Chapter 9

For the past two days, Xiao Xiaoli’s brow had been twitching nonstop. She looked deeply worried and kept sighing every now and then.

“What’s wrong with you? You’ve been wearing that gloomy face all day. You’ve sighed no fewer than five times in an hour.” Mu Cheng waved the phone in her hand. “Bad mood? Come play a game?”

Xiao Xiaoli sighed again. “How could I be in the mood to play games right now? I’m telling you, I keep feeling like something bad is going to happen. My instincts have always been very accurate. A woman’s sixth sense.”

Mu Cheng tapped open the game and waited for the loading screen, not forgetting to insult her in passing. “That’s not accurate instinct, and it’s not a woman’s sixth sense either. You’re purely just a jinx.”

“Then I really am going to jinx something.” Xiao Xiaoli spun her swivel chair around until she was facing Mu Cheng. “I’m telling you, Liu Sihui is the type with an extremely strong desire for revenge. Whoever provokes her, she’ll definitely return it double. If she doesn’t beat you up, then she’ll scheme against you behind your back. Quite a few people at school have suffered losses at her hands.”

Mu Cheng was too focused on playing her game and did not listen very carefully. “Liu what? What revenge? Who?”

“The green-haired one from the cafeteria two days ago.” Xiao Xiaoli pushed off the floor with her foot and slid toward Mu Cheng, chair and all, then snatched her phone away. “Can you be serious? I’m genuinely worried here.”

Mu Cheng’s whole heart and eyes were full of the game. Heartlessly, she said, “Give me back my phone. I’m in a team fight. If I get reported later, I’m not letting you off.”

Xiao Xiaoli glanced at Mu Cheng’s score. “Zero kills, seven deaths. You’re playing support and still managed to feed the enemy jungler into godlike status. With this score, you’re still afraid of being reported?”

Mu Cheng snatched her phone back and lowered her head to tap the screen. Her moves were as fierce as a tiger’s, and then the two large words “Defeat” appeared on the phone screen.

“Lost again.” Mu Cheng tossed the phone aside, irritated. “The reason I haven’t played games these past two days was because I got reported so much I was banned from matchmaking. I finally managed to play again, and now I’m probably getting reported for this match too. Tell me, what’s wrong with these teammates? I’m very serious when I play games, okay? Feeding kills takes effort too.”

Xiao Xiaoli clicked her tongue twice. “That must have been so exhausting for you. You’ve perfectly embodied what it means to be both bad at the game and addicted to playing it.”

Mu Cheng was unwilling to admit she was bad and retorted, “You’re the one who’s bad. I’m an ace support.”

Xiao Xiaoli also played this MOBA mobile game, but she basically never played with Mu Cheng. The reason was simple: Mu Cheng was too much of a pit. So much of a pit that it left people with no temper. Playing with her, without exaggeration, meant never winning.

After Mu Cheng finished being angry, she picked up her phone and prepared to start another match.

Xiao Xiaoli sat in front of the computer, suddenly making a fuss as she waved her over. “Mu Cheng, come here. Hurry and look.”

“What?” Seeing her so worked up, Mu Cheng temporarily set the game aside and leaned over in confusion to glance at the computer screen.

It was a video. The quality was unclear, the filming environment noisy, and the camera was unsteady, shaking all over the place. It had been shot on a phone.

As the video played to the end, Mu Cheng’s eyes widened. She immediately slapped the table in anger. “What the hell? This completely reverses black and white. Who posted this video? This is purely malicious editing.”

The main characters in the video were Mu Cheng and Xiao Xiaoli. Everyone else had been mosaicked over, leaving only Mu Cheng and Xiao Xiaoli’s faces visible.

The video had been filmed two days ago, and the location was the cafeteria.

When Liu Sihui had made things difficult for Mu Cheng in the cafeteria, someone had secretly filmed the video. But the contents of the video were not what had actually happened. Instead, it had been maliciously cut together and pieced together at random.

It had clearly been Liu Sihui who had made trouble first, but the video removed the scene of Liu Sihui bullying them and left only the scene of Liu Sihui being shoved to the ground, with Mu Cheng and Xiao Xiaoli standing beside her.

Taken as a whole, it looked as if Mu Cheng was bullying someone. Once paired with a title about Read on BaiLianTalescampus bullying, Mu Cheng and Xiao Xiaoli had somehow inexplicably become people who used power to bully others.

The moment this video came out, Mu Cheng and Xiao Xiaoli instantly became targets of public criticism. The comments under the video were full of scolding.

“Please make sure to punish the people hitting others in this video severely. I really can’t stand this kind of campus bullying. It’s too much.”

“The little girl with the bun looks quite cute, but I never expected her to have such a vicious heart. How can she bully someone like this?”

“What school is this? My daughter is about the same age as the girl in the video. I suddenly feel so worried for her.”

“When I was in school, I was bullied like this too, and it left a huge shadow on me. These people can’t even be considered students. They have no humanity at all.”

“A group of people borrowing someone else’s power to act mighty. Drag them home and have their parents beat them once, and they’ll behave.”

“The person above, you’re wrong. The problem is that their parents might help the tyrant commit evil and not think their own children did anything wrong at all.”

“This video is very messy. It obviously feels edited, and there’s no clear action of anyone hitting anyone either. How are you all so sure this is bullying?”

“I also feel like this video isn’t quite right. Not taking sides.”

Out of ten comments, nine were scolding them. Every one of them was filled with righteous indignation, acting as messengers of justice, yet not many people cared about whether the video was true.

Mu Cheng contacted the blogger who had posted the video and told him to clarify and delete it, but the other party did not reply at all. But that made sense. The blogger had posted this video with the intention of framing them, so how could he possibly be willing to delete it so easily?

