Chapter 30
The next morning, Lin Xiu sat up abruptly, looked at the time on his phone, and rubbed his hair in frustration.
“Chi Aibei—”
Seeing Chi Aibei tied up with bedsheets, Lin Xiu sighed in exasperation.
He shouldn’t have agreed to share a room with him last night. The kid didn’t snore, but he hadn’t been still all night. Several times, Lin Xiu almost got kicked off the bed.
“Chi Aibei, wake up! We’re late!” Lin Xiu didn’t know what was wrong with him; he’d overslept twice in a row. He spoke while untying the bedsheets.
The four corners of the sheet were tied around Chi Aibei’s arms and legs. Chi Aibei opened his eyes sleepily. “Brother, what are you doing?”
Lin Xiu had been irritated by his kicking last night and hadn’t loosened the knots properly. Now, untying them was difficult. He said, “Untying you.”
Chi Aibei struggled to lift his head and looked at the bedsheets. He was stunned. “Why did you tie me up?”
Lin Xiu glanced at him. “To stop you from participating in a martial arts tournament in the middle of the night.”
Lin Xiu untied the bedsheets from his upper body, got out of bed, and turned to leave. “Untie the bottom yourself. I’m going to wake up Jiang Yu.”
This was unbelievable, Lin Xiu thought. He couldn’t get up, but how could Jiang Yu sleep so soundly?
Jiang Yu thought he was dreaming when he heard the knock. It wasn’t until Lin Xiu shouted, “Jiang Yu, we’re late!” that he jumped out of bed like a zombie.
He pulled out his phone from under his pillow and exclaimed, “Holy crap!” before tumbling out of bed. While putting on his clothes, he opened the door. “Why are you calling me only now?”
Jiang Yu had never been late in his life. This was the first time.
Lin Xiu said, “I overslept too.”
Jiang Yu: “Why do you always oversleep?”
Jiang Yu went to wash up. Passing Lin Xiu’s room, he saw Chi Aibei in his underwear, struggling with the bedsheet tied around his legs.
Jiang Yu stopped. “What are you doing?”
Chi Aibei glanced at Jiang Yu. He didn’t know how Lin Xiu tied it; he’d been trying to untie it for a long time without success. “Brother tied me up, and I can’t untie it.”
Jiang Yu: “????”
Jiang Yu turned to look at Lin Xiu. What are you two doing behind my back?
Lin Xiu ignored them. “Hurry up, don’t dawdle. It’s Monday.”
Chi Aibei simply pulled his feet out of the sheet, threw it aside, and ran to the door. “What’s wrong with Monday?”
“Monday is when they catch latecomers and check our appearance,” Lin Xiu glanced at him and frowned. “Put on your pants.”
Jiang Yu’s attention had been on the naked Chi Aibei, but when he heard Lin Xiu, he froze—Oh no, it’s Monday!
Every Monday, the headmaster would personally catch latecomers at the school gate. Regardless of who it was, latecomers had to stand in front of the entire school assembly.
Jiang Yu looked at Lin Xiu. “What do we do?”
Lin Xiu said expressionlessly, “I don’t know.”
Jiang Yu: “…”
Neither Lin Xiu nor Jiang Yu had ever been caught, much less made to stand on the stage and read a self-criticism.
Chi Aibei came out after putting on his pants. “I have an idea.”
Lin Xiu and Jiang Yu looked at him simultaneously. “What idea?”
Chi Aibei: “Let’s climb over the wall.”
…
The back wall of the school. Chi Aibei had climbed over it once and was familiar with it. He explained the structure of the wall to Jiang Yu and Lin Xiu, mainly to tell them that the wall was very high and there was nothing to use as a foothold.
“Be careful when you climb down; I almost fell to my death last time…” Before Chi Aibei finished, the blue-and-white figure next to him “whoosh” climbed over the wall.
Chi Aibei stared at Lin Xiu, who was perched on top of the wall, dumbfounded. After a while, he finally recovered. “Brother, how did you get up there?”
Jiang Yu was equally shocked; he even wondered if there was something wrong with his eyes.
Lin Xiu reached out. “Jiang Yu, give him a boost, lift him up.”
Jiang Yu: “…Oh, okay.”
Jiang Yu raised a leg for Chi Aibei to step on, and with a push and a pull, Chi Aibei was lifted onto the wall with Lin Xiu. Then they pulled Jiang Yu up. Before Jiang Yu could steady himself, Lin Xiu jumped down.
