Fake Slackers

Chapter 17: Life is always full of surprises

They found a secluded place: a grassy field near the equipment room with a large rock mimicking a mountain at its center. The three squatted, resting against the 'mountain.'

Xie Yu was about to stand up when He Zhao pulled him back down. "Stay right there. Talk. Keep talking."

Actually, there wasn't much to say.

Xie Yu didn't know anyone called Liu Yuan. He just remembered that the girl had buried her face in her hands, squatted on the floor, and cried.

Yang Wenyuan was terrified and didn't dare face Xie Yu head on. After two blows from a stick, he turned and ran out. Xie Yu had no intention of squatting and comforting the girl, either. He felt that he had done his civic duty, and tossed the wooden stick he had randomly grabbed into a stall, then started to walk out.

He had just taken a step when a hand caught his pant leg and the girl said weakly, "...Don't tell anyone, I beg of you."

"Yeah, that's her," Shen Jie said. "Terribly timid, and would rather be bullied than make a sound."

Shen Jie added, "So you beat up Goody-two-shoes Yang until he ran?"

He Zhao didn't quite understand, either. "Then why does this dude only pester me? Envious of my good looks?"

Xie Yu said calmly, "...I was wearing a mask."

Although the smell in the toilet wasn't that strong, the scent of disinfectant was terrible. Xie Yu had grabbed a mask before he went, not expecting he would really use it.

He Zhao let out a thoughtful, "Ah."

Shen Jie immediately exposed He Zhao's unrealistic thoughts: "Forget it, Zhao-ge. It's no use even if you wear a mask. Big bro Xie only beat him up, but just think about what you've done."

"What did I do? I didn't hit him," He Zhao said. "I was very merciful."

If pulling someone's pants off, standing to the side and mocking their dick for being small, and letting them run around naked for almost two to three hours counted as merciful, Yang Wenyuan would probably rather get beaten up.

After hearing the ins and outs of it all, Xie Yu sank into silence, too.

He Zhao said, "I really don't like fighting. I pick a peaceful way of settling things."

Peaceful... it really was peaceful.

No wonder Yang Wenyuan couldn't let it go. That event definitely ranked among the most humiliating things in life, especially for a proud elite student like him. How could he endure this? When Liu Yuan transferred schools, he had thought this piece of blackmail would now have no opposing witness, and took the chance to make trouble.

But He Zhao, because of a girl's plea and her reputation, had stood there enduring everything without a word even though Yang Wenyuan had barked right up to his front door. It made Xie Yu look at his deskmate in a different light.

"If not, would I have let him live till now?" He Zhao picked up a pebble and threw it as he spoke. It landed on an exercise machine, then rolled a couple times. After it had gone, he said, "It's been really damn awful holding it in."

The latter half of Shen Jie's class period had been changed to a boys' assembly: the boys would go to the soccer field, line up, and practice passing. So they only chatted for a while before Shen Jie had to stand up and dust himself off: "Class assembly, I have to go. Let's talk later. Calm down, Zhao-ge. You absolutely have to stay calm."

He Zhao waved at him without looking up. "Get lost, you."

The temperature outside was 32°C (90°F), and Xie Yu didn't really want to stay here under the hot sun.