Presentation(2)

An art piece is like a piece of artist's soul, they treat it like their child most of the time, Xie Mingze felt his head turning empty. The next group would be them, there would be no time to come up with another plan. The only way would be to present the things they had prepared before hand. 

Though it would a bit too cruel to Fen Yichen. He would lose face just because he lost the flashdrive to Mu Bai. 

Fen Yichen continued to tap on the desk, his other hand holding Xie Mingze's hands. It was honestly not a big deal if a bug keeps lurking around, he would just ignore it, but since it kept jumping around infront of him then he should exterminate it.

Mu Bai had long since finished the presentation wth a smirk on his face, without any ounce of guilt found on his face. 

Usually such thing would cause no ripples on his heart, the only reason he bothered was because the person he stole from was someone he was protective of. If Kim Sinian would see Fen Yichen taping the table with the usual smile on his face he would shiver in fright. He knew that gesture meant he was annoyed and was ready to strike back. 

It was like a child stealing from the president of a nation. That is how big of the gap they have.

"Next group!"

Xie Mingze snapped out of his thoughts when it was finally their turn, he anxiously turned to Fen Yichen. 

"Let's ask the professor for an extension, I believe I could do something within that time." He whispered, not wanting for him to lose face. 

He squinted his eyes feeling Mingze's shaking hands. 

"Don't worry. I can handle it."

"I can present if you want."

It would be too cruel to let him face the criticism head on when it was his fault. Anyways, he could just dissociate and ignore them. 

"I want a reward after this."

That was the only thing he said before standing up.

The moment everyone started whispering when the same exact ppt showed was not surprising. It looked like they are the one ripping off Mu Bai's work. The only difference is the name of the presenters.

The professor, did not say anything and let Fen Yichen to talk. His expression was serious devoid of any emotion. Xie Mingze clenched his fist, unsure of what to do. The whole presentation was like a charade, it was the longest ten minutes of his life. 

"Then, I would like to say why we are the original and senior Mu is a fake."

The class gasped, they never expected Yichen to announce it head on. Even the professor was surprised, he thought they would settle it silently after the presentation day. The whole thing was honestly blowing up. The students wanted to listen in the drama, quietly eating the melon seeds.

Seeing nobody stopping him, Yichen continued. He closed his laptop and a wallpaper of Mingze's face in HD was shown in the big screen. "Sorry, that was not what I wanted you guys to see."

He nonchalantly ignored the people wondering why that was his profile and then opened a folder. It was named, M's. 

The folder opened and it was all picture of Mu Bai in bar or partying elsewhere, "I collected all of this in his social media as soon as he presented using our materials. As you can see, he was out partying 24/7, constantly updating his socmed account like a celebrity. It might made you wonder, how he had the time to make this piece?"

Bang!

The chair made a scraping sound before it fell down on the floor. 

"I just know how to make proper time management."

"Oh then I guess that flashdrive you use to present was yours?"

At the mention of the flashdrive, Mu Bai started sweating bullets. It was the thing he stole from Mingze as he left the room, he honestly thought he hit the jackpot because their project was in there. He took deep breaths thinking there is no concrete evidence.

"Of course it's mine, why would I use someone else's?"

"Then you wouldn't mind if we open it here using my laptop right?"

Xie Mingze was wondering what Yichen wanted to do at the mention of the flashdrive. Then it snapped, 'fuck' he couldn't help but curse inside his head. He remembered putting that thing there, they made a lot of it so their ruse would be believable. 

He made sure to lock it with a password, so there is no way for Mu Bai to open it, but if it's Yichen then clearly he would have the means to do so. 

Fen Yichen he even dares?

"I don't need to prove anything to you."

"Yes, you don't. I'll just call the police on you for stealing."

Ultimately, he was forced to give in despite being given a choice. Is there really something special that could prove he stole it? Mu Bai started to feel scared, he was even doing this in front of the whole class.

"I don't want to do this since this was supposed a secret, but I don't want to fail on this subject either."

Lies, even if he failed this subject it doesn't matter. This was just extra units he took because of Mingze. He would lose nothing, but Mingze would on the other hand would repeat. As much as he thought of having Mingze as his junior cute, he couldn't stand the thought of him feeling sad because of some bastard.

Upon opening the flash drive on his laptop, he glanced at Mingze one more time. 

"I'll give you one last chance, confess to your deeds."

"You kids really doesn't know how to respect their elders."

Bluffing until the end, commendable indeed. His only mistake was trying to take advantage of the wrong person. The locked folder opened and in it showed pictures of Mingze and Yichen together, seemingly on a date and affectionate with each other.

"I don't want to attack you, but you had to steal the flashdrive containing my lover's picture."