Chapter 1.13

Bu Huai was born into the wealthy Bu family. He was spoiled and pampered by his father, but his mother taught him strictly, always having high expectations for him.

He was the first child, and he had a younger sister whom he dearly loved. He always protected her when their parents had their awful fights.

They were victims of an arranged marriage, and they had always blamed the other for it, never looking past the haze to their own loved ones. His mother and father insulted each other regularly, taking advantage of everything to snipe at the other.

When Bu Huai turned fifteen, he noticed the fights became almost daily, and he found himself comforting his crying sister increasingly often.

And then he got the news that his parents might divorce. His parents were talking to both of their parents-in-law. The marriage was originally set up because both of their parents wanted to combine their companies, so they combined their families. Although Bu Huai's grandparents were desperately trying to stop their divorce, Bu Huai could tell it was imminent.

Then he learned that his sister tried to commit suicide. The pressure from school and the impending break up of her family both contributed. The last straw was when she learned that her boyfriend was cheating on her.

She had walked up to the roof of her school building and jumped.

Luckily, somebody saw her and called the police. She was alive, but unwillingly.

In this turbulent point of his life, Bu Huai met his first love, Mu Ninghua. She brought stability to his quickly crumbling world.

He quickly fell for her, and although she seemed a little bit over the top and dramatic, he could look past that.

However, he never professed his love to her. One reason was that he didn't know if it was actually love. Maybe he only felt emotion toward her because she was his only solace. He also didn't want to drag her into the mess he called family.

So when the first year of school started, he treated her like dirt under his shoe, arrogantly showing off and pushing her away, so she would leave.

She never left.

And so their relationship was at a standstill for two years. At some point, Bu Huai realized that Mu Ninghua would never leave. And that was when he knew he could rely on her for the rest of his life.

When his last year of high school started, he decided to reform his character in Mu Ninghua's eyes and pursue her.

So when his childhood friend, Ling Yu, introduced him to Mu Ninghua's best friend, he immediately pounced on the opportunity to get closer to Mu Ninghua through him.

...

"Guys, this is Li Ming. Li Ming, this is Han Ying, Han Yang, Lu Shuhen, and Bu Huai," Yang Lizhen introduced.

Bu Huai's eyes lit up. He enthusiastically greeted him, dropping his arrogant facade in excitement. "Hello, you're Mu Ninghua's friend. I'm Bu Huai!"

Ling Xia's smile morphed into a frown of confusion. Bu Huai seemed to realize that he had only ever acted pompous and rude in front of Ling Xia.

"Uh, don't mind him." Yang Lizhen hastily diverted Ling Xia's attention from the mess that was Bu Huai. "These two, Han Yang and Han Ying, are twins."

'Yeah, I could've gathered that,' Ling Xia thought sarcastically.

Out loud, though, he only replied, "I understand." His eyes switched between two remarkably similar faces. The only difference was that Han Ying had a scar on his cheek.

The twins looked at Ling Xia weirdly, wondering who would say, "I understand," to something like that.

"Lu Shuhen is the son of the successor of the Lu Corporation. He just got back from the U.S. And you already know Bu Huai." Yang Lizhen continued talking, introducing the people behind more in a bit more detail, although the information on them was just the tip of the iceberg.

"Yes, we have met in school. It's also nice to meet you, Mr. Lu." Ling Xia held out his hand, and Lu Shuhen took it, both of them exchanging friendly smiles while shaking hands.

"It's nice to meet you as well," Lu Shuhen returned.

The five people sat down at the table Ling Xia was originally sitting at after ordering some food for themselves. Ling Xia sat down with them as he was now officially part of their conversation.

Bu Huai seemed fascinated with Li Ming's past, but Ling Xia could make out that the real object of his interest was Mu Ninghua.

Things were not looking up for Ling Xia. It seemed Bu Huai was already so infatuated with Mu Ninghua to put down his arrogance and talk to those he once considered below him.

Ling Xia felt like he had to reconstruct Bu Huai's entire outlook on life. Why fall for the one girl who never stopped sticking to him, but was also very cold to him? It was really stupid in Ling Xia's eyes.

The five chatted for some more time, Ling Xia being mostly occupied with Bu Huai's incessant questions until Ling Xia's phone vibrated in his pocket. He pulled it out and checked what the message he had gotten said.

"My dad has just messaged me that he is here to pick me up. Please excuse me." Ling Xia got up from his seat and heard a chorus of goodbyes sent toward him.

"Goodbye. It was nice meeting all of you," he said in a very monotone voice, making the Han twins look at him disbelievingly. They didn't seem to like Ling Xia very much. Or at least, they didn't like Ling Xia's portrayal of Li Ming.

Ling Xia didn't care and headed out of the shop and toward the building Li Ming's father had dropped him off at. He reached there in no time, and they went back to the Li's house together.

The next day, Ling Xia went to school. He hoped Mu Ninghua wouldn't pull one of her stupid tricks today.

He had gone to the ice rink yesterday after the meeting and ended up completely exhausted when he got back to Li Ming's house. He was still sore from it, so he was not up for any weird plots and schemes to bring him down today. He really just wanted to have a normal day.

