Chapter 18 My Little Sweetheart.

Ji Shu sobbed, “This chocolate was definitely bought by your dad for some shameless little vixen outside.”

Ye Rongcheng took a hard drag of his cigarette. A ring of bluish-white smoke drifted from the corner of his mouth. “I never bought it. You mysteriously pull out a receipt I’ve never seen and throw a temper at me. Your mom is doing this on purpose, suspicious all day like she’s got a mental problem.”

“I’m suspicious? Who made me suspicious?” Ji Shu refused to yield. “When have I ever wrongly accused you?”

“I’ve had enough of this life. Fine, we’ll divorce. You can go live with whoever you want!” Ji Shu’s words actually had some backbone and landed with force.

It was just that the boy-who-cried-wolf trick had been played too many times. Her husband and son had long stopped taking it seriously.

“The son is already that old. Divorce over what?” Ye Rongcheng didn’t want to make such an ugly scene in front of their son. This wife of his was a model wife in outsiders’ eyes, but at home she was nothing like the gentle and virtuous woman she was outside.

“Alright, alright, stop crying. What kind of look is that? I remember you said a couple of days ago that Hermès came out with a new bag. Later I’ll have someone bring you one.” For women, bags cured all diseases. Especially Hermès. The therapeutic effect was the best.

Ji Shu pulled out another tissue to wipe her tears, making quite a bit of noise.

Ye Rongcheng’s cigarette-holding fingertips skillfully flicked the ash. The ash dropped into the crystal ashtray on the coffee table.

The two of them seemed to be waiting for Ye Xiaoyang to take a stance.

“Dad, Mom, stop arguing.” Ye Xiaoyang knew he always had to say something to maintain this marriage that looked as if it might collapse in wind and rain. Otherwise he would seem too heartless.

“The chocolate was bought by me.” These words fell in the spacious living room of the villa and startled his parents into looking at each other.

Before the two of them could open their mouths to ask, Ye Xiaoyang confessed, “I smashed a girl with a football at school. I felt bad, so I sent her a box of chocolate.”

He spoke in a neat, orderly way, without mixing in any extra emotion, just like a meticulous news anchor on the evening news.

These few sentences of Ye Xiaoyang’s blocked back all the questions the two of them wanted to ask.

If Ye Xiaoyang had been evasive, it would have looked like a thief with a guilty conscience. But this tone of his made it clear he was clean and had no other meaning.

“Oh, so that’s how it is.” Ji Shu crumpled the wet tissue into a ball and threw it into the trash can. She would rather her son had said something else and confirmed his dad’s crimes. Instead of stating a fact like this that made her lose face, as if everything had been her looking for trouble and bringing it on herself.

“Why didn’t you say so earlier?” Ji Shu wanted to recover a bit of ground.

“He’s not a three-year-old child anymore. Does he need to report every little thing to you in detail?” Ye Rongcheng said. “It’s such a small matter.”

Who knew whether he was speaking for Ye Xiaoyang or for himself.

A woman’s suspicious nature was truly terrifying. Even more terrifying was that their intuition was often very accurate.

Ji Shu shot Ye Rongcheng a look and said nothing more, but she still pulled a long face.

Ye Xiaoyang said lightly, “Alright. I’m going back to my room.”

Seeing their son walk up the spiral staircase, Ji Shu nudged Ye Rongcheng with her elbow. “The Hermès we agreed on. No going back on it.”

“This color, Hermès orange.” Ji Shu took out her phone and swiped the photo for Ye Rongcheng to see. “Just a little over a hundred thousand. Not expensive at all.”

Ye Rongcheng gave a muffled grunt, pressed the cigarette into the ashtray, and his heart dripped blood.

The son’s one-thousand-something chocolate had blown up the old man’s little treasury of more than a hundred thousand. He had truly raised a good son.

The three-day holiday passed very quickly. When Ye Xiaoyang went to school on Wednesday morning, he discovered that the open ground under the teaching building was piled full of large cardboard boxes.

Quite a few students used the time before morning reading started to poke their heads around and whisper.

“Air conditioning? The school is going to install air conditioning for us?”