Xiao Xiaoli said angrily, “This video was one hundred percent posted by Liu Sihui.”

Mu Cheng had also guessed it. Aside from Liu Sihui, no one else would do something like this. And because she did not dare offend Zhong Yingzhi, she deleted all the footage of Zhong Yingzhi and left only Xiao Xiaoli and Mu Cheng, the two soft persimmons who could be kneaded however she liked.

“What do we do?” Xiao Xiaoli’s face was full of worry. “We’re the victims, but she turned around and accused us first. Now we’re being cursed as the perpetrators instead. What even is this? It’s too unfair.”

Mu Cheng snorted. “What the hell. She really thinks the two of us are soft persimmons? She’s already climbed on top of our heads to piss on us.”

Xiao Xiaoli asked, “Do you have a plan?”

Mu Cheng narrowed her eyes. “I do have one.”

Xiao Xiaoli thought about it, then shook her head worriedly. “Forget it. It’s just one video. No one online knows anyone anyway. If we get cursed a few times, then we get cursed a few times. Endure it, and it’ll pass. Liu Sihui is a famous delinquent. She lost face in the cafeteria, and she posted this video because she wanted to prove her position as boss. If we provoke her again, she might call people over to beat us up.”

“Why are you so cowardly?” Mu Cheng hated that iron could not become steel.

Xiao Xiaoli clicked her tongue. “You’re not cowardly? You’re so amazing, huh? We still have to stay at this school for two more years. If we get targeted by a delinquent, can we still have good days?”

Mu Cheng lowered her head and thought. That reasoning was indeed reasonable, but she could not swallow this anger.

Just then, Mu Cheng’s phone rang. She glanced at the caller ID. It was Mother Mu.

Mu Cheng answered the call. Before she could say anything, Mother Mu started scolding her furiously. “We sent you to school and spent so much money on you. Fine, if you don’t study properly, then so be it, but now you’ve become a little delinquent at school?”

Mother Mu must have seen the video online. After all, the video had been [unauthorized copy]shared more than ten thousand times and had even been pushed onto the trending topics.

Mother Mu had recognized Mu Cheng in the video and misunderstood for a moment, her emotions agitated.

“No,” Mu Cheng tried to explain. “That video was randomly edited by someone. I didn’t hit anyone.”

Mother Mu did not listen at all. “I already saw that video. I saw it clearly and plainly. You beat someone until she was lying on the ground, and you’re still here quibbling.”

Grandma Mu spoke up for Mu Cheng on the other end of the phone. “Xiao Cheng isn’t that kind of child. There must be some misunderstanding here.”

Mother Mu was furious. “Mom, you’re just spoiling her. What misunderstanding could there be in this kind of thing? The video was filmed and posted online. She’s out there acting like a delinquent and bullying other people’s children.”

“Your own child, so why won’t you believe her? Besides, Xiao Cheng already said that video was messed with by someone else.” Grandma Mu’s usually kind face, lined with wrinkles, showed anger.

Father Mu, who had been silent all this time, finally spoke. His voice was loud and forceful. “What are you all arguing about here? I don’t care whether she hit someone or not. Whether she did or didn’t, either way, if she injures someone, I don’t have money to compensate the other family’s parents. My money has to be kept for my son to buy a house, buy a car, and marry a wife.”

Father Mu and Mother Mu were not worried that Mu Cheng had gone bad. What they worried about was only that she might cause trouble and need the family to clean up the mess.

Mother Mu said, “A daughter is just a money-losing good. She’ll be married off eventually and won’t belong to our family. We can’t spend too much money on her. We shouldn’t have let her go to university at all.”

Mother Mu glanced at Grandma Mu, curled her lip, and said unhappily, “Mom, you too. You should have kept at least some of the demolition compensation from our hometown. Wouldn’t it be better to save that money for Xiao Xiong to buy a house? Why spend it on her university? It’s not even useful.”

“What kind of words are those? From the time Xiao Cheng was little until now, this is how you’ve treated her. If I hadn’t looked after this girl, wouldn’t you have made her drop out in middle school?” Grandma Mu was so angry she threw the cane in her hand onto the ground.

“Xiao Cheng has had good grades since she was young. She’s obedient and sensible. Since she got into a good university, of course she should study. As for that precious son of yours, he’s the one who doesn’t need to study. You spoiled him until he has no respect for elders or juniors, and he causes trouble at school all day instead of studying properly. He’s full of bad habits. Don’t you even think about touching my demolition compensation. I’m keeping all that money for Xiao Cheng…”

Listening to these arguments, Mu Cheng’s hand tightened around the phone, her expression lonely and downcast.

Mu Cheng sent Grandma Mu a text, telling her not to argue with her parents and not to get so angry she harmed her health.

The text had only just been sent when Grandma Mu’s call came in.

Grandma Mu sighed. “Your parents are just like that. Don’t be sad. Grandma is here. Grandma will protect you. No matter what that video says, Grandma is on your side. My Xiao Cheng definitely didn’t hit anyone. Even if you really did hit someone, that must mean those people deserved to be hit.”

Mu Cheng’s eyes reddened, and her nose stung.

Grandma Mu said, “Grandma has money. If you injured someone, Grandma will compensate them for you. My Xiao Cheng cannot let others bully her. I’m telling you, whatever your brother has, Grandma will give you every single thing too. When my Xiao Cheng gets married, Grandma will buy Xiao Cheng a big house as a dowry.”

Mu Cheng wiped her tears, her voice choked. “Grandma, I don’t want a big house.”

Grandma Mu heard the sob in her voice and scolded her indulgently, “What are you crying for? You’re already so grown up. Aren’t you ashamed?”