Chapter 89 - Again
Chapter 89: Again
Translator: Larbre Studio Editor: Larbre Studio
....“Do you know Zhou Xiaoxiao? What is your relationship with her?” Wang Mengmeng avoided answering the question, but Li Xianyu opened his eyes and questioned loudly.
Her eyes were big, her eyes were round. She did not have any evil auras around her. On the contrary, she was a little beauty.
Wang Mengmeng was struggling internally. She preferred to convince herself that Li Xianyu and Zhou Xiaoxiao had known each other, or that he possibly had an understanding of this matter, rather than face up to the speculation that made her cold-hearted.
Li Xianyu puffed out a mouthful of smoke as he gazed behind Wang Mengmeng. “Look at me.”
Wang Mengmeng couldn’t understand his intentions. As she heard his words, she looked at his eyes. As the smoke between them rose and drifted, she saw her reflection in his bright eyes and the ghost in her school uniform standing behind her.
Zhou Xiaoxiao?!
She suddenly felt great fear and an intense chill up her spine. Wang Mengmeng’s legs buckled as she screamed and threw himself into Li Xianyu’s arms. “Help me…”
Her entire body trembled. Ger voice sounded like a passer-by trekking in the harsh winter.
Li Xianyu looked down at her pale face and placed his left arm around Wang Mengmeng’s waist. The latter, on the contrary, felt a little more at ease as she grabbed Li Xianyu’s arm tightly. Her heart beat rapidly as she implored, “Save me.”
When she spoke, her eyes kept looking backwards, but she dared not look back.
Wang Mengmeng did not know whether Li Xianyu could save herself or not. She just instinctively asked for help. However, the man beside her gave her an indescribable sense of stability.
Woah, this chick has a good figure… Li Xianyu embraced her and gave her an extra point silently in his heart.
“Do you have anything you want to tell me?” asked Li Xianyu.
Wang Mengmeng’s expression was ever-changing as she bit his lip. “Yes, Zhou Xiaoxiao was trapped in the water room.”
Li Xianyu’s eyelids twitched. According to his legal knowledge, even if this matter was not enough for someone to be charged of murder, the minimum consequence was criminal responsibility.
“Are you involved?” he murmured deeply.
Wang Mengmeng looked odd, nodded, and shook her head.
“Zhou Xiaoxiao was an eccentric person who didn’t like to communicate with others. She was very calculative as well. She always argued with her classmates because of trivial matters. Over time, she was outcasted. Later, the students found out that even if they bullied her, her parents did not come to school to make trouble. The teachers did not care much either. So, she was marked as the bullying target by the girls in the class.”
Most of the violence on campus was due to the following few factors: poor interpersonal skills, lax enforcement with punishments in schools, and irresponsible parents.
Wang Mengmeng suddenly shivered as she shrunk in Li Xianyu’s arms. At this time, Zhou Xiaoxiao’s spirit stood beside her, as she almost stuck her pale face beside Wang Mengmeng.
“Amongst everyone, two of the female classmates went the most overboard. Every day, their pleasure was to bully her with the others. They threatened her that if she dared to tell the teacher, they would find someone to rape and disfigure her. Zhou Xiaoxiao was frightened. After a long time, she got used to it. They took her pocket money, kicked her into the shit trough of the women’s toilet, and dragged her into the grass behind the school to beat her up. She didn’t even resist; she just knew how to endure. The girls’ families were quite well off. Their parents ran a business and had contacts with my family. I’m one of their team. But I never bullied Zhou Xiaoxiao on my own initiative. But I didn’t dissuade them either. Zhou Xiaoxiao was not well-liked either.”
She couldn’t see that Zhou Xiaoxiao’s expression was already very fierce. Her bloodshot pupils were slowly replaced by cataracts.
In dealing with aggrieved spirits, there were two rules: first, no looking at them directly. Second, their direct names were not to be called.
There would be repercussions if they existed in one’s mind. If one were to call their names directly, it was highly likely that they would be attracted to the caller.
Li Xianyu frowned and tightened all his muscles as he gathered his strength. Zhou Xiaoxiao seemed to have been scalded as she drifted away quickly.
Wang Mengmeng suddenly felt the chill receding. The man in front of her seemed to emit some heat as her cold body gradually recovered its temperature. Her delicate body was close to Li Xianyu. “After school that day, everyone left except for the four of us. The two girls beat Zhou Xiaoxiao up and pushed her into the water room, saying that as long as she spent a night in there, they would not bully her in the future. I didn’t think it was right to do this, but I didn’t want to fight with the two of them over Zhou Xiaoxiao. Hence, I closed one eye…”
“Who knows that Zhou Xiaoxiao died the next day?”
“We were all very afraid. We agreed that nobody would say anything about it, and just pass it off as an accident from playing hide-and-seek.”
“After all these years, although they no longer mentioned Zhou Xiaoxiao, I could feel that they regretted what they had done, at the party that day. So, at the suggestion of the classmates, they went to the water room and said those words, in order to make themselves feel better. I followed suit, but who knew…”
Wang Mengmeng’s big eyes were full of tears.
