Chapter 71
Pinned to the ground by the bodyguards, with several hands clamped over his mouth, Qin Buming’s eyes went wide. In disbelief, he stared at Xia Fengsheng standing at the very top.
The security guard who had been holding Qin Buming down instantly turned and rushed the other way.
Looking at Xia Fengsheng, who had appeared from god knew where, Yang Liwan felt cold sweat soak through his back in an instant.
What was supposed to be a forum lecture where his puppets publicly pledged loyalty had, in full view of everyone, turned into an open mutiny.
That was something he had never anticipated.
Yang Liwan stumbled backward and shoved a security guard hard toward Xia Fengsheng’s direction. “Go!”
“Catch him!!”
At once, security personnel swarmed toward Xia Fengsheng.
The whole scene exploded into chaos, more and more guards pouring through the doors.
The visiting teachers and students from other schools, along with Jing University’s own students sitting in on the lecture, were all stunned. The faster-reacting ones had already whipped out their phones and started recording.
Something like this happening at Jing University was bound to be huge news. If they posted it online, it would definitely blow up.
The university leadership would never ignore a scandal involving the school. Sure enough, Xia Fengsheng soon saw the security staff and the Party secretary of the finance department rushing straight toward him.
Xia Fengsheng was not an idiot. If they were coming to grab him, there was no way he was just going to stand there obediently.
The moment security charged up, he darted away with astonishing speed, nimble as a monkey. The guards and the Party secretary tried to close in from both sides, but Xia Fengsheng flipped over the row of seats in front of him, and the two sides smashed straight into each other.
His movements were agile, and even while being besieged he did not panic in the slightest. So what if he really got caught? He was far from the only student like this.
Soon enough, the other side’s advantage in numbers kicked in and Xia Fengsheng found himself boxed in. Right then, amplified voices suddenly rang out from every corner of the lecture hall.
One after another, people began rising out of the crowd.
“My name is Li Wangqing, and I am joining this public, real-name accusation!”
“My name is Zhan Shengyao, and I am joining this public, real-name accusation as well!”
“My name is Xxx…”
In an instant, nine students appeared from different corners of the lecture hall, all standing on Xia Fengsheng’s side.
The school leadership and security staff were completely dumbfounded.
They had never expected so many people to emerge all at once. This was clearly a coordinated operation.
“What are you all standing there for? Grab them!”
The lecture hall dissolved into total chaos. Ten little monkeys leapt around, shouting and flinging leaflets into the air.
They moved so fast and so wildly it was like they had really spent time in a zoo. No one could catch them.
Monkey Xia sprinted right up to Yang Liwan and drove a kick straight into him.
Then he kicked him and bolted, running while shouting, “I, Xia Fengsheng…”
Looking at Qin Buming collapsed on the podium, his voice rang out loud and clear:
“Qin Buming, along with eleven other students, is jointly filing a real-name report against Yang Liwan, associate professor at Jing University’s Huaguang School of Management in the Department of Finance, for academic fraud and abuse of power for personal gain.”
Not only were leaflets with evidence flying through the air at the scene, at the very same time, Zheng Xing—waiting outside campus—posted an electronic article online laying out Yang Liwan’s crimes.
He had bought reposts from quite a few major accounts on Weibo, Douyin, and other social media platforms to amplify the story.
The account publishing the article had been created under Xia Fengsheng’s own name. He had privately contacted the other students and led the joint accusation himself, so the article was written from his perspective as well. After drafting it, he handed it over to Zheng Xing, who waited outside campus and published it online at the appointed time.
By choosing a major public event like the lecture forum to launch the accusation, Xia Fengsheng had accurately calculated that the school would never let them leave campus easily.
So he had arranged for Zheng Xing to coordinate outside, answering their move from beyond the walls.
Yang Liwan worked at Jing University. In a certain sense, he and the school were a community of shared interests.
A scandal involving a Jing University associate professor was also a scandal involving Jing University itself. Even though students like them—oppressed and exploited—had done nothing wrong, before the matter grew too large, the school would not help them.
Sure enough, after half an hour of trying their hardest to speak out, Xia Fengsheng and the other “monkeys” were locked into a double dorm room and deprived of their freedom.
Why bully monkeys!!!
Li Wangqing’s fury hit its peak. He pounded and kicked the dorm door. “What right do you have to lock us up? This is unlawful detention! Now you suddenly want to hush things up? Where was the school when Yang Liwan was oppressing us, threatening us, and refusing to let us graduate?!”
Hatred filled Li Wangqing’s eyes. Back when his SCI article had been stolen, he had nearly wanted to die.
Why should the article he had worked on day and night, the data he had painstakingly organized, be handed over to someone else?
Just because he had no family connections, no backing? Just because the other party was Yang Liwan’s nephew?
Fucking heaven truly had no justice!
Academically, Yang Liwan had never given them any real guidance at all. For his own selfish ends, to secure national funding, he forced his students to falsify papers and fabricate data. If they refused, he threatened them with graduation.
