003. Waking Up as Spider-Man

As they spoke, Su Ye and Gwen quickly arrived at the classroom, one after the other, and took their seats, ceasing their conversation and preparing for class.

However, not long after the lesson began, Su Ye was suddenly overwhelmed by a wave of dizziness, as if suffering from both a hangover and a high fever before being hurled onto a roller coaster. The entire world spun around him. The intense discomfort made it impossible for Su Ye to focus on the lesson, and he ended up resting his head on the desk for the entire morning.

Gwen, for her part, said nothing about this. Listening to lectures or sleeping in class—both were a student's own choice, a unique feature of their country.

But not everyone saw it that way. Thompson, still smarting from his perceived humiliation that morning, waited until Gwen left before striding over to Su Ye’s desk. Without warning, he raised his hand and aimed a heavy slap at the back of Su Ye’s head.

“This morning I spared you for Gwen’s sake. Did you really think I’d let you off so easily? Damn it!”

Thompson didn’t hold back at all, determined to teach Su Ye a lesson and show him, and everyone else in the class—no, in the whole school—who was really in charge. As his hand came down, a smirk crept onto his lips. He could already picture Su Ye being knocked to the floor, flustered and aggrieved.

Crack!

A sharp sound rang out, but the impact he expected never came. Instead, a searing pain shot through Thompson’s wrist, as if it had been caught in an iron vice.

“Aah!” The pain only fueled Thompson’s aggression. Especially when he saw that the hand gripping his wrist belonged to the very Su Ye in front of him, rage boiled over.

“Damn it!” He clenched his other fist and swung it at Su Ye’s head. But suddenly, his vision blurred, and a tremendous force crashed into his chest. In the next instant, his entire body was sent flying.

“What the hell… just happened?” Thompson’s mind was a whirlwind of confusion. Even after he hit the ground and passed out, he still had no idea what had occurred.

Everything had happened so quickly that even the surrounding students were left dumbfounded. All they saw was Thompson walking over, raising his arm, and then suddenly being launched backward as if by some invisible force.

Was he faking it?

As the person at the center of the storm, Su Ye rolled his neck and stood up from his seat. He may have seemed to be sleeping all morning, but no one knew the truth: his body had undergone a complete transformation.

The spider that had appeared from nowhere during his photo with Gwen was, indeed, a super spider. Now, not only was his eyesight perfect and his hearing keener, but his body had developed lean muscle, he felt energy coursing through him, and he’d gained a spider’s instinct for sensing danger.

Earlier, he had been napping, recovering from the weakness brought on by his mutation. But when Thompson approached to attack, his spider sense immediately sounded the alarm. That was how he managed to grab Thompson’s wrist and then send him flying with a single punch.

To others, these feats seemed utterly impossible, yet to him now, they felt as ordinary as eating or drinking.

Speaking of eating, Su Ye suddenly realized he was starving. Without so much as a glance at the fallen Thompson, he turned and headed for the cafeteria. The transformation had come with a massive energy drain; he felt as though he could devour an entire cow.

The moment Su Ye left, the previously silent classroom burst into noisy chatter.

“What just happened?”

“How did Lightning get sent flying? Was it Ye Su who did that?”

“I didn’t see anything. It looked like Lightning just launched himself.”

“Lightning, wake up!”

With the help of his cronies’ slaps, Thompson slowly regained consciousness.

“Lightning, what happened just now? Did Ye Su send you flying? Did he use Chinese kung fu? How do you feel? Do you feel sick? Are you hurt? Want to go to the nurse’s office?”

“Get lost!” Thompson stood up, rubbing his chest, his face twisted in anger as he surveyed the room.

“Where’s Ye Su?”

Someone nearby raised a hand. “He didn’t look so well. Maybe… he went to the nurse’s office?”

Seeing Thompson storm out, his cronies hurried after him.

“Lightning, should we go cause him trouble? You just slipped up earlier! If we all go together, we’ll teach him a lesson he won’t forget!”

“Yeah, Lightning, the nurse’s office is small. We’ll trap him inside and beat him up—let’s see if his kung fu can help him then. We’ll make it so his own mother wouldn’t recognize him.”

“We could even…”

“Enough!” Thompson’s shout cut them off. Though he wasn’t sure what exactly had happened, there was definitely something strange about that foreign student. Even with three of them, he didn’t feel confident about confronting him now.

So, best to let it go for now.

“I’m hungry. Let’s go eat.”

Within their little gang, Thompson’s word was law, so his cronies said nothing further and followed him to the cafeteria.

“Fine, we’ll let him off for now. But sooner or later, he’ll pay for his arrogance.”

“Don’t worry, Lightning, his time will come…”

As they chatted, they soon reached the cafeteria. The moment they walked in, Thompson spotted Su Ye sitting not far away, clutching a tray of burgers and shoveling them into his mouth like a starved man.

“Wasn’t he supposed to be at the nurse’s office?” Thompson asked reflexively, a trace of unease flickering across his face, as if he recalled some nameless fear. Suddenly, he didn’t feel hungry anymore.

But one of his cronies pointed excitedly at a girl sashaying past Su Ye with a tray, calling out, “Look, Lightning, it’s MJ!”

“MJ’s so hot, Lightning, you’re one lucky guy!”

The other cronies couldn’t help but praise her. This MJ, though her face was a bit broad and her looks rather average, had an impressive figure. She walked with a captivating sway that drew every eye.

Thompson’s face split into a lewd grin, as if recalling some delightful memory. High schoolers here knew a lot, and acted on it, so happiness wasn’t just a fantasy—it was real.

Then, right as Thompson and his friends watched, MJ, with all her swagger, stepped on a patch of water near Su Ye, lost her balance, and tumbled backward.

Watching a pretty girl make a scene was many men’s secret delight, but if she was your girlfriend, that was another story. If anything slipped out, he’d be mortified.

But Thompson was too far away to do anything but watch helplessly.

At that moment, Su Ye, who had been sitting there eating, stood up without anyone noticing, caught MJ around the waist in one swift motion, and with his other hand, juggled and caught the food flying from her tray as if performing in a circus.

Everyone nearby was stunned. As for MJ herself, she was so shocked she could hardly stand.