In the vast multiverse, Yu Zhou was an ordinary plane administrator.

Planes in the multiverse were as numerous as leaves on a tree, making plane administrators countless.

  The primary duty of Yu Zhou and his fellow administrators was to monitor the operation of their respective planes and promptly report any malfunctioning ones to their superior, the Divine Messenger.

  The Divine Messenger was responsible for resolving bugs within the planes, ensuring their smooth functioning, and thereby maintaining the harmony and stability of the vast cosmos.

  His daily routine was predictable. Watching the favored children of fate cause all sorts of trouble within the planes was like watching a grand soap opera, making his days pass with a certain kind of interest.

During a break, Yu Zhou watered the succulent on his desk. After setting the watering can aside, he sat at his workstation, lost in thought.

  Just then, a plane administrator approached carrying a thick stack of observation reports. His face was ringed by enormous dark circles, and he stumbled momentarily as he reached Yu Zhou.

Fortunately, Yu Zhou reacted swiftly, catching him before he fell.

"Meng Fu, you don't look well. Sit down and rest for a moment."

  Meng Fu staggered to his feet, his voice barely above a whisper. "I can't. These are urgent documents. I need to deliver them to the Bureau of Space Management immediately."

  Yu Zhou replied, "You're barely steady on your feet. Let me deliver them for you."

Yu Zhou's steadiness and reliability were well-known. After a moment's thought, Meng Fu grasped Yu Zhou's hand weakly and said, "Then I'll leave it to you. The Bureau needs them urgently. I'll treat you to a meal when you return."

  Yu Zhou chuckled, patted Meng Fu's shoulder, tidied the thick stack of plane observation reports on the desk, confirmed everything was in order, then carried the reports out of the observation room.

The submission point was the Plane World Security Administration Bureau, commonly known as the PBA.

  The Dàqiān World's Bureau building resembled a magnificent temple, meticulously designed for symmetrical beauty—even the number of red carp in its twin viewing pools was identical.

The Dàqiān World was upheld by twenty-four deities, pillars supporting its existence, hence they were also known as the Twenty-Four Pillars of Heaven.

  Yu Zhou's department belonged to one of these pillars—the God of Order and Justice, who also held the foremost position among the Twenty-Four Pillars.

The atmosphere within the Bureau was heavy. Two divine messengers stood beside the viewing pools, sighing as they watched the koi swim within.

  Yu Zhou approached carrying a stack of documents. Seeing their faces ashen as if mourning a death, he couldn't help asking, "Has another problem arisen in the planes?"

One of the divine messengers let out a heavy sigh, closing his eyes as he replied, "Not just one world."

  The other envoy, his face ashen, raised a thick stack of reports. "These are all the planes that have fallen into chaos. Multiple adjacent planes are collapsing in succession—and these are core planes. You know how dire this situation is."

Adjacent planes collapsing in succession!

Yu Zhou's expression turned grave.

  The multiverse resembled a colossal bridge built from countless blocks. It appeared sturdy, yet if several blocks were removed from its core, the entire structure would teeter on the brink of collapse.

Before Yu Zhou could ask further, the divine messenger continued, "The principal gods have been alerted, but even they are powerless."

  Yu Zhou remarked, "The laws and order of a plane's world aren't easily shaken. With the Gods of Order and Law absent, it's only natural the other gods are helpless."

The Divine Messenger replied, "That may be true, but we can't just give up. Several Main Gods have already entered those planes."

  Yu Zhou froze for a moment, murmuring, "It seems worse than I anticipated."

Another divine envoy gazed with a look of regret: "If only the God of Order and Justice were still here. After all, he was the mightiest among the Twenty-Four Pillars of the Main Gods."

  Seeing the emissary's furrowed brow, Yu Zhou felt helpless.

What could he, a mere minor plane administrator, possibly do?

Besides, when the sky falls, someone taller will hold it up.

  After exchanging pleasantries with the two divine envoys, Yu Zhou entered the hall of the Plane Administration Bureau. The bustling lobby was filled with familiar faces among the plane administrators.

After greeting them one by one, Yu Zhou walked through two long corridors. Suddenly, something tripped him up.

  He looked down to find his shoelace had come undone.

Yuzhou had no choice but to set aside the thick stack of observation reports he carried and bend down to tie it.

Just as he finished knotting the lace, the ground suddenly shook violently.

  The white marble floor beneath his feet split open with a massive gash. Unable to dodge in time, Yu Zhou plunged headfirst into the abyss.

The sensation of freefall sent a chill down his spine. The stack of thick plane observation reports was swept away by a violent gust, scattering like snowflakes through the air as they plummeted alongside him.

  "Oh no! The pillar just lost stability, tearing open a crack in the collapsing planar barrier! A plane administrator fell through!"

  A divine messenger shouted, his face ashen.

  "My goodness!"

  "That plane administrator is likely doomed!"

  The ground had already closed over the gap, and no one knew which plane the unfortunate administrator had fallen into.

Just as everyone was growing frantic, a plane administrator suddenly burst into the hall, shouting, "Order and time have been reset! The divine law of the One-Pillar God has taken effect!"

  The noisy hall fell instantly silent.

The laws of the God of Order and Justice had taken effect at this critical moment!

The gears of order began to turn slowly.

The shattered order started to rebuild itself.

Several divine messengers exchanged glances.

  After a long silence, the divine envoy acquainted with Yu Zhou spoke: "Since time has been reset, we must prevent the Son of the Plane from turning dark. Otherwise, all efforts will be in vain—the power of the law will diminish!"

  Another divine envoy replied: "We'll do our best and leave the rest to fate. If the heavens fall, the Supreme God will hold them up."

  The chaos of the vast multiverse was temporarily quelled.

*
8097 was a doomsday plane. Xu Tan, the Child of the Plane, was supposed to follow the path of "technological advancement for national prosperity." Yet his skill points suddenly went awry, leading him to develop the ruan-th108 virus.

  Commonly known as the zombie virus, it was highly contagious, airborne, and capable of penetrating Level 3 protective suits.

When the two deities descended upon this plane, they beheld a desolate, gray world.

  Walking through the gray clouds, they gazed upon the towering gray spire piercing the sky in the distance.

That was Xu Tan's kingdom.

The man who single-handedly destroyed this plane stood at the very top of the gray tower, watching the clouds.

  The deities gazed down upon this favored son of fate from above the clouds. He wore a white shirt and silver-rimmed glasses, his narrow eyes fixed on the clouds. His pale, bloodless lips curved upward in an elusive, inscrutable smile.

  Countless zombies shuffled beneath the tower, while researchers in white coats hurried through its corridors. The world revered him, feared him, despised him—yet the entire realm revolved around him. Alone at its pinnacle, he watched the clouds.

