Chapter 15
Severe pain, dizziness.
Wen Rong’s whole body went into spasms. He pressed hard on the bridge of his nose and his cheeks, attempting to use the pressure to distract from the sour ache radiating from his bones.
When his brain became deprived of oxygen from enduring it, an evil thought spawned in his heart: Why doesn’t someone else be the alien?
This world assigned parents, siblings, and friends to most people. Most students could study quietly, yet “special” things always befell him.
Wen Rong knew this thought was wrong, but he really couldn’t bear it anymore.
He looked up at the sky, desperate to know what exactly was crushing him to the point of suffocation.
But he couldn’t see it.
He couldn’t see it, others couldn’t see it, and no one helped him remove the burden. He couldn’t alleviate it himself either.
Instead, the blazing sun stung his eyes until they hurt severely. Tears evaporated the moment they emerged, and every time his eyelids closed, it felt like barbs scraping his eyeballs.
Wen Rong raised his hand to block the sun from the pain. Before the shadow fell, blood from his hand dripped onto the tip of his nose.
In a trance, the blood and the hand formed a double image, slowly fading in color.
A smaller hand, dripping with blood, superimposed over his palm.
Little Wen Rong, just in the first grade, walked out of the infirmary. His injured parts were still throbbing when he was slapped twice in the face.
The teacher hurriedly pulled the crazy woman away, but the woman struggled fiercely, her hands reaching through the gap, sharp fingernails leaving three more bloody tracks on his face.
At the same time, curses in a local dialect were left behind: “No mother to teach him,” “No one wants him”…
Little Wen Rong dazedly raised his hand to touch his face. When he brought it before his eyes, it was full of blood.
It was the first time he saw so much blood, and the first time he saw “maternal love.”
The woman was the mother of the boy he had fought with. She loved that boy very much. After coming to the school, she hugged the boy and cried, then unreasonably threw a tantrum and rolled on the ground to blow the matter up, even calling the police to the school.
“This time it’s defined as a mutual brawl. You two apologize to each other and be good friends in the future, okay?”
Little Wen Rong explained, “Police Uncle, he hit me first. He’s been hitting me for many days.”
“You hit him too.”
The Director said, “Mr. Police Officer, it really was that child who kept bullying Little Rong. Little Rong had no choice but to fight back.”
“Kids will be kids; fighting is normal. Don’t fight anymore in the future, understand? If you fight again, Uncle will arrest you both.”
When leaving the school, the woman held the boy making faces with one hand and cursed with the other on her hip, “Dog thing with no one to teach you, drop out! If you don’t drop out, I’ll write a report letter to the Education Bureau.”
Little Wen Rong couldn’t understand a single word.
He tugged at the Director’s sleeve. “Director, he is a bad kid. Why didn’t the Police Uncle arrest him and put him in jail?”
The Director did not answer his question.
The new week, Little Wen Rong was sent to another school.
Wen Rong was very stupid. He couldn’t figure out why he was the one being punished. He was also very paranoid, wanting very, very much to know why he didn’t receive an apology or concern after being bullied, but instead had to transfer schools.
—Until one day watching the news, a child was arrested and jailed for accidentally killing the child who bullied him.
From that moment on, he stopped thinking about this question.
That news was like a handful of soil covering him, burying all his evil thoughts, and simultaneously planting a seed that sprouted—he couldn’t go to jail. If he went to jail, he couldn’t study, couldn’t find his mom and dad, and couldn’t find a good job to live a good life.
Later, this seed bloomed, spread pollen, and reproduced on his corpse, completely obliterating him until he no longer looked human.
Those fragile flowers were unlucky too, growing on someone like him. They couldn’t enjoy sunny days; dying and reborn, reborn and dying, living not a single bit happily.
Wen Rong sighed, letting his body sink into the deep sea formed by gathered distracting thoughts.
Thump, thump, thump. His heart beat as loudly as a drum in the suffocation.
His vision began to blur, the surroundings gradually turning black.
A moment later, this blackness changed again. Broken, old walls sandwiching a concrete floor. A long corridor, deep and dark, where not a speck of light could penetrate.
His sleeve was tugged.
A child held up two blood-dripping hands high.
The face carved from white jade wrinkled again and again, mouth flattened in grievance, daring not to cry, unable to speak.
Wen Rong knew he was afraid, wanting to ask, “Will I die from bleeding so much?”
—Just a brat who was both naive and afraid of death, yet prayed for a happy life.
Wen Rong squatted down and carefully wiped the blood off his hands with his sleeve. “You won’t die.”
The affirmative answer was like comfort. The child’s shoulders twitched, biting his lip to sob silently.
Truly pitiful.
Wen Rong wiped his face for him, inadvertently smearing all the blood onto the boy’s cheek.
“Alright, I know these days aren’t happy. It really won’t be like this in the future.”
[Host?]
[Host, whether you lie on the ground or hug your head, don’t just space out.]
The AI voice dispelled the darkness.
The child’s face, along with the school in his memory, turned into wind blowing toward the sky. Wen Rong propped himself up from the grass, wiped the back of his hand across his face, and his pure white skin was instantly covered in blood.
“Gege, I want to exchange for something.”
Cloudless for ten thousand miles, the sky and the church blended into an oil painting.
After accepting Zhou Xie’s critique and education, Leon finally regained his freedom, walking leisurely down the white steps.
“There was absolutely no need for you to help the Special Recruit.”
