After that day, Rong Xuanyu began to deliberately avoid meeting Jiang Buli.
After all, after what had happened… she truly didn't know what mindset she should adopt when facing him.
Paper over the cracks? The lifelong-single Rong Xuanyu admitted she couldn't do it.
Cut ties completely? That was even more impossible.
Xu Weiyan hadn't been dealt with yet—what if she took her eyes off the kid for even a moment and he ended up back on the road to ruin?
So she could only maintain this awkward, ill-defined relationship.
The training camp was gradually drawing to a close, and public lectures and elective courses filled up Rong Xuanyu's schedule step by step. With classes as an excuse, she no longer had to pick Jiang Buli up from his lessons from time to time.
She quietly breathed a sigh of relief—she had never been so grateful for a heavy course load.
Chen Jiafeng pounced on her from behind and slung an arm around her shoulder, sounding puzzled. "I really don't get you. You finally finished a course, and now you've filled the slot with piano lessons."
"That's a course even Omegas don't want to learn."
"You're something else." Chen Jiafeng tossed his flashy red hair and gave her a thumbs-up.
It was all just to avoid Jiang Buli.
Rong Xuanyu shoved Chen Jiafeng toward He Yan and Li Guanqi, not wanting to see him or be bothered by him.
After so many days, the dormitory relationships were no longer as strained. The three of them had greatly changed their opinion of Rong Xuanyu, and could even joke around without any lingering awkwardness during their spare moments.
But Rong Xuanyu had seemed preoccupied these past few days. Whenever a course ended, she'd take some easy elective, and she worked three part-time jobs a day, as if she was afraid she wouldn't exhaust herself to death.
Rong Xuanyu rubbed her throbbing temples, waved at the three of them, and headed off to class with her bag.
Chen Jiafeng and the others exchanged glances and stopped in their tracks. He Yan's brows were tightly furrowed as he guessed, "Do you think she might be in some kind of trouble?"
Chen Jiafeng was equally baffled. "She's like a completely different person."
Li Guanqi stepped forward, his eyes dark and unreadable. "What if she's being coerced by someone and has no choice?"
Chen Jiafeng's brow twitched. "Then that would make sense!"
"Rong Xuanyu isn't a bad person. The way she used to skip class and show up late all the time—could that also be…"
Remembering those baseless posts on the forum, the three immediately thought of one name.
"Jiang Buli of the Shangjing Jiang family?!"
Rong Xuanyu had no idea about their wild speculations. She walked alone down the shaded path, stepping over scattered patches of golden light on her way to class.
On the bustling thoroughfare, Omegas would occasionally point at her and whisper among themselves, then laugh without any attempt to hide it.
At first, Rong Xuanyu thought they were greeting her—until one day, an Omega pointed at her nose and called her a shameless, low-class Alpha. Only then did she suddenly understand that she could never be popular.
So the next time she faced such situations, she stopped reacting altogether.
Watching the tall, handsome Female Alpha gradually walk away, a shy Omega patted her companion beside her and said excitedly, "Oh my god, I'd only ever heard rumors before—this is the first time I've actually seen her."
"Say what you will, but you can't deny that face. If I had a bit of money, I'd be willing to spend it on her too."
…
The noisy chatter of the crowd faded into the distance. Rong Xuanyu walked into the classroom as usual and casually found a seat.
It wasn't until the class bell rang that she realized no one else had shown up. Rong Xuanyu was puzzled for a second, then took out her Guangnao and discovered that she was the only student enrolled in this course.
Moreover, the elderly professor, being too old and in poor health, had requested leave half an hour ago.
Rong Xuanyu: "…"
With nothing else to do, Rong Xuanyu suddenly recalled a Mori Weimian she had experienced before.
Earthquakes, tsunamis, floods—humanity was always so insignificant in the face of nature.
By the time Rong Xuanyu arrived at the scene as part of the rescue team, it was already too late. The entire sky was a hazy gray, and no matter where she went, she could hear desperate sobbing.
After one night, the sounds were gone.
The excavator dug through layer after layer of concrete, layer after layer of the dead. The whole sky was thick with the fermented stench of rotting corpses.
The most hopeless thing of all was knowing he was still alive—he was just two or three meters beneath your feet. He went from full of hope at first to barely clinging to life, and you were completely powerless to help.
By the end, Rong Xuanyu couldn't cry anymore. She only knew how to mechanically dig and fill soil, until she discovered a piano atop a pile of rubble, and beneath the piano, a six-year-old girl.
In her young, childish voice, she pleaded, "Someone's here? Can you play a song for me?"
Rong Xuanyu rubbed her frozen fingers and soothed her softly, "Then you have to wait patiently for the rescuers to come, okay?"
Rong Xuanyu knelt before the battered piano, pressing the stiff, reluctant keys, and played her a halting, out-of-tune rendition of Juliet's "Love Story."
"Juliet, trust me, you will never be alone."
"Start running, and the best is yet to come."
Begin running; the best is yet to come.
…
Joyful notes drifted above the ruins, but when Rong Xuanyu finished and knocked on the rubble, the ruins no longer answered her.
Rong Xuanyu's fingertips began to tremble pathologically again. She patted her right hand with her left, looked out at the pleasant weather beyond the window, and inexplicably wanted to play another piece.
The female Alpha set down her canvas bag, sat stiffly on the piano bench, and smooth, flowing notes poured from her dancing fingertips, rising high, drifting past the pristine white gauze curtains, and falling into the solitary confinement cell just one wall away.
