Rumor Counterattack
The moment Xu Ying pushed open the classroom door of Class 7, Grade 11, the originally noisy morning self-study session suddenly became eerily quiet for a second.
She paused slightly, her eyelashes fluttered, but her face remained calm. She was all too familiar with this sudden silence—every time she transferred to a new school, there would always be a few days when she felt like a specimen locked in a glass case, scrutinized by everyone with curious or judgmental eyes.
This time, however, there was something else in those eyes.
Xu Ying walked to her seat with her head down, glancing out of the corner of her eye at several girls exchanging quick glances, a knowing smile playing on their lips. The boys in the back row deliberately raised their voices: "Holy crap, it smells so good today!" A burst of laughter followed.
Her seat was in the third row by the window, where sunlight streamed obliquely through the glass onto the table, illuminating the three words written in white chalk: "Woman Who Pays Back for Others".
Xu Ying stood in front of the table, her fingertips unconsciously digging into her palms. She heard whispers behind her, deliberately kept quiet:
"I heard she brought Heng-ge water again yesterday?"
"He puts on an air of superiority, but in reality..."
She took a deep breath, pulled a tissue from her bag, and forcefully wiped away the three words. Chalk dust fell in a flurry, like a miniature avalanche in the sunlight.
"Make way."
A deep male voice suddenly sounded behind her. Xu Ying's back stiffened; she knew who it was without turning around—Zong Heng always carried a faint scent of mint cigarettes, mixed with the heat of his morning run, which was particularly noticeable on the early autumn morning.
She stepped aside, and out of the corner of her eye, she saw Zong Heng carrying his school uniform jacket in one hand and casually slinging his backpack over his shoulder with the other. He glanced at the desk she had just wiped clean, and his brow furrowed almost imperceptibly.
Who wrote it?
The question came unexpectedly. Xu Ying looked up, meeting his gaze for the first time—the boy's features were sharp, and the shadow cast by his brow bone made his eyes appear exceptionally deep. She opened her mouth, but ultimately just shook her head: "I don't know."
Zong Heng stared at her for two seconds, then suddenly sneered and kicked the chair of the boy in the front row: "Li Hao, did you do this?"
The boy whose name was called almost jumped up in fright: "Heng-ge, I'm innocent! I saw it as soon as I arrived this morning!"
The classroom fell completely silent. Everyone held their breath, waiting to see how this farce would end. Xu Ying felt her cheeks burning; being publicly "protected" was more humiliating than being ridiculed.
"Alright." She reached out and tugged at Zong Heng's sleeve, her voice almost inaudible, "Class is about to start."
Zong Heng glanced down at her fingers clutching his school uniform—slender, fair, with neatly trimmed nails. He raised an eyebrow, then suddenly leaned closer: "Xu, would you call this...touching me on purpose?"
The warm breath brushed against her earlobe, and Xu Ying released her hand as if she had been electrocuted, her ear tips instantly turning red.
During the third break, Xu Ying repeatedly washed her hands at the sink. The cold water flowed freely, but she still felt chalk dust clinging to her fingers.
"Really? Is she that bold?"
The conversation coming from the cubicle made her pause.
"I saw it with my own eyes! Yesterday after school, she deliberately waited at the school gate, and when she saw Heng-ge come out, she went up to him..."
The faucet was turned all the way up, and the water stopped abruptly. Xu Ying looked up and saw her pale face reflected in the mirror. She had clearly gone straight home; how could she have been "waiting for someone at the school gate"?
"I heard her school had a really bad reputation..."
"He looks like a model student, but behind the scenes..."
The cubicle door suddenly opened, and the two girls froze when they saw Xu Ying standing in front of the mirror. The air seemed to freeze, with only the sound of water dripping from the faucet—drip, drip, drip.
Xu Ying slowly pulled out a tissue and meticulously dried her fingers. The tissue was crumpled into a ball and accurately thrown into the trash can with a "thump".
"Excuse me." Her voice was calm, as if she hadn't heard anything.
As they passed each other, the girl named Chen Yue suddenly scoffed, "What are you pretending for?"
Xu Ying didn't stop walking, but bumped into Zong Heng, who was leaning against the wall with his arms crossed, at the door. The boy stood backlit, his school uniform collar loosely open, revealing half of his collarbone. He had obviously heard the whole conversation and was now looking at her with a half-smile.
"Do you need a hero to save the damsel in distress, Xu?"
Sunlight streamed in from behind him, casting a long shadow on the ground that stretched right to Xu Ying's feet. Looking at that shadow, she suddenly felt very tired.
"No need," she said softly. "Rumors stop with the wise."
Zong Heng paused for a moment, then laughed out loud: "A good student is a good student, even when bullied, he still quotes famous sayings." He straightened up, casually playing with his lighter, "What a pity..."
