Winter Time Rendering

Chapter 164: Chapter 69: Zhang Shutong’s Capture

By the long break after second period that afternoon, Zhang Shutong still hadn’t returned to the classroom.

The incident with the building blocks from this morning wasn’t over. Song was in his office, launching another major investigation.

As a result, the hallways were a cacophony of noise. Only the students of Ninth Grade, Class One, were inside for a study hall, supervised by the class monitor.

But the bespectacled girl completely lacked authority. She was doing her best just to keep the students from running out of the room. As for the students whispering amongst themselves?

’Let them be. I can’t control them anyway.’

And so, the most brazen clique in the class had already openly swapped seats.

Du Kang greeted a boy with a grin and, in exchange for a carton of milk, moved to a seat in the third-to-last row by the window.

Qingyi was right behind him in the second-to-last row. As Qingyi himself put it, this spot was prime real estate.

And it was none other than Ruoping who had already squeezed in beside Qingyi.

The trio prepared to hold an emergency meeting.

"What’s the deal with Shutong? How did he manage to piss off Gu Qiuyan?"

"Unfortunately," said Qingyi, the only one in the know, motioning for them to temper their grief. "Shutong has been exposed."

"Exposed?"

"He was the one who instructed Li Yipeng to smash the building blocks," Qingyi whispered.

"What?" Du Kang and Ruoping’s faces fell.

"Du Kang, keep it down, or I’ll have to write your name down..." The class monitor’s faint voice drifted from the teacher’s desk. She only ever dared to pick on the easy targets.

"Have mercy, have mercy." Du Kang turned and clasped his hands together in mock supplication. No longer in the mood for banter, he immediately pressed, "Explain yourself. How is Shutong involved in this?"

"Just kidding." Qingyi watched their reactions for a moment, finding them hilarious, before slowly revealing the truth. He then deftly tilted his head to dodge Ruoping’s incoming claw. "Hey, calm down..."

He dodged the claw, but not the foot. The girl stomped hard on his shoe.

"Spit it out! Stop trying to be mysterious," Ruoping glared.

Meng Qingyi handed her his phone while he set about cleaning his sneaker. It was a white shoe, and getting it stepped on was painful—as precious to a man as his hairstyle.

「A moment later.」

After the phone with the chat log had made its rounds, the emergency meeting devolved into a gossip session.

"See? I told you there was something going on between them," Du Kang said with a raised eyebrow. "Our ’Deskmates of the Year’ are finally teaming up."

"When did they get so chummy? Weren’t they giving each other the cold shoulder just a little while ago?" Ruoping was stunned.

Du Kang patted Ruoping’s shoulder and said in a grave, worldly tone, "There’s nothing to be done. Your Shutong’s all grown up now. You can’t control him anymore. I’d advise you to let him go."

"Get lost. Who are you calling old?" Ruoping retorted, then turned to Qingyi. "So, what are those two doing in the office right now?"

"Shutong says they’re ’still fishing’."

"What do you mean ’still’?"

"Probably because we just went fishing last night," Qingyi said, sounding a bit confused himself.

As they spoke, students were being called out of the classroom and returning one by one. Song was calling them by seating order, and it was soon Du Kang’s turn. The three of them talked it over, wanting to go together as a support group to check on him. They figured they had enough pull with their homeroom teacher for that.

But Qingyi stopped them.

"Shutong specifically told me to have the three of us go one by one."

"Is this part of the plan, too?"

"This is also part of the plan."

Ruoping was getting a headache from all this mystery. She waved a hand. "Fine, Du Kang, you go scout things out." Du Kang gave a mock salute. "Yes, ma’am! Await my good report!"

With that, he turned and ran off.

A short while later, Du Kang returned, sighing.

"It’s over. It’s all over," he declared the moment he stepped into the classroom. "Shutong really got caught..."

"What happened? Spit it out, what did you see?" Ruoping demanded.

"The second I went in, I saw him standing there, facing a cabinet. Song and Gu Qiuyan were sitting nearby, and each of their expressions was colder than the last. I also heard them say they were going to call his mom..."

"Oh, and they were talking about transferring him to another class. We might not see him again..."

"Du Kang, Feng Ruoping, please keep your voices down," the class monitor piped up again feebly.

It was unclear if Du Kang heard her; he just heaved another sigh and returned to his seat.

Soon, it was Ruoping’s turn.

Ruoping also returned a moment later. She wasn’t sighing—she was furious.

"I can tell Shutong is being framed! Isn’t Gu Qiuyan just making baseless accusations? Is it just because her family’s rich? And Song, too! Why does he believe everything she says? I could just as easily say it was someone else!"

The angrier she got, the more she wanted to march up to the teacher’s desk and demand justice for Zhang Shutong. Du Kang rushed to pull her back, whispering, "Hey, please, don’t cause a scene..."

"Am I bothering you?" Ruoping whipped her head around.

"You’re scaring her..." Du Kang pointed feebly at the class monitor. The monitor was already gathering her textbooks, apparently preparing to cede the podium to ’Heroine Feng.’

Qingyi ran over to help placate her. After a long time coaxing her with gentle words, the two boys finally managed to pull the sullen girl away from the teacher’s desk.

The rest of the class had been completely lost, but after the trio’s commotion, they finally understood—

The castle incident during the long break this morning... Zhang Shutong was the prime suspect.

No wonder he and Gu Qiuyan hadn’t come back since last period.

Just then, someone who had already been to the office whispered:

"I think they’ve confirmed it. The teacher is asking for eyewitnesses."

Those words were like a stone dropped into a calm pond, sending ripples of discussion throughout the classroom:

Some were doubtful.

