Chapter 1
"Under the Wutong Tree" is a famous large-scale social forum in Nanyuan City that integrates various elements such as life gossip. Anyone who is cheating or catching a mistress or looking for a lost cat or dog can post it on the forum and get results in three or four days at the shortest, or up to a year and a half.
Two years ago, Jiang Wan posted a missing person notice on the forum, but it has remained unnoticed ever since. It has received very few hits, and most of the few comments are from Chen Meiyu pretending to be a bystander.
Chen Meiyu had given her a tip before. If she wanted to create more hype, Jiang Wan might as well upload a few photos of herself online, and then direct and act out a missing person notice. Someone with her looks would definitely set the forum on fire. Later, when the hype was building, she could then post a message to find the person she really wanted to find.
It sounds feasible indeed.
"But you don't know that Jiang Huainan likes to browse this forum whenever he has time. If he saw it, I might lose my father before I even find my uncle's girlfriend."
Even though Jiang Huainan couldn't be considered a particularly good father, he was still better than nothing. After all, men have a natural immunity from being just a decoration.
Jiang Wan had just emerged from the Academic Affairs Office, clutching her newly approved leave of absence application. Three weeks before the Gaokao, she'd applied for leave. This wasn't uncommon in her grade. Jiang Wan knew a girl from Class 8 upstairs who, aside from taking exams, had barely been to school during the second semester of her senior year, spending her days shuttling between various elite cram schools.
Chen Meiyun held a floral parasol. She'd gotten a tan in Sanya over winter break, and it hadn't faded back yet. She'd recently made sun protection a top priority. The two of them were walking to the school cafeteria. The bell hadn't rung yet, and the school's food-deprived zombies hadn't even started to move out, so they walked at their leisure.
Chen Meiyu felt that Jiang Wan was quite conflicted about the matter of looking for someone.
"Since the woman you're looking for is related to your uncle's death, why don't you confront your father directly? After all, there is strength in numbers."
Jiang Wan scrolled through the few meaningless comments on his post and turned to look at her. "I also found this woman in my uncle's diary when I was sorting through his belongings. He met her while working away from home. But I'm not sure if she was involved in his being tricked into joining a pyramid scheme."
Jiang Sheng's diary didn't contain much information about this woman. From what he wrote, he knew she was about forty years old, about 1.7 meters tall, with a rather heroic appearance, favored the color red, and seemed to be from Xuancheng. She had been working as a migrant worker since her teens. These were very vague and general information, making it harder to find her than to find a needle in a haystack. Fortunately, Jiang Sheng left a key piece of information in the back of his diary.
——There is a boy with this woman, but the specific relationship is not certain.
"Jiang Sheng wrote in his diary that the child was very pretty and smart, and that he should be around the same age as us."
Chen Meiyun became excited when she heard the word "good-looking": "You mean, she has a son who is about the same age as us, and he's a handsome boy?"
"Nanyuan isn't that old. Do you think he could be right next to us? If he's really as smart as your uncle says."
Chen Meiyun's imagination was extraordinary. Jiang Wan frowned and asked, "You're not sure if he's her son. And you said he might be in our school?"
Jiayuan was one of the best high schools in Nanyuan City, and those who could attend this school were indeed quite talented, both personally and through their families' combined strength. But as for handsome guys—Jiang Wan had really only seen a few.
"Maybe." Chen Meiyun has been watching too many Korean dramas lately and has become addicted to screenwriting. "You don't understand. Fate is really magical."
"The heroine falls in love with the man who murdered her father. It's a classic that will be passed down forever."
Jiang Wan rolled his eyes at her: "First, my father is still alive, and second, my uncle was not murdered."
He jumped off the building by himself.
At this point, Chen Meiyu was a little confused: "If that's the case, why did you think of looking for that woman? Because she tricked your uncle into joining a pyramid scheme? But even if you found her, you can't do anything to her without evidence."
The school cafeteria is right in front of us, the aroma of food is floating in the air, the early summer sun is shining down, and the whole campus seems to be bathed in a golden mist.
