Reversed Life: Chapter 6 - The Innocent Delinquent Girl Fell in Love with Me
Chapter 6: The Innocent Delinquent Girl Fell in Love with Me
After that shy female class committee member fled in panic with the homework in her arms, Class 1 of the second year fell into a brief silence.
“What the hell?”
“What’s going on?”
“Mu Xiangxiang?”
“No freaking way…”
“But the class monitor didn’t deny it just now…?”
“Holy crap, don’t tell me it’s real?”
“…Maybe they teamed up to prank us.”
“It is her, right? I didn’t recognize her at first, but now that I look again… Mu Xiangxiang’s always been that pale and skinny anyway. From the back she still looks the same.”
“You actually believe that? Everybody knows what Mu Xiangxiang looks like. Are you stupid?”
“Damn it, stop talking and somebody just go ask her already!”
“Then why don’t you go?!”
“Uh…”
“If you’re so brave then you go, go go go—”
Everyone was caught between intense suspicion and not daring to confirm it face-to-face. They shoved and pushed each other, trying to pick a sacrificial hero to investigate, while the buzzing discussions grew louder and louder.
Until the desk behind Qiao Nan got shoved into his back for the third time. All the pushing and arguing instantly stopped when he turned around and looked at them.
The school tyrant had never in his life experienced being harassed while simply sitting quietly at his own seat. He was practically speechless from irritation. The three hyperactive boys froze on the spot under his stare. Qiao Nan looked at them for a moment before casually tossing out: “One warning, alright?”
After he turned back around, the three boys collectively retreated three steps.
Then, teary-eyed, they dove straight back into the crowd.
Qiao Nan discovered that Mu Xiangxiang’s popularity really was terrible. After being at school this long, aside from Jiang Hai—whose motives were unclear—not a single classmate had voluntarily come over to greet him. Still, judging from everyone’s attitude, the avoidance didn’t seem malicious. And considering how unfamiliar they all looked even after staring for so long without confirming his identity, the most likely explanation was that Mu Xiangxiang herself simply never interacted with them much in the first place.
Heh. What a troublesome personality.
Qiao Nan was starting to worry that she might get bullied at his own school. After all, compared to Yingcheng, the atmosphere at No. 12 High School was even worse. He pulled out his phone, intending to send Mu Xiangxiang a text, when he suddenly felt several especially heated gazes land on his face.
The classroom atmosphere instantly froze. Then the mood changed immediately. In the tense silence, Qiao Nan looked up. Standing at the classroom doorway were several girls with different styles of beauty, all staring expressionlessly inside. Leading them was a long-haired girl whose skirt looked noticeably shorter than everyone else’s. Appearance-wise… she was okay, probably. But for a school tyrant like Qiao Nan, who had grown up surrounded by beauties, she only counted as average. So he critically evaluated her in his head—
Her eyes weren’t as big as Mu Xiangxiang’s. Her legs weren’t as long. Her skin was pretty fair too, but if you looked closely, Mu Xiangxiang’s complexion was still clearer and brighter.
Six out of ten. No more than that.
Miss Six-Out-of-Ten stared directly at him and spoke in the tone of a debt collector: “Mu Xiangxiang?”
Anybody who dared talk to him like that was usually plastered onto a wall by now. Qiao Nan’s brows lifted slightly. He set down his phone and lazily leaned back in his chair. “What?”
“Is it really you?” Perhaps because a doubtful guess had suddenly become reality, the moment Six-Points looked into his eyes, they filled with undisguised malice. She sized Qiao Nan up from head to toe, her gaze traveling from his short hair down to his pants, and the longer she looked, the uglier her expression became. After a moment, she said coldly, “Come outside.”
Oh?
Qiao Nan immediately found this interesting. He stopped playing with his phone and tilted his head at her curiously. “Who are you?”
As if she had never expected that answer, shock flashed across Six-Points’ face. One of the girls beside her, a follower with a bob haircut, spoke up at once. “Lingli, don’t waste words with her.”
Then she turned viciously toward Qiao Nan. “And you! Quit playing dumb! If we tell you to come out, then come out!”
“Ohhh.” Qiao Nan suddenly understood. So this was the little delinquent from Yingcheng that Mu Xiangxiang had been so wary of.
But before transferring schools, he had never even heard of this person. And in real life, she looked a bit different from the photos, which was why he hadn’t recognized her at first glance.
