Xu Muchan sighed after being locked inside the equipment room.
He felt that people who enjoyed bullying others really had no creativity at all. They kept using the same childish tricks over and over again.
What era was this?
If someone was locked inside and could not get out, wouldn’t they simply call for help?
Those three people had apparently not even considered that possibility. They had locked him in here and simply left.
Xu Muchan found it utterly baffling.
However, he had deliberately played along with this idiotic little performance for another purpose, so naturally he was in no hurry to leave.
Instead, he slowly felt his way around until he found a place to sit down. He placed his white cane beside him, then took the stone statue out of his crossbody bag and hugged it against his chest.
In a dejected tone, he said,
“Big Brother, you’re not here, and someone bullied me again.”
“I thought that after coming to a new school, I would finally find someone willing to be friends with me…”
The sadness in the young boy’s voice grew deeper and deeper.
The dim light from outside cast a shadow across his lowered profile, making him look fragile and pitiful.
His thin shoulders also curled inward slightly.
After a moment of silence, his body suddenly trembled violently, as though he were crying but did not want anyone to see his tears. So, in a futile attempt to deceive himself, he buried his face in the crook of his arms.
Outside the window, Wei Yao witnessed the scene and could not help cursing.
Originally, he had planned to wait until the little blind guy suffered a little before making a dramatic appearance as the hero who rescued the beauty.
But after unexpectedly seeing this scene, Wei Yao, who rarely experienced a pang of conscience, could no longer wait.
He slapped the window hard and shouted,
“Little blind guy, stop crying! Wait for me. I’ll open the door for you!”
After saying that, he ran toward the main entrance.
Only to discover that the door was locked.
Wei Yao cursed again.
“Wait for me!”
Then he raised his foot and kicked the door hard.
Unfortunately, the metal door of the equipment room was clearly much sturdier and more durable than the mortal flesh of Young Master Wei.
His kick failed to open the door and nearly broke his own leg instead.
His face twisted in pain as he gritted his teeth. Afraid that the person inside might hear him, he endured the pain with a grimace.
Only after the pain subsided somewhat did he shout,
“Don’t be afraid! I’ll go find that idiot Jinqi and get the key from him to open the door for you. I’ll be back soon!”
After saying that, he limped away as fast as the wind.
Xu Muchan slowly raised his head. ?
He recognized the voice as belonging to Wei Yao, his classmate, but he did not quite understand. Wei Yao had not exactly been friendly toward him before. In fact, the two of them had even gotten off on the wrong foot. So why had Wei Yao suddenly appeared to rescue him?
Xu Muchan certainly did not want Wei Yao meddling and ruining his plans.
He had to hurry.
With that thought, Xu Muchan put the stone statue back into his bag, stood up with the aid of his white cane, and headed toward the main door without hesitation.
The equipment room contained many metal shelves, with all kinds of sports equipment piled beside them. Some things had not yet been put away and were arranged in complete disorder. Someone with normal eyesight could easily avoid them, but for a blind and flustered teenager, there were simply too many obstacles.
Just as he was about to collide with a metal shelf, the shelf in front of him was suddenly pushed aside by an invisible force.
The metal frame scraped against the tiled floor, producing a sharp, ear-piercing sound.
Xu Muchan, however, seemed to be startled by the noise and hurriedly took several large steps backward.
But there were also shelves piled high with equipment behind him. Some of the items could not even fit on the shelves and had simply been stacked along the walkway.
Just as he was about to trip again, the shelves and miscellaneous objects behind him were moved aside one by one in time.
For a moment, the entire equipment room was filled with all kinds of sharp, grating noises.
Xu Muchan suddenly stopped.
As though he had realized something, he turned his face around, searching in every direction.
“Big Brother, is that you?”
The boy’s voice was soft and gentle, filled with unmistakable joy.
No one answered.
The disappointment on his face was obvious, but he continued,
“Big Brother, are you still angry with me? Because I wouldn’t listen to you and insisted on leaving the village to return to the Xu family?”
The noises in the equipment room stopped.
All the obstacles within two meters of Xu Muchan had been cleared away. The shelves were piled against other shelves, while sports equipment was scattered everywhere, making the entire room look as though a hurricane had swept through it.
Xu Muchan released his grip on the white cane and crouched down where he stood, hugging his knees. His expression became even more pitiful.