At this point Li Wangqing was done enduring. He knew someone was listening outside, so he aimed his voice at the dorm door and let loose.
“Yang Liwan, I—”
Li Wangqing was a year younger than Zhan Shengyao. Watching him rant without stopping, Zhan Shengyao thought to herself that youth really was wonderful—after spending half an hour leaping around that lecture hall like a monkey, he still had the energy to go on.
Unlike her. Old. So old.
The next second she turned and saw Qin Buming.
Zhan Shengyao: …
Zhan Shengyao: Fired up again!
Qin Buming looked at the suddenly appeared Xia Fengsheng and Zhan Shengyao, so moved that his eyes almost welled with tears. His voice was thick with emotion. “Sheng’er, Shengyao, I—oof!”
Zhan Shengyao’s fist slammed into his stomach, folding Qin Buming up like a shrimp.
Damn monkey, making yourself carry everything alone.
Just looking at him made her burn with nameless anger. They had founded the studio together as partners through thick and thin, yet Qin Buming had swallowed the whole matter himself and planned to fight alone.
Did he really think that if something happened to him, they would just stand by and do nothing?
After punching him, Zhan Shengyao turned and walked off without even sparing him a glance.
Clutching his stomach, Qin Buming reached out to stop her. “Shengyao… Shengyao!”
He stretched out a Qiong Yao-style hand of yearning, and the next second another shadow loomed over him.
Qin Buming looked up, smiling. “Sheng’er.”
The very next instant, Xia Fengsheng’s handcrafted leather shoe launched a sudden attack on his shin.
“AHHHHHHH!”
Now Qin Buming was hugging both his stomach and his leg as he toppled back onto the bed.
The other students beside them stared, dumbstruck.
How had this turned into infighting?
Xia Fengsheng had not used much force. He knew perfectly well why Qin Buming had chosen not to tell them.
Dawn Studio had lost all its collaborations in one blow, and both his and Zhan Shengyao’s data on their computers had disappeared overnight. That alone was enough to show the power standing behind Yang Liwan.
Ordinarily he looked like a pigheaded buffoon, but it had to be admitted that Yang Liwan had not reached the position of associate professor at the nation’s top university by being simple. He was like a tree that looked dead and leafless above ground, while underground his roots ran dozens of meters deep.
Qin Buming had not wanted to implicate them. If today he truly managed to force society to pay attention to academic fraud and bring Yang Liwan down, then from now on no student under Yang Liwan would be oppressed again, and the students under him could be reassigned to other advisors and continue their studies.
But if he lost, his own career would never recover, and graduation would become a joke. Better that when Yang Liwan framed him for stealing a friend’s data and files, he said nothing, let Dawn Studio fall apart, and make sure the final consequences did not drag Xia Fengsheng and the others in with him.
If he could not take Yang Liwan down, then nobody could. Afterward, Xia Fengsheng and Zhan Shengyao would only need to keep their heads down under Yang Liwan and they would still be able to graduate safely.
He had arranged protection for his parents. He had planned everything out—except for Xia Fengsheng and the others choosing to stand beside him.
Qin Buming covered his face and collapsed onto the bed.
This was Beijing University. Smart people like him were everywhere.
If he could think of it, how could Xia Fengsheng and Zhan Shengyao possibly not?
“Sheng’er. Shengyao.”
Zhan Shengyao snapped, “What!”
Her bark made Qin Buming flinch. “A-apologize…”
“What’s the use of apologizing? If apologies worked, what would we need police for?” Though her tone was still bad, seeing the dark circles under Qin Buming’s eyes and how horribly he looked after days without sleep gradually cooled her anger.
“If anything this big happens again, you absolutely have to tell us.”
They were the sort who had gone through hardship together and built something from nothing together. Back when the studio had just been founded, they could only work out of their dorm rooms.
Now that things had finally improved, who would have thought Qin Buming would try to stage some noble self-sacrifice act.
Qin Buming nodded, eyes red.
Then Zhan Shengyao called on everyone to pull out their phones and repost Zheng Xing’s article online.
Zheng Xing was the IT guy—he dealt with networks all the time. With the help of big accounts reposting the article, and with the accusation involving the country’s top university, the keyword about Yang Liwan’s academic misconduct shot onto the trending list almost immediately.
It was graduation season. Most young people online were students, and anything related to papers or graduation naturally struck a nerve.
In less than half an hour, the accusation soared to the number one spot on the social news trending list.
Netizens also launched into heated discussion.
“Fuck it, why are there these conscience-less beast mentors everywhere? As a graduate student, I hope he goes to hell.”
“AHHHHHHHH! Articles for high school academic competitions were actually written by graduate students from a top university—can these academic lords just fucking die?”
“Haha, look at the ‘genius youth’ from the academic lord family, publishing multiple SCI papers at such a young age. Amazing, right? Is that what we’re supposed to say?”
