Wang Chaoyang was a “rich second-generation” in every sense of the word; it was said that two of the school’s teaching buildings had been built with donations from his father.
Wang Chaoyang’s academic performance was excellent. He consistently ranked first in his grade, a presence far beyond the reach of all other top students.
Furthermore, Wang Chaoyang was particularly loyal and righteous, making him very popular among his classmates. Naturally, the teachers valued him highly; the principal often invited him to sit in his office, and even the stern-faced Dean of Students would always beam with smiles upon seeing him.
Delinquents did not dare to provoke such an outstanding student, someone who excelled in both character and academics.
Therefore, when Wang Chaoyang publicly announced that Chen Mo and Li Hang were under his protection, it stood to reason that their lives should have become easier.
However, in reality, they did not.
The two of them were still extorted, insulted, and bullied every single day.
Every afternoon after school, that group of bad students would wait at the entrance of the alley.
And Chen Mo and Li Hang, inexplicably, always insisted on taking that path, running straight into them.
What followed was always a demand for money. Li Hang would give money; Chen Mo didn’t want to, and so Chen Mo would be beaten.
Then, Wang Chaoyang would appear like a hero. The mere mention of his name was enough to scare those delinquents into crawling and scrambling away, vanishing one by one.
For several days, it was a similar script. The repetition gave Chen Mo the illusion that they were filming the same movie every day—a script where he and Li Hang were forever the pathetic “cannon fodder” in need of saving, while Wang Chaoyang was the heroic protagonist who always appeared just in time.
Because every time he tried to resist, he was restrained by an invisible force, and he was somewhat afraid of those sudden electric shocks that occurred from time to time, Chen Mo gradually gave up on direct confrontation.
He wanted to tell the teachers and his parents about this matter.
Since he couldn’t solve it himself, handing it over to adults to handle was surely the right move.
But unfortunately, even this was not possible.
In fact, every day after school, Chen Mo wanted to tell his parents about it.
Every time he was about to speak, a voice would appear in his mind, advising him not to.
“Your parents are already very tired; don’t tell them about such trivial matters.”
“Your sister is in poor health; she went to the hospital again last night.”
“It must have cost a lot of money again. Your parents work very hard to put you through school and stay up late taking care of your sister. Be more sensible!”
Chen Mo: “…”
Although this voice was annoying and daily persuaded him not to resist the bullies—making him loath to pay it any mind—this particular point actually made sense.
Thus, Chen Mo did not tell his family.
He decided to tell his homeroom teacher, as it was something happening at school after all.
However, their homeroom teacher, Mr. Cao—who wore black-rimmed glasses and blue shirts—was like a loach diving into the mud once class was over; he was slippery and impossible to catch.
Today, Chen Mo was determined to catch Mr. Cao.
As soon as the bell rang, he “brushed” up from his seat and chased after Mr. Cao, who was walking out with his textbooks tucked under his arm.
While chasing, he shouted loudly, “Mr. Cao, I have something to tell you.”
Mr. Cao acted as if he couldn’t hear, walking faster and faster, further and further away, until he vanished at the end of the corridor.
Chen Mo ran with all his might but still failed to catch him; Mr. Cao entered the teachers’ office.
There seemed to be some kind of barrier set up at the entrance of the teachers’ office. In short, after Mr. Cao stepped inside, Chen Mo instinctively stopped in his tracks.
He felt as though he could not take a single step further.
He decided to wait at the office door.
Just then, a boy carrying a stack of notebooks appeared at the door. Seeing Chen Mo lingering there, he asked, “Chen Mo, what are you doing here?”
Chen Mo looked over; it was their class monitor, Lin Jun.
He thought that since he couldn’t find Mr. Cao, it would be good to tell the monitor and have him relay the message.
So he grabbed Lin Jun and told him about how he and Li Hang were always blocked and bullied by several bad students after school.
Upon hearing this, Lin Jun was filled with righteous indignation. He said angrily, “This is too much! I’ll help you tell Mr. Cao!”
Chen Mo said gratefully, “Thank you, Monitor.”
Lin Jun said, “Then wait here. I’ll go in and talk to the teacher.”
With that, Lin Jun entered the teachers’ office carrying the stack of notebooks.
He didn’t invite Chen Mo to go in with him, and it didn’t occur to Chen Mo to follow. It was as if they both tacitly accepted that the teachers’ office was not a place one could enter casually. Only a very small number of students could go in, such as class officers or students with good grades.
Chen Mo waited at the door for a few minutes before Lin Jun came out.
Chen Mo hurried to ask him, “How was it? Did you tell him?”
Lin Jun looked at him, but suddenly slapped his own forehead and said, “Oh my, look at my memory. I actually forgot!”
Chen Mo was puzzled: “Then what were you doing in the office for so long?”
Lin Jun had already turned around and was heading back inside, clearly intending to go back and tell the teacher.
Chen Mo had no choice but to continue waiting patiently.
A few minutes later, the class bell rang.
Chen Mo hesitated about whether to continue waiting when Lin Jun came out again, this time carrying a stack of test papers.
Chen Mo looked at him. Lin Jun also heard the bell and gave him an apologetic smile: “I’m sorry, Chen Mo. The English teacher just asked me to bring these papers to the classroom. I haven’t had time to tell the homeroom teacher yet. I’ll definitely do it during the next break!”
