Prodigy’s Playground

Chapter 92 The Donghai Promise

Jiang Ran bit his lip.

At last…

He had said it.

In that instant, staring into Nan Xiuxiu’s innocent eyes, he wavered more than once.

But—

He had to say it.

He had to understand what he was supposed to do.

And he had to understand what true respect toward Nan Xiuxiu meant.

“I’m sorry.”

Jiang Ran looked at her lowered head, strands of pink waves drifting in the night wind.“This is my own problem.”

He spoke softly:

“Let’s part peacefully—”

“I don’t agree.”

Nan Xiuxiu suddenly lifted her head and glared fiercely at Jiang Ran.

“I don’t agree.”

She repeated it.

The force of her tone stunned him.

This…

Since when did breaking up require consent?

It wasn’t a withdrawal notice—you couldn’t refuse to withdraw.

In Jiang Ran’s understanding, a breakup was a notification, not a proposal.

It was a ceremony that could be completed unilaterally.

He sighed.

“Whether you agree… doesn’t really matter.”

“How does it not matter!”

Nan Xiuxiu planted her hands on her hips.

“When we started dating, it wasn’t just me who said yes! We both agreed! So why is it that now, for breaking up, you get to decide alone?!”

Jiang Ran opened his mouth.

Speechless.

“I don’t care.”

Nan Xiuxiu seemed to have found the high ground.

“As far as I’m concerned, I don’t agree to this breakup!”

“If dating required both of us to agree, then breaking up also requires both of us to agree!”

Faced with this unreasonable logic, Jiang Ran didn’t know how to refute her.

“Fine.”

He made up his mind.

There were things he hadn’t wanted to say.

But now, he had no choice.

“Maybe I wasn’t clear just now. I’ll say it again.”

Jiang Ran looked into Nan Xiuxiu’s resolute eyes.

[The Jiang Ran you liked… is no longer here.]

“I mean that literally. Do you understand?”

Nan Xiuxiu held her breath.

Then her breathing quickened.

“So… you don’t like me anymore.”

“You can understand it that way.”

Jiang Ran had to sever this causality.

[We were never people from the same world. In every sense, we don’t belong to the same world.]

“I’m sorry for entering your life, for disturbing it… but no matter what, the entanglement between us has to end. I won’t say things like ‘for your own good’ or ‘it’s better for both of us’ to shift responsibility.”

“Our story was wrong from the beginning. It was my mistake, my oversight that caused all of this.”

“So I have to [correct that mistake]; so I have to go to [Donghai University].”

Jiang Ran turned around.

“Let’s part peacefully. I’ll go to my school. You stay at yours.”

“I wish you… a bright future.”

With that—

He stepped forward, back to Nan Xiuxiu, walking in the opposite direction.

A sigh escaped him.

Nan Xiuxiu suddenly stepped forward, reached out, and grabbed the hem of his shirt, clutching it tightly.

He could not move forward.

He sighed inwardly, not knowing how long this breakup would continue to entangle them.

“Donghai University.”

Nan Xiuxiu clenched her teeth and stared at him.

“You’re breaking up with me because you’re going to Donghai University. Because you’re going to graduate school.”

Jiang Ran felt helpless.

At this point, unless he revealed the Positron Cannon, the time-traveling texts, the entire Worldline Theory, it would be impossible to truly explain himself. No matter what he said, it would ultimately be interpreted as “First thing after getting ashore, cut down your beloved.”

And there was no way around it.

From a third-person perspective, it did look exactly like that.

Nan Xiuxiu gripped his shirt tighter.

[What if I go to Donghai University too?]

Jiang Ran let out a faint laugh and turned back toward her.

“You want to go to Donghai University too?”

“Well?” Her gaze was serious.

“What do you mean?”

[If I go to Donghai University too, then we’ll be people from the same world, right?]

Jiang Ran met her eyes.

He realized—

There was not a trace of surrender in them. Not a trace of compromise. Only an unextinguished stubbornness.

Sometimes—

In certain moments—

He truly thought this girl was quite good.

But…

As he had said, they were not from the same world. Not from the same worldline.

Jiang Ran belonged to Worldline 0.

Nan Xiuxiu belonged to Worldline 1.

Jiang Ran of Worldline 0 and Nan Xiuxiu of Worldline 1 were meant to be two parallel lines that would never intersect.

If Qin Feng had not made that final desperate reversal, sending a time-traveling text across ten years, their life trajectories would never have collided.

But there was one unchangeable fact.

The most important thing for Jiang Ran was to return to Worldline 0.

To do that, everything that had happened now would have to be rewritten.

He and Nan Xiuxiu were like two stars rising and setting in opposite directions. The distance between them—

Was simply: “In life, we do not meet.”

“I know what you’re thinking, but you’re misunderstanding me. I’m not breaking up with you because of that. The two things have nothing to do with each other.”

Jiang Ran explained:

“Besides, relying on your recent exam results to get into Donghai University is impossible. Maybe if you won an Olympic gold medal it might work, but the next Olympics aren’t until 2028.”

“Anyway, stop obsessing over Donghai University. There’s no hope. And there’s no meaning.”

But as if she hadn’t heard him—

Or perhaps she thought he was making excuses—

Nan Xiuxiu’s gaze remained firm.

“If I can get into Donghai University to study, just like you! Then you take back what you said!”

Jiang Ran sighed.

Ignorance could be fearless.

Nan Xiuxiu hated studying. She had barely opened a book. She probably didn’t even understand what upgrading from junior college to a bachelor’s degree meant. She had no idea that there was no pathway in this world for a junior college student to transfer into Donghai University for undergraduate study—no matter how wealthy her father was.

If there were such a path, would Jiang Ran be struggling like this?

He gently gripped her wrist, freeing the hem of his shirt.

He lowered her hand and turned away.

He had said everything he could.

He didn’t want to entangle himself further.

This time—

Nan Xiuxiu did not chase after him.

Jiang Ran walked along the campus wall in the opposite direction, hearing only his own footsteps.

She must be heartbroken.

From her perspective, he had abandoned her after success. First thing after getting ashore, cut down his beloved. Forgot his roots after upgrading. Looked down on her junior college background.

So be it.

This relationship.

Let it end like this.

“Jiang Ran!!!”

Behind him—

Nan Xiuxiu’s furious shout tore through the night.

He turned back.

She was still standing where she had been.

She raised her right hand, pointing at him ten meters away, her index finger sharp with anger and judgment.

“Just you wait!”

She bit the words out.

[I will definitely make it to Donghai University!!]

The night wind rose.

Fallen leaves seemed to come alive, swirling like butterflies between them, drawing a ripple of time in the air.

Across that lifted current of time, they looked at each other.

On one side—attachment to the past.

On the other—a glance toward the future.

“Give up.”

Jiang Ran’s voice was swallowed by the Donghai night wind.

“You won’t make it.”