What was he thinking?
No one knew.

  Footsteps approached from behind.

A figure emerged from the shadows, walking steadily until it stood beside Xu Tan.

It was a human infected by the virus—tall and handsome in life, now covered in faintly protruding purple veins and crimson eyes.

  A zombie's lifespan was only ten years, and today marked the final day of that tenth year.

His expression was calm and detached, devoid of the despair of one facing death. Like Xu Tan, he tilted his head back, gazing at the leaden gray clouds in the sky.

He said, "It's cloudy today."   
  This human, soon to become a zombie, possessed an exceptionally hoarse yet captivating voice. Like some understated, exquisite instrument, it vibrated with a deep, resonant tone that stirred the soul.

Xu Tan turned to look at him, smiling as she said, "You're here?"

  His narrowed eyes finally focused, resting on this face. Those slender eyes gazed greedily at the zombie's godlike features. Xu Tan could no longer resist. She stepped forward, tiptoed, and gently kissed his cold lips.

  In the tenth year of the apocalypse, Xu Tan fell in love with a zombie.

  He fell in love with a zombie who retained human emotions and thoughts after infection.

  His name was Yu Zhou.

  Yu Zhou held him close as they kissed wildly beneath the gray clouds, reveling in their final moments of life.

  The god of love and desire parted the heavy clouds, and golden sunlight poured down like sand, bathing the kissing lovers.

Xu Tan's long, pale fingers traced the man's strong arm, his fingertips slowly sliding down the prominent purple veins.

  His hair was damp with sweat, lashes wet, honey-colored eyes misty. Gazing skyward, he said joyfully, "Look, the light is coming."

  Yu Zhou embraced him, stroking his eyelashes damp with sweat and tears.

A golden pillar of light enveloped them. Yu Zhou spoke calmly, "Xu Tan, I see it."

  Xu Tan smiled, nestling into Yu Zhou's embrace. He grasped Yu Zhou's hand, about to kiss its back and veins, when that hand suddenly went limp and fell from his grasp.

Separation always came so suddenly, just as their meeting had once been.

  Xu Tan paused, straightening his disheveled clothes before nestling against the lifeless corpse.

A sharp pain pierced his heart, as if it had split into two halves.

He kissed Yu Zhou's forehead and smiled. "Then take me with you. Take me away."

  "This life of mine, so full of sin, has reached its end."

Standing atop the clouds, the two gods watched in silence as the Chosen One embraced his deceased lover and leapt from the gray tower. Their bodies pierced through the clouds, ultimately crashing to the ground.

The God of Love and Desire spoke: Did you hear that?"

  The God of Power and Authority replied, "I did. It was the sound of the gears of Order beginning to turn."

  The gears of Order were turning.

  Time reset. The ravaged city regained its prosperity. Streets bustled with people, lined with green trees and red flowers.

  The zombie named Yu Zhou had transformed into a tiny infant boy, swaddled in white cotton blankets and placed beside a red trash bin.

Night had fallen. A thick stack of plane observation reports glowed with a pure light in the darkness, lying quietly beside the infant.

  Heavy snowflakes began falling from the sky. A sanitation worker in fluorescent yellow overalls swept past the trash bin with a broom when the swaddled infant suddenly let out a faint cry.

  The sanitation worker, who had no children of his own, spotted the tiny infant. After a moment of shock, he bent down and picked up the swaddled baby.

The stack of luminous plane observation reports floated up, staying close to the infant.

  Sixteen years later, as a pivotal moment approached, two deities descended once more upon this plane.

  The God of Love and Desire inquired, "What of that administrator who fell into the plane?"

  "He has been reincarnated. He is now a sixteen-year-old youth who transferred yesterday to attend his freshman year at Qingpu Noble Academy."

  The God of Power and Authority replied.

“The prestigious academy where the Chosen of the Plane attends?”

“Yes.”

  The God of Love and Desire frowned. "The administrator mentioned those Chosen Ones from the fallen planes are terrifying—utterly antisocial, psychologically twisted to the extreme. Even the seasoned plane administrator found them chilling."

  "By the way, what about the observation reports on those collapsed planes?"

  The God of Strength and Power sighed with pain: "They all fell along with that unfortunate plane administrator."

  He added, "We'll have to request the administrators resubmit them. Hopefully, not too many details are missing. Then we can address the root cause and devise a solution."

  The two Main Gods arrived at Kiyoura High School. A youth clad in sky-blue jeans and a white shirt walked past them, carrying a thick green Mewtwo vocabulary book in one hand and a black backpack on his shoulders.

  Towering in stature, his facial features were sharp and deeply carved, his expression utterly impassive.

  His eyelids were slightly lowered, raven-feathered lashes obscuring half his tea-colored irises, his gaze inscrutable.

  Amidst the bustling crowd at the school gates, the slender, upright figure had already drawn numerous admiring glances. The God of Love and Desire noticed the boy's hand, hanging loosely at his side, slowly clenching into a fist. The protruding knuckles turned faintly white.

  His heart wasn't as cold and indifferent as his exterior suggested; it was merely a mask of detachment the youth wore to conceal his inner anxiety and fear.

The god of strength and power frowned, studying the youth's features.

For some reason, he felt a vague sense of familiarity with the face before him.

  Standing before Qingpu's gates, Yu Zhou adjusted his backpack straps. Taking a deep breath, he stepped unobtrusively into the famed Qingpu Elite Academy.

Alas, he was no noble—merely a financially distressed student granted full tuition waiver by Qingpu for his exceptional academic performance.

  This wasn't Yu Zhou's reason for coming to Qingpu. What truly swayed him was the annual five-thousand-yuan subsidy. For a special-needs student, the lure of money was unimaginable—enough to make him resolve to take a risk.

It was called a risk because Qingpu wasn't exactly welcoming to students from poor families.

  In places like Qingpu, students from disadvantaged backgrounds faced subtle exclusion and even bullying.

Qingpu never published the list of special financial aid recipients and strictly protected students' personal information. Consequently, most aid recipients kept their status hidden, unwilling to reveal it to their classmates.

  At this age, students' hearts are often incredibly sensitive. A single look of pity or sympathy could break them.

Like other students in financial hardship, Yu Zhou did his best to conceal his status. Besides excelling academically, he was also skilled at gaming. Sometimes he'd earn money by coaching others, then use it to buy high-quality knockoffs at the wholesale market.

  He didn't actually want to pretend to be rich; he just hoped not to stand out as poor in an elite school like Qingpu, aiming to blend in seamlessly.