Although Chen Mo found it very strange that Lin Jun hadn’t mentioned it despite going in twice, he didn’t have time to press the matter and hurried back to the classroom for his lesson.
During the next few breaks, he went to find Lin Jun again, but there was always some reason that prevented the other boy from relaying the matter to the teacher.
After several times, Chen Mo felt that this path might also be a dead end.
He stopped looking for Lin Jun.
However, every time Lin Jun ran into him, he had a look of hesitation on his face.
In truth, Lin Jun also felt strange. He constantly felt as if he had an important task to do that he kept forgetting, and that this task was related to Chen Mo.
But every time he saw Chen Mo and wanted to ask clearly, he would forget as soon as he turned his head.
This matter made him very uneasy.
So uneasy that his head even throbbed at times.
…
After school that day, Chen Mo made an important decision.
He said to Li Hang, “We are not going through the East Gate today.”
The East Gate was the one where those bad students blocked them every day.
Li Hang followed his lead and asked, “Then which way do we go?”
Chen Mo said, “The North Gate.”
The North Gate was the so-called back gate of the school, the same gate Chen Mo had used before when he went to jump into the river.
Li Hang thought this was a great idea.
Although going through the North Gate meant a bit of a detour to get home, it was better than constantly running into those bad students.
The two of them settled on the plan.
Chen Mo was actually a bit nervous, worried that those people might move to the North Gate to wait for them. After all, judging from his experiences during this period, escaping them seemed to have become an impossible task.
But on this day, they were actually safe and sound.
A very simple method—merely changing their route home—and the bullying behavior stopped.
Li Hang was very excited and said to Chen Mo, “Then starting tomorrow, we’ll take the North Gate!”
The next day, they followed their plan to go home via the North Gate, only to find that this gate, which was usually always open, was actually closed. A heavy lock hung on the gate, clearly added just today.
This was too strange.
After all, when Chen Mo had gone through this gate to jump into the river a while ago, the school hadn’t locked it.
Now, for no reason at all, the gate was suddenly locked.
Chen Mo felt the entire situation was bizarre.
This change was exactly like the invisible force that restrained him, as if there were some kind of intent in the dark meddling to forcibly dictate their trajectory—demanding that they must go through the East Gate.
They must be bullied by those bad students; they must be saved by Wang Chaoyang.
“Then we’ll take the side gate,” Chen Mo said firmly.
Their school actually had a hidden side gate that not many students knew about, located near the cafeteria.
It was used by the school’s logistics staff for moving goods.
They prepared to head over and take a look.
Halfway to the cafeteria, they ran into the class monitor, Lin Jun.
Seeing them, Lin Jun greeted them. He looked at Chen Mo and said, “I always feel like I promised to do something for you, but I keep forgetting.”
Chen Mo was actually a bit dissatisfied with this irresponsible monitor and said crossly, “I told you about us being bullied. You promised me then that you’d help tell the teacher, but you’ve been making excuses and delaying, saying you forgot every single time.”
Lin Jun froze: “Yes, that’s it!”
His expression became one of guilt and unease, mixed with confusion. He muttered, “This matter is really important. Every time you mention it, I get so anxious. But I don’t understand—why is it that every time I turn around, I… forget? My memory isn’t that bad!”
Chen Mo was startled.
Lin Jun’s description gave him a sense of familiar helplessness.
It was as if an unseen hand was preventing them from revealing the bullying to their elders and teachers.
Yes, a force had been suppressing this matter, keeping everything within the cycle of “them being bullied and being saved by Wang Chaoyang.”
At this moment, Li Hang suddenly chimed in: “Actually, every time they extort us, I don’t want to give them money either. But as soon as I refuse, it feels like an electric shock in my brain. It hurts so much I can’t stand it.”
Chen Mo’s pupils constricted sharply.
“Electric shock…” he murmured, thinking of the same pain in his own mind every time he resisted.
“In other words,” Chen Mo looked up at Lin Jun and Li Hang, “among the three of us, we all feel that something is wrong.”
Chen Mo paused and pondered, “There should be one more person who feels similarly.”
Li Hang also had a suspicion: “Wang Chaoyang?”
“Right! Wang Chaoyang appears every time we encounter the bullies. Today, we’ll still follow the previous route. We’ll definitely run into him later. When that happens, we’ll ask him and see if he knows what’s really going on.”
The three of them agreed.
Chen Mo and Li Hang walked toward the East Gate as usual, with Lin Jun accompanying them.
Sure enough, just as they exited the school gate, they saw those bad students waiting there as usual, blocking their path.
This time, with the addition of Lin Jun, there were three boys, so the other side was somewhat wary.
But the extortion continued as always.
This time, Li Hang endured the pain and insisted on not giving money. Chen Mo didn’t give any either, and Lin Jun helped them.
Just as the two sides were about to come to blows, exactly as they had anticipated, Wang Chaoyang arrived as scheduled.
With an air of righteous indignation, he shouted loudly, “What are you people doing?”
In the next second, just like every time before, the bad students immediately stopped what they were doing upon seeing him appear and scurried away dejectedly.
Wang Chaoyang approached, smiling as he patted Chen Mo on the shoulder. He looked at them, his gaze lingering for half a second on Lin Jun—who shouldn’t have been there—before asking warmly, “Are you guys okay? Don’t worry, I’m here.”