuck their heads into the room, but much to their disappointment, they failed to see anyone inside. They felt suspicious and started to look for the military instructor. However, they could not see the military instructor and that good-looking boy anywhere inside this bathhouse at the moment.

As such, the boys began to gossip about the military instructor and the good-looking boy. They even talked about this during the dinner party. The girls enjoyed these gossips. They even used their imagination to dramatize all the details of this incident, making the party go with a swing.

Lin Wenxi sat in the bamboo forest, which was far away from the crowd. He got two dishes. One was a fried fish. He ate only less than half of it and put it down. The other dish was also a fried fish. He did not touch it and gave it Zhang Dong, who kept watching him with a smirk on his face. Zhang Dong took the fish, and quickly gulped it down. After that, he continued to watch Lin Wenxi with a smirk on his face. Lin Wenxi gave him the remaining half of the fried fish, he quickly gulped it down again. Lin Wenxi felt so awkward that he immediately ran away from his military instructor.

Zhang Dong looked at Lin Wenxi. He wore a pair of dark blue jeans and a light blue and white sweater. He looked extra fresh in the autumn wind. Zhang Dong could not help but beam brightly. This was the first time that he had seen Lin Wenxi dressed in something other than the camouflage suit.

After the dinner, the students went to their dormitories with their friends. Lin Wenxi went to his dorm and then quickly walked out of it. After a while, he plucked up courage to enter the dorm again, but still quickly escaped from the place. He was filled with astonishment and thought, “This is ridiculous. This mixed dorm has only four beds. That means I have to share my bed with at least 6 or 7 boys.”

A girl walked up to Lin Wenxi and said smilingly and meaningfully, “Who knows what will happen when so many boys sleep together.” With these words, she burst into laughter and walked away. Lin Wenxi got goose bumps all over his body.

The next morning, Zhang Dong woke up at 4:00 am. After traveling together with the students for these days, the military instructors got used to waking up at this hour. As they were afraid of waking up the students, they decided to go down the hill to complete their daily drill. When Zhang Dong walked out of his dorm, he saw a slender figure. It was a boy dressed in a blue and white sweater. The boy fell into a doze while holding a dirty backpack.

Lin Wenxi had left his dorm early this morning. When he woke up and found out that there were at least two legs and two arms on his body, he immediately closed his eyes and prayed. When he opened his eyes again, he finally accepted the fact that he was sleeping together with several boys and the boys who slept beside him put their right legs and right hands on him. He thought desperately, “Well, I’m sleeping in the mixed dorm and among a group of animals. And these animals keep snoring.” It had taken him a lot of effort to get out of the bed. Now he opened his eyes again and saw a familiar person doing exercises in the sun. He was stretching his hands above his head and bending himself at the waist. Lin Wenxi really wanted to kick his ass, but on second though, he decided to show some respect and just elbowed Zhang Dong down the steps.

Zhang Dong reacted quickly and nimbly ran down the steps. He swiftly turned around and picked up a small stone. When he was about to throw the stone at the person behind him, he saw that it was Lin Wenxi and dropped his hand. He smirked at the boy and then smiled at him. In the end, he laughed out loud and walked away.

He thought, “It looks like this brat is about to retrieve himself very soon!”

Shortly after breakfast, the pick-up coach arrived. The students got on the coach one by one. Three of the students in the depot had been sent back to the university yesterday since they were wounded and needed treatment. Now, there were 24 students, and two of them were forced to take this coach to go back to the university to take a rest. When they heard that it would at least 6 hours to drive back to their university, they were astonished. They were told that they had walked nearly 500 kilometers during the past 20 days. The wetlands and swamps that they had walked past were not even located in the city where they set off from. It was said that the top three students would have to walk another 100 kilometers to reach the destination. Lin Wenxi received a call from Shu Xiaoman. She asked him many questions. “Is your hair a mess now? Have you fully recovered from the cold? Did you meet any boy you like? I can be your matchmaker…” She kept asking and talking, and Lin Wenxi just gave her some simple answers or replied by saying, “Uhm”. After that, Zhang An’an and Wang Xiang talked with him on the phone. They worked smoothly together and kept teasing about his relationship with Zhang Dong.