Qiao Nan dropped his lazy demeanor. Normally, he didn’t bother arguing with girls, but after realizing this was Fang Lingli—the one who had spent an entire semester bullying that idiot Mu Xiangxiang—he started feeling a little annoyed.
So with a thunk, he tossed his phone into the desk compartment and slowly pushed himself to his feet.
Fang Lingli visibly tensed up. Her expression suddenly turned wary, and a taut, explosive tension spread rapidly between them. The entire classroom fell silent.
Just then, an unexpected female voice broke the stillness. “Fang Lingli? He Xiaokui?”
A middle-aged woman in a business suit walked in carrying several textbooks under one arm. As she spoke, she eyed the girls at the doorway suspiciously. “Class is about to start. What are you all doing standing outside our classroom?”
Everyone visibly relaxed, including the previously aggressive Fang Lingli. Under the woman’s questioning gaze, Fang Lingli brushed at her hair by her temple in a concealing gesture, then shot Qiao Nan another guarded look. “Nothing, just came to pick something up. Goodbye, Teacher Wang.”
With that, she turned and left.
Qiao Nan, who had already taken a step forward, could only stop unhappily. Leaning against the desk with irritation, he watched their retreating figures disappear.
Teacher Wang also jumped in surprise when she saw him. Hugging the lesson plans to her chest, she hesitated before speaking. “This student, you…”
A wave of idiotic laughter immediately spread through the classroom—“Haha, even the homeroom teacher can’t recognize Mu Xiangxiang’s new look!” A few braver students quickly shook off the fear from the earlier confrontation and loudly explained to the teacher, “Teacher Wang, this is Mu Xiangxiang!”
Teacher Wang turned back to Qiao Nan, her face full of astonishment. “Eh—?”
Qiao Nan met her gaze calmly. He didn’t care about becoming the center of attention; what occupied his mind was something else entirely. Since this homeroom teacher could recognize Fang Lingli by name, did that mean she truly didn’t know Mu Xiangxiang was being bullied?
Impossible. No one understood this school better than Qiao Nan, who had run wild in Yingcheng since middle school. Because most of the students came from unusual backgrounds, surveillance cameras were everywhere, and the faculty feared students getting hurt even more than the parents did.
If Fang Lingli’s bullying target had been anyone in this class other than Mu Xiangxiang, all the drama from last semester probably never would have happened.
But what could anyone do about it? Whether it was Mu Xiangxiang or this homeroom teacher, neither of them truly had the power to stand against Fang Lingli’s family background. Once the teacher stepped out of her professional role, she was just an ordinary person. And behind Mu Xiangxiang, there was no friend powerful enough to stand up for her.
As someone who had once stood at the very top of Yingcheng’s social pyramid, Qiao Nan understood the school’s rules all too well. In an instant, countless irritating thoughts flooded his mind—until his phone vibrated inside the desk compartment with a new message.
He stopped thinking and glanced up unconsciously at the clock on the blackboard. The time pointed to 8:40. There was still plenty of time before classes started at nine.
So for the other party to appear at such a perfectly timed moment just now, and then say to Fang Lingli, “Class is about to start…”
At last, Qiao Nan’s expression relaxed again. He even showed a hint of a smile, casually pulling one hand out of his pocket to wave at the female teacher, who still didn’t seem fully certain of his identity. “Long time no see, Teacher Wang.”
Then he obediently sat back down, not even crossing his legs.
The message that had just come in on his phone was from Mu Xiangxiang: “I found your classroom. Pay attention in class, remember to record the lecture, and take notes. Oh right, did you hand in the homework for me?”
Looks like this idiot didn’t run into any trouble after all.
With extreme disdain, Qiao Nan typed back two words: “Nope.”
******
Teacher Wang taught chemistry, but for the first class of the new semester, she didn’t talk much about the textbook. Most of the period was spent exchanging greetings and urging the students to get back into study mode as quickly as possible.
After listening for a while, Qiao Nan started getting sleepy. But remembering how Mu Xiangxiang had repeatedly stressed that he absolutely wasn’t allowed to sleep in class, he forced his eyes open and lazily sprawled across the desk reading.
Yingcheng’s curriculum moved faster than ordinary public schools, and the material was somewhat different, too. Fortunately, Qiao Nan didn’t seem to find it particularly difficult. After all, even though he hated homework and studying, before transferring schools, he had once ranked in the top ten of Yingcheng’s grade for years straight. It was only after transferring to No. 12 High that he’d gradually become too lazy to bother with academics.
