“One,” Cheng Mengxue said, blinking.
One?
“Just one?”
“Yep.”
She took out her phone and handed it to Jiang Ran.
“See for yourself.”
He took the phone and opened the text message interface.
On March 26, she had indeed received only one spacetime text message… precisely the sixty-five-character message Jiang Ran had composed, not a single word off.
There was no second message before or after it.
How was he supposed to interpret this?
Jiang Ran scratched his head.
That mysterious message and string of numbers that had appeared out of nowhere before had made him suspicious for a long time. Even during this plan to save Xu Yan, he had opposed it, fearing that some terrible consequence might occur.
But from the looks of things now…
Had he really just been too sensitive?
He scrolled down again.
In the message records from March 22, those two spacetime text messages lay there quietly, side by side.
Could it be that this garbled-message-looking text really was just a string of gibberish, a glitch, a case of overthinking?
He returned the phone to her.
The IV drip was finished as well. The nurse removed the needle and told him he could leave the hospital after resting for a bit.
The nurse clearly knew about Jiang Ran saving people, and her attitude toward him was excellent. Smiling warmly, she asked him all sorts of questions and even praised him for being amazing.
It made Jiang Ran feel a little uncomfortable.
“Hehe, this is nothing!”
Cheng Mengxue gave a mysterious smile.
“When you get back to school, there’ll be an even bigger surprise waiting for you!”
“Surprise or shock?”
“Of course it’s a surprise!”
“What kind of surprise?”
“A surprise is a surprise!”
“Don’t play word games. Hurry up and explain it to me—what exactly is the surprise?”
“The surprise is—”
“Is?”
Whoosh.
Cheng Mengxue opened a webpage on her phone and shoved a news article on the screen in front of him.
“The surprise is! Jiang Ran! You’ve become a great hero who acted bravely for a righteous cause!!”
……
After returning to school, he finally understood what a “surprise” meant.
Countless classmates, some he knew and some he didn’t, all came over to greet him.
“Not bad, Jiang Ran! A real man!”
“You’re freaking awesome, bro. Respect! I don’t admire anyone, but I admire you! Seriously!”
“Did you know you’ve gone viral on Douyin? All kinds of videos about you have millions of likes!”
“Senior, can I add you on WeChat? I want to…”
Exaggerated.
That was the only word for it.
Jiang Ran had always been a nobody at Donghai University.
Of those who could get into this place, which one hadn’t once been the favored child of heaven in their class?
First-place students were everywhere here. Even the slackers who failed their courses had been top students in their high school stories.
Not to mention Jiang Ran hadn’t joined any clubs, had never won any awards, and had no especially outstanding achievements.
Yet in the blink of an eye—
In no more time than it took to send a spacetime text message…
He had leapt into becoming a hero praised by everyone for acting bravely for a righteous cause.
Ring ring ring, ring ring ring, ring ring ring, ring ring ring—the phone rang.
The caller ID showed his homeroom teacher.
Laughable. He had been in university for two years and had only ever dealt with his counselor; he had never said a word to his homeroom teacher.
“Hello?”
“Hello, Jiang Ran? Have you come back from the hospital?”
On the other end of the line, the homeroom teacher sounded excited.
“Hurry over to my office. The television station wants to interview you! The reporters have been waiting for a long time!”
When he arrived at the office, it was packed with people.
“That’s right. Jiang Ran has been outstanding ever since he enrolled—warmhearted, kind, and willing to help others. This is also the result of the guidance of our class atmosphere.”
The homeroom teacher sat ramrod straight, currently being interviewed.
His balding head was slicked with hair gel; he had never been this glorious before.
“I often teach them that studying is important, but being a good person, having moral character, and possessing kindness are even more important.”
“This has always been my educational philosophy. I’m very gratified that Jiang Ran was able to take these words to heart and remember them.”
“Student education is a very complex matter. Different students require different guidance. I have always cared deeply about the students’ growth and…”
Blah blah blah—he spoke into the camera for half an hour.
“How was that?”
He wiped his sweat and looked at the cameraman.
“Can all of that be aired?”
“We’ll have to edit it down to two lines,” the cameraman said.
“Haha, cutting out two lines is fine!”
The homeroom teacher was very magnanimous.
“As long as you preserve the overall completeness.”
“No, no, no…”
The cameraman corrected him.