“This animal absolutely exploited far more students than just these. These are only the ones who had the courage to stand up.”
“Stay strong! I speak out for oppressed students!”
“Why isn’t Beijing University saying anything? Come out and speak!”
—
Meanwhile, Yang Liwan was being questioned by the school leadership.
He was not some clueless fool who knew nothing. The joint accusation from Xia Fengsheng and the others did not surprise him at all. The only thing he had not expected was that they would strike today, at the lecture forum.
The moment he threatened Qin Buming, he had already anticipated that they would eventually expose him.
Of course, he had prepared countermeasures too.
He told the school leadership, “Everything those students are saying is false. I’m strict with them as a matter of principle, and academically I hold them to the highest standards. Their graduation data and research topics are poorly done, their theses fail to meet the bar—but if they think I’ll just wave them through, sorry. Since I’m an associate professor, I’m also a responsible teacher. There’s no way I’d let them graduate like that.”
“And I always bring them along on my projects too. After all, it’s not easy for these kids to get through school, and I even share profits with them. Who knew they’d be dissatisfied with the amount they got and start attacking me over it?”
“They’re all utterly ungrateful. They refuse to see any of the good I’ve done for them. Qin Buming in particular secretly joined forces with Xia Fengsheng and the others to smear me, fabricating evidence out of thin air to file a complaint against me.”
Yang Liwan beat his chest and stamped his foot. “Truly the farmer and the wolf.”
While explaining himself to the school leadership, the people he had arranged outside campus also began moving.
He could not touch Qin Buming’s parents, since someone had protected them—but there was already one person he had bought off for one million.
The hot-search entry that had been hanging at the top disappeared in an instant. In its place appeared a scandal about Xia Fengsheng.
Every article Zheng Xing had posted vanished all at once. When Zheng Xing saw the new trending entry with Xia Fengsheng’s name in it, his pupils shrank.
What happened? Where had their voices gone?
He posted the article again, but it was now restricted, barely visible to only two or three viewers.
Seeing the suddenly appearing hot-search entry with Xia Fengsheng’s name, Zheng Xing hurriedly grabbed his phone and sent Xia Fengsheng a message.
“Sheng’er, check the trending list right now!”
Xia Fengsheng tapped into the trending topic tied to his name.
The next second, a familiar face sprang onto the screen.
It was a video. In the video, Li Ruling’s eyes were full of tears, her whole face gaunt and worn as she looked into the camera.
“Hello everyone. I am Li Ruling, the mother of Xia Fengsheng, a graduate student in the Huaguang School of Management, Department of Finance at Jing University.
“I am a single mother. I raised Xia Fengsheng alone after he was little, but when I developed uremia, he stood by and did nothing. He threw me into the hospital and refused to save me, disregarding all the mother-son affection between us. Instead, he used what little money our family had left to buy himself a new phone and a new computer, and even used my life-saving money to solicit prostitutes. After going to Jing University, he completely cut off contact with me.
“I truly had nowhere left to turn, so I came to seek the help of the internet.”
As she spoke, she held up her uremia test report.
“If anyone sees Xia Fengsheng, please help me pass on one message. Shengsheng, Mom doesn’t blame you. Mom just wants to live. Please, please give Mom the money back.”
The uremia test report was shocking to look at.
Xia Fengsheng stared at the video on his phone and stood frozen for a very long time.
If time started over, I definitely would never hurt you again! The woman’s crying voice echoed in his mind.
Xia Fengsheng stared at the video on the screen.
But Mom, if it started over, you still betrayed me all over again.
—
Not long after the beginning of senior year in high school, Shi Ye returned to Beijing because of health reasons. Xia Fengsheng’s life fell into the same routine every day: dormitory and classroom, two points in a line.
Once senior year began, he stopped working part-time. The money he had already earned, along with the prize money from competitions, was enough to support him through a year of exam preparation.
He threw himself entirely into studying.
He had a goal of his own. His chosen target was Jing University.
Not only was Beijing University a top institution, it was also in the capital—Beijing.
And Shi Ye was in Beijing too.
Every day, from the moment he opened his eyes, all Xia Fengsheng did was study. It was dry and monotonous, but he never let up. He knew very clearly what he wanted.
His days passed quietly like that, until one day he got a call from the hospital saying his father had been in a car accident and that he needed to come at once.
When Xia Fengsheng arrived at the hospital, Xia Zhiyuan was wrapped all over in bandages and already on the verge of death.
The doctor said he seemed to have been waiting for something the whole time—until Xia Fengsheng appeared.
Xia Zhiyuan took one look at him, and then finally breathed his last.
Xia Fengsheng stood there staring at Xia Zhiyuan’s corpse, not knowing what expression he should wear.
This was the first time he had faced death in its truest sense. As he looked at Xia Zhiyuan, his face was numb and cold, yet his eyes were complicated.
The doctor was taken aback. He had not expected a child to be so calm in the face of a loved one’s death. “Are you Xia Fengsheng?”
