Chapter 62: Saving the Bullied Top Student (10)

Tang Qi could feel Luo Xun’s hand gripping hers trembling. She gently patted Luo Xun’s hand to comfort her, but Zhou Chenglong stepped forward. “Luo Xun, can I talk to you alone?”

The sound of his footsteps terrified Luo Xun so much that she curled into a ball, pressing her forehead against Tang Qi’s back like an ostrich, as if that way Zhou Chenglong couldn’t see her. Her voice was sharp. “D-Don’t come closer! Stay away!”

“Luo…”

“Shut up!” Tang Qi’s eyes blazed with fury. “Don’t you see Luoluo is scared? Get lost…”

Startled by Tang Qi’s outburst, Zhou Chenglong stumbled back several steps. Tang Qi commanded, “You stand outside the courtyard gate. Hands on your head, facing away from us, and squat.”

“Don’t push your luck!” Zhou Chenglong ground his teeth. Tang Qi’s face was cold. “Right now, you are the one begging us. Those parents came looking for you, didn’t they? Being hounded and cornered isn’t comfortable, is it!”

She jabbed a finger through the air at him. “You need to understand: right now, you… are asking us for a favor. When begging, you need the proper attitude.”

Zhou Chenglong clenched his fists. He didn’t dare act out, and Tang Qi was right. Those parents had shown up at his house this morning, demanding he pay for the losses and take responsibility. They yelled insults and threw punches and kicks at him. He tried to fight back but was no match for several fathers, who pinned him and slapped him several times.

All he did was complain to a few friends! How was any of this his fault?

Thinking of his mother’s screams and their attitude, Zhou Chenglong felt utterly humiliated and deeply wronged. He walked outside the gate and squatted down.

Hearing the footsteps move away, Luo Xun finally raised her head. From her angle, she could only see his hunched, retreating back.

Perhaps because she couldn’t see his face, the fear gripping Luo Xun’s heart lessened significantly. She looked up to see Tang Qi looking at her with encouragement. Tang Qi’s voice was nothing like its previous sharpness; it was gentle enough to melt water. “Don’t be afraid. Look, he doesn’t even dare to resist.”

As she spoke, she picked up a rock from the ground. “Want to try hitting him once?”

There was a time when Luo Xun walked to school every day, and every day she would see Zhou Chenglong and his friends along that stretch of road. That path was practically her daily nightmare.

They would throw stones and bugs at her. She couldn’t dodge or run. If she dodged, Zhou Chenglong would instantly explode and throw even bigger, more numerous rocks at her.

Once, she even got a cut an inch long on her forehead. Zhou Chenglong paused for a moment, then doubled over, laughing uncontrollably, and wouldn’t let her wipe it clean. He said he wanted the whole school to see the color of her blood.

She attended class the entire day with blood smeared on her face. Her homeroom teacher finally couldn’t bear to watch and helped her wash her face. This “game” lasted a month before Zhou Chenglong got bored and ended it.

The stone in Tang Qi’s hand suddenly overlapped in Luo Xun’s mind with the one that had hit her head back then. Luo Xun’s hands trembled uncontrollably as she took the stone.

The stone wasn’t large, but in her hand, it weighed a thousand pounds!

Tang Qi encouraged her, “You can vent any grievance you have. This is what he owes you.” She didn’t agree with answering violence with violence, but Luo Xun had been bullied for two years; the emotional scars were too deep. She needed to let out the pain, the pent-up resentment.

As if bewitched, Luo Xun let fly the stone. Whoosh. It landed softly on Zhou Chenglong’s body. His squatting form shifted slightly but he said nothing.

The small courtyard had many pebbles. Tang Qi picked up a few more. “Keep going?”

Luo Xun’s eyes lit up. This time, her hand was much steadier. The stones landed heavily on Zhou Chenglong, making him wince in pain.

“How many times did he bully you before?” Tang Qi asked.

