Meng Yanxi turned her head to look at Chen Shu: “Sister Shu, please trouble yourself to call my dad. His son ate someone else’s breakfast at school, have him come over and discuss compensation.”

Chen Shu was still somewhat flustered. She hadn’t even figured out who was secretly dating whom yet, and now it had jumped to compensation?

“No, no need!” Ji Haoxuan’s mother hurriedly raised her hand to stop them.

They had held parent–teacher meetings several times already. Even if she hadn’t known who Meng Shixu was at first, by now she had found out. Although her son was outstanding and the affiliated school was upright and well-run, without all that messy nonsense, the Meng family was, after all, wealthy and powerful. She didn’t want to offend Meng Shixu for no reason. If it were really over a few days’ worth of breakfast and Meng Shixu had to make a trip, offending him… the road ahead was so long. Besides getting into college, there was work, marriage, having children, their education… who knew just how far the Meng family’s reach extended.

“It must have been my misunderstanding.” She forced a smile at Meng Yanxi. “Your honored father is very busy; let’s not trouble him.”

“‘Your honored father.’” Meng Yanxi rolled those two words on his tongue, smiling but not smiling.

“However, Teacher Chen,” Ji Haoxuan’s mother glanced at Jin Zhao again, then turned to Chen Shu and said, “I believe Ji Haoxuan is no longer suitable to sit at the same desk as this female classmate.”

“Mom!” Ji Haoxuan grabbed at her, hoarsely shouting.

His mother ignored him, stared at Chen Shu, and pressed, “What do you think?”

Chen Shu nodded.

Whether or not the two were in an early romance, things had blown up like this—she definitely had to separate them.

“I’ll switch with Ji Haoxuan.”

Everyone looked toward the voice.

Lu Jingyue had come in with Meng Yanxi. He hadn’t spoken before, hadn’t even come close, leaning against an empty desk not far away, one long leg slightly bent, one hand in his pocket, wearing a leisurely, relaxed, spectator’s posture, detached from everyone else.

Meeting the crowd’s astonished gazes, Lu Jingyue straightened up and repeated himself.

“I’ll switch with Ji Haoxuan.”

♥︎ ྀི◟ ͜ ◞♥︎ ྀི◟ ͜ ◞♥︎ ྀི

Before the first period bell rang, Lu Jingyue had already switched seats with Ji Haoxuan.

Ji Haoxuan’s mother stood outside Jin Zhao’s window with her arms crossed, watching coldly. That gaze, mixed with hostility and disdain, made Jin Zhao feel as if thorns were pricking her back, and it also drew the speculative or excited looks of other classmates.

Thus, what should have been an ordinary seat change immediately became intriguing in the eyes of the class; quite a few students huddled together, whispering.

Tears were just about to spill from Jin Zhao’s eyes.

She clearly hadn’t done anything, so why was it always her who was unlucky?

“You can’t always be this weak.”

Lu Jingyue didn’t have many things. He finished moving quickly, pulled out the chair beside her, and sat down.

Jin Zhao lifted her eyes to look at him.

The girl’s skin was snow-white, yet her eye rims were red through and through. Lu Jingyue leaned back against his chair, turned his gaze sideways, and asked, “Do you know what Meng Yanxi would do if the same thing happened to him?”

Jin Zhao didn’t know why Lu Jingyue suddenly brought up Meng Yanxi.

Lu Jingyue’s gaze passed over her, toward behind her. Jin Zhao followed and turned her head.

Outside the window, Ji Haoxuan’s mother was already gone.

Jin Zhao immediately looked toward Meng Yanxi’s seat. Meng Yanxi wasn’t there either.

She looked at Lu Jingyue in confusion. Lu Jingyue laughed softly and fished out the math test paper for the first class from the desk cubby. As expected, aside from the first page, the rest was completely blank.

She had long heard Luo Heng and Si Tian mention that her new deskmate always had endless creativity when it came to slacking off.

“I don’t know either.” Lu Jingyue looked at her meaningfully. “Depends on what he’s thinking.”

Jin Zhao: “?”

She often felt that Lu Jingyue and Meng Yanxi should go cultivate Zen together in the deep mountains—the way the two of them spoke carried the same inscrutable depth, as if they came from the same school.

But someone as unlucky as her—where would she find the spare energy to pay attention to heaven’s favored ones like Meng Yanxi and Lu Jingyue?

Unease churned in Jin Zhao’s heart. She thought of Ji Haoxuan’s mother’s gaze, like the tongue of a venomous snake, and feared that what she was capable of was far more than this.

Reality proved that her bad premonitions always had an almost deranged accuracy.