Jiang Wan was so hot in the sun that she could hardly open her eyes.
"have no idea."
"Maybe--." She seemed to think seriously and tilted her head. Chen Meiyu was still looking at her expectantly.
"Maybe he wants to see how handsome the boy is. If he's suitable, he can just grab him and make him his son-in-law. It's only natural that a son should pay for his mother's debts, right?"
Chen Meiyu:?
"Jiang Wan, I think you are hopeless."
"How about this? I'll send you to Korea to debut tomorrow. You can only come back after filming a hundred dramas where you fall in love with the murderer of your father."
Jiang Wan nodded without hesitation and agreed: "Okay."
"But remember to find me a handsome male lead, one with a small car and small sides."
"Aren't you afraid of losing your father this time?" Chen Meiyu was speechless.
"Who is my dad? I already have a car and a bicycle, so why do I need a dad? People should not be too greedy, otherwise..." Jiang Wan pointed to the cafeteria entrance: "I can't even grab a chicken leg in the cafeteria at noon."
＊
After Jiang Wan finished her last lunch at school, she went back to the classroom to pack up her books and belongings. Chen Meiyun was supposed to accompany her, but she was called to the office by the math teacher, leaving her alone in the huge Grade 1 class.
When Chen Wulin called, Jiang Wan had just packed up all his things and was about to go to the school gate.
She was carrying a lot of bags, so answering the phone was inconvenient and she hadn't intended to. But Chen Wulin insisted, calling again if the first one didn't go through.
"What's up?" She had experienced his persistence before. Jiang Wan found a place under the teaching building to avoid the sun. A few high school seniors who had just finished their meal came back from the corridor. Most of them were in a hurry, but they didn't forget to nod and say hello to Jiang Wan when they saw him.
"Jiang Wan, you have achieved enlightenment."
After all, with the 50 extra points from F University, according to Jiang Wan's level, as long as he didn't get knocked unconscious during the exam, he would definitely get in.
Jiang Wan nodded politely and smiled faintly: "Thank you."
Chen Wulin seemed to have heard her conversation as well. After a few seconds of silence, he spoke: "I'm at the gate of your school. When will you come out?"
"You don't go to school?"
Jiang Wan thought he was exaggerating a bit.
"I took half a day off."
Chen Wulin changed into casual clothes, a white T-shirt with gray pants. He didn't look like a standard handsome guy, but because of his temperament, he could be considered elegant. Jiang Wan knew that many girls liked his type.
Even Chen Meiyu was once possessed by the devil.
But Jiang Wan had no feelings about this type of film. When she was a child, she watched a lot of Hong Kong crime-solving films, and many of the murderers in the wife-killing and corpse-disposal cases were of this type.
"How did you know I was leaving school today?" The two of them stood by the roadside, waiting for a ride-hailing service. The midday sun was a bit scorching. As Chen Wulin bent down to take the two bags from Jiang Wan's hands, her eyes caught the beads of sweat on his forehead. He hadn't just arrived as he'd said on the phone; he'd probably been waiting at the school gate for quite a while.
Chen Wulin pursed his lips and didn't answer, but Jiang Wan could guess: "Did my dad tell you?"
As if this matter was a fatal flaw for Chen Wulin, a trace of obvious panic flashed across his innocent eyes, but his voice remained as calm as usual: "I didn't look for my uncle."
Jiang Wan was so nervous that he was speechless: "So what if I find it?"
Anyway, it was Chen Wulin's mother who had an affair with Jiang Huainan, not Chen Wulin.
Jiang Wan stopped talking and opened her phone to continue watching a vlog she hadn't finished watching yesterday. This blogger was a British student, very handsome and had good taste in clothes, but the most important thing was that his videos were also very funny, simply a record of British food complaints.
Jiang Wan watched for a few minutes before she felt a gaze approaching. She raised her head and glanced at Chen Wulin: "Want to see it? I'll send you the link."
Chen Wulin, however, said something completely unrelated: "Do you like this?"
Jiang Wan was not comfortable with the hint of sarcasm in his tone.