But yesterday, Yu Zhou's status as a student from an extremely poor family was exposed.

Rumors are often terrifying; any piece of gossip inevitably gets embellished as it spreads.

  Within a single day, Yu Zhou transformed into a pretentious, fake-brand-wearing, money-obsessed poor guy.

The class group chat and campus forums were flooded with Yu Zhou's "glorious deeds," even digging up photos of his usual knockoff outfits.

Who knows who took those pictures? So pointless.

  When Yu Zhou entered the classroom, the chatter abruptly halted. After a brief silence, the students resumed their conversations, but Yu Zhou could feel the furtive glances directed at him.
Yu Zhou ignored the stares and walked straight to his seat.

  Because Yu Zhou was very tall, his seat was in the back row by the window.

  After setting down his backpack, Yu Zhou discovered a dead rat inside his desk.

  A skinned, bloody dead rat.

 💞 Dear readers,
Please let me know if anything in the translation is unclear. I will clarify or improve it as needed.💞

His gaze swept across the classroom, finally settling on Xu Tan.

The youth in the white shirt was chatting and laughing with his desk mate, Sun Rao.

  His narrow eyes curved slightly, like a young fox with snow-white fur.

When conversing with others, the corners of his mouth would always lift ever so slightly, his face bearing a faint, ambiguous smile—almost as if he were flirting.

  Had Yu Zhou not witnessed Xu Tan's countless acts of cruelty, it would have been impossible to imagine that beneath such striking beauty lay a heart as savage as a beast's.

  Like a pure white rose, seemingly untouched by the world, flawlessly pristine. Yet lift the soil where it roots, and you'd find the flower growing atop a pile of white bones—chilling to the bone.

Yu Zhou tore a blank page from his exercise book and wrapped the blood-soaked mouse inside.

  The exercise books and error notebooks inside his desk were stained. Beyond the scent of blood, a nauseating, fishy stench lingered.

Zhou Sitong, seated at the desk in front of Yu Zhou, glanced back. The moment he recognized the blood-soaked rodent wrapped in paper, a piercing scream erupted from his throat.

" Eww, a dead rat!"

The shriek pierced the classroom, drawing everyone's gaze toward Yu Zhou.

Yu Zhou pulled out tissues to wipe the bloodstains. Fortunately, the cover of his error notebook was waterproof, so only the front cover was stained. Unfortunately, the blood had seeped into his English workbook, meaning he'd have to buy a new one at the bookstore after school.

  He tossed the dead rat and the exercise book into the trash bag expressionlessly, then carried the bag out of the classroom.

  Class hadn't started yet. After disposing of the trash, Yu Zhou went to the sink to wash his hands. The icy water washed over his fingertips, causing a dull ache in his knuckles from the bone-chilling cold. Yet the lingering stench still clung faintly to his fingers, deepening the gloom on Yu Zhou's face.

  Xu Tan was a born sociopath.

  His heart held no emotion, finding pleasure in others' suffering. Like a cunning, cruel hunter, he relished watching his prey's desperate struggle as death approached.

  His mind was that twisted.

  Perhaps he found high school life at Qingpu too dull, seeking amusement by tormenting Yu Zhou.

Yu Zhou's hands had grown numb under the cold water's relentless flow. He exhaled heavily, shaking the water from his hands.

  He went to the small shop outside and bought a bar of sulfur soap, some disinfectant, and a towel. Returning to the classroom, he wiped down the contents of his desk once more.

  The first class of the day was math. Yu Zhou listened attentively while taking notes. After class, he leaned slightly against the window sill, propping his hands on the ledge as he gazed outside.

  Their classroom building was on the first floor, windows open. A gentle breeze swept through as Yu Zhou gazed at the lush trees outside, momentarily lost in thought.

Groups of vibrant students passed by the window in threes and fives. Yu Zhou stared blankly at the carefree smiles on their faces.

  Under the brilliant summer sun, a blue butterfly landed lightly on the glass window. Yu Zhou's gaze paused momentarily. Just then, a youth in a white shirt walked past the window, casually glancing his way.

  His skin glowed painfully white in the sunlight, his finely drawn brows and eyes radiating indifference and impatience toward everything.

  It was Xu Tan again.

  Yu Zhou withdrew his gaze, curled his fingers, and tapped the window. The blue butterfly resting on the glass fluttered its wings and flew away.

  The math representative entered the classroom carrying a stack of report cards, distributing the monthly exam results.

Every month in sophomore year brought a monthly exam, followed by rankings. Yu Zhou consistently held the top spot in the grade.

Xu Tan, however, remained perpetually second—firmly held down by Yu Zhou with no chance of overtaking him.

  Yu Zhou took his report card and glanced at it hastily. Once again, he was ranked first in the grade, with Xu Tan still holding second place. Their scores in other subjects were neck and neck, except for Chinese, where Xu Tan scored slightly lower at 120 points.

Yu Zhou's Chinese score was 135, instantly widening the gap between them.

  Many girls in the classroom stole glances at him. A handsome, academically brilliant iceberg-type scholar was practically irresistible to girls his age.

Yu Zhou tucked the report card into his book without expression. From childhood onward, he had always ranked first in every exam. He was long accustomed to it.

  His classmate Zhou Ran, observing Yu Zhou's unruffled demeanor, muttered under his breath, "Show-off," rolled his eyes, then rolled up his school uniform sleeve to reveal a silver mechanical wristwatch.

He excitedly boasted to Sun Rao at the desk in front: "This watch is so cool, right? Just bought it yesterday. It's a limited edition—only five exist worldwide."

Sun Rao glanced at it, his interest lukewarm. "I'm not into watches. My dad ordered me a sports car last week. It cost over ten million. The only problem is I'm too young to get a license, so I can only drive it around the house for now."

  After speaking, Sun Rao kicked the desk in front of him, belonging to Zhou Simo, and demanded bluntly, "Hey, go buy me a bottle of water."

Zhou Simo, a student from a particularly poor family, was small and thin, wearing thick black-rimmed glasses. Hearing Sun Rao's request, he hesitated before glancing at the clock on the wall.

  "Class starts in a minute," he stammered.

Sun Rao crossed his arms and delivered a hard kick to Zhou Simo's chair. The student slammed forward, sending the desk jerking violently. Books and stationery scattered across the floor with a clatter.

  Zhou Simo's face flushed crimson as he crouched down to gather his belongings. Sun Rao continued kicking his chair relentlessly, drawing hoarse laughter from the boys behind them.

  Yu Zhou took a deep breath, his mind too unsettled to continue solving the math problems on his exam paper.

  Like Zhou Simo, he was a special-needs student. To protect their privacy, Qingpu never disclosed the identities of these students.