Leo, a capable subordinate beside Zhou Xie, along with Shi Ye—the four of them had been taken to “Mom’s Tea Party” since they were sensible enough.
Leo and Zhou Xie were cousins, their relationship closer, so when Shi Ye and Zhou Xie fell out, Leo stood behind Zhou Xie without hesitation.
Leon remained neutral; currently, his relationship with both sides was quite good.
He had always been this kind of person: not favoring one side, not taking a stand, watching the fire from the other bank, staying out of it.
Leo repeated, “Don’t help the Special Recruit.”
Azure eyes filled with laughter. “As a serious and responsible assistant homeroom teacher, I have to take good care of my Junior.”
“There’s no need. The Special Recruit won’t last long in the school anyway.”
“Who knows about the future.”
Before getting the Rubik’s Cube, no one would have thought Wen Rong could play it so well.
Leon remained curious about Wen Rong’s true colors.
How could a person have no temper at all?
“Never mind the Special Recruit, there’s a more troublesome matter right now.”
Leon lacked interest. “If it’s about Shi Ye, no need to mention it.”
“There are currently too many freshmen applying for the New Tennis Club. Zhou Xie has a headache.”
“This shows that Zhao Zeryang is indeed not a good President.”
“If a new club is created just because of dissatisfaction, the school will be in chaos.”
“What chaos? You aren’t the Principal, why worry about it? Besides, why drag clubs into it? Zhou Xie is just afraid everyone will emulate Shi Ye and oust him, the Student Council President. If he did fewer obedience tests on everyone, wouldn’t it be fine? Everyone is a normal person, not an M.”
Leo choked on the letter “M,” but persisted, “Stability of order requires rules for restraint. I think my cousin did nothing wrong. Shi Ye is corrupting the school’s atmosphere.”
Leon was noncommittal, his gaze moving to Leo’s head of curly hair. Chestnut-colored, lighter in the sun, still the puppy that followed behind Zhou Xie when they were young.
“Why aren’t you talking?”
Leon: “What should I say? If I say I want to be an S, will your cousin give up his seat?”
“Are you angry? Can’t you speak properly—”
His shoulder was bumped at that moment.
The person running past hurriedly turned back to apologize. “Sorry, Senior, sorry.”
Leon nodded to accept the apology, thinking to himself, Luckily there was you, otherwise I would have annoyed the puppy.
He looked in the direction the person wanted to run and saw trophies stacked like a champagne tower, shining painfully bright in the sunlight.
“Has Zhao Zeryang become an exhibitionist? Why force others to look at the Tennis Club’s years of dirty laundry?”
Leo ignored his foul language, squinting at the boy. “What’s happening over there?”
The boy was a bit scared, answering vaguely, “Watching the drama.”
“I want to hear the specific event.”
“The Tennis Club is looking for trouble with the Special Recruit. They beat the Special Recruit to death.”
As if validating these words, a full-bodied roar came from the distance, “Brother Zhao, another ball!”
Leon’s expression changed drastically, and he bolted into the crowd.
Under the trophy tower, the Tennis Club members clapped and shouted, “Brother Zhao is awesome!”
Zhao Zeryang was floating on air, even more triumphant than when Shi Ye lifted the Open trophy a few months ago. He smiled until his eyes disappeared into his face. “Hahaha, who told that idiot not to move.”
“Brother Zhao, quick, another ball,” “Brother Zhao is ox-some.”
A different voice appeared in the crowd. “Senior, this isn’t good, right?”
The Tennis Club crowd clamored, “None of your business. Do you want to side with the Special Recruit?” “Scram, stay out of Tennis Club affairs.”
The voice howled, “Senior is so fast, who can see clearly? You should hit a few more balls for us to learn!”
“Hahahaha.”
Zhao Zeryang received tremendous encouragement, the corners of his mouth nearly grinning to his ears. “Alright then, I’ll show everyone a bit more today.”
The fluorescent green ball was tossed into the sky. Zhao Zeryang looked up, raising his racket—
A black shadow suddenly darted past Leon, kicking up wind. The speed was so fast that by the time his gaze followed, the small, thin figure had already punched Zhao Zeryang’s face to the side.
The tennis ball landed quietly.
Wen Rong grabbed Zhao Zeryang’s head and smashed it straight into the trophy tower.
Rumble—
The Tennis Club’s family fortune fell apart.
The racket hit the ground. Zhao Zeryang turned into a pile of soft mud, sliding down the table, kneeling on the ground, then toppling straight onto the lawn.
This series of actions was too sudden and brief, happening in just a breath. No one had time to react, even thinking it was an hallucination.
Only after a long time did someone scream:
“The President fainted.”
“Bleeding! Quick, quick, call the school doctor.”
“Zhao Zeryang violated School Rule 32, provoking trouble. Club recruitment qualification canceled.”
Leo’s voice was like a bomb, causing the Tennis Club members to explode. “On what basis!” “Fuck! You actually dared to hit back—” “I’m going to beat you to death.”
“School Rule 31, violence is prohibited. Violators will be expelled.”
“I… The Special Recruit used violence against our President. He gets expelled!”
“Expelled!”
The roaring got louder and louder. Wen Rong remained unmoved, standing quietly in the turbulence. The sunlight carved his soft jawline into a sharp shape.
Leon watched, suddenly smiling.
He knew it. “Gentle,” “Obedient,” “Dull”—these personalities that needed to be watered with love and money wouldn’t truly appear on an orphan who had long endured violence.
So what will you do next? Drop out with hundreds of millions in debt?
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