After a long moment, Xia Fengsheng finally said, “Yes.”
“I didn’t expect you to be this grown already. Just now the patient kept muttering about a three-year-old child named Xia Fengsheng.”
Xia Fengsheng’s eyes shifted slightly. In the final flash of death, Xia Zhiyuan’s awareness had returned to when Xia Fengsheng was three.
Back then, the family of three had still been in their happiest and warmest days.
But the warm, beautiful home of that time had long since become unrecognizable.
Xia Zhiyuan had regretted things too.
But if he really cherished those memories so much, then why had he treated him that way afterward?
Xia Fengsheng’s feelings toward Xia Zhiyuan were complicated. He hated him, but he also still remembered how, when he was little and ill, Xia Zhiyuan and Li Ruling had burned incense and prayed for him, begging that he grow up safely and in good health.
Xia Fengsheng did not cry. He was not the type to forget pain just because he had eaten a meal. Over the years, any real affection he had for Xia Zhiyuan had long since disappeared. Before this, it had also been a very long time since he last saw him.
That final look from Xia Zhiyuan—perhaps in his haze, he had truly remembered his original wish.
To wish only that his child would grow up safe and healthy.
Xia Zhiyuan died in a car accident. The other driver had been fatigued and slammed into his truck.
The compensation payout came to six hundred thousand yuan.
Xia Fengsheng used most of it to buy Xia Zhiyuan a grave plot. After all, that money had been paid because Xia Zhiyuan died.
He put the rest in a bank account and planned to use it later for college.
After that, he kept going to school as usual, but moved out of the school dorms and back home.
The dormitory lights were turned off at ten every night, and that was not enough time for him to study, so he began living at home instead.
He studied until past midnight every day before finally sleeping.
One day the school let out early, at five in the afternoon. Xia Fengsheng came home and opened the door, only to see a strange woman inside the house.
She was wearing a floral dress, her black hair pinned up neatly behind her head. She looked to be in her early forties, with fox-shaped eyes and a fairly tall frame, around 170 cm.
The moment she saw him come back with a backpack, Li Ruling stood up from the living-room sofa.
“You’re Shengsheng, aren’t you?”
Though she was a stranger, Xia Fengsheng was too smart. He almost guessed who she was at a glance.
He stood in the doorway without stepping in.
Seeing the faint reaction he had to the name “Xia Fengsheng,” Li Ruling hurried toward him. “Shengsheng, it’s me. I’m Mom.”
She came right up to him, tears rising in the lines around her eyes. “You’ve grown so much. Mom finally has the chance to see you.”
She hugged him tightly, crying her eyes out.
Xia Fengsheng’s whole body went stiff. Just as his feelings for Xia Zhiyuan were complicated, so too were his feelings for Li Ruling. In his memories, there were still good things about her.
Praying and burning incense for him when he was sick as a child.
Breaking down in tears after the custody ruling, secretly trying to carry him away in the middle of the night.
But because he had begun surviving independently from such an early age, his rationality seized control before his emotions could.
He was like a cold machine made of instructions only, especially now that Shi Ye had returned to Beijing—once again, he shut all emotion out.
Having entered society too early, Xia Fengsheng knew exactly how dangerous people’s hearts could be.
People changed. No matter how good they started, they could become utterly unrecognizable.
Xia Zhiyuan and Li Ruling’s marriage was the best example. They had begun by promising to grow old together, only to end up both cheating.
He was not a sentimental person. His coldness, grown from childhood, made him more rational than most.
Li Ruling had not come to see him after the divorce. He did not blame her. She had her own life.
Leaving the past behind and not seeing him was the best way.
But for her to appear now, at this exact moment, was far too convenient.
Only a few days ago, Xia Fengsheng had driven off some so-called relatives—people he had never seen before and who were not remotely close to him—who had come to take his father’s compensation money and house from him.
Facing Li Ruling, he said coldly, “If you’re here for money, I can give you part of it.”
He was already in senior year of high school. He truly did not have the energy to waste on this.
Better to spend money and send the person away.
Hearing that, Li Ruling shook her head and looked at him. “No. Mom just wanted to come and see you. I’m not here for money.”
“Mom just wanted to come back and see you.”
Xia Fengsheng took her hands off him and stepped out of her embrace. “Think what you want.”
After the age of three, he had never seen Li Ruling again. He did not really feel anything for his mother—not like or dislike. The emotions were complicated, but there was no real movement inside him, just like when Xia Zhiyuan had died.
Since the moment he became aware of the world, he had never truly known family affection. Naturally, he could not understand what family really felt like.
Father, mother—they were nothing more than nouns.
He was not stupid. He knew full well Li Ruling had not come back because she loved him.
Fifteen years without seeing him—just as when he entered the house, Li Ruling had not recognized him, and only knew he was Xia Fengsheng after sounding him out.
“If you’re not here for money, then leave.”
His words were resolute. He thought he could look down on all those so-called family ties.