But there were three things in this world that couldn't be concealed:

Coughs, poverty, and love.

  A pair of knockoff shoes, a generic pen, an ordinary-looking shirt, or the timid demeanor of someone unaccustomed to the world—all inadvertently revealed his poverty.   
  The weak are easy prey. Poverty isn't anyone's fault, but it often means lacking the background and resources to compete with others.

  The margin for error in a poor person's life is minuscule.

For children from ordinary families, the college entrance exam is a narrow bridge to change their fate.

But for most students at Qingpu, all roads lead to Rome—the exam is merely one path among many.

  Besides, they were born in Rome.

  Yu Zhou deeply disliked Qingpu's academic atmosphere. Campus bullying incidents here had even made the news several times, prompting the school to stop publishing the number of special hardship students.

  Had it not been for Qingpu's generous scholarships and subsidies for top students, a child from a poor family like him would never have come here to study.

  Yu Zhou was a student Qingpu had recruited at great expense. To navigate these three years unscathed, he had consistently pretended to come from an upper-middle-class family. Combined with his naturally taciturn nature and minimal interaction with classmates, his facade had held firm.

  He had been extremely cautious and confident he could navigate these three years unscathed.

Yet poverty proved impossible to conceal, even for a genius with exceptional intelligence.

Seeing Zhou Simiao being bullied now filled Yu Zhou with a profound sense of desolation—perhaps akin to the sorrow one feels when a fellow creature suffers.

  Fortunately, the bell for class rang just in time. The math teacher entered with his textbook, and the students finally quieted down to continue the lesson.

Zhou Simo picked up the items from the floor, lowered his eyes, and listened quietly to the lecture.

After school, Yu Zhou went to the cafeteria for dinner and spotted Zhou Simo again in the corner.

  High schoolers, at sixteen, were at an age when emotions ran high and minds were fragile.

Loneliness and pervasive cold violence could easily shatter a young soul.

After getting his food, Yu Zhou carried his tray and sat down across from Zhou Simo.

  Zhou Simo froze. Yu Zhou looked at the stir-fried vegetables on his plate, slowly picked up a piece of potato, and popped it into his mouth. After chewing a couple of times, he said, "Have you considered transferring schools? With your grades, it wouldn't be hard to get into another school."

  Zhou Simo gave a wry smile. "Qingpu University paid a hefty sum to recruit me. My mom's sick and needs money for surgery. Transferring without a valid reason means I'd have to pay that money back."

A bitter taste rose in Yu Zhou's throat. He set down his chopsticks and said earnestly, " Then hang in there. We're in our second year of high school now. We still have a year until the college entrance exams. You need to get into a good university."

Zhou Simo's eyes lit up instantly. He grinned at Yu Zhou. "Don't worry about me. This little thing is nothing. I'm used to it."

  He smiled again. "And you have to hang in there too."

Yuzhou replied, "I will."

After finishing his meal, Yuzhou bid farewell to Zhou Simo and returned to the classroom for evening self-study.

  Qingpu High's evening study session ended at 9 PM. Yu Zhou stuffed his clothes into the deep blue backpack slung over his shoulder and took the bus home. He locked his bicycle downstairs and climbed the worn staircase to the fourth floor.

The dim, dilapidated room was empty, save for a small, dim yellow lamp glowing in the entryway.

  Yu Zhou missed his grandfather terribly.

  His grandfather, Yu Qinjian, had been a sanitation worker. The two had relied on each other for survival. Yu Zhou had once silently vowed that once he got into college and made something of himself, he would give his grandfather the best life possible.

  Sadly, the kind old man passed away during Yu Zhou's freshman year of high school.

He still remembered how his grandfather's aged face would instantly light up with a smile whenever he called him "Little Zhou."

Just thinking about it made his heart ache terribly.

  On Saturday, Yu Zhou went to the market and bought two bitter melons.

Bitter melon clears heat from the body. At Yu Zhou's age, when blood was boiling, he often lay awake at night, restless and feverish.

He deliberately chose two fresh bitter melons, because fresh ones aren't bitter at all—they even have a hint of sweetness. They're delicious in soups or stir-fries.

  Dinner was bitter melon soup and tomato scrambled eggs. After eating, he retreated to his small bedroom to play video games, losing track of time until the sun had long since set. Relying on his youth and stamina, Yu Zhou played straight through until 3 a.m.

  Pulling off his headphones, stars dancing before his eyes, Yu Zhou stood up and grabbed a bottle of milk from the fridge, gulping it down in one go.

He spent two days gaming at home, earning a little money, then frantically cramming his homework on Sunday night at 9 PM.

  At midnight, he washed up in the bathroom before collapsing sprawled out on his small bed.

Life sure was lonely.

Unable to sleep, Yu Zhou got up in the middle of the night to tidy his grandfather’s closet. The bookshelf was filled with his old textbooks, each covered in brown paper book covers his grandfather had made.

  Yu Zhou's eyes stung, and his nose suddenly felt sore.

  With reddened eyes, he carefully returned the books to their places. Just then, a stack of A4 paper suddenly fell from the top shelf, landing squarely on Yu Zhou's head.

  Clasping his head, Yu Zhou bent down to pick up the thick stack of A4 paper. Printed across it in large black numerals were the words:

—Observation Report for Dimension 8097.
"What is this?"

Yu Zhou casually flipped through it and was surprised to find it contained exquisitely drawn comics.

In the black-and-white comic, a small boy's head is held down in a bathtub filled with water by a large hand. He struggles relentlessly, his face beneath the water contorted with terror, his eyes filled with anguish.

  He seemed to be the protagonist of this comic, yet Yu Zhou found no name for him within its pages. Not only the main character, but all other figures in the comic remained nameless—even the streets and city buildings bore no labels. This led one to suspect it was an unfinished work.

  Unable to suppress his curiosity, Yu Zhou pressed onward, utterly bewildered.

  The boy in the comic was born into a wealthy family, with a gentle, beautiful mother and an extremely successful father. To outsiders, the boy's life must have seemed perfect.

But the boy's father was a man who glorified violence, a true sadist.

  His mother was a beautiful but useless woman who only knew how to spend money. She dared not cry loudly in front of her husband. The boy, covered in bruises, tried to tell his mother about his pain. Young as he was, he longed for her to save him.

  But his mother would always cover his mouth with a sad and timid expression, unable to resist her husband and unwilling to lose that unlimited black card.

  She craved dazzling jewels to adorn her beauty, reveling in parties with wealthy socialites. Adorned in the most glittering accessories and draped in the most extravagant gowns, she lived a life of opulent excess.