“I mean we can only keep two lines. After all, the main person we’re interviewing is Jiang Ran.”
“Huh?”
The balding man cracked.
……
After the interview ended, he received another notice from the counselor. Tomorrow, the school would be holding a “Deeds Report Study Session and Commendation Conference for Righteous Bravery” for him in the grand auditorium, and told him to prepare in advance.
“Do you have a suit?”
“No.”
“Borrow one from the student union. They have plenty.”
……
In his two years at university, Jiang Ran had never been this busy. He finally understood what it meant to be dog-tired.
At the conference the next day.
He sat to the left of the president, read a report on his deeds written by Cheng Mengxue, and then read a speech on acting bravely for a righteous cause written by DeepSeek.
After that came the presentation of certificates, honorary titles, and the bonus from the Donghai City Foundation for Righteous Bravery.
The bonus was quite decent—a full fifty thousand yuan.
After the conference ended, the two children he had saved held flowers in their arms and, accompanied by their parents, presented them to Jiang Ran.
“Thank you, big brother!” “Thank you for saving us!”
Experiencing this kind of scene for the first time, Jiang Ran inevitably felt a little stiff.
Come to think of it…
This was the first time in his life he had ever received flowers.
No one had ever given him flowers before.
At this moment, he didn’t feel anything particularly special. He simply felt a trace of warmth.
[I really did do a good thing.]
Every boy, in his youth, hopes to become a great hero who saves the world.
But as they grow older, they discover that the world is very big, and also very small.
A family is a world. Two people in love are also a world. Sometimes, a single person is likewise a world.
But no matter which world it is…
It is worth protecting.
“Jiang Ran.”
Hearing the voice, he turned his head.
Xu Yan walked over with a smile and patted his shoulder.
“Not bad, Jiang Ran! I already thought you were pretty great before, but now I still have to say it—I really see you in a new light!”
“At the time, you yanked me back before I could even react, and then you jumped straight into the water. You scared me to death.”
Jiang Ran looked at Xu Yan’s fair neck and rosy face, and couldn’t help feeling a little dazed.
He thought back to the previous worldline—the corpse pushed out of the operating room, the white cloth covering her face.
That had been a lifeless dead person.
And now, her sweet smile, the warmth coming from his shoulder, all stood as irrefutable proof…
This was a living person, youthful and beautiful.
[A person who was dead in the original history, in the original worldline, was saved by them, and continued a new life in a new worldline.]
Even though she herself… knew nothing about any of it.
Only Jiang Ran remembered.
“You really are brave!” Xu Yan kept praising him.
He raised his head.
Looking into her smiling eyes, he said:
“You were brave too.”
His voice was very soft.
All these flowers and praises should have belonged to you.
……
Half an hour later, he returned to the club activity room.
Jiang Ran placed the flowers, certificates, banner, and bonus box on the table, then took out the fifty-thousand-yuan righteous bravery bonus and handed it to Cheng Mengxue.
“Treat it as club activity funds.”
The two of them were shocked.
“You’re this generous! This is fifty thousand yuan!”
“Don’t spend it recklessly,” Jiang Ran instructed.
For some reason… he felt that this fifty thousand yuan was rather heavy.
Qin Feng and Cheng Mengxue chattered away on the other side, discussing what they should use the funds to buy.
Jiang Ran sat on the sofa and looked at the small blackboard.
289269426494642
That mysterious string of numbers with no clear meaning was still written on it.
He closed his eyes.
The numbers that surfaced before his eyes began to separate, twist, extend, and then combine again… forming all kinds of words that flashed through his mind:
Spacetime, mystery, pattern, law
Fear, unknown, danger, warning
Confusion, exploration, death, change
History, traversal, river, memory
Salvation, answer, code, new life
World, hero, responsibility, future
……
He slowly opened his eyes.
“I’ve changed my mind.”
Hearing his voice, Qin Feng and Cheng Mengxue stopped their discussion and turned to look at him.
“Before, I really did hesitate. I was afraid, and I was lost. But now… I’ve figured it out.”
“If we want to know the answer, just sitting around imagining things is useless. The risks that need to be taken must be taken. Those detours that must be walked… perhaps not even a single meter can be skipped.”
Jiang Ran stood up, his gaze serious as he looked at the two of them.
“So, I take back what I said before.”
“[Let’s continue… the spacetime text message experiment.]”