A male Omega with striking features, golden hair, and violet eyes knelt alone before a shrine.
He recalled the phone call his father had made to him moments ago, and a shadow of gloom hung over his heart.
"Sending you to school was so you could meet outstanding Alphas. I never expected you to lose your head and say something so absurd—it's absolutely laughable!"
"An Omega only needs to learn how to please her future husband. What do you mean, becoming a commander?!"
"If you keep being this ungrateful, you might as well drop out and get married!"
With a sharp click, the call was mercilessly cut off.
Siberling knew that self-interest came first, yet he couldn't help but cling to his fantasies, pouring out his aspirations to his father—only to receive a ruthless belittlement in return.
Frustrated and irritable, he suddenly heard the cheerful piano music from next door and couldn't help but shout madly: "I want to hear Charge Forward Without Fear!"
This solitary confinement cell had been requested anonymously; no one outside could possibly know he was inside, which was exactly why Siberling felt free to lose his mind.
He had only intended to make someone else miserable since he was miserable himself, but to his surprise, the piano melody on the other side shifted seamlessly, suddenly jumping two octaves.
The style of the music changed completely from its earlier gentle tenderness to something impassioned and stirring, as if thousands of horses and troops were thundering forward, radiating killing intent.
A lone wanderer of the frontier stood unmoving atop the city wall. In the blink of an eye, the enemy was at the gates, and the sounds of battle rang without end.
The bitter north wind whipped up the hem of his coarse robes. Suddenly—he moved!
The piano notes climbed frantically, rapid and dense like urgent drumbeats.
The swordsman stood as steady as a mountain, reached back to release his sword case, and twelve treasured blades burst forth at once, circling and roaming between heaven and earth.
The sky hung low, sunlight parted the dark clouds, and a beam of heavenly light shot down from the firmament.
The music suddenly stopped.
At that moment, silence spoke louder than sound, and Siberling's heart clenched tight.
The next instant, the crash of keys struck with righteous grandeur, like a majestic, towering beast—wherever it passed, all evil was vanquished.
The twelve long swords merged into one. One sword broke through thousands of troops and horses; one sword soared into the void, striking straight at the heavens.
The resonance's lingering notes slowly faded, but the thunderous music plucked at Siberling's heartstrings, leaving him unable to calm for a long time.
After staring blankly for a long while, he finally snapped back to reality as if waking from a dream, pushed open the door of the solitary cell, and rushed to the door next door.
By then, the pristine white gauze curtains swayed gently, and the room was already empty.
Siberling's expression shifted, and he hurriedly ran toward the corridor, only to see beneath the camphor tree, the tall female Alpha with her high ponytail gently swaying, a pristine white canvas bag slung over her shoulder, strolling leisurely away.
"Rong—Xuan—Yu." The Omega said, each word deliberate.
That afternoon was the first-grade department's public rest day. Rong Xuanyu had just received a message from Jiang Buli asking her to pick him up after class.
"…What do I do, what do I do, what do I do."
Ever since that incident, Rong Xuanyu had been on edge all day, terrified he might do something else that an old man couldn't handle.
But Jiang Buli had suddenly changed his tactics—whenever they met, it was always simple, innocent contact, never overstepping any boundaries.
Yet Rong Xuanyu instead felt like she was being boiled like a frog in lukewarm water.
Distracted and absent-minded, Rong Xuanyu arrived at the destination, only to find she was early and class hadn't ended yet. On the podium, a scrawny, gaunt lecturer was mercilessly criticizing someone.
So fierce. Rong Xuanyu stole a glance and saw Lu Lefeng had been called up, stammering without an answer, only to be drenched in sarcasm.
"You can't even answer this question—are you an idiot?"
"Would anyone like to help him answer?"
The entire classroom was dead silent. Rong Xuanyu saw Jiang Buli sitting off to the side with his hands tucked in, fair-skinned and quiet as a wooden statue to avoid drawing the lecturer's attention.
Rong Xuanyu felt torn in two—on one hand, she thought the kid was so well-behaved and adorable; on the other, she was constantly reminded of his past misdeeds.
Clearly, the kid's luck wasn't great either, because sitting too close to Lu Lefeng, he too was called up by the strict lecturer.
But he was perfectly composed, skipping even the time to think, and flatly said he didn't know.
The class bell rang, and cheers of relief erupted from the back of the classroom. That behavior was like a fuse, directly igniting the lecturer.
"What are you laughing at?! What's so funny?!"
"I don't care how you do it today—whether you figure it out yourselves or find outside help—no one is leaving until you get the correct answer!"
The classroom first erupted in grumbling, then fell into fearful silence under the lecturer's threatening glare.
This question was beyond the syllabus. It had been briefly mentioned in previous lessons, but never covered in depth, so no one could come up with the correct answer.
The situation was momentarily deadlocked.
Jiang Buli frowned and turned to look out the window, only to find that Rong Xuanyu had already arrived. Seeing him glance over, Rong Xuanyu quietly waved his hand.
Jiang Buli, who was usually stern and unsmiling, now subtly curved his lips, the joy in his eyes nearly overflowing.
She… no longer rejects me?
Rong Xuanyu didn't know what was wrong with himself. He had come as if walking to the executioner's block, but when he actually saw the child, his mind couldn't think about much else.
Noticing that the building was nearly empty, with barely a soul left, Rong Xuanyu checked the time and took the initiative to knock on the door.
"Teacher, may I try this problem?"