  Day after day, the boy grew more disappointed, his heart growing colder with each passing day.

He began torturing small animals, tormenting mice in cages. His cruelty escalated—mice gave way to rabbits, rabbits to snakes. He developed a hatred for humanity, treating others' suffering as a spice to flavor his boredom.

  He knew he was sliding into the abyss.

Yet no one could save him.

The comic abruptly ended there. Yu Zhou searched the bookshelf for a while but couldn't find the continuation. He tidied up the stack of comics and placed them in his desk drawer.

  The perk of being a top student was skipping expensive tutoring classes.

So Yu Zhou had weekends free—he could sleep until 10 a.m. if he wanted. Yet his body clock remained precise, waking him at six every morning.

With no groceries left at home, Yu Zhou splashed water on his face and headed out of the tenement building with cash in hand.

  The tenement building where Yu Zhou lived stood right next to another one. The streets were lined with tall willow trees, their branches hanging low. When the wind blew, these branches swayed softly, like green silk ribbons dancing in the breeze, adding a splash of color to the gray, dilapidated tenement buildings.

  A narrow passageway separated the two dilapidated buildings. The area suffered from poor lighting, the walls were badly weathered, and utility poles plastered with flyers occasionally came into view.

  The morning sun cast a perfect beam of golden light through the drab concrete blocks, spilling onto the narrow passageway.

A youth in a white shirt stood within that beam of light, as crisp and fresh as a clear, round dewdrop on the tip of tender green grass, utterly out of place on this narrow, cluttered street.

  Yu Zhou's footsteps halted.

The youth in the sunlight had skin so pale it seemed almost transparent. A smile played on his face as he extended a hand toward Yu Zhou. His fingers were long and slender, revealing faint bluish veins on his pale knuckles. Paired with hands as perfectly sculpted as works of art, it created an eerily cruel beauty.

  When the brain is overwhelmed by excessive stimuli, it crashes. Yu Zhou watched mechanically as Xu Tan approached him, saw Xu Tan extend those hands, filled with a sickly beauty, and snap his fingers beside his ear.

With a sharp crack, Yu Zhou snapped back to reality. He asked coldly, "What are you doing here?"

  Xu Tan smiled. "Just curious where the always-branded academic genius Yu Zhou lives."

He scanned the surroundings, his lips curling higher. "Turns out your place is worse than I imagined. Is this a dump or a slum?"

  Xu Tan covered his nose with his hand, his narrow fox-like eyes narrowing slightly. "You know, every time I pass by you, I catch this peculiar scent. Now I understand—it's the smell of an inferior being."

  His voice carried a peculiar quality—a laugh-tinged tone with the crispness of youth, yet each word grew more venomous than the last.

Yuzhou, standing a good half-head taller than Xu Tan, frowned at the remark.

  Xu Tan wore a white shirt, its pearl buttons gleaming faintly. He'd buttoned it tightly all the way up, revealing only a slender, pale stretch of neck at the collar, appearing somewhat frail.

  Xu Tan possessed a sickly beauty, and his heart was even more twisted than his appearance.

His harmless looks easily deceived others. If he wished, he could charm anyone into happily revolving around him. Even Sun Rao's gang, who constantly bullied Zhou Simo, became his little minions.

  Beyond Xu Tan's charm, perhaps an even greater factor was his father, Xu Zhi—a powerful figure in Jingzhou. Xu Tan himself was born with the status of a crown prince, destined for the throne.

With such formidable family connections, it was nearly impossible for Xu Tan to lack friends.

  In fact, the two had once been deskmates.

Back then, Yu Zhou's status as a special financial aid student hadn't been exposed yet. When students from other classes mentioned Yu Zhou, they'd always say, "That super aloof, quiet, always-wearing-XX-brand-clothes academic genius in your class."

  At sixteen, when vanity runs high, Yu Zhou tasted the bitterness of poverty while gaming to earn money for knockoff goods. Seeing classmates from wealthy families casually drop thousands on sneakers, he felt profoundly inferior.

  Compounding his misery was having a genuine heir to a wealthy family as his deskmate. This stark contrast only deepened Yu Zhou's gloom, making him dread exposure every single day.

  One day during math class, after sitting next to Xu Tan, Yu Zhou got up to refill his water cup.

  When he returned with his cup, he saw Sun Rao and his gang grinning as they tore up Zhou Simiao’s freshly taken class notes. Zhou Simiao sat silently in his chair, head bowed, too afraid to speak up.   
  Yu Zhou desperately wanted to help him, but as a student from an extremely poor family himself, he was powerless to do so.

  Besides, his rationality far outweighed his emotions. He would never do anything that exposed his own financial hardship.

  Yu Zhou pressed his lips together slightly. Looking up, he spotted his new deskmate, Xu Tan.

  Xu Tan sat in the back row of the classroom, one hand propping up his cheek while the other twirled a blue ballpoint pen. A carefree smile played on his face as he watched Sun Rao and the others tease Zhou Simiao.

  Sun Rao and his gang were the class bullies. After weighing the pros and cons, everyone else chose to look the other way, coldly observing the scene.

  Yu Zhou averted his gaze. When he spotted the ballpoint pen in Xu Tan's hand, his heart skipped a beat.

  That was his pen—not the genuine article, but a two-yuan knockoff.

  The pen was a foreign brand called Qianle, retailing at 56 yuan each. Students from well-off families in Qingpu all used this brand of stationery.

Yuzhou couldn't afford the real thing, of course. He could only buy high-quality knockoffs. While the writing was still reasonably smooth, there was a noticeable difference compared to the genuine article. Anyone who used these pens regularly could easily tell they were fakes.

  Xu Tan, however, had his pencil case filled entirely with Qianle stationery.

Yu Zhou's heart was already in his throat. He controlled his facial muscles, walked over to his seat with relative composure, placed his water cup on the windowsill, opened an English workbook, and said to Xu Tan, "Give me your pen."

  Yes, Yu Zhou had only this one pen.

He was a meticulous person, worried that someone might borrow his pen and discover it was fake. So he eliminated that possibility at the source.

  Xu Tan twirled Yu Zhou's pen in his hand, propping his chin on his palm as he tilted his head to observe Yu Zhou.

He possessed exceptionally beautiful eyes—narrow and petal-shaped, honey-colored irises clear and moist beneath thick, long lashes, always holding a faint, playful smile.

  Girls in class would often steal glances at him. The moment their eyes met Xu Tan's, these young girls, newly awakened to romance, would blush and avert their gaze, never daring to look up at him again.

But those affectionate eyes held no allure for Yu Zhou; instead, they made him more vigilant. There were three special-needs students in his class, and now only two remained.

