Chapter 167
Chapter 167
Xu Minghu lay in the hospital bed with all hope extinguished, allowing the campus doctor to change his dressing.
He alternated between grimacing in pain and sighing miserably.
“My lifelong reputation… How did that rotten brat get leverage on me…?”
“He even knows about me and Ah Mei…”
The thought made Xu Minghu even more depressed.
Secrets he had believed perfectly hidden had been exposed through a single dream.
“Damn it… And he made me take the blame…”
“You little bastard. Just wait until I find something on you. Then I’ll–”
[Beep-beep.]
[PayDaddy reminds you that you have a pending transfer.]
As Xu Minghu muttered, several payment notifications suddenly appeared on the phone beside him.
His eyes were drawn to the screen. The resentment in them instantly gave way to light.
“Oh? Did this month’s bonus come early?”
“Let’s see…”
Xu Minghu opened his phone, then froze.
He had received what could only be called a vast sum–several years of his salary.
The sender was Qin Lan.
“This…”
Xu Minghu rubbed his eyes, then looked again at the name “Qin Lan” on the screen, completely baffled.
What did this mean?
Had the brat developed a conscience?
“This much money… Is it compensation for emotional distress? I never expected the brat to have such decent character.”
Professor Xu sat stunned in bed, unable to react for quite some time.
Then another message arrived.
[Elder Xu, I’m sorry. Please help me distribute this money among the victims.]
Xu Minghu’s mind failed to catch up with the sentence.
“Victims? Who does he mean–”
Before he could finish, his phone rang. The caller ID read [Iron Rooster].
Xu Minghu shuddered at the sight.
Only one person on his contact list bore that label: Li Antu.
The instant he answered, Li Antu roared so loudly that his voice nearly blew the ceiling off.
“XU! MING! HU!”
Normally, no matter how serious the disaster, Li Antu still addressed Professor Xu as “Elder Xu.”
The man was highly respected in educational and academic circles, and had even taught Li Antu in the past.
But now, Li Antu had no patience left for courtesy. He screamed Xu Minghu’s full name.
“Get to the academy’s southeast gate!”
“Hurry! Hurry!”
Despite his fractured foot, Xu Minghu rolled and scrambled out of bed before hauling himself awkwardly into a wheelchair.
He had never seen Dean Li this furious…
Combined with the inexplicable transfer Qin Lan had sent him, it inspired an extremely ominous premonition.
Soon, Xu Minghu sat in his wheelchair as the campus doctor pushed him slowly toward Clear Spring Academy’s southeast gate.
Then he regretted coming.
He regretted not asking for an anesthetic in advance, which would have let him remain in that hospital bed and pretend the world had nothing to do with him.
The sight before him was simply not something a venerable old professor ought to behold.
Granted, he himself was famously unhinged, but…
“Holy shit.”
Even those two words floated strangely from his mouth.
They sounded squeezed through a throat held in someone’s grip.
The road outside the school gates, ordinarily so dignified and solemn, had become…
How could one describe it?
Most of the pink fog had dispersed, but a cloying sweetness lingered in the air, like peaches left to overripen in summer.
Sunlight filtered through the leaves and fell upon the crowd, stretching their shadows into crooked shapes.
Of course, the sunlight might not have been responsible. The people themselves were not standing especially straight.
One of the “United Government experts” who had been lying in wait–a Tier Four Core expert disguised as a tourist taking photographs–
Was now hugging his selfie stick, eyes unfocused.
His entire body trembled faintly as he muttered to himself. Xu Minghu could vaguely make out fragments like “oh, yeah” and “so deep.”
His legs had gone limp as boiled noodles. Only the selfie stick kept him from collapsing.
Beside him, the cigarette had fallen from the unemployed drifter’s mouth.
He lay on the ground, both hands gripping his waistband, his expression flipping repeatedly between agony and bliss.
Then there was the sausage vendor.
He had knocked over the grill, scattering sausages everywhere.
As for the vendor himself–another Tier Four expert–he was crouched behind the grill in an incomprehensible position, clutching the cart as his body jerked rhythmically.
Every jerk forced a muffled groan from his throat. It sounded as though he had been punched, yet somehow also satisfied.
There were tears in the corners of his eyes, but a blissful smile curved his lips.
“What the fuck… I’ve really seen a ghost today,” Xu Minghu murmured.
And there were many, many more.
Most outrageous of all was Old Sun, the security guard in the gatehouse.
Old Sun was around Xu Minghu’s age, and his limbs were no longer especially nimble. Strictly speaking, he was unsuited to security work.
But his son held an administrative post in the academy’s student affairs office, so Old Sun had kept the job.
His favorite pastime was listening to historical storytelling on the radio.
Now he lay sprawled in the gatehouse chair while the radio continued playing.
“And so Zhao Zilong stood at Changban, his mighty silver spear in hand. Seven times he charged in, seven times he charged out–in and out, in and out…”
It fit the scene far too well.
Old Sun leaned back with both hands gripping the armrests. Each time his body thrust upward, the chair released a squeak.
From the gates inward, the entire road was filled with people.
Some crouched on the ground, then abruptly raised their heads and howled with relief.
Others lay flat with their limbs spread, staring at the sky and gulping air, their lips curved in smiles that spoke equally of relief and utter helplessness.
Damp.
The word suddenly entered Xu Minghu’s mind.
Yes. The entire entrance was damp.
Not the dampness of rain, but something steaming, salty, and moist.
The air carried the oppressive heaviness that came before a summer storm, only thicker and more… alive.
Waves.
Another word entered Xu Minghu’s mind.
One after another, these people seemed to be weathering invisible waves.
Some had just been struck and lay exhausted in the ebbing tide.
Some were cresting the peak.
Others had endured a second and third wave in rapid succession, yet still clung stubbornly to their final piece of driftwood.
Before one wave could settle, another rose…
“Tragic” was the only word for it.
“Arrive again and again.” Yin Manqing had used those words earlier.
Young and innocent Qin Lan had not understood what such a concept truly meant…
Xu Minghu did.
After witnessing scene after scene, Xu Minghu silently turned his gaze away.
He no longer dared to look.
Or perhaps he simply could not bear to.
“Elder Xu,” the campus doctor beside him said with a complicated expression, “should we help them?”
Xu Minghu remained silent for three seconds. Then, in the voice of a man who had seen through all mortal concerns, he said,
“Save my eyes first.”
Rapid footsteps sounded behind them.
It was Dean Li.
He had sprinted over at full speed. His tie hung crooked, and two buttons had burst from his shirt.
He reached Xu Minghu, stared at the “spectacle” ahead, and let his lips tremble for a full five seconds.
Then he slowly raised a hand and rubbed his eyes.
As though wiping them clean would reveal an ordinary scene.
It did precisely jack shit.
He still saw the same tableau that made him want to resign on the spot.
“…Elder Xu.” Despair and helplessness filled Li Antu’s voice. “What do we do now?”
Xu Minghu did not answer.
What do we do?
You’re asking me?