What he did not know was that from the moment Li Ruling appeared, everything had already begun to change.
No matter how sharp a child was, he was still a child. What he thought was cold, cutting language actually carried the stubborn bravado of a child, though he himself did not notice.
Li Ruling’s sudden intrusion threw off the rhythm of his life. Xia Fengsheng had no idea how she had gotten the house key, but every time he came home from school and opened the door, Li Ruling was there smiling brightly, waiting with a table full of food.
“Shengsheng’s back? Go wash your hands.” Li Ruling busied herself in the kitchen. “One more soup and we can start eating.”
The sound of water running and Li Ruling’s voice filled the kitchen.
She had even hung wind chimes on the balcony, so when the wind blew, they rang with a soft tinkle.
Xia Fengsheng looked at it all coldly, opened the door, and went straight back to his room.
Li Ruling could not be driven away, so he treated her as air.
Later, after studying until midnight and getting ready to go to the bathroom to shower, he opened the door and his slippers hit a tray on the floor.
On it was a thermal food container. A yellow sticky note had been pasted to the side.
“Don’t study too late. Rest properly.”
Xia Fengsheng threw away the note and returned the container to the kitchen untouched.
But when he passed the balcony, he saw several sets of clothes hung up freshly washed.
Xia Fengsheng strode back to his room and opened the wardrobe.
The few clothes he owned had all been washed by Li Ruling.
The next morning, when he got up, Li Ruling was in the kitchen frying youtiao.
The moment she saw him come out, she immediately asked, “Shengsheng, why didn’t you eat the food from last night? Did you go the whole night without eating?”
Xia Fengsheng did not answer. He only said, “Don’t go into my room again.”
“I’m sorry.” Li Ruling apologized. “Mom didn’t mean to. I was cleaning the house and wanted to see if there was anything of yours that needed washing.”
“I’ll wash my own things. I don’t need you to.”
With his backpack on, Xia Fengsheng left the house.
He hated Li Ruling’s sudden concern. Why had she appeared only now, after Xia Zhiyuan was dead?
When Xia Zhiyuan had no money, he drove big trucks. Being broke was the norm. Half the year he was away from home. Li Ruling had not lacked opportunities to come see him.
Since she had chosen, back then, to bury the past and never see him again, then she should never have appeared for the rest of her life.
Xia Fengsheng originally thought he would go on treating Li Ruling with indifference forever. But then he saw Li Ruling waiting at the school gates after evening self-study, just like other parents, to pick him up.
From the time he was little, no one had ever picked him up from school.
When he was young, other kids were collected by their families, while he went home alone with his backpack. He acted as if he did not care.
But in truth, in those years when he still longed for love, Xia Fengsheng had indeed secretly envied the other children.
In elementary school, his dreams had been filled countless times with scenes of a parent coming to pick him up, buying him the snacks other parents brought their children, then taking his hand and walking home in laughter.
At Wuhai High School, evening self-study ended at nine.
Xia Fengsheng walked out with the stream of students, just as usual. Those with family waiting all looked around eagerly for their parents.
Xia Fengsheng kept walking straight ahead.
“Shengsheng!”
A bright female voice rang out from the crowd.
Li Ruling stood beyond the throng, clutching late-night snacks she had bought for him, waving hard. “Mom’s here to pick you up!”
Gradually, Li Ruling began appearing not just at home, but in every corner of Xia Fengsheng’s life.
When he got sick with a fever, she stayed by his bedside through the night. When he placed first on an exam, she celebrated. She celebrated his birthday. When someone provoked him and he got into a fight and the school called in parents, she came and stood up for him.
“Say that again! What do you mean my kid started it? If your kid hadn’t bullied our Shengsheng, do you think Shengsheng would’ve hit him?!”
“I’m telling you, our Shengsheng isn’t an unreasonable child. He hit your son because your son provoked him first. What exactly did Shengsheng do wrong? You were the ones who started this conflict!”
“If you slander my child again, I’ll tear your mouth apart right now!”
The other parent sneered and pointed at Li Ruling. “Why don’t you ask any student or teacher here? Everyone knows your Xia Fengsheng is a notorious problem student. Every day at school he’s either picking on this one or bullying that one. Other than getting good grades, what else does he have? If he’s already like this now, who knows, once he gets out into society he’ll probably wind up in pri—AHHHHHHH!”
Li Ruling yanked a fistful of the woman’s hair, so hard it looked like she was about to rip the scalp right off her head. Her face twisted, terrifying. In a low voice she hissed, “You dog-bred bitch, what filth are you spewing?”
The other parent had never imagined the gentle-looking woman in front of her would really attack. Li Ruling did not hold back at all. The veins on the backs of her hands and along her arms bulged violently with the force of it, strands of hair tearing straight from the scalp. The dean’s office instantly erupted with pig-slaughter screams.
“AHHHHHH let go! Let go right now!”
“Xia Fengsheng’s mother, calm down! Talk it out, talk it out!”