  The first, Tan Shu, had transferred precisely because of Xu Tan's clique of followers.

Xu Tan showed no intention of returning the pen. Yu Zhou murmured again, "Give me back my pen. I need to do my homework."

  The carbon pen spun lightly between Xu Tan's fingertips. The smile vanished from his face. His chin lifted slightly, his eyelids drooping ever so slightly, revealing an expression of utter disdain.

Xu Tan leaned in slowly, his lips—tinged with a faint flush—almost brushing Yu Zhou's earlobe. His voice was soft: Top student, this pen is fake."

A thunderclap echoed in Yu Zhou's mind, yet his face remained expressionless. He reached out, seized Xu Tan's wrist, pried open his fingers, and snatched the counterfeit product from his grasp.

  He remarked in a matter-of-fact tone, "Is that so? Perhaps you bought a counterfeit."

In truth, a stationery shop stood right by the school gate, stocked predominantly with expensive Qianle pens. The likelihood of purchasing a fake was minuscule.

  Sure enough, Xu Tan let out a soft chuckle. She slowly withdrew a Qianle carbon pen from the pencil holder with her snow-white fingers, casting a half-smile, half-sneer glance at Yu Zhou.

Yu Zhou clenched the carbon pen in his hand tightly, his face tense as he tackled the English problems.

  After school that evening, Yu Zhou printed out his class notes and slipped them into Zhou Simo's desk while the classroom was empty. Sun Rao, Zhou Ran, Tan Ziqi, Wu Peiran—these bullies who constantly picked on Zhou Simo were all second-generation rich kids.

  Sigh. I hope Zhou Simiao's grades won't suffer.

Just as Yu Zhou was feeling melancholy, a solitary clap echoed behind him.

Yu Zhou's hair stood on end. Turning around, he saw Xu Tan standing at the classroom door, smiling and applauding.

  "Who would've guessed the top student in our grade is actually so kind-hearted?"

His voice rose at the end, light and cheerful, yet his eyes burned with malice.

He walked over to Yu Zhou, tilted his head, and pulled the stack of printed class notes from Zhou Simo's desk.

  Yu Zhou replied coldly, "I never would've guessed a rich kid would be so fond of meddling in others' affairs either."

Xu Tan stood a head shorter than Yu Zhou, yet he showed no sign of weakness. Narrowing his eyes slightly, his words carried a sharp edge: "Do you know what 'sympathy for one's own kind' means?"

  "Sympathy for one's kind"—meaning the sorrow felt upon witnessing the death of one's own kind, as it evokes thoughts of one's own impending fate.

Yu Zhou took a deep breath, snatched the stack of notes from Xu Tan's hand, and returned them to Zhou Simo's desk. Frowning, he stared at Xu Tan and said flatly, "I don't understand what you're talking about."

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  The next day on the way to school, Yu Zhou stopped by the stationery shop near campus. This store specialized in high-end stationery, and in a place like Qingpu where keeping up appearances was commonplace, the stationery students used had become another status symbol.

  A Qianle pen costing 56 yuan had become the standard issue for everyone, alongside expensive limited-edition fountain pens and flashy collaboration stationery.

  A fountain pen cost two thousand yuan, a diamond-encrusted mechanical pencil fifteen hundred, a limited-edition titanium-cased carbon pen thirty-seven hundred—even shoelaces sold in the stationery store fetched two hundred and fifty yuan a pair.

  Luxury goods are all about flaunting one's status. In terms of practicality, those thousand-yuan pens are no better than the three-for-two yuan carbon pens on Pinduoduo.

  But who hasn't yearned for such things?
Being a beggar isn't pitiable. What's truly pitiful is when that beggar covets the expensive diamonds in the display window—that feeling of striving desperately yet never attaining it is what drives people mad.

  This was Yu Zhou's first time stepping into this store. He wandered to the Qianle stationery section, hesitated for a long time before finally picking up a Qianle carbon pen.

  Buying such a pen meant going hungry tomorrow morning.

  Fifty-six yuan—his living expenses for three days.

  Even if he spent his free time collecting bottles and cardboard, a month’s worth would only fetch twenty yuan.

  The rich squandered money recklessly, while the poor were dying of poverty.

  His heart bled as he walked out of the stationery store clutching the carbon pen. But he had no choice. What if his desk mate Xu Tan messed with his pen again? His status as a special-needs student might be exposed.

  Beyond fearing bullying, a touch of vanity also played a part. He dreaded imagining the looks he'd get from the well-off students in class if his status as a special financial aid student were exposed.

Pity? Sympathy? Schadenfreude? Or outright mockery?
  Mock the top student in the grade for wearing counterfeit designer clothes?
Yuzhou stepped into Class 3 holding that carbon pen. Half the students were already there, chatting quietly. After gaming half the night, he pulled a packet of instant coffee from his pocket and poured it into a cup.

  Xu Tan sat down with his backpack, his fingertips tinged with pale pink as he pinched the instant coffee packet.

He sniffed it, wrinkled his nose, and said with a smile, "I thought there was a coffee shop near school?"

  There was indeed a coffee shop near the school—a globally renowned chain where even the cheapest cup cost 38 yuan.

Yu Zhou’s instant coffee had been purchased through group buying on Pingxi Xi, averaging less than 70 cents per packet.

At an elite school like Qingpu, no one drank instant coffee. Nearly everyone carried a freshly brewed Coko coffee.

  Yu Zhou swirled his water cup, glanced at Xu Tan, and remarked indifferently, "Is drinking instant coffee illegal?"

Xu Tan's smile deepened slightly. He tossed Yu Zhou's coffee packet into the trash bag and rubbed the lingering coffee residue from his fingers.

  "This coffee tastes cheap."

Yu Zhou took a sip, his temper simmering. He pulled out a CET-6 dictionary from his desk and began underlining unfamiliar words with his new carbon pen.

  After just two pages, a fluffy head leaned in. A faint, fresh scent of plants wafted over as Xu Tan rested his chin on Yu Zhou's shoulder, smiling as he gently took the carbon pen from Yu Zhou's hand.

"It's not counterfeit, is it?"

  Xu Tan chuckled, twirling the pen lightly on his slender, flower-branch-like fingers. Holding it steady, he drew a big smiley face on Yu Zhou’s CET-6 vocabulary book.

  Yu Zhou sat upright in his seat, his back straight as an arrow. He stared at the smiley face on the vocabulary book, then glanced at the fluffy head resting on his shoulder. Taking a deep breath, he reached out and gently pushed Xu Tan's head away.

Xu Tan didn't seem to mind. Examining the carbon pen in her hand, she said slowly, " Wow, it really is real."