Chi Aibei exclaimed, “Wow, Brother, you’re amazing.”
Lin Xiu: “Get down.”
Chi Aibei looked at the distance between the wall and the ground, his legs trembling. “I’m scared.”
Lin Xiu stood at the base of the wall, looking at him. “Weren’t you pretty brave last time?”
Jiang Yu: “Last time? How many times have you two climbed over this wall?”
Lin Xiu: “Once for me, twice for him.”
Jiang Yu looked at Chi Aibei incredulously. “Twice? You’re pretty brave.”
Chi Aibei said, “If it weren’t for me scouting the way, you’d be making a fool of yourselves at the gate right now!”
Jiang Yu snorted. “It’s not just me who’ll be embarrassed; Lin Xiu’s with me, so what am I afraid of?”
Chi Aibei was about to retort when Lin Xiu said, “Get down, I’ll catch you.”
Chi Aibei looked at Lin Xiu below. “No, what if I hurt you?”
Lin Xiu didn’t believe he could get hurt by someone as soft as a steamed bun. “Don’t waste time. Are you jumping or not? If not, I’m leaving.”
Chi Aibei quickly shouted, “Jumping! Jumping!”
Chi Aibei closed his eyes, spread his arms, and jumped. The feeling of crushing the big guy didn’t happen this time; he only felt a tightening around his waist, then his feet landed firmly on the ground.
He opened his eyes and looked at Lin Xiu, who was looking at Jiang Yu on the wall. Chi Aibei followed his gaze.
Jiang Yu was also a little scared to jump, but he was too embarrassed to act like Chi Aibei and act cute to Lin Xiu. He waved his hand. “Um, you two… you two move back.”
Seeing Chi Aibei and Lin Xiu actually take a couple of steps back, Jiang Yu twitched his mouth… You guys actually moved! Aren’t you afraid I’ll fall to my death?
Lin Xiu urged, “Don’t dawdle, the headmaster will be here soon.”
As if Lin Xiu was a jinx, as soon as he finished speaking, a familiar angry shout was heard, “Who’s there? What are you doing?”
The bushes here were quite dense. Although you could see someone on the wall from a distance, you couldn’t see the people standing at the base of the wall. Lin Xiu recognized the headmaster’s voice, so he said, “Jump quickly!” and ran off with Chi Aibei.
Jiang Yu, perched on the wall and unsure how to get down: “?????????”
The headmaster, seeing someone climbing the wall, came over quickly. When he saw who was on the wall, his anger instantly turned to disbelief. “Jiang Yu? What are you doing here?”
Jiang Yu, perhaps influenced by Chi Aibei, started making things up. He suppressed his panic, put on a nonchalant expression, and looked into the distance. “I’ve been under a lot of pressure lately, and the classroom felt a bit stifling. I wanted to be alone and look at the scenery.”
If anyone else had said this, the headmaster would have thought he was joking. But this was Jiang Yu, the consistently high-achieving second-place student in the second-year group, a top student. The headmaster not only didn’t doubt him, but also felt a jolt at his apparent depression.
Could he be having suicidal thoughts?
He’d read many news reports about students jumping off buildings due to stress, and if Jiang Yu was having suicidal thoughts, it would be a huge problem!
The headmaster quickly softened his voice. “Um, Jiang Yu, you’re only in the second year of high school. Don’t put too much pressure on yourself. Studying is important, but you also need to relax properly.”
Worried about Jiang Yu doing something foolish, the headmaster carefully approached him. “Come down first. Tell the teacher what’s wrong.”
…
Chi Aibei and Lin Xiu had been back in the classroom for a while, but Jiang Yu hadn’t returned. Chi Aibei asked, “He wouldn’t have been caught, would he? Would he rat us out?”
Lin Xiu glanced at him. “Didn’t he promise to stand by you?”
Chi Aibei frowned. He only now understood what it meant to say that empathy was meaningless when something didn’t happen to you. He thought he had a god’s-eye view and could see everything from Lin Xiu’s perspective, but it seemed he’d overestimated himself.
Chi Aibei looked at Lin Xiu and suddenly felt that he hadn’t trusted Jiang Yu’s promise from the beginning.
Chi Aibei: “Brother, did you…”
Before Chi Aibei could finish, Jiang Yu and the headmaster appeared at the classroom door. Not only was the headmaster not angry about Jiang Yu climbing over the wall, but he also patted Jiang Yu on the shoulder in a friendly way.
The next second, Chi Aibei heard the headmaster call, “Lin Xiu, come out for a moment.”
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