“And it’s G-brand central air conditioning. So expensive.”

“Is the sky raining red rain? Since when has the principal been that generous?”

“Last night I heard two teachers say this was donated by a student’s parent. With how stingy the principal is, how could it be possible?”

“Ah? Which student’s parents are that generous?”

“Don’t know. Supposedly they were afraid it would look bad if they only installed it for their own child’s class, so they contracted the air conditioning for the whole school.”

“What a tycoon. Why don’t I have parents like that?”

Everyone started guessing which classmate’s parents had done this good deed.

Ye Xiaoyang remembered that a few days ago when Luo Yi was on the phone with her dad, she had vaguely mentioned the air conditioning matter.

It shouldn’t be that coincidental, right?

A few classmates discussed without coming up with any leads. When they turned their heads and saw Ye Xiaoyang was also there, they found it strange. This kind of academic god never cared about worldly matters of the lower realm. His appearing here now must mean something was off.

Thinking that Ye Xiaoyang’s family was also rich, they asked, “Did your dad buy these for us?”

Ye Xiaoyang couldn’t help giving a cold smile.

Marx once said that capital comes into the world dripping from head to foot, from every pore, with blood and dirt.

His dad Ye Rongcheng, as a figure who ranked in Xishui’s financial world, naturally treated this sentence as a guiding principle. Wanting to scrape money from under his fingernails—aside from his mom Ji Shu, there were probably not many people with that ability.

How would Ye Rongcheng do this kind of meaningless charity?

Ye Xiaoyang: “No.”

No? Then for the moment they really couldn’t think of which classmate’s parents were that lavish.

After arriving at the classroom, more than half the classmates were already there. Everyone was swaying their heads and reciting books.

Luo Yi was covering both ears, softly reciting Free and Easy Wandering .

This period was Chinese morning reading. As soon as Chinese teacher Liang Qin entered the classroom, she said she was going to spot-check recitation.

The status of high school Chinese was very awkward. It was a main subject, worth 150 points on the college entrance exam, yet it was far from as important as math and English.

No.1 High had a joke that had been circulating for a long time: “Math is the emperor, English is the favored concubine, and Chinese is the empress banished to the cold palace.”

So when Liang Qin suddenly wanted to check recitation, the classroom immediately filled with complaints.

“In your class’s last midterm exam, the average scores for math, physics, and chemistry were all first in the grade. Chinese didn’t even rank in the top three. It looks like I’ve been too loose with you on ordinary days.” Liang Qin spoke with conviction. “On the last midterm’s ancient poetry fill-in-the-blank questions, how many people got them all right? Raise your hands and let me see. You can be exempt from the check.”

There were nearly fifty people in the class. Not a single person raised a hand.

The reason was that the last question tested a line from Preface to the Pavilion of Prince Teng : “Governor Yan’s refined reputation, with ceremonial halberds arriving from afar; Prefect Yuwen’s virtuous example, with carriage curtains pausing briefly.”

Preface to the Pavilion of Prince Teng was not a required recitation piece for the college entrance exam in Province X. This line wasn’t famous, and it had many obscure characters. The students had basically all fallen on it. Even Ye Xiaoyang hadn’t been spared.

Liang Qin held the book and started the spot-check from the first row on the far right.

The person pointed to would be randomly given a title and had to recite starting from a designated paragraph. If they couldn’t recite it, they would stand and recite until class ended.

Standing as punishment wasn’t a big deal, but it really was a bit humiliating. Everyone was already in high school, yet they were still being corporally punished and shamed like elementary school students. Their faces couldn’t take it.

Yet Liang Qin checked them one by one. Not a single person could escape. Morning reading had just ended, and among the people she had checked, not a single one had actually passed.

Liang Qin slapped the book onto the podium and exploded. “You had three days off for May Day, and I see you’ve all lost your sense of direction! The college entrance exam Chinese dictation is worth twelve points. What concept is twelve points? One point difference is several thousand people. Are you planning not to take these twelve points?”

“On ordinary days I don’t leave you much homework. I just ask you to recite a bit, and you brush me off like this?” Liang Qin spoke until spit flew. The students below didn’t dare let out a single fart.