Some were surprised.

And some were just eager to pry and enjoy the drama.

The sharper students had already put the pieces together:

"So that’s why Zhang Shutong suddenly became deskmates with Gu Qiuyan! I thought they’d made up. Do you guys remember that whole thing with the scarf? Gu Qiuyan insisted on blaming him for no reason. Well, looks like he finally gave her a real reason to."

"It’s really Zhang Shutong? I didn’t think he was that kind of person..."

"I think Zhang Shutong is being framed, too..."

"Even if he did do it, you can’t blame him entirely. Gu Qiuyan falsely accused him last time. If it were me, I’d want to get even, too."

It was mostly the girls who came to his defense.

Even the class monitor stopped trying to quiet them down. She just gave the desk a token tap with the board eraser before pricking up her own ears to listen in.

A few boys tried to offer their opinions, but a single glare from Ruoping sent them shrinking back.

The sentiment in the classroom began to turn one-sided.

This continued until a boy rushed back in and tapped his deskmate—a boy with a tan—on the shoulder.

"When you go in, don’t say much. Song is about to explode..."

Zhou Ziheng nodded, then got up and left the classroom.

Finally, it was his turn.

Yet, right now, he was just confused.

’How did it end up being Zhang Shutong?’

’If he really did it...’

’...then where did Li Yipeng go?’

’And what about me?’

Sometime around the first period that afternoon, he’d heard people say that Gu Qiuyan had gone to get water. Something must have happened, because she had suddenly run out of the room, her eyes red. Then Zhang Shutong had chased after her. Everyone had gossiped about it a little, but how had *he* suddenly become the suspect?

But he felt nothing but disgust for both Zhang Shutong and Gu Qiuyan. So, once his confusion passed, what remained was mostly gloating.

’Didn’t Gu Qiuyan ignore my "warning" this morning? Had she finally lost her cool and started lashing out randomly?’

’And that Zhang Shutong guy, too. You wanted to play the white knight this morning, grabbing me and asking all sorts of questions, didn’t you? Well, payback’s a bitch. You should worry about clearing your own name first.’

Thinking of this, he slowed his pace a little.

He had always been patient and composed. He knew he absolutely couldn’t let his smug satisfaction show on his face. As the only one who knew the full story, he was, of course, the only one who understood exactly what had happened.

’If he had to describe his current mood, it would be the satisfaction of watching a group of people run around in circles, all thanks to a small arrangement of his own making.’

’He was looking down on them from on high, a cold sneer in his heart.’

Zhou Ziheng walked into the office.

He almost laughed the moment he stepped through the door. It was just as Du Kang had described: the boy, Zhang Shutong, was standing facing a cabinet as punishment. On the other side of the room, by a desk, their homeroom teacher sat with a stony expression. Gu Qiuyan was beside him. To Zhou Ziheng’s disappointment, the girl’s face was merely cold; she wasn’t crying.

A dark cloud hung over the office.

A wave of superiority washed over him.

And yet, Gu Qiuyan was still the most beautiful, most dazzling girl he had ever seen. Even just sitting there silently, she made him subconsciously avert his gaze, not daring to look too long. This inexplicable sense of inferiority made him grind his teeth.

’Even though he was the avenger hiding behind the scenes—her enemy, by all rights—sometimes he wished she would spare him just one glance.’

But Gu Qiuyan had never once looked his way.

He felt a strange surge of anger. In truth, his feelings for Gu Qiuyan were complicated. It wasn’t the same bone-deep hatred his father held for her family. When his father had first told him what to do, he’d hesitated. ’Burning down someone’s house... what if someone dies?’ But his father had assured him the forecast called for rain that day. It would just be a ’profound lesson,’ nothing serious.

’A lesson.’

This idea began to grow after they became deskmates. His original plan had been...

’Gu Qiuyan didn’t have any friends in class; she was always alone. Once we became deskmates, I could use that opening to get close. We could become good friends, or maybe something more. When that time came, perhaps I wouldn’t have to follow my father’s orders. Instead, I could persuade her, and she in turn could persuade her own father. Wouldn’t that be a much better result?’

The reality, however, was that the girl named Gu Qiuyan had never once given him a real look. Even when he put on a smile and asked after her, all he got was a perfunctory nod. Sometimes, when she was annoyed, she wouldn’t say a word, just wearing the same cold expression she had on now... He hadn’t originally intended to teach her a lesson—not until he was consumed by a suffocating sense of inferiority and shame.

If she had treated everyone that way, it might have been fine. But as her deskmate, Zhou Ziheng couldn’t help but notice that her attitude toward that boy, Zhang Shutong, was different. And so, a month ago, he had conducted a dress rehearsal for what would happen today:

A perfect opportunity. A dirtied scarf. A vicious accusation. And just as he’d planned, it successfully turned them against each other.

’That meant I still had a chance.’ That’s what he’d thought, right up until yesterday.

But then, for some reason, those two had made up!

Just yesterday!

They became deskmates!

’That was supposed to be my seat.’

The girl was a delicate flower on an insurmountable peak. If he couldn’t have her, then crushing her petals into the mud—destroying something so beautiful—would be just as satisfying.

The mere thought of it made his hands tremble with excitement.

And so, Zhou Ziheng never felt that he had done anything wrong.

’Yes, he had already tried.’

’He had wanted to use a gentler approach at first.’

’To resolve the conflict between their families.’

’But it was useless.’

’Could he really be blamed for that?’

’It’s your fault.’

’It’s your family’s fault.’

’You have only yourself to blame.’

He gave Gu Qiuyan one last look.

’I already gave you a chance.’

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