Li Xianyu closed her eyes and imagined that they had returned to campus.
A group of grown-up young people had returned to their alma mater, mourning the early death of their classmate. Three of the girls stood in front, recalling their mistakes in their youth as they expressed their remorse, hoping that her dead soul would rest in peace.
Rather than expressing remorse, Li Xianyu felt that what they said and did was just to make themselves feel better.
They had no supernatural eye, so they couldn’t see inside the boiling water room. Perhaps, when they bowed their heads, the young aggrieved spirit had been standing in front of them.
After they had said their pieces and did what they were supposed to do, they turned around and left, continuing with their lives.
At the moment when they turned around, they felt relieved, as if they had been spared. Their normal laughing and chatter resumed. No one noticed that the dead spirit had started to follow behind them.
Li Xianyu opened his eyes, saw Wang Mengmeng’s nervous expression, and the fierce gaze of the aggrieved spirit from a distance.
The spirit had been formed because of someone’s lingering thoughts. However, they had no way to communicate with others. He was able to be conscious about this, because he had not been tainted by the resentment of spirits.
In this case, the two girls had encountered an accident. Back then, they were still junior high school students, even if the truth came to light, they would not need to be responsible. Being juveniles, the law would forgive them.
However, karma would not spare them ultimately. Hence, they were not worthy of any sympathy.
What about Wang Mengmeng? Should she, as a bystander in this incident, pay the price with her life, for her indifference?
Inevitably, Li Xianyu recalled a great controversy on the Internet. The topic went like this: helping someone was a bonus, not helping someone was the norm.
However, if Wang Mengmeng stood up to them at that time or had gone to find the teacher afterwards, maybe Zhou Xiaoxiao would not have died.
The possible price she had to pay was that she would follow in Zhou Xiaoxiao’s footsteps and be excluded by their classmates…
Li Xianyu suddenly laughed uncontrollably and wondered why he had thought so much. He had seen incidents of campus violence before. There were always one or two students in the class who were bullied and excluded. However, when that happened, who stood up for them? Definitely no one, not even himself.
Since the vast majority of people could not do that, why would Wang Mengmeng be able to?
“Close your eyes.” He put his hand over Wang Mengmeng’s big eyes, pulled out his badge which was becoming increasingly obsolete these days, and shot it out with his fingers.
The badge transformed into a ray of light as it penetrated Zhou Xiaoxiao’s spiritual body.
A burst of green smoke, invisible to the naked eye, rose as the spirit disintegrated.
“You, are the both of you already at the next base?” Zhao Yi and his girlfriend came round the corner as they saw this scene. They were also accompanied by Yang Guangtai, who looked tired.
“It’s all right.” Li Xianyu patted her on the shoulder.
Wang Mengmeng ignored Zhao Yi and the others as she looked around with trepidation. Naturally, she could not see Zhou Xiaoxiao, who had already disintegrated. However, she still refused to break free of Li Xianyu’s embrace. She boldly held Li Xianyu’s cheek in her two small hands and asked, “I want to look at your eyes. You, you look around.”
“Is your roommate this good at picking up girls?” Zhang Hui asked in disbelief.
“Isn’t your bestie picking up my brother?” Zhao Yi retorted.
Yang Guangtai was speechless
Bastard, obviously I liked her first.
Was this the difference between a low-grade singleton and a noble singleton?
Wang Mengmeng could not escape Li Xianyu’s clutches. He did not like the other average-looking girl, but this blind date as good as failed.
Sure enough, they would go to the Internet bar to play games. A girlfriend was an extra.
After several times, it was determined that there was no sign of Zhou Xiaoxiao from Li Xianyu’s eyes. Wang Mengmeng was relieved as she collapsed onto Li Xianyu.
“She… will she still follow me?”
“No.”
“Can I trust you?” Wang Mengmeng asked weakly.
“Believe it or not, it’s up to you.” Li Xianyu pushed her away and walked towards the room.
So cool… Wang Mengmeng looked at his back and as her heart fluttered.
As dinner continued, Wang Mengmeng snuggled up to Li Xianyu. She had to be next to him to feel safe. Zhao Yi and the others had ambiguous smiles.
Li Xianyu inexplicably and rightly became the target of binge drinking. Yang Guangtai took the opportunity to take revenge and forced him to drink and drink. However, he could not out-drink Li Xianyu and forced Huang Yicong to join the gang.
“What’s the matter with you lately? You’re always not present,” Yang Guangtai said.
During the meal, Huang Yicong hardly spoke. He looked frail and his eyes gave off a blank look.
As he heard those words, he forced a laugh, picked up his cup and toasted Li Xianyu.
“Are you all right?” Li Xianyu asked with concern.
He shook his head and downed the entire cup.
Li Xianyu patted him on the shoulder. As his palm made contact with his body, his eyes boiled up again. He covered his eyes as his tears flowed wildly.