“Xia Fengsheng’s mother, calm down! Calm down!”
Li Ruling planted herself firmly on top of the woman’s back, pinning her arms down with both feet and gripping her hair from behind, her eyes so wide they looked terrifying.
“What were you saying about our Shengsheng?!”
“I’m talking to you! What were you going to say next?!”
“You really thought our Shengsheng had nobody to protect him, so you could bully him however you wanted?!”
The woman howled in agony, tears pouring down, twisted on the floor into something barely human under Li Ruling’s assault.
Teachers and the dean tried to pull Li Ruling off, but she would not let go. It did not matter who came—no one could make her stop. Anyone who tried got slapped.
At one point the office became such a mess that not even the people breaking up the fight dared to get close after seeing her crazed expression.
The only thing piercing through the whole office was Li Ruling’s sharp voice.
“Apologize to my Shengsheng!!!”
“I said apologize to my Shengsheng, do you hear me?! APOLOGIZE!”
That day, the whole school learned that Xia Fengsheng’s mother was just as terrifying as Xia Fengsheng himself.
When Xia Fengsheng arrived, what he saw was Li Ruling with her hair in disarray, fighting another parent.
She was in the middle of beating the woman senseless, and none of the nearby teachers or staff could stop her. Yet the instant Xia Fengsheng appeared in the doorway, Li Ruling froze, scrambled up off the woman, and hurriedly smoothed her own messy hair, looking at Xia Fengsheng’s normally cold face—which was now filled with unmistakable shock—with embarrassment and guilt. She smiled awkwardly.
“M-Mom was just… discussing business with them.”
Soon the other fighting student was also brought into the dean’s office. Parents always wanted justice for their own children. Just as the beaten parent opened her mouth to say something to Xia Fengsheng, Li Ruling immediately stepped in front of him and glared at the woman fiercely.
As if daring her to say one more word and risk having her scalp yanked again.
Then she turned and gently soothed Xia Fengsheng.
“Mom’s here. Nobody gets to bully you.”
Those dark eyes looked at her, and for the first time, the coldness inside them softened.
After that, although Xia Fengsheng was never exactly close to her, the two of them gradually began living like an ordinary mother and son.
Li Ruling picked him up after school, attended his parent-teacher meetings, and bragged proudly to the neighbors whenever he won a prize in a competition.
When the weather got cold, she laid out his thicker clothes for him in advance. Because he studied so hard, she stewed soup for him.
And little by little, Xia Fengsheng began calling her… Mom.
The moment Li Ruling heard that title, tears poured down her face. She shut herself in her room and cried quietly for a long time.
—
One day school let out early and there was no evening self-study. At five in the afternoon, Xia Fengsheng came home carrying vegetables.
When he reached their floor, he happened to see Li Ruling out in the open corridor, chatting with a middle-aged man around forty-something.
The man saw him first. Li Ruling turned around and beckoned. “Shengsheng, come here. This is Uncle Zhao, who just moved in next door today.”
That day, a new family had moved into the apartment next door. Li Ruling had come out to get acquainted, thinking that as neighbors they ought to help each other out if anything came up.
Keeping good relations with the people next door.
Uncle Zhao’s name was Zhao Yong. He was a delivery driver who hauled fruit, vegetables, and other goods in a van. He was forty-six this year and had a six-year-old son at home.
The child was shy and had not come out, so Zhao Yong was talking with Li Ruling outside.
Xia Fengsheng greeted him, brief and polite, and that was all.
They were both ordinary, normal households. Most of the time there was nothing difficult going on, and naturally there was not much overlap between their two families either.
Life passed quietly on.
Xia Fengsheng also chatted with Shi Ye on his phone and video-called him.
From autumn into winter, they had not seen each other for a long time, and the longing between them grew, but not their love.
“Today I love you too.”
Every single day, Shi Ye loved Xia Fengsheng, and he never tried to hide it. He passed that love to him plainly and directly.
Having been raised with love from the very start, he knew best how to give it.
Sometimes words were blades, but words could also be medicine that soothed the heart.
Shi Ye said good night to the camera. Every night before bed, the two of them video-called for around ten minutes.
They were both busy—one with academics, one with dance—so they did not have much time.
But that never stopped Shi Ye from loving him. Every time they ended a call, it ended with love.
Back then, Xia Fengsheng fell asleep each night accompanied by Shi Ye’s love.
—
One noon during the lunch break, Xia Fengsheng went home to retrieve study materials.
A van was parked right in front of the parking space below the apartment building, blocking a car from getting in or out.
The sedan owner could not get through when he called the van owner, so he shouted downstairs.
“Mr. Liu, are you there? Could you please come move your car?”
Xia Fengsheng glanced at the van. If he remembered correctly, the plate ending in 4499 belonged to Zhao Yong. Yet for some reason the sedan owner was calling for “Mr. Liu.”
Xia Fengsheng did not think much of it. After taking his materials, he returned straight to school.