"What's a pity?"
"It's a pity there are no wise men here." The metal lighter danced between his fingers, tracing a cold arc of light. "Only bastards like me."
During the last period of the afternoon, Xu Ying discovered that her math workbook was missing.
She crouched down to check her desk drawer, her fingertips suddenly touching a folded note. Unfolding it, crookedly printed text came into view:
"Stay away from Zong Heng, you bitch. Otherwise, next time it won't be as simple as tearing up homework."
Xu Ying stared at the note for a long time, until the handwriting began to blur. She remembered her homeroom teacher's words before she transferred schools: "Keep a low profile in the new environment, don't cause trouble." She remembered her parents' worried eyes: "Yingying is too well-behaved, she's easily bullied..."
"What are you looking for?"
Zong Heng's voice came from above. Xu Ying quickly clenched the note in her hand, and when she looked up, she had regained her composure: "It's nothing, I just lost my homework."
The boy squinted. Sunlight streamed through the glass window, making her clenched fist almost transparent, revealing the white knuckles. He suddenly knelt down on one knee, his gaze level with hers: "Open your hand."
"……"
"I'll count to three," Zong Heng's voice deepened, "One."
Xu Ying bit her lower lip.
"two."
Her eyelashes trembled slightly.
"three."
His palm was forcibly pried open, exposing the crumpled note to the air. Zong Heng glanced at it, his eyes instantly turning icy. He stood up, creating a gust of wind, and the desk clattered loudly as he did so.
Who did it?
The entire class fell silent.
Xu Ying looked at the boy's tense back and suddenly stood up: "Never mind."
"Forget it?" Zong Heng turned around, his eyes terrifying. "You fucking..."
"I said forget it." Her voice was soft, yet unusually clear. "I don't care."
These words were like a bucket of cold water poured over him. Zong Heng stared at her for a long time, then suddenly laughed: "Fine, you're noble." He kicked the chair away and walked out of the classroom without looking back.
The door was slammed shut with a deafening roar.
Xu Ying slowly sat back down and discovered that her notebook was actually at the very back of the drawer, but it had been covered with obscene words using correction fluid. She gently smoothed the curled corners of the pages and took out an eraser from her pencil case.
When I erased the third "cheap" character, the eraser suddenly broke.
Xu Ying sat in her seat, her fingertips unconsciously tracing the edge of her textbook. The noise in the classroom was muffled yet jarring, as if filtered through frosted glass.
"Have you heard? She arrives at school early every day just to wipe Zongheng's desk..."
"Why pretend to be a good student? Aren't you just trying to marry into a wealthy family?"
She lowered her head to flip through the book, her eyelashes casting a small shadow beneath her eyes. This wasn't the first time she'd heard these words. At her previous school, some people had also gossiped behind her back, calling her "pretentious" because of her good grades and quiet demeanor. Back then, she would argue back with tears in her eyes, only to later realize that explanations only fueled the malice.
"Silence is the best armor." Her mother's words echoed in her ears. She pursed her lips and pressed the mechanical pencil with a click.
Suddenly, the girl in front of her "accidentally" knocked her pencil case away, and colored pencils scattered all over the floor.
"Oh dear, I'm so sorry," the girl apologized dramatically, eliciting a few snickers from those around her.
Xu Ying squatted down and picked them up one by one. A sneaker deliberately stepped on a highlighter pen that had rolled into the aisle. She looked up and met Chen Yue's provocative gaze.
"Could you please lift your foot?" Her voice was soft, but every word was clear.
Chen Yue pouted and instead rubbed her toes together. The pen casing cracked open with a "crack".
The back door of the classroom was suddenly kicked open, and Zong Heng strode in carrying a basketball. Everyone fell silent instantly, and Chen Yue immediately withdrew her foot. Xu Ying quickly picked up the broken pen and returned to her seat.
Out of the corner of his eye, Zong Heng sat down next to her, his school uniform jacket swirling in the sunlight. He glanced at the cracked pen in her hand, then scanned the classroom, letting out a cold laugh.
During the third break, Xu Ying brought her homework back from the office. She had just pushed open the back door when she heard her name called.
“How could Zong Heng possibly like a bookworm like Xu Ying? It must be her—”
The sound abruptly stopped. She stood in the doorway, the thick stack of notebooks in her arms suddenly feeling incredibly heavy. The air froze for a few seconds, then the crowd dispersed as if nothing had happened.
When she returned to her seat, she found that the zipper of her pencil case had been opened. Inside lay a crumpled mint—the wrapper had been maliciously torn.