During the break, Jin Zhao went to the restroom with Si Tian. From the neighboring stall came the excited chatter of two girls—

“Hey, did you hear? That new girl who transferred into Class A next door, what’s her name—Jin Chao or Jin Today or something—she seduced the Class A monitor, kept him on the hook, made him buy her breakfast every day. His mom found out and brought it all the way to the school!”

“Huh? That can’t be, right? If she got into Class A, her grades should be really good.”

“So what if her grades are good? That doesn’t mean her character is. Besides, what use is good character? Getting benefits is what’s real. Otherwise, where do you think the news came from? The people involved definitely wouldn’t say anything, teachers wouldn’t either—so of course it was the boy’s mom who said it.”

“Then she’s really something, school just started a few days ago…”

Jin Zhao heard every word clearly inside the stall, her whole body icy cold.

She knew it. She knew it…

“Hey! Who are you two saying seduced someone?! Get the hell out here!”

Si Tian rushed out first. Hearing them wag their tongues, she was so furious she kicked the door.

Si Tian was famous for being fierce—she often chased after Luo Heng to beat him up, and she was childhood friends with Lu Jingyue. The two girls recognized her voice and fell silent at once, not daring to even breathe loudly, pretending no one was inside.

But Si Tian wouldn’t let it go. She kicked the door hard again. “Get out! Say it to our faces! Spreading dirty rumors behind people’s backs, what kind of trash behavior is that!”

She was truly angry, kicking again and again. The stall door was almost about to be kicked down.

Afraid something would happen, Jin Zhao hurried out and grabbed Si Tian’s arm, pulling her forcefully toward the exit. “That’s enough, let’s go. Class is about to start.”

Si Tian kicked once more in rage, but with Jin Zhao holding her back, the sole of her shoe only brushed past the stall door.

Back in the classroom, Si Tian stormed off to look for Ji Haoxuan. His seat was empty. With nowhere to vent her anger, she kicked a desk hard, hurting her own foot, then limped back to her seat.

She turned and pointed at Jin Zhao. “You—you’re just too easy to talk to! You should’ve fought those two rumor-spreading trash just now! Perfect chance to call their parents in and make them pay you compensation for emotional distress!”

“Enough. You think everyone’s like you, lawless.” Lu Jingyue lifted his head from his phone and interjected calmly.

Si Tian’s family had power, and she was an only child. It wasn’t the first time she’d hit someone at school—she feared neither heaven nor earth. When parents came, everything would be smoothed over for her.

But not every parent would shield their child. Some parents would instead turn around and scold their own child for lacking self-respect and causing trouble for the family, harming the child’s interests just to keep the peace.

Jin Zhao had a frightening intuition: Ji Haoxuan’s mother was not satisfied with merely changing seats. She looked like the kind of mother who would stop at nothing for her son’s future. But she definitely wouldn’t let Ji Haoxuan leave Class A—so the answer was obvious.

This also explained why the rumors spread so fast. —Ji Haoxuan’s mother wanted to use public opinion to blow things up, force her out of Class A, and completely separate her from Ji Haoxuan.

But Jin Zhao would never change classes. She had worked so hard to study—if she were forced out because of an unprovoked disaster, that would truly be far too unfair.

All morning, Jin Zhao was on edge.

But fear was useless; the matter still had to be resolved. She thought that she should go find Chen Shu and ask Ji Haoxuan’s mother to come over again, the three of them speaking openly to clear things up and avoid unnecessary trouble and misunderstandings.

♥︎ ྀི◟ ͜ ◞♥︎ ྀི◟ ͜ ◞♥︎ ྀི

In the afternoon, just as Jin Zhao walked into the affiliated school, she ran into Wang Jiajia from Class Three.

With the friendship forged over those five test papers, Wang Jiajia had already automatically categorized her as a bestie. The moment she saw Jin Zhao, she mysteriously hooked onto her arm and asked, “Is that thing with Ji Haoxuan in your class real?”

Jin Zhao’s face went deathly pale.

So fast? Ji Haoxuan’s mother couldn’t even wait for her to clarify the misunderstanding?

“W-what?”

The autumn sun was no longer as scorching as midsummer, yet it made her feel chilled to the bone, unsteady on her feet.

Wang Jiajia didn’t notice anything amiss and was still enthusiastically gossiping. “Ji Haoxuan’s mom extorted Meng Yanxi!”

Jin Zhao froze on the spot. “Huh?”

Ji Haoxuan’s mother—how did that get tied to Meng Yanxi?

What did Meng Yanxi have to do with this?