He had thought life would continue peacefully like that forever, as if he had already walked through the worst that life could offer.
Until one day, after school, Li Ruling failed to come pick him up.
When he got home, what he saw was Li Ruling collapsed on the floor.
“Mom!”
Li Ruling was rushed to the hospital, where the doctor diagnosed her with acute uremia.
Standing in the hospital corridor, Xia Fengsheng’s mind went completely blank. His face, already naturally pale, went even whiter. His breathing fell apart, and everything around him seemed to freeze.
Why was Li Ruling so sick?
Staring down at the hospital floor, Xia Fengsheng felt fear and panic explode inside him.
Why was his mother suffering from such a grave illness?
The terror of losing her detonated through his whole body. Since childhood, he had envied other children countless times for having fathers and mothers.
Now his mother was finally back, and heaven wanted to take her away from him in another form.
No.
His whole body trembled.
No.
His body moved faster than his thoughts. In a panic, he begged the doctor to save his mother.
The doctor looked at him with difficulty. “The treatment level in a small city is limited. If you want to cure your mother, she has to be transferred to a hospital in the capital.”
Xia Fengsheng did not waste a second. That very night he began handling Li Ruling’s transfer.
When he registered her patient information and took out her household registration booklet to fill in forms, he discovered Li Ruling was married, and the head of household on the first page was a man surnamed Liu.
Xia Fengsheng ignored it and simply flipped past the first page. Whether Li Ruling had remarried or divorced again did not change the fact that she was still his mother.
Soon, he took Li Ruling to a hospital in the capital and poured all the family’s money into her treatment.
And the attending doctor told him that if he wanted to save Li Ruling, there was only one option—
a kidney transplant.
Without a transplant, she would only wait to die.
A transplant cost four hundred thousand yuan. Even if he took out all of the accident compensation and everything he had saved, he was still short by two hundred thousand.
Two hundred thousand yuan was a heaven-shattering sum for a high school student.
Sitting in the hospital corridor, Xia Fengsheng was drenched in sweat.
But no matter what, he had to come up with that money.
It was his mother’s life-saving money.
Xia Fengsheng never told Li Ruling the actual cost of the operation.
But Li Ruling seemed to have guessed it anyway.
Lying in the ward, tubes in her body and her face as withered as a dead branch, she said, “Shengsheng, don’t save Mom. It’s okay.”
Xia Fengsheng did not answer.
He leaned at her bedside in silence, and tears fell from his eyes.
He was always silent about his feelings, but his feelings were deeper than anyone else’s.
Li Ruling gently stroked his hair. “The fact that you recognized me again, that’s already enough. Mom has no regrets anymore. Mom wronged you. If I’d come back to you earlier, maybe we could have had a few more years together.”
“Shengsheng, every day I’ve spent with you has made me happy. You’re the best and proudest child your mother could ask for.”
“Shengsheng, let Mom go.”
Xia Fengsheng gripped Li Ruling’s hand tightly and would not let go.
During that period, he was on the brink of total collapse, running everywhere to borrow money. He put the family apartment up through a real estate agent.
But with the property market already saturated, a shabby old apartment under fifty square meters in a small city would not sell quickly at all.
His eyes were bloodshot. He watched in despair as Li Ruling’s life faded day by day before his eyes.
Desperation devoured him little by little until there was not even a bone left.
Could someone please help him? In the dead of night, he was collapsing inward. Could someone please save his mother?
For the first time in his life, he begged heaven not to take his mother away.
He had only just gotten his mother back.
And at that moment, Old Master Bie found him and offered him a sum of money on the condition that he leave Shi Ye.
Xia Fengsheng knelt in the darkness, dried tear streaks still on his face.
It snowed that day—light, thin flakes—but they pressed him down so hard he could not stand back up.
He knew that once he chose the money, he and Shi Ye would be impossible forever.
Fate had once again shoved him back to the edge of the abyss. No matter which way he turned, all that waited was endless darkness.
On one side, his mother.
On the other, Shi Ye.
And second by second, time gave him absolutely no room to grieve or hesitate.
In the end, Xia Fengsheng chose the money.
Two days before the hospital payment deadline, the Bie family’s bodyguards brought him two hundred thousand yuan.
Together with the money he already had, it was enough for Li Ruling’s transplant.
On the day of the operation, Xia Fengsheng waited outside the operating room. The instant the doctor came out and informed him that the surgery had succeeded, it was as if every ounce of strength had been ripped from him. He finally collapsed onto the chair.
The operation had succeeded.
A smile appeared on Xia Fengsheng’s face. But as he smiled, tears began streaming down as well.
He was immersed in the joy that his mother had survived—
and at the same time knew that he and Shi Ye would never be possible again.
After breaking up with Shi Ye, Xia Fengsheng kept to his agreement with Old Master Bie and never appeared in front of Shi Ye again.
But on the day Shi Ye performed on stage, Xia Fengsheng secretly went there wearing a cap. He disappeared into the crowd and, like everyone else, watched Shi Ye dance.