Zong Heng was reclining in his chair, playing on his phone, seemingly oblivious to what was happening. But when she picked up the candy, he suddenly spoke up: "There's a quiz next class. Can you answer the last big question?"
This was their first serious conversation in three days. Ever since the water-handing incident at the basketball game, he had either been sleeping or skipping classes, as if deliberately avoiding something.
Xu Ying stuffed the candy deep into the drawer: "The question type is similar to last week's homework."
"Tsk." He tossed his phone aside, grabbed the notebook from her desk, and said, "Let me copy this... Hey, what's this?"
On the notebook's title page, someone had drawn ugly doodles, and next to it was written "gold digger." Zong Heng's eyes suddenly turned cold. Xu Ying quickly snatched the notebook back, tore off the page, and crumpled it into a ball.
"It doesn't matter." Her voice trembled slightly. "It's just a draft anyway."
Zong Heng stared at her pale knuckles, then suddenly pulled a new mint from his pocket and slapped it onto her homework. The wrapper was shiny, as glaring as his burning gaze.
"Don't eat that one on the ground." He lowered his voice. "Chen Yue put some Tiger Balm on it."
Xu Ying suddenly looked up.
It rained heavily when school let out. Xu Ying stood at the end of the corridor, watching Chen Yue and her group leave, laughing and joking under their umbrellas. They deliberately splashed water in the puddles, and some mud splashed onto the cuffs of her school uniform trousers.
"Aren't you leaving yet?"
Zong Heng was leaning against the wall, his school uniform draped over his shoulders. Rain dripped down his hair, forming a small puddle behind his collarbone.
Xu Ying lowered her head and tidied her schoolbag: "Wait until there are fewer people..."
"Wait my ass." He grabbed her backpack and slung it over his shoulder. "Here, take it."
In the rain, he held up a long-handled black umbrella, and Xu Ying was forced to walk close to his right arm. As the fabric rubbed against each other, she caught a faint scent of mint cigarettes on him.
As they turned the corner, Zong Heng suddenly swore and shoved the umbrella into her hands: "Stand still."
Only then did she notice that Chen Yue's henchman was stuffing something into her bicycle basket next to the phone booth. When Zong Heng rushed over and grabbed the man's collar, the dead rat in the basket fell out and tumbled in the puddle.
Xu Ying gripped the umbrella handle tightly. Rainwater streamed down the umbrella ribs, forming a curtain of water. Through this transparent barrier, she saw Zong Heng pinning the other person against the wall and saying something. The person nodded, pale-faced, and staggered away.
He came back soaking wet, his bangs stuck to his forehead, but he grinned nonchalantly: "Starting tomorrow, I'll protect you."
The space under the umbrella was too small, and his breath was damp with rain. Xu Ying suddenly noticed a very small black mole on his right ear cartilage, like a pencil dot.
“No need.” She tilted the umbrella toward him. “I don’t need to be pitied.”
Zong Heng was stunned for a moment, then scoffed, "Who the hell pities you?" He suddenly bent down and leaned closer, so close that she could count his eyelashes, "I'm pursuing you, can't you tell?"
The rain was pouring down. Xu Ying's ears were ringing, and the umbrella in her hand fell into a puddle with a "plop".
The last rays of the setting sun slanted through the windows into the classroom, bathing the desks and chairs in an orange-red light. Xu Ying was packing her schoolbag when her fingertips touched the depths of the desk drawer, and she suddenly stopped—there was a folded piece of paper tucked there.
She slowly unfolded the paper; the handwriting on it was crooked and uneven, as if deliberately written with her left hand:
"Stay away from Zong Heng, you bitch."
Xu Ying's breath hitched slightly, her fingers unconsciously tightening, the note crumpling into a ball in her palm. She looked up, her gaze sweeping across the classroom—a few girls were huddled together whispering. When they saw her looking over, they immediately fell silent, lowering their heads and pretending to organize their books, but the smiles on their lips were impossible to hide.
Chen Yue.
Xu Ying's gaze was fixed on the girl in the middle. Chen Yue was the class's "gossipmonger," and she loved to spread rumors. Ever since the basketball game, she had been gossiping about Xu Ying and Zong Heng behind their backs.
Xu Ying took a deep breath, stuffed the crumpled note into her pocket, picked up her schoolbag, and walked straight to Chen Yue's seat.
Those who hadn't left the classroom sensed something was off and slowed down, secretly glancing in their direction.
Chen Yue was chatting and laughing with her deskmate when she looked up and saw Xu Ying standing in front of her desk. She was stunned for a moment, then raised her chin and asked, "What?"
Xu Ying didn't say anything, but calmly took the note out of her pocket, unfolded it, and pushed it in front of Chen Yue.
"Did you put it there?" Her voice was soft, yet it was like a sharp knife, shattering the false tranquility of the classroom.
