Celestial Silver Spoon - Chapter 22

everything is settled, you must return to the hospital immediately.” Diao Qi tightly gripped Xie Wan’s hand and turned away, speaking to himself, “Ah… Liu Kaiteng is lucky to have such a daughter… remarkable…”

There are those who leave their names in history, stand by emperors, walk hand in hand with heroes, and get intoxicated with poetry. Many talk about the beauty that causes trouble or the woman who is a heroine, but who knows the pain behind that beauty? History shouldn’t just brush over these women lightly, for what they have given is much more than just a smile or a glance!

Unknowingly, it was almost noon. Yixuan was bored to death in her room, so she went downstairs.

“Knock knock!”

“Ye Chen, are you up?” Outside dormitory 1301, Yixuan knocked and asked. Yet, there was no response from inside.

“Ye Chen?”

“Uh… oh… is that Yixuan? Yixuan! Oh, coming!” Hearing Yixuan’s voice, Ye Chen stumbled a bit as he pulled the covers off and went to open the door.

“Take it slow!”

“Ouch, that hurts.”

“Didn’t the doctor say you should go out and walk around when you have nothing to do? It seems like you’re sleeping all day.” Yixuan helped Ye Chen sit on Mingzi’s bed and said.

“Isn’t my recovery going well? Why are you here?” Ye Chen asked.

“Bored. Oh, by the way, this morning I ran into some strange people, and they even hit…”

“Hit what?” Upon hearing the word “hit,” Ye Chen seemed to react instinctively, raising his voice sharply.

“Oh, they just started a conversation with me. I noticed their speech was a bit different from yours.” Yixuan smartly diverted the topic from mentioning that they hit Xiang Tengfei to prevent Ye Chen from getting worked up and causing unnecessary trouble.

“They talked to you? They didn’t do anything to you, did they?” Ye Chen looked Yixuan up and down as he asked.

“No, just exchanged a few words, but I felt they were a bit odd. One of them mentioned he’s not a student from Shengze College.”

“What? Not from Shengze College?” Ye Chen said in shock.

“Can you not overreact like this?” Yixuan commented on seeing Ye Chen’s flustered look.

“Oh, let’s go down and check if they’re still around.” Ye Chen realized his slip and said quietly.

“Okay, I’ll help you down,” Yixuan said as she supported Ye Chen’s arm and led him out of dormitory 1301.

Outside Shengze College, a red Lexus honked twice, startling the security guard.

“Don’t open it! I’ll go see who is in the car! With all these fake license plates around, who knows if someone’s trying to sneak into our school,” one guard was about to press the gate opener when the crooked-faced security guard stopped him.

“Have you all lost your minds? You don’t know to open the gate when Madam President arrives?” Xie Wan called out as she stepped out of the car towards the guard who had come out.

“Oh my! Ms. Xie, hurry! Open the gate quickly!” the crooked-faced security guard ordered his subordinate to open the gate upon seeing Xie Wan. She didn’t say much and got back into the car.

“Senior brother, look!”

At that moment, a handsome boy and a group of twelve were walking right in front of the gate. They saw a car entering from outside and started walking towards it.

“Xie Wan, something seems off about those people; you should get out and check,” Liu Zixu said, her eyes also fixed on the group.

“Alright, miss,” Xie Wan replied, stepping out of the car and walking towards the group.

Perhaps too exhausted, once Xie Wan got out, Liu Zixu leaned her head on the small pillow of her seat and closed her eyes.

“Senior brother, why is she dressed like that? She’s not an assassin, is she?” the tall boy following the handsome boy remarked as he noticed Xie Wan wearing a long gauntlet that covered her arm.

“You hear about robberies in broad daylight, but murders? Not so much,” the handsome boy paused, giving the tall boy a sidelong glance.

“Why are you not in class and loitering around the campus?” Xie Wan stopped about a meter from the handsome boy and asked.

“Who are you?” the handsome boy slowly responded, adjusting his glasses.

“I’m the one asking the questions, and you only need to answer,” Xie Wan replied coldly, her eyes piercing through the brown lenses at the handsome boy. The disdainful sharpness in his eyes also shot through his brown glasses back at Xie Wan. The two locked eyes for a long moment before the handsome boy finally spoke, “We are here to find Ye Chen.”

“Ye Chen? What do you need him for?” Xie Wan asked, frowning. Both of them were very cautious in their words.

“If you know him, miss, please take us to him.”

Xie Wan was already suspicious of the handsome boy who spoke so stiffly. The request to take them to Ye Chen made her feel even more uneasy.

“Who are you people?” Xie Wan inquired.

“Who we are doesn’t matter. What matters is whether you know the person we’re looking for.” The handsome boy’s words carried a hint of menace as if he held deep-seated hostility toward Xie Wan.

“You’re not students of Shengze!”

“Who said we’re not?”

“Do you know what day it is three days from now?”

“……”

“Who sent you?”

In a flash of anger, Xie Wan’s left arm throbbed in pain, causing her to lean forward slightly. The handsome boy, observant as ever, assumed she was about to attack and swiftly swept a kick towards Xie Wan’s neck. Feeling a draft of cold wind, Xie Wan leaned back just in time. The handsome boy missed and landed, ready with his left foot in a backward sweep. Xie Wan raised her right hand to block, and the force sent her back a meter.