“…Put bugs in my desk fifty-eight times, splashed ink on my clothes sixteen times, punctured my bike tires sixty-seven times… locked in the bathroom, shut in the sports room, homework torn up, countless times…” Luo Xun started narrating calmly, but her voice gradually choked with sobs. This was a long-standing scar; even just thinking about it caused her pain and breakdown. She could only suppress these wounds where no one could see them.

She didn’t understand. She couldn’t comprehend why she had to endure all this. Now, finally laying it all out in the open, she found that compared to the excruciating pain before, her heart was a little calmer. “And… he and his friends threw rocks at me. Six hundred and fifty-eight rocks hit my body.”

Each time, she had silently counted them in her mind. She didn’t know why she remembered so clearly—maybe to distract herself, or maybe… for this day!

“Get it all back. You can hit it all back!” Tang Qi handed Luo Xun the stones. Luo Xun took them, and this time, she used all her strength. Her features twisted with exertion and fury as she mercilessly hurled a stone straight at Zhou Chenglong’s head.

Bang!

“What the f—” Zhou Chenglong was never good-tempered. He couldn’t help but jump up and curse a few times. But turning and seeing Tang Qi’s icy face, he gritted his teeth and squatted back down.

Luo Xun didn’t throw any more stones. Instead, she gathered her courage and asked through the doorway, “Does it hurt? I want to ask you, does this hurt? It really hurts, doesn’t it?”

Zhou Chenglong said nothing. Luo Xun screamed, her voice thick with tears, “It hurts me too! Being bullied by you every day, I was in pain, I’d break down too! Every day I just wanted to die! I don’t understand why you bullied me so much?”

Her words were fragmented, her shouts breaking. This was her outcry. “Why did you bully me?! Tell me!! Ahh!!”

This was the question she had asked in her dreams countless times. Today, she could finally ask it out loud.

Tears streamed down Luo Xun’s face. Tang Qi wrapped an arm around her shoulders. Luo Xun buried herself in Tang Qi’s embrace; though not an incredibly broad shoulder, it gave her a complete sense of security.

“I…” Zhou Chenglong didn’t know why either. Maybe it really was as Tang Qi said. He wanted to drag Luo Xun down, to fall into the abyss with him.

But, that wasn’t what he thought at the beginning. He had clearly just wanted to catch Luo Xun’s attention.

When had it twisted into this?

“People like him don’t have a ‘why’ for what they do. It’s simply because you looked easy to bully. He’s just rotten to the core, utterly disgusting. Luoluo had the bad luck of attracting this kind of disgusting person.” Tang Qi’s malicious words hit Zhou Chenglong like a physical blow, making his whole body shudder.

He wanted to say that wasn’t it. He came today to apologize to Luo Xun. To tell her that he just liked her, wasn’t thinking clearly, which is why he did those things. He came to beg for Luo Xun’s forgiveness.

And to beg for his friends’ forgiveness too. None of them were bad people!

They were just… just a bit reckless!

“That’s not…” Zhou Chenglong tried to explain, but hearing Luo Xun’s heartbroken sobs, the words of explanation stuck in his throat, unable to come out.

At the start, he hadn’t intended to hurt Luo Xun. He just took her book, wanted to tease her a little, but afterwards…

And he hadn’t done it on purpose anyway. It was Luo Xun’s fault for never crying! He thought it was fine!

Luo Xun wailed loudly. Tang Qi quietly held her, patting her back. “It’s over. This will never happen again.” At the same time, she breathed a sigh of relief internally.

This cry had finally vented it all out. She was really afraid Luo Xun would bottle everything up inside and break.

When the crying stopped, Luo Xun sheepishly wiped her tears. Noticing the large and small wet spots on Tang Qi’s clothes, she reached out to wipe them, murmuring, “When we get back, I’ll wash them for you.”

“There’s a washing machine.” Tang Qi teased. “What if you hurt your hands washing them? I’d be heartbroken.”

Seeing Luo Xun’s mood much improved, Tang Qi pinched her cheek. “You go pack your clothes. I’ll wait.”