“I remember that I was sold. If there had been any other way, I wouldn’t have wanted to come back either. But I can’t see anymore. Yundong doesn’t have any good hospitals, and the money I’ve saved isn’t enough for medical treatment. I won’t be able to go to school anymore, and the people in the village won’t care about me…”
“But the Xu family has money. They can send me to a major hospital. Maybe there’s still a way to cure my eyes…”
Xu Muchan had originally only intended to act pitiful.
But as he continued speaking, he seemed to genuinely feel wronged. His eyes grew slightly moist, and his voice trembled.
“I don’t want to be blind for the rest of my life. I want to go to college. I want to find a good job someday…”
The boy’s shoulders trembled slightly. His eyelashes lowered, and transparent tears fell with soft patter onto the tiled floor.
When Xu Muchan first learned that he might lose his sight, he had not cried.
At that time, he had simply desperately searched for information and done his best to prepare for the worst possible outcome.
But now, he cried.
He could not say whether it was because he was afraid or because he felt wronged.
In the darkness, a faint sigh sounded.
Xu Muchan felt a cool sensation touch his sore, tearful eyelids. He reached out to touch it, but his fingers found nothing.
It was as though that fleeting sensation had merely been an illusion.
“Big Brother, are you still angry?” Xu Muchan asked, his voice thick with tears.
The answer came in the form of a creaking sound as the metal door opened.
A faint breeze came from behind him.
The door was open.
Big Brother had opened the door for him, yet still refused to show himself.
Xu Muchan could not understand why, but he had not forgotten today’s purpose.
He felt around until he found his white cane, sniffled, and asked the silent air,
“Big Brother, will you keep protecting me like you did before?”
“There are so many strange things outside the village. I can’t see them. I’m scared.”
The open door was blown back and forth by the wind. The old hinges creaked eerily, as though urging Xu Muchan to hurry outside.
Xu Muchan understood.
He casually wiped his face and curled the corners of his lips into a smile.
“Thank you, Big Brother. With you here, I’m not so scared anymore.”
.
Wei Yao desperately ran back with the key, afraid that if he took too long, the little blind guy would be scared out of his wits.
In order to get the key as quickly as possible, he had gotten into a fight with Jinqi.
His left cheek had taken a punch by accident and was still faintly throbbing with pain.
But compared with the excitement of rescuing the little blind guy from danger, that little bit of pain was nothing.
Wei Yao rushed back to the equipment room like a gust of wind, only to see that the equipment room’s main door, which had originally been locked from the outside, was now half open.
His heart immediately sank.
He hurried over and pushed the door open, only to collide head-on with Xu Muchan, who was feeling his way toward the entrance.
If Xu Muchan had not been walking so slowly, the door Wei Yao shoved open would probably have slammed straight into his face.
Xu Muchan stopped.
He tilted his head and listened for a moment before hesitantly asking,
“Wei Yao?”
Wei Yao was breathing heavily.
He was also somewhat dumbfounded when he saw Xu Muchan and the open door.
“Who opened the door for you?”
Xu Muchan reacted quickly and asked in confusion,
“Didn’t you open it?”
Wei Yao scratched his head.
He felt that something about this was strange, but he could not explain it for the moment.
So he simply grabbed Xu Muchan by the wrist and pulled him outside.
“Forget it. We’ll talk about it later. Let’s get out first.”
Xu Muchan stumbled several steps as Wei Yao pulled him along and led him out of the equipment room.
However, he quickly pulled his hand free and frowned.
“I can walk by myself.”
Wei Yao turned around, originally intending to lecture him a little.
But when he saw Xu Muchan’s reddened eyes and the dried tear tracks on his face, he immediately began stammering.
“You—you’ve got to be way too scared! I was only gone for ten minutes or so. How did you end up crying this badly?”
Xu Muchan had not expected an outsider to see him in such an embarrassing state, and he immediately became somewhat unhappy.
And Wei Yao’s way of speaking was genuinely irritating.
He had actually called Xu Muchan timid.
The few points Wei Yao had gained in Xu Muchan’s estimation for coming to help had immediately dropped again.
Xu Muchan turned his head and “looked” toward Wei Yao’s right side.
Suddenly, he asked,
“Wei Yao, who’s the person beside you?”
Wei Yao: ????
He abruptly turned his head and looked to both sides.
He was so frightened that he stammered even more.
“It—it’s late at night. D-don’t say weird things! Where would there be anyone beside me?”