He had promised Shi Ye he would definitely go.
He bought flowers for Shi Ye too, and tucked them among the countless bouquets from the fans.
There, Xia Fengsheng saw Shi Ye’s parents, his teacher He Yu, and all the rest of his family and friends—so many of them—and also the endless fans inside and outside the venue.
As he left, he glanced one last time at Shi Ye onstage, bowing after finishing his performance.
Shi Ye, your dance was exactly as I imagined.
Beautiful.
—
By the time Li Ruling recovered and they returned to Shenzhen, it was already May. Early summer had arrived, and the city had turned warm.
Only one month remained until the college entrance exam.
Xia Fengsheng threw himself entirely into preparation.
“Do we really have to do this?” Li Ruling looked at the man before her, Liu Changhao—also known as Neighbor Zhao Yong—with reluctance.
“Can’t the house paperwork be handled on another day?”
“If it’s another day, someone with his brains will notice,” Liu Changhao said. “That boy is smart. It has to be when he’s panicked and emotionally unstable, so he’ll sign without noticing anything wrong.”
Li Ruling’s face was full of resistance. She was already cured now. There was no need to seize the house from Xia Fengsheng anymore.
And on top of that, the signing would happen on the very day of Xia Fengsheng’s college entrance exam.
The college entrance exam was life-defining.
No matter what, she did not agree.
Liu Changhao said, “Right now all you remember is that Shengsheng is your child. Don’t forget that we also have Yangyang.”
Yangyang’s formal name was Liu Muyang, the child Li Ruling had after remarrying Liu Changhao.
Long before Li Ruling went back to find Xia Fengsheng, she had already found out she had uremia. Liu Changhao had emptied the family’s savings and sold their house to pay for her treatment, but the illness had only been kept under temporary control and never truly improved.
All the money in the house was gone. The house was gone too. With nowhere left to turn, Li Ruling had gone to Xia Fengsheng.
He still had his father’s apartment and the compensation money.
“If you don’t get that house, how is Yangyang supposed to start elementary school?” Liu Changhao pressed.
Yangyang was six this year, exactly the age for primary school. Without a school-district apartment, he would not be able to enroll.
The moment she heard that Yangyang might not be able to go to school, the hesitation in Li Ruling’s eyes slowly faded.
Soon the days of the college entrance exam arrived.
Xia Fengsheng entered the examination room carrying his admission slip and ID.
That entire day of exams went smoothly.
But then, right after the first day’s exams ended, Xia Fengsheng got a call from Zhao Yong saying Li Ruling’s condition had relapsed and she was in the ICU.
Xia Fengsheng rushed to the hospital, where Zhao Yong stopped him outside the ICU.
Looking at Xia Fengsheng’s panicked face, Liu Changhao gripped his shoulders and said, “Shengsheng, don’t panic first. Your mom has already been resuscitated. She’s still alive, but she can only maintain vital signs in the ICU. Right now, what matters is money.”
The ICU alone cost more than ten thousand yuan a day. And all the money had already been spent on Li Ruling’s treatment before.
Other than selling the house, Xia Fengsheng had no way to come up with that much money so quickly.
But over the next two days, he still had exams to take, so he had no time to deal with the house.
He could only choose one—
his mother, or the college entrance exam.
At that moment, Zhao Yong gripped his shoulder and said, “Shengsheng, we’re neighbors. You’ve still got the exam these next two days. When your mom got on the ambulance, she kept saying that you had to take your exam. If you trust your uncle, let uncle handle selling the house for you. Uncle will take care of all the paperwork as fast as possible.”
At the time, that was Xia Fengsheng’s best option.
It could save his mother and preserve his exam at the same time.
Over the next two days, Zhao Yong handled the house sale.
The house sold very quickly in his hands. On the final day of the college entrance exam, just before the last subject—English—was about to begin, Zhao Yong stopped Xia Fengsheng in the open corridor on the way to the exam center.
He held out the contract and blocked his path. “Shengsheng, hurry and sign this. The house has a buyer. Once you sign, the money can go into your mom’s account tomorrow. Twenty-four hundred thousand in total.”
For a tiny, rundown old apartment in a small city, less than fifty square meters, two hundred and forty thousand yuan was already a very good price.
Liu Changhao had calculated it precisely. Xia Fengsheng would be rushing to the exam hall, and in that state he would sign in haste.
And indeed, that was what happened.
Xia Fengsheng did not hesitate at all. He picked up the pen right away.
If the house sold, there would be money to save Li Ruling.
But just as he flipped to the last page and was about to sign, he saw a familiar name in the buyer field.
Liu Changhao.
He had seen that name before—in Li Ruling’s household registration booklet.
“Shengsheng, what’s wrong? Why did you stop signing?”
Mr. Liu, please come move your car!
Memory overlapped with reality.
Xia Fengsheng lifted his head, his black eyes fixed on him.
“What is your name?”