“Not bad at all!” Xie Wan twisted in mid-air with a horizontal turn. The handsome boy advanced with careful steps as Xie Wan spun three full circles mid-air and then extended her right foot sharply towards the handsome boy’s head. He blocked with his fist, allowing Xie Wan to flip and land gracefully. The handsome boy made a running leap, rising nearly two meters off the ground, and kicked rapidly at Xie Wan’s chest with crossed legs. Seeing the fierce attack, Xie Wan had no time to back away. She tried to block with her hands, but with her left hand immobilized, she opted for a backward flip, narrowly avoiding the kicks that grazed the tip of her nose. Missing his target, the handsome boy landed just as Xie Wan pounced from behind. As he turned around, Xie Wan’s right foot was already at his cheek, sending him flying a meter to the right, crashing to the ground.

“Get her!” the tall boy shouted, and a dozen people surrounded Xie Wan.

“Damn it! It’s our own people fighting each other!” the crooked-faced security guard exclaimed, seeing Xie Wan and a “student” locked in combat on campus.

“Captain, should we call the police?”

“Are you out of your mind? Don’t air our dirty laundry in public, got it? Grab your gear and get in there!”

“Whose side are we on?”

“Did you grow up eating pig brains?”

The crooked-faced security guard, along with five of his subordinates, approached Madam President’s car, determined to ensure she noticed their intervention.

Before the five guards even reached them, Xie Wan was already engaged in a fight with eleven people. Outnumbered and injured, and facing skilled opponents, Xie Wan was thrown to the ground in seconds.

“You bunch of punks looking for trouble? Get your hands behind your backs, now!” the crooked-faced security guard barked, signaling for one of his subordinates to help Xie Wan up. He then swaggered over to confront the dozen attackers.

Hearing the guard’s shout, the handsome boy and his group were stunned. It became clear that the woman they had knocked down was affiliated with the college, or else the security wouldn’t have come to her aid.

“This isn’t good! Senior brother, what do we do now?” the tall boy whispered behind the handsome boy.

The handsome boy gave the tall boy a look, his eyes darting from the tall boy to Xie Wan. Misunderstanding the cue, the tall boy thought he was being told to continue fighting Xie Wan and blurted out, “Senior brother… really?”

“Go apologize!” the handsome boy muttered through gritted teeth, twitching a corner of his mouth.

The tall boy froze at the handsome boy’s words, his face displaying reluctance, but he grudgingly began to move forward.

“Y-you… stand still!” the crooked-faced security guard barked, watching as the tall boy took two steps forward, prompting him to take three steps back. Adjusting his hat with his left hand and pointing the stun baton with his right, he continued, “I didn’t mean… I didn’t mean anything else…”

“Stand back!”

“Okay… okay.”

Faced with the crooked-faced security guard’s panicked orders, the tall boy reluctantly stepped back. Not wanting to lose face, the guard approached again, straightening his posture and commanding, “What department and class are you from?”

“They’re not students of Shengze. Who knows which gang they’re from. They should be sent to the Public Security Bureau before they cause more trouble here!” Xie Wan said, eyes fixed on the handsome boy.

“This… this… well, that’s up to you then, up to you,” the crooked-faced security guard said, incredibly turning to the handsome boy and the others with these words, an astonishing statement indeed!

The handsome boy was at a loss for how to respond and turned his head to look at the people behind him, who exchanged confused glances, clearly unsettled by the guard’s puzzling words.

“Brother! Please, let us go! We promise to be grateful and change our ways, to become better people in the future!” In the midst of everyone’s hesitation, a chubby kid at the back suddenly spoke up loudly. His words seemed to clear a path, and those in front of him stepped aside. Everyone else widened their eyes in disbelief, then glanced at the crooked-faced security guard, some wiping sweat from their brows.

The crooked-faced security guard sniffed and said, “I see you all understand the principle of ‘leniency to those who confess and severity to those who resist.’ Well then… since everyone’s political awareness is so high, alright, then this…”

“Ahem! Ahem!” Xie Wan cleared her throat to interrupt the guard’s increasingly off-track bureaucratic speech.

“Well, even if you’re willing to confess, you can’t just keep causing trouble. Come with me to the police station!” the crooked-faced security guard said, rolling his eyes in feigned seriousness.

Hearing this, the handsome boy’s group exhaled nervously once more. The guard turned to leave, but no one followed him.

“Brother, please have mercy on us. We’re newcomers here, from the same village. How about I recite a few prayers and burn some incense for you? Let’s just call it even?” the chubby kid added.

The crooked-faced security guard pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his face, saying, “Good heavens, is that how you curse people?”

“Stop being so wishy-washy! You’re supposed to be a man! You’re embarrassing yourself!” Xie Wan scolded the security guard.

“Senior brother, I think we should just get out of here,” the tall boy suggested to the handsome boy.

Without a word, the handsome boy took two steps forward and addressed the guard, “Brother, we didn’t mean to cause trouble…” As he spoke, Xie Wan launched a kick at his face. The handsome boy blocked it with his left hand, so Xie Wan swiftly aimed her right elbow at his left cheek. The handsome boy ducked and swept his leg, forcing Xie Wan to flip away, and the two resumed their fight.

At that moment, Yixuan was helping Ye Chen toward the college’s north gate, where they could faintly see the ongoing scuffle.