Lo and behold, the exact opposite happened.

In the middle of the day, Ling Xia felt something being slipped into his pocket. He refrained from observing down at it for too long so as to not attract the attention of the people that put it there. He simply took a quick glance at it and looked back up as if nothing happened.

There was a piece of paper in his pocket. It looked like it was barely hanging onto his pocket, ready to fall out at a moment's notice.

Honestly, that was probably their plan. To wait until Ling Xia entered the classroom, then get somebody to bump into him causing the paper to drop from his pocket. The tiny folded-up piece of paper most likely had something that could be used to accuse Ling Xia for cheating.

Mu Ninghua was getting suspicious of how Ling Xia kept avoiding her attacks though, so Ling Xia had to keep his avoidance a little bit more on the down-low. Doing that meant going along with her scheme for now.

Did Ling Xia really have to do this today? He was completely drained. He silently groaned.

Of course he did. Otherwise, his plans wouldn't work out.

He couldn't wait until he could implement his blackmail plan. Then he wouldn't have to deal with Mu Ninghua for a long time.

He was unable to tell Mu Ninghua everything now though because then Mu Ninghua would be more cautious about what she told Ling Xia, and then Ling Xia wouldn't be able to get any clues from her, and then he wouldn't be able to tell those clues to the Crimson Moon gang in exchange for protection, and then the gang would find it weird, and then...

Ling Xia quietly sighed. 'I suffer.'

Fortunately, he was broken out of his lamenting. Unfortunately, it was done by Mu Ninghua who had roughly bumped shoulders with him.

Ling Xia almost lost balance but steadied himself until he realized that Mu Ninghua had done that to make the piece of paper drop from his pocket. He made a split decision and dramatically and unreasonably fell over, right onto the recycling bin near him.

There was no viable way he could have fallen that way, but the people in this school weren't able to tell when Mu Ninghua switched black and white(1), so he felt like he wasn't taking too much of a risk.

The recycling bin toppled when Ling Xia tumbled onto the side of it, and all the things inside fell out. The piece of paper that fell out of Ling Xia's pocket blended in perfectly.

Ling Xia's left shoulder made contact with the floor, and for a moment, he thought his stupid idea to make Mu Ninghua's plan fail worked out with no consequences until his shoulder started throbbing with pain.

He groaned as the pain spread throughout his arm and gently rubbed the shoulder that hit the floor while laying on the floor.

"Oh my gosh! Are you okay, Li Ming? I'm sorry I wasn't looking where I was going." Mu Ninghua tried to help Ling Xia up, but Ling Xia refused her help and pushed himself off the ground, painstakingly trying not to put pressure on his left arm.

"I'm fine." Ling Xia forced a smile. Now he was sore and injured. Great.

Ling Xia picked up all the things on the ground and dropped them back in the recycling bin. As he was about to let a piece of paper drop into the bin, Mu Ninghua, who was helping him, stopped him.

"Why are you throwing that away? That was the thing in your pocket."

Ling Xia stopped moving.

In his mind, he looked up to the clear, blue sky and asked any and all higher beings if he mentioned that he didn't want to do this today.

Jokingly, of course.

He was an atheist, literally. He didn't believe in science either. Science flew out the window when spiritual power became known to the world. There was no reason for, no viable way nature would have allowed it, but the anomaly still existed. Just, nobody knew how to use it.

Ling Xia finally ended his frozen like an ice cube phase and rushed to create a plan in his head.

He looked at the piece of paper in his hand, noting that it was the same as the one in his pocket earlier.

He didn't refute Mu Ninghua's words about dropping something. Instead, he only pointed out that the piece of paper wasn't the same thing he dropped.

"Oh. But I thought I dropped this," Ling Xia said while showing Mu Ninghua something he randomly picked up from the ground.

A very befuddled Mu Ninghua peered at the object in Ling Xia's hand. It was a small scrap of paper, easily passable for what Mu Ninghua put in his pocket.

'Huh? Li Ming actually had something in his pocket that he dropped? I was so close this time!'

Mu Ninghua gave Ling Xia a painful smile, which Ling Xia saw with glee. He forgot all of his previous feelings of unwillingness and drank in the sight happily. 'How beautiful,' he thought.

"Oh, I must have seen it wrong. Sorry." Mu Ninghua's eye twitched with restraint which just showed how hard it was for her to say that last word.

Ling Xia gave her a small smile. "It's okay."

Mu Ninghua gritted her teeth. She couldn't believe she had to admit she was wrong, and Ling Xia even agreed! In front of the entire class! When everybody was looking at them because Ling Xia fell!

Hatred and anger swirled around in her heart as her nails dug into her palms. The devil on her shoulder rose up, relentlessly screaming at her to claim vengeance.

She stubbornly refused, thinking that she didn't have as many people that would protect her if something went wrong because of the recent drop in some of the favorability levels.

Her stand on this matter was being chipped away at though, and by the end of the day, she had promised herself payback.

Notes:

1: Switching black and white: Somebody mixing up good and bad to the point where everybody thinks that the righteous person is the evil one and vice versa.