Wang Jiajia glanced around, then carefully took her phone out of her pocket, opened the affiliated school forum, and handed it to her.

“See for yourself. It’s been pinned in red all morning.”

Jin Zhao shifted her gaze. At a glance, she saw several bright-red characters—

Shocking! Is Meng Yanxi being extorted?!

The main post contained three secretly taken photos.

At the very start of first period morning class, when the teaching building corridors were empty, at a turn of the stairwell, Meng Yanxi—wearing his school uniform—was handing a rather thick stack of hundred-yuan bills to a middle-aged woman.

The woman had her hair permed into small golden curls, one arm hooked through an LV monogram bag, the other hand reaching out to take the money.

The three photos were taken in quick succession, perfectly capturing the entire process from the woman receiving the cash to putting it into her bag and leaving.

Throughout the affiliated school’s history, Meng Yanxi had always been a lone, undefeated figure. Even if nothing were going on, just the three words “Meng Yanxi” alone were enough to guarantee explosive traffic—let alone when linked to something as alarming as “extortion.”

No matter how wealthy Meng Yanxi was, he was still, after all, only a high school student.

As soon as the post went up, comments immediately appeared below:

——Oh my god! What is Meng Yanxi doing? He didn’t sleep with someone’s daughter and get shaken down by his mother-in-law, did he?! [Shocked][Shocked]

——Then that’s way too little money, isn’t it? Looks like only three to five thousand. Young Master Meng wouldn’t be that stingy, right?

——Stop talking nonsense. This time it has nothing to do with a girl; the other party is a boy. [Covering mouth][Covering mouth]

——Pupil-shaking shock! Is Meng Yanxi playing this wild now? Girls can’t satisfy him anymore??

——Peh! Don’t be so malicious toward Meng Yanxi. I happened to pass by and overheard a bit—this time he’s a complete victim.

——What? Fifth floor, explain in detail! [Let me hear][Let me hear]

——Fifth floor, hurry up! Or we’ll beat you to death through the internet cable!

——I don’t really know what exactly was going on either. I was just passing by. I heard Meng Yanxi say at the time, “I didn’t realize it would cause such a big misunderstanding. Including today’s portion, Ji Haoxuan has brought me breakfast for a total of five days. These three thousand yuan are the breakfast money and my apology. Please, Auntie, be sure to accept it.”

——Yes, yes, yes, I heard about it too. Seems like it really was about breakfast! But I didn’t hear it in the hallway—I overheard it while passing by the teachers’ office. Apparently Ji Haoxuan’s mom came knocking, saying someone ate her son’s breakfast and demanded the other party call their parents over—parent to parent.

——Holy shit! Is that really necessary? It’s just a few breakfasts, and she wants my Uncle Meng to come over? My Uncle Meng hasn’t seen money that little in his life, okay!

——Meng Shixu: Finance, immediately transfer three million over. Make her get lost!

——No, I heard it too. At first it seems they didn’t figure it out and wronged another girl, saying the girl ate the breakfast and went to find her. Only later did they realize it was actually Meng Yanxi who ate it.

——They wronged the girl, but that didn’t stop his mom from taking Meng Yanxi’s money anyway. [Heh][Heh]

——That girl is so miserable…

——The girl is really miserable.

——Wait, am I the only one focused on five days of breakfast costing three thousand yuan? Six hundred a meal, are Ji Haoxuan’s breakfasts made of gold or what? [Pupils shaking]

——@Meng Yanxi, don’t let Ji Haoxuan bring breakfast anymore. Find me! Different every day, no three thousand—three hundred is enough, and I’ll throw in two days free!

——Two hundred is enough for me!

——I don’t want money! @Meng Yanxi

——No internal competition! Let me go first! I’ll even pay you two hundred! @Meng Yanxi @Meng Yanxi

……

The thread’s later trajectory grew more and more absurd, and the traffic kept climbing. Class was about to start, and Jin Zhao didn’t have time to finish reading. She handed the phone back to Wang Jiajia.

Wang Jiajia put it away and quietly asked Jin Zhao, “Three thousand yuan is enough to file a case. Have you heard anything? Will Meng Yanxi call the police?”

Jin Zhao was completely unprepared. She had spent the entire morning anxious, imagining countless terrifying scenarios, even preparing what she would say when she went to communicate with the other party. She never could have imagined that in just half a day, things would take this turn.

Ji Haoxuan’s mother extorted three thousand yuan from Meng Yanxi?

What three thousand yuan? Could it be the three thousand Meng Yanxi won from a scratch-off ticket?

Oh my god! Just how did Meng Yanxi step in sideways and turn things into this?!