When Chen Wulin first moved into their community, his temperament was not so unpredictable, but over time, he seemed like a plant that had lived in a dark environment for a long time and grew crooked as it grew.
"Who doesn't like a handsome guy?"
"Don't you like pretty girls?"
"Being handsome can't be eaten. If you find a handsome guy, does that mean you have to eat whole grains? For a man, the most important things are character and responsibility, as well as the ability to make money."
"Like, there's a guy in our school who looks decent, but he actually got in through connections. His high school entrance exam score was only good enough to get into a regular high school. Do you think a guy like that would have good character?"
Jiang Wan didn't want to pay attention to him: "I'm not dating him, why should I care about his character?"
The dark clouds hanging over Chen Wulin's face slowly dissipated.
But then Jiang Wan added, "But you said he looks decent. If he looks like me, what's the harm in dating him? Dating doesn't matter whether he gets into a regular high school or a key city school. Chen Wulin, this isn't the admissions office."
Chen Wulin turned his head away, looking at the vast and boundless road, and said in a weak and unwilling voice: "Jiang Wan, sooner or later you will suffer a great loss because of this."
Jiang Wan felt that Chen Wulin was looking for trouble today: "I thought you came to pick me up today with good intentions."
Chen Wulin: "When have I ever had any ill will towards you? On the contrary, you, Jiang Wan, you were not like this before. If you must bring up that matter, it was my mother's fault. You can't, you can't blame her mistake on me."
"I didn't blame you for that."
"I have no ill will towards you, it's just that at some point, I feel like I don't understand you anymore."
Chen Wulin looked over with a puzzled look.
"For example, in the second year of junior high school, you talked about this with Lin Manjia."
"You clearly know that she is leading the class to spread rumors about me."
Jiang Wan thought at that time that people really shouldn't think of themselves too seriously. She thought that she and Chen Wulin had known each other for many years and there should be some friendship between them, but she didn't expect that in the end she would be the one who brought shame upon herself.
"You know?" Shock and other emotions flashed in Chen Wulin's eyes. Jiang Wan didn't understand and felt it was unimportant.
"Who told you that?"
Jiang Wan smiled and said, "I saw it with my own eyes."
Chen Wulin's expression was truly remarkable at this moment, turning pale, then blue, before finally returning to his usual dull expression. It was like a stone dropped into water, shattering only the momentary stillness before returning to its original state.
"But Jiang Wan." Chen Wulin's voice was cold and pale, like a sharp blade emitting cold air that cut a harsh hole in the hot air of early summer.
"Are all the things Lin Manjia said really false?"
"Which of those boys wasn't bitten by you—"
A white Volkswagen online-hailing taxi slowly pulled up in front of them. The hot air from its exhaust licked her bare calves like tongues of fire. It was a scorching summer day, burning painfully, like a bite from a ferocious beast—not fatal, but far more painful. Jiang Wan walked forward, opened the backseat door, and glanced sideways at the boy next to her. Fine beads of sweat, freshly tanned by the sun, lined her temples. Her smooth, beautiful face was expressionless, yet her beauty and liveliness were undeniable.
"Chen Wulin."
Jiang Wan's voice was very calm. She used to use this tone when she gave speeches under the national flag every week. There were no ups and downs in her voice. Combined with her cold face, there was a natural sense of distance.
"Even if it's all true, so what?"
"Is this a reason for her to spread rumors about me?"
Jiang Wan's eyes swept over. Her eyes were black and round, often sharp but also cute. What she revealed at this moment was not playfulness or cuteness, but seeing through.
"Actually, you think the same as her, right? I've never said that I'm a certain type of girl, but you, and the rest of you, always impose your imagination of me on me."
"Then in the end, when you find out that I'm nothing like you imagined, you put all the blame on me."
"Beautiful, kind, pure, what else? Considerate? I advise you not to apply your mother's standards for finding a daughter-in-law to others, otherwise you will be the only one who gets angry and embarrassed in the end."
"If you still want to be friends with me." Jiang Wan added slowly.
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