Xu Muchan tilted his face as though listening.
After a moment, he turned toward Wei Yao again and said in confusion,
“But he says he’s your older brother.”
Wei Yao’s face instantly went white.
He did indeed have an older brother.
And that older brother was already dead.
Very few people knew about this.
Xu Muchan had only just transferred here. There was even less possibility that he could know about it…
Wei Yao felt as though he was about to have a heart attack.
He did not even dare glance sideways with his peripheral vision.
He immediately skipped over the subject and said in a trembling voice,
“Stop talking about it… Evening self-study is about to start. Let’s hurry back to the classroom. There are more people in the classroom…”
Xu Muchan could hear the fear in his voice.
He tilted his head.
“You’re afraid of ghosts?”
Wei Yao immediately jumped like a startled cat.
Lowering his voice, he scolded the little blind guy for being so ignorant of taboos.
“Don’t mention that word at night! What if you actually attract one?!”
Xu Muchan perfunctorily went,
“Oh.”
Fortunately, he kindly did not continue.
In reality, he was not trying to scare Wei Yao.
There really were ghosts beside Wei Yao.
And not just one.
There were many.
The moment the two of them left, Jinqi and the other two returned.
Seeing the equipment room’s open door, Jinqi cursed.
“Fuck. Is that idiot Wei Yao crazy? Why did he suddenly decide to meddle in this?”
When Wei Yao had come to ask him for the key, Jinqi had naturally refused to give it to him.
Although Wei Yao and Jinqi had never had much interaction and their circles of friends did not overlap, they had both heard of each other’s reputations.
This was the first time they had directly gone up against each other.
Jinqi had originally thought Wei Yao would back down once he realized the situation was difficult.
Who would have thought that the other guy would immediately throw punches at the slightest disagreement, like a mad dog?
Although Jinqi’s side had three people, Wei Yao had clearly undergone specialized combat training. Even fighting three against one, he had not been at a disadvantage.
Jinqi had not gotten anything out of the fight. He could still taste blood in his mouth.
Furious, he kicked the equipment room door and snarled,
“I’ll remember this grudge. I’ll definitely make him pay someday!”
Beside him, Chen Zhou looked through the open doorway into the equipment room.
The scene inside, which looked as though a storm had swept through it, startled him.
“How did all the shelves in the equipment room fall over? Don’t tell me that idiot Wei Yao went crazy and did this?”
Liang Yong saw it too.
Curious, he walked inside and kicked the nearest shelf.
“No way, right? This shelf is so heavy.”
Jinqi was already furious. He had no interest in discussing shelves.
Seeing the other two still having the leisure to inspect them, he cursed,
“Stop fucking wasting time. Are we leaving or not?”
“Yeah, yeah, we’re leaving.”
Seeing that Jinqi looked particularly bad-tempered, Liang Yong exchanged a glance with Chen Zhou and immediately headed outside.
Just as they were about to leave, the door, which had been standing wide open, suddenly slammed shut with a tremendous BANG.
The three of them jumped.
“Who the fuck is playing tricks outside?”
Jinqi strode over and grabbed the door handle, continuing to curse in increasingly colorful language.
“Fucking idiot! When I catch you, you’re dead!”
He violently yanked the handle several times, only to discover that the door would not open at all.
Only then did he realize there was a problem.
He turned back toward Liang Yong and Chen Zhou.
“That idiot outside probably locked the door. Call Xilong and have him come open it for us.”
Xilong was the class’s physical education representative. He had always had a good relationship with the PE teacher and had a key to the equipment room.
The key Jinqi had was a duplicate he had gotten made from Xilong’s.
Liang Yong pulled out his phone and tried to make a call.
But he discovered that his phone had no signal at all.
“I don’t have any signal. What about yours?”
Chen Zhou took out his own phone and checked.
There was no signal on his either.
He turned toward the person beside him.
“Jinqi, do you have any signal?”
“I don’t have any signal either…”
A girl giggled beside him.
Her voice was almost pressed directly against his ear.
It was a female voice.
Not Jinqi’s.
But if it wasn’t Jinqi…
Then who was it?
An immense terror seized Chen Zhou.
Under extreme fear, his throat could not produce a sound.
Only his head, controlled by his body’s instinct, slowly turned around like a rusty gear, stiffly and jerkily—
And met a deathly pale face filled with malice…