Luo Xun also didn’t want to face Zhou Chenglong anymore. She turned and went back inside to pack. Tang Qi walked outside the gate. Noticing Zhou Chenglong’s gaze fixed intently on Luo Xun, she mocked, “What, want to beg for forgiveness? Forgive you, and incidentally forgive your little friends?”

She suddenly grabbed Zhou Chenglong by the collar. “I warn you, don’t come at Luoluo with your carefully packaged excuses to disgust her. Were you going to say you ‘liked’ her, just wanted to get her attention, and you took it too far? Still think you’re some great romantic? Want to use the ‘didn’t know how to like someone’ excuse?”

“Liking someone is instinct. You instinctively want to be good to them. Any harm done under the banner of ‘liking’ someone isn’t liking at all. You hurt her so much—did you ever even treat her as a person? Do you still think she wasn’t worthy of your affection? How could the great Boss of No. 1 High School like a nerd?”

“And what if your ‘brothers’ saw? Then just bully her a little. Maybe in your heart, you even thought only bullying her was some kind of deep, profound love? Truly great?”

Tang Qi’s anger boiled over. She punched Zhou Chenglong square in the face. “Zhou Chenglong, you are damn nauseating. You didn’t know you were bullying her? Didn’t know she was suffering? You knew. But that feeling of power was exhilarating. Controlling someone felt great. And that occasional guilt that popped up? You could just bury it under the label of ‘like.’”

“You’d tell yourself, ‘It’s only because I don’t know how to properly like someone that I did this! I didn’t mean it.’”

“Are you even a man? You’re an animal. If you think you did nothing wrong, why come here begging for forgiveness today? In these past two years, you had countless chances to seek her forgiveness, countless chances to change. Why didn’t you change?”

“Because she couldn’t fight back! And now here you are, needing something from her, hoping Luoluo will come forward and forgive you scumbags. Zhou Chenglong, you want all the good while doing all the bad. Were you thinking that after you confessed, she’d be moved to tears of gratitude?”

Tang Qi patted Zhou Chenglong’s face with just enough force to sting. “Wrong. She just feels disgust. Everyone will feel that. No one is moved by your self-righteous ‘love.’ They just find you revolting.”

“You’re not her! How do you know she can’t forgive me?” Zhou Chenglong’s voice was harsh. He had bullied Luo Xun, but his feelings for her were also true. “I can change. I’ll treat her good from now on.”

“Because we’re human!” Tang Qi sneered. “I’m telling you, begging is useless. Luoluo won’t forgive those people. And she won’t forgive you! Why should she forgive you just because you asked? Who the hell do you think you are?”

Tang Qi’s gaze at Zhou Chenglong dripped with contempt. “Trash!”

Luo Xun stepped out of the house and called, “Little Seven!”

Tang Qi released Zhou Chenglong. She first looked back to take the badly damaged suitcase from Luo Xun’s hands and said softly, “Let’s go home and eat first. We’ll go check on your mom at the hospital tonight.”

Luo Xun nodded. Summoning her courage, she looked at Zhou Chenglong. “What did you come to ask me today?”

“I wanted…” Zhou Chenglong’s eyes lit up.

“No matter what it is, I won’t agree. Zhou Chenglong, from the first time you bullied me, I’ve wanted to kill you.” Luo Xun was no saint; she couldn’t forgive someone who had bullied her like this. Back then, she couldn’t fight back; now she had a pillar to lean on.

That’s right. She felt Tang Qi was her pillar. She trusted her without reason.

“Little Seven, let’s go.”

Seeing Luo Xun’s gaze full of trust and dependence on Tang Qi, a wave of pain spread through Zhou Chenglong’s entire being.

Clearly, he was the one who liked Luo Xun the most. So why…

Tang Qi turned to look at Zhou Chenglong, narrowing her eyes. “But, if you really want to beg for mercy… remember to come to school from now on, Classmate Zhou!”