  Yu Zhou set his vocabulary book aside, grabbed Xu Tan's wrist, and yanked the pen out of his hand with force.

  Yu Zhou's grip was strong. When he released it, a bright red fingerprint mark appeared on Xu Tan's slender, pale wrist.

  Xu Tan raised her wrist, staring at the imprint for a moment before suddenly kicking Yu Zhou's calf with her shoe tip. Tilting her head, she said, "The monthly exam is next week. Guess who'll be top of the grade?"

  Yu Zhou flipped a page in his CET-6 vocabulary book, covering the smiley face Xu Tan had drawn on it, and replied coldly, "Boring."

Though outwardly calm, during the monthly exam, Yu Zhou deliberately got one multiple-choice question and one fill-in-the-blank question wrong.

  He thought resentfully—if Xu Tan took first place in the whole school, maybe she wouldn't keep fixating on him.

Xu Tan was exceptionally skilled at putting on a facade. For some reason, this annoying girl always showed her worst side without restraint right in front of him.

  Contrary to his hopes, when the report cards were handed out, Yu Zhou found his name at the top of the list, beating Xu Tan—the second-ranked student—by a mere five points.

  His eyes widened further upon seeing Xu Tan’s Chinese score: a mere 110 points.

  It was enough to make one’s hair stand on end.

  Could Xu Tan's Chinese possibly get any worse?

Yuzhou leaned on the windowsill, staring speechlessly at the sky. It was as blue as washed silk, with a single bird soaring overhead.

Classmates holding their report cards murmured in astonishment.

" Yu Zhou is so impressive, topping the grade again."

"Yeah, even with those tough math questions, he only got two wrong!"

"The top ten spots come and go, but the top two are always in our class!"

"True, the gap between them wasn't huge this time, but Xu Tan always ends up behind Yu Zhou."

  "Sigh, Xu Tan scores near perfect in every other subject, but Chinese really holds him back."

  "Didn't the Chinese teacher say last time his essays are dry and emotionless? Everything he writes reads like an argumentative essay."

  "Yu Zhou is still the best. He's the real deal—a true scholar with no weaknesses, a perfect all-rounder."

  The all-around scholar Yu Zhou was memorizing vocabulary.

  He wasn't quite as formidable as his classmates made him out to be. His science and Chinese were solid, but English posed a challenge. Add to that the fact that Teacher Qingpu often tested students with questions beyond the syllabus, forcing Yu Zhou to study English diligently just to score high on exams.

  After class began, the teacher praised Yu Zhou as usual. Yu Zhou sat expressionless at his desk, still the aloof student in everyone's eyes.

  Truthfully, Yu Zhou was simply an indifferent person. Aside from his grandfather, few could elicit a smile from him or stir significant emotional response. He possessed remarkable emotional resilience, a steel-like heart, and formidable psychological fortitude.

  After evening study ended, Yu Zhou took a detour before boarding the bus home. Halfway through the ride, a heavy rain began to fall outside.

  Amid the steady patter of raindrops, Yu Zhou yawned and fell asleep, clutching his backpack.

  In his sleep, a faint scent of grass and plants suddenly filled the air. Yu Zhou opened his eyes groggily. Through blurry vision, a slender, delicate hand waved before him. The palm was soft and pink, like a cat's plush paw pad.

  Yu Zhou jolted awake, his eyes snapping wide. Looking up, he found a handsome, smiling face hovering over him.

  It was Xu Tan.

  What was he doing on this bus?!

  Yu Zhou sat up straight. Xu Tan clung to the seat behind him, his dark almond eyes fixed on Yu Zhou as he spoke in his usual sticky-sweet tone: "First time riding the bus. It's such a novel experience. Who knew you could travel this far for just one yuan?"

  Yu Zhou took a deep breath, his cold, tea-colored eyes fixed on Xu Tan's smiling face.

"Xu Tan, why are you following me?"

Xu Tan's smile remained unchanged. It was like a mask, perfectly fitted to his face, never removed.

  Under the dim bus lights, his eyes grew more like glass beads—translucent, cold, devoid of life or emotion.

He often used that same gaze when watching Sun Rao and his crew bully the impoverished students.

  Though Sun Rao's gang seemed capable of any evil, in truth, Sun Rao and Zhou Ran were merely Xu Tan's lackeys.

The most terrifying, spine-chilling figure had always been Xu Tan.

The bus rolled past stop after stop.

Yu Zhou never got off.

  He knew he'd been exposed.

When the bus reached its final stop, the rain outside still showed no sign of letting up. The driver began urging passengers to disembark. Yu Zhou abruptly stood up, grabbed Xu Tan's wrist, and yanked him off the bus.

  The rain poured down that day, a downpour so fierce it stung the eyes. Both men were soaked to the bone, yet Xu Tan pulled out his phone and began snapping photos of the tower block, which could only be described as a shantytown.

Amid the thunder and rain, Xu Tan's voice, dripping with contempt and scorn, pierced straight through Yu Zhou's skull.

  "You sure know how to put on a show, huh? You're practically scraping the bottom of the barrel, aren't you? You're nothing but a rat living in a stinking sewer! Tomorrow I'll post these photos in our class group chat so everyone can see what kind of trashy place our 'genius student' who wears designer labels every day actually lives in!"

  The next day, Xu Tan didn't show up for class, supposedly with a bad cold.

In reality, he'd been dragged into the dormitory building by an enraged Yu Zhou and beaten until his butt was swollen.

  The reason for spanking Xu Tan's bottom was that the flesh there was plentiful and unlikely to be injured easily. After all, Yu Zhou was a poor student—if he really caused Xu Tan serious harm, he couldn't afford the medical bills.

  A week had passed since the incident.

  Yu Zhou had been filled with regret ever since. Being targeted by someone as maliciously intent as Xu Tan was sheer bad luck.

  He shouldn't have crossed this little devil—after all, the Xu family could crush him like an insect with a flick of their finger.

  Now Xu Tan had tracked him down to his home. It made sense—for a spoiled, top-tier rich kid like Xu Tan, investigating a poor student was no trouble at all.

Yu Zhou pushed Xu Tan away as he approached, his voice cold with a sneer. "If I'm an inferior being, then what are you? Someone I've always kept beneath me—the lowest of the low?"

  Xu Tan smiled. His smile was always hazy, never quite a smile, like viewing flowers through mist—a veil that prevented anyone from glimpsing his true thoughts beneath the mask.

“Just a few points higher on the test, and now you’re all puffed up?”

  He draped an arm over Yu Zhou’s shoulder, narrowing his fox-like eyes as he surveyed the cramped, crowded surroundings of the tenement building. "Then again, people like you only have one path. You’re forced to jostle with thousands of others on that single plank bridge. That’s why you value grades above everything else."