“The next two periods are cancelled. All of you recite for me!” Liang Qin seemed determined to show these little brats some color—Chinese was the empress. Even after entering the cold palace, she was still the empress. High school Chinese teachers also needed respect.

“The classmates who didn’t pass the spot-check will come find me later and continue reciting. It’ll only be over when you pass.” Right after the holiday, she had to make them gather their minds. Otherwise their hearts would all wander off from playing. How would they study then?

After the class bell rang, Liang Qin continued the spot-check.

When she reached Ye Xiaoyang, the recitation piece was Guan Ju .

Ye Xiaoyang recited it extremely fluently. Unexpectedly, Liang Qin pointed to another piece, Li Sao , as if deliberately making things difficult for him.

Wasn’t that so? Ye Xiaoyang could score full marks in math, physics, chemistry, and biology. When it came to Chinese, he actually even lost points on dictation. Wasn’t that looking down on Chinese?

She had to give him a show of strength.

The classmates all looked over. If even the academic god couldn’t recite it, then the whole class would probably become a laughingstock.

They both hoped Ye Xiaoyang could live up to expectations and break the curse, and also didn’t hope he would stand out alone like a crane among chickens.

If Ye Xiaoyang recited it, it would be: “Look, there are still people who can recite it. Why can’t you? Isn’t it because you didn’t put in enough heart?”

If Ye Xiaoyang couldn’t recite it, it would be: “Even Ye Xiaoyang can’t recite it. How do you have the confidence not to recite and still take those twelve points?”

Fine. There was always a reason. Teachers could always find an excuse to lecture people.

Yet how could Li Sao be that easy to recite? The Chu ci written by Qu Yuan, China’s first romantic poet, could be described as awkward, obscure, and hard to understand.

Ye Xiaoyang’s memory was outstanding, but that still had to be built on the foundation that he could understand it.

“If only my feelings were truly beautiful and refined, what harm even in long hunger…” Ye Xiaoyang recited to here, then truly couldn’t remember the part after.

Even though he had recited ninety percent of the selected excerpt, Liang Qin still made him stand as punishment. She had made up her mind to kill the chicken to warn the monkeys. He was the best example.

Everyone sighed.

It looked like there was going to be an unprecedented grand occasion of the whole class standing as punishment.

This was also pretty good. Anyway, none of them reciting it and all of them reciting it had the same effect.

Ye Xiaoyang didn’t mind much either.

Even if he got zero out of those twelve points, it probably wouldn’t have much effect on his college entrance exam result—anyway it would be either Tsinghua or Peking University. A third situation was impossible.

What’s more, how could it possibly be zero points? His recitation ability could absolutely defeat 99.99% of examinees.

He expressionlessly held a book. When he turned the page, the corner of his eye caught Liang Qin heading toward Luo Yi’s side.

“Hey, look quick.” Zhou Jiahang, as his fellow sufferer who had only recited two lines before being made to stand, said, “Liang Qin is going to bully your little darling.”

Ye Xiaoyang: “…”

What the hell was “little darling”?

Though she really was quite darling, and that possessive “your” was also used with great essence.

Zhou Jiahang successfully used one sentence to salvage the two of them’s teetering friendship.

When Ye Xiaoyang had just been pointed to, he hadn’t been nervous at all. Now he faintly started worrying for Luo Yi.

If she couldn’t recite it and was made to stand, her face was so thin. She would definitely feel terrible.

Luo Yi was pointed to stand up. Liang Qin flipped the book with a rustling sound and finally stopped on a certain page.

With his 1.5 vision, Zhou Jiahang quickly identified the illustration on that page.

“Holy shit. This old woman Liang Qin actually made her recite The Peacock Flies Southeast ?”

The Peacock Flies Southeast , together with The Ballad of Mulan , was called one of the “Twin Jades of Yuefu.” It was the first long narrative poem in the history of Chinese literature, more than 350 lines and more than 1,700 characters.

Key point: more than 1,700 characters. Not a required recitation piece for the college entrance exam. At most the kind that appeared in extracurricular fill-in-the-blank questions.