Chen Yue glanced down at the note, a mocking smile playing on her lips. "What? You dare to do it but not admit it?" She deliberately raised her voice, making sure everyone around could hear. "The whole class knows you seduced Zong Heng, so what are you pretending to be innocent for?"
Xu Ying's fingertips were slightly cold, but her face remained expressionless. She stared into Chen Yue's eyes and said, word by word, "Say it again."
Chen Yue scoffed, crossed her arms, and leaned back, her tone dismissive: "I said, you seduced Zong Heng. Did you hear me?"
The classroom fell completely silent; even the sound of turning pages disappeared. All eyes were on the two people, and some even secretly took out their phones to record this "show."
Xu Ying lowered her eyes, her gaze falling on the unopened can of cola on Chen Yue's table.
The next second, she reached for the Coke, pressed her thumb against the pull tab, and flipped it open with a "click".
Before Chen Yue could react, Xu Ying had already raised her hand—
"Whoosh!"
The cold, brown liquid was splashed directly onto the front of Chen Yue's school uniform, trickling down the fabric and dripping onto the ground.
The entire classroom erupted in chaos.
"Holy crap!"
"Has Xu Ying gone mad?!"
Chen Yue froze for a second, then screamed, "Are you fucking sick?!" She stood up abruptly, her school uniform clinging to her body, soaking wet, and the sweet smell of cola filled the air.
Xu Ying remained standing in the same spot, the empty soda can in her hand slightly deformed. Her voice was calm, yet carried a chill:
"If I hear you spreading rumors again, next time it won't be Coke."
Chen Yue was so angry that she trembled all over and raised her hand to slap him—
Just as Chen Yue's hand was about to fall, the back door of the classroom was kicked open with a "bang".
Everyone turned around at once.
Zong Heng leaned lazily against the doorframe, one hand draped over his school uniform jacket and the other in his pocket. His gaze swept across the classroom, finally settling on Xu Ying and Chen Yue, his eyebrows slightly raised.
"Wow, it's quite lively here."
His tone was casual and mocking, but his eyes turned cold.
Chen Yue's hand froze in mid-air, her expression shifting, before she finally lowered it reluctantly. She bit her lip, attempting to strike first:
"Zong Heng, Xu Ying inexplicably splashed my cola on me!"
Zong Heng ignored her and walked straight to Xu Ying's side. He glanced down at the empty can in her hand and chuckled, "Not bad, good student."
Xu Ying pursed her lips and remained silent.
Zong Heng then turned to Chen Yue, his eyes suddenly sharp: "You were about to hit her?"
Chen Yue took a half step back under his gaze, stammering, "Y-it was her first..."
"I don't care who goes first," Zong Heng interrupted her, his tone icy. "Don't you want your hand anymore?"
The classroom was completely silent; everyone held their breath, afraid of missing a single detail.
Zong Heng's gaze swept over the onlookers, and suddenly he reached out and grabbed the collar of a boy in the back row—it was Li Ming, who usually loved to gossip with Chen Yue.
"I heard you've been quite sarcastic lately?" Zong Heng pulled him close, slammed his fist against the wall, grazing the other's face, and with a muffled thud, plaster fell from the wall.
Li Ming turned pale with fright, his legs went weak: "Heng... Brother Heng, I was wrong..."
Zong Heng released him and sneered, "If I hear you gossiping again, next time it won't be a wall."
After saying that, he turned around, grabbed Xu Ying's wrist, and strode out.
Xu Ying stumbled slightly as he pulled her, and instinctively tried to break free, but he held her even tighter.
"Don't move." He tossed out the words without turning his head. "I'm furious right now."
The two walked one after the other down the empty corridor, their shadows stretched long by the setting sun.
Xu Ying stared at Zong Heng's back; his shoulders were tense, clearly still angry.
She suddenly spoke up: "...You don't have to do that."
Zong Heng paused, turned to look at her, and asked, "What?"
“Stand up for me,” Xu Ying said softly. “I don’t care what they say.”
Zong Heng stared at her for a few seconds, then suddenly sneered, "But I care."
Xu Ying was taken aback.
He scratched his head in frustration, his tone harsh but with a hint of awkwardness: "From now on, if anyone's being sarcastic, just tell me, you hear me?"
Xu Ying didn't answer, but just gave a soft "hmm".
Zong Heng glanced at her, then suddenly reached out and flicked her forehead: "Are you mute? You're usually so good at roasting me, aren't you?"
Xu Ying winced in pain, covered her forehead, and glared at him.
Looking at her like this, Zong Heng suddenly laughed: "That's more like it."
The last rays of the setting sun fell on the two of them, their shadows overlapping and stretching out long and long.
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