  Yu Zhou swatted Xu Tan's hand away. "What's the point of saying that to me? Trying to make me look uncomfortable?"

He scrutinized Xu Tan from head to toe, his expression dripping with sarcasm. "Is it because rich kids like you have too many options, so you're bored enough to hang out with lowlifes like me?"

  Xu Tan replied, "Exactly. That's who I am—rich and idle. I don't have to cross that narrow bridge of the college entrance exam like you do. So when I'm bored, I just have to find my own fun."

  He hooked his finger through the drawstring of Yu Zhou’s hoodie, twisting the light gray cord round and round his pale pink fingertips. Yu Zhou couldn’t hold back any longer and snapped, "Xu Tan, you’re sick!"

  Xu Tan chuckled. "You were pretty tough when you dragged me into that dorm building to beat me up. Now you're backing down?"

  Yu Zhou stared at his sly, malicious expression, clenching his jaw and letting his handsome face grow icy. "I have a short fuse. If you want me to drag you into that dorm building and spank you again, go ahead and keep talking."

  Anger flared in Xu Tan’s eyes. That had been one of the most humiliating moments of his life, a memory that still filled him with shame whenever it surfaced.

Seeing him get worked up gave Yu Zhou a sense of satisfaction. He couldn’t be bothered with this rich layabout. He reached out again, gripping Xu Tan’s wrist firmly and yanking the drawstring of his hoodie free from the other’s fingers.

  He strode forward, walking all the way to the nearby vegetable market.

The market bustled with people. Yu Zhou closed his eyes and massaged his temples before approaching a stall selling cilantro and tomatoes.

  Standing before the stall, he selected tomatoes and bought a bunch of tender young cilantro. Near the morning market, someone was selling egg pancakes. The aroma was irresistibly tempting, wafting straight into Yu Zhou's nostrils. He swallowed hard, then pulled out five yuan to buy two egg pancakes.

  Truthfully, if it weren't for discovering such a vast wealth gap between himself and his classmates after entering Qingpu, this life wasn't so bad. It was certainly better than those who slept rough and ate in the open.

But how to put it?

  Yu Zhou recalled a line—I could have endured the darkness, had I never seen the light.

Once the stark divide between rich and poor was laid bare before him, the impact was overwhelming.

  Helplessness, confusion, despair, and utter disillusionment—Yu Zhou had experienced them all.

He’d once been obsessed with a sports car model priced at five hundred yuan, displayed in a shop window. Every time he passed by, he’d circle the store, gazing through the glass at the model car inside.

  Just as he yearned for that model car beyond reach, Xu Tan owned a real sports car. Dressed in trendy clothes, he sat cross-legged on the hood of the silver-gray vehicle, wearing that half-smile, half-sneer—lazy and weary.

  Seeing that social media post had stung Yu Zhou's pride a little. From that day on, he never went to look at that sports car model again.

  It was like comparing heaven and earth, clouds and mud. It took Yu Zhou a long time to adjust his mindset.

  Munching on his egg pancake, he carried tomatoes and cilantro home, picking up a few empty water bottles along the way to sell for scrap money at month's end.

  Returning to that narrow alleyway, Yu Zhou deliberately scanned the area. Xu Tan was nowhere to be seen. Such a wealthy young master could hardly tolerate this environment; every extra second felt suffocating.

  After washing the vegetables and stowing them in the fridge, Yu Zhou returned to his bedroom to do homework. The room in the tower block was tiny—a 1.2-meter single bed and a 1.5-meter desk occupied most of the space. The wall behind the desk was entirely covered by bookshelves, while the floor was tiled with old-fashioned, garishly patterned light green ceramic tiles.

  Yu Zhou cherished his little room. He was an exceptionally diligent and clean boy, tidying the place spotless every day.

  He worked through his homework at lightning speed. Many math problems required no paper calculations—he could solve them mentally in a single pass.

  This meant classroom assignments took little time, freeing him to play online games for money.

Yu Zhou began tapping away at his game again, earning cash. For those without much, money offered a rare sense of security.

  The top student's gaming skills were also top-notch, allowing him to earn several hundred yuan a week.

The phone set aside began emitting message alerts. After finishing a game, Yu Zhou casually picked it up to glance at the class group chat.

Yu Zhou tapped into the class group, and his previously relaxed expression instantly darkened.

  Sun Rao @All Class Members: "Hahaha, come see where our top student Yu Zhou lives!"

The photo showed those two dilapidated, gray tower blocks.

  Zhou Ran: "Whoa, so the all-brand-name academic superstar actually lives in this slum? Is this place even habitable? Won't the building collapse?"

Other classmates in the group joined in the mockery.

"Seriously!"

  "No way! Seeing that arrogant vibe Yu Zhou gives off, I thought he came from some well-to-do family?"

  Messages flooded the chat.

  Yu Zhou's face darkened like storm clouds. He directly tagged Zhou Ran: "It won't collapse. And if it does, you'll be the first one crushed to death."

  Yu Zhou’s blunt retort instantly silenced the class group chat. The other students stopped their teasing.

  Yu Zhou sent another message in the group.   
  “So what if I wear knockoffs? Did I spend your family’s money? Did I eat your family’s rice? Mind your own damn business.”

  That's how school bullying works—they always pick on the weak.

If your personality is like a soft lump of dough, people will just knead and mold you however they please. But if you show your thorns, they'll find you prickly and hesitate to mess with you.

And Yu Zhou had never been one to take things lying down.

  The class group chat fell silent.

Yu Zhou tossed his phone onto the bed and downed a large gulp of water from his cup.

Saying he didn't care was a lie, but since it had already happened, he couldn't let it escalate further. As long as he acted indifferent, no one would use this against him.

  Yu Zhou quickly came to terms with it. On Monday morning, he rose early. The cool breeze brushed his face as he arrived first in the classroom, pausing before Xu Tan’s desk.

The bloody dead rat in that desk drawer remained etched in Yu Zhou’s memory.

  He was absolutely unwilling to suffer even the slightest loss.

As classmates gradually entered the classroom, Yu Zhou caught Xu Tan walking in with a cup of coffee out of the corner of his eye. A faint smile touched his lips.

Xu Tan placed the coffee on her desk and reached into her desk to grab the unfinished exam paper.

  The math paper lay on top, easily accessible. Just as Xu Tan's fingers closed around it to pull it out, his knuckles suddenly brushed against something cold, soft, and wriggling.

His fingers froze instantly. His muscles and joints seemed to betray his brain's commands, slowly lowering his head like a rusted robot.