Still, that didn’t stop textbooks from making him drowsy. Ahhh, if only he could smoke a cigarette right now.
The first class finally ended before he completely passed out. Before leaving, Teacher Wang looked at him with a trace of concern. The moment the woman’s back disappeared from sight, Qiao Nan shot to his feet with incredible speed, drawing sideways glances from all the nearby students.
First, he kicked the chair of the desk in front of him, which had an unusually large amount of space around it. “Move forward a bit.”
Then, carrying his phone and the cigarette pack he hadn’t even dared open at the Mu family home, he hurried out of the classroom.
*******
In another classroom, Class Four of Grade Two, Jiang Hai was still dazed over his encounter with Mu Xiangxiang that morning.
To be honest, when he’d seen the expression on Mu Xiangxiang’s face as she slung her backpack over one shoulder and walked off down the stairs, even his liver had trembled. The hairs all over his back had stood on end, and he’d nearly dropped to his knees on the spot.
It was too strange. At most, his relationship with Mu Xiangxiang had been that they frequently ran into each other during academic competitions. His impression of her beforehand was simply that she was smart, cold, and far quieter than the other girls who chirped nonstop the moment they saw him.
He’d had a good impression of her, so whenever they met at school, he’d even taken the initiative to greet her a few times.
But wasn’t that supposed to count as friendliness? No matter what, it shouldn’t have resulted in the kind of reaction someone would have upon meeting a natural predator. It was way too weird.
Resting his chin on one hand as he leaned against the windowsill, confusion filled his handsome face, causing countless girls both inside and outside the classroom to share in his melancholy.
Just as he was lost in thought, a chubby boy suddenly burst in, shoving through the crowd of girls at the doorway.
“Jiang Hai!” He looked like he’d just run a marathon. After stopping, he was so winded he could barely stand, and he seemed panicked as well. Bracing himself against Jiang Hai’s desk, he panted: “Y-you should go take a look! That Mu Xiangxiang you mentioned this morning—Fang Lingli brought people to cause trouble for her again!”
*******
Yingcheng’s restroom was completely empty, and Qiao Nan was very satisfied about that. He washed his hands clean, then, just like before he transferred schools, strolled over to the bright window and pushed it open slightly.
Finally—
With tears practically in his eyes, the school tyrant ripped open the cigarette pack and pulled one out between his lips, reaching into his pocket for his lighter.
At last, there was no magically appearing Mu Xiangxiang’s father, or Mu Xiangxiang’s mother here!
Filled with this overwhelming emotion, his fingers trembled as they pressed down on the lighter wheel.
The next second, his sharp ears caught the sound of chaotic, hurried footsteps coming from outside the restroom.
********
Fang Lingli’s expression darkened. “Are you sure she’s in there?”
“Someone saw her go in with their own eyes!” He Xiaokui hurried to keep up with her pace. “And this morning someone personally saw Jiang Hai talking to her, too. Looks like locking her doors and throwing away her schoolbag isn’t enough to scare her anymore. We have to teach her a proper lesson today!”
The seven or eight girls behind them instantly grew excited, as though they’d stumbled upon some rare entertainment, and eagerly chimed in agreement.
Fang Lingli ignored them. When they reached the restroom entrance, she left two girls outside to stand guard while leading the rest inside.
The room was completely empty.
The girls quickly began pushing open each stall door one by one, but unfortunately, there was nobody behind any of them.
A moment later, they regrouped around Fang Lingli. Her brows were tightly furrowed.“What’s going on? Didn’t you say someone saw Mu Xiangxiang come in?”
Faced with everyone’s suspicious looks, He Xiaokui immediately fell speechless. Just as she herself was starting to get confused, a low, husky chuckle suddenly sounded from behind them.
Fang Lingli’s pupils contracted. She spun around instantly—and her scalp prickled with horror.
There, crouched atop the waist-high sink counter with the agility of a hunting leopard, was a figure.The owner of that figure narrowed a pair of beautifully shaped eyes slightly, as though finding the scene in front of him highly amusing. The moment their gazes met, he bared a row of white teeth in a strange, unreadable grin.
The unlit cigarette caught between his teeth bobbed slightly as his lips moved.
“I am here, actually.” Qiao Nan smiled as he asked, “Need something from me?”
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