Chapter 11: Survival

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How could Zhao Ze be stripped of his authority and sent back to civilian life?

First, take away the position of class monitor, which placed him in command of the class.

Then give him the largely useless post of Physical Education Committee Member.

Li Shuangjie herself had risen from that position, so she knew exactly how thankless and exhausting it was. Zhao Ze was a lazy good-for-nothing who balked at every little responsibility. Making him organize morning exercises each day was practically a death sentence.

Besides, he was no Li Shuangjie. He lacked the aura of a true dragon that seemed to linger around her. Even as class monitor, he had never been able to command universal respect. After his demotion, his words would carry even less weight.

“You’re still being too merciful to him,” said Song Encheng.

In his opinion, even the post of Physical Education Committee Member was too generous for Zhao Ze.

“You simple-minded, muscle-bound idiot!” Li Shuangjie made no effort to hide her contempt for her childhood friend. “If you strip him of all his power at once, of course he’ll turn on you! And even if he doesn’t, everyone else will. He still has people in the class committee—people he personally promoted. What if they deliberately trip you up out of spite?”

“It can work that way? But aren’t you the class monitor?”

“Does being class monitor make me superior to everyone else? Comrade Song, that is a very dangerous way of thinking. If you think like that today, tomorrow you’ll end up like Zhao Ze, thrown out of office!”

Li Shuangjie reached over and stole a piece of sweet-and-sour sparerib from his tray.

“You should think about it. The old system is full of people who are in league with Zhao Ze. Even if I carry out sweeping reforms, I have to clean house before I can welcome new guests.”

Song Encheng understood none of this.

“So… you mean we should do some cleaning?”

“…”

Li Shuangjie pressed a hand to her forehead.

“I really can’t get on the same wavelength as you.”

“All right, all right.” Song Encheng did not understand these things. He only knew that Li Shuangjie liked meat, so he went back for another serving and dumped the whole lot onto her plate.

Li Shuangjie stared wide-eyed at the mound of ribs before her and cursed, asking whether he was feeding a pig.

“I feel sorry for you. You have to study every day, and you also have to scheme against all the boys in your class.” Song Encheng examined her face. “Look at you. Have you been bottling up your frustration lately? You’ve lost weight from not getting enough slapping. Why don’t we sneak off after school and—”

“Enough, enough! That’s disgusting!”

Li Shuangjie had stopped playing that game long ago.

Song Encheng froze. Looking deeply wounded, he asked, “Why? Didn’t you used to enjoy playing it with me? When you were happy, you gave me one slap; when you were unhappy, you gave me two. Don’t you remember? Back in primary school, there was one time when you said you felt awful, grabbed my hand, and dragged me into the woods. We played that game all afternoon… You even said you only felt truly alive when you were slapping me…”

“Stop! That’s so vulgar!” Li Shuangjie nearly wanted to sew his mouth shut.

That had all happened when they were children. Who did not have a dark past? Besides, it was really Song Encheng’s dark past. Anyone else would have been mocked for it, yet he took pride in it instead.

“Could it be that…”

His sharply defined brows drew together.

“You’ve gotten tired of slapping me?”

A little appalling, Li Shuangjie thought.

What had she turned her childhood friend into?

“You’re overthinking it! I’m merely putting my energy into the class.”

“That’s good.” He paused, then asked, “Is it very troublesome?”

“We’ll take it slowly. The darkest hour has already passed.” Li Shuangjie wiped her mouth. “Giving him the post of Physical Education Committee Member is both a cautious interim measure and a way to let him taste the bitterness of losing an election—the very bitterness he once inflicted on me. Everything he did to me, I’ll return to him a hundredfold!”

Song Encheng’s heart trembled violently.

A surge of pride welled up within him, as the primary husband.

This was his wife-lord!

He would certainly assist her to the best of his ability! His mind might not be particularly sharp, but his appearance was passable, and he was physically fit. To help his wife-lord relieve her frustrations, he would train hard and strive to endure even more slaps…

He had even begun learning skincare recently. Face masks, toners, moisturizers—Song Encheng had ordered a huge pile of them. Every day he patted and rubbed products onto his face. Even half an hour before physical education class, he applied sunscreen.

His closest friends all asked why he had suddenly become so precious.

Song Encheng told them, “A man has to increase his own value.”

All for Li Shuangjie.

So that when she slapped him, her hand would glide effortlessly.

•

Li Shuangjie was a woman of her word. She began by cleaning house.

Back when she had been Physical Education Committee Member, she had already taken stock of everyone: who could be used, who could not, and who needed to be disciplined before they could be put to work. Her original blueprint, naturally, had been to fill every position with girls.

But Marx had said that one must analyze each situation on its own terms, and revolutionary thinkers had likewise emphasized adapting measures to local conditions. After the classes were reshuffled, Class Eleven became a science class, with boys making up nearly seventy percent of the students.

That was reality.

To ensure that her reforms were properly implemented, she needed to borrow their strength—or, more precisely, win them over. Zhao Ze would have been ideal. If he were willing to work for her, his influence could rally the whole class.

But he was simply… too disobedient.

She had found someone more suitable.

Just look at him: her good deskmate, her foreigner, her fine little dog. Newly arrived and familiar with no one, he was foolish enough to want nothing more than a friend. It was simply his bad luck that he had set his sights on Li Shuangjie. He could hardly blame her for taking advantage of him.

At first, she had only intended to use him to drive Zhao Ze from office. But she discovered that the boy was unexpectedly useful. When she tested him by skipping class, he had acted with solemn righteousness, swallowed his grievances, and placed the interests of the class above his own.

Excellent.

He even had the morals of a girl.

What she needed was Zheng Lanyu.

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His vow to follow her unto death was secondary. Li Shuangjie had no interest in personal worship. What she needed was someone capable of sacrificing his own interests for the collective. If the class ever became divided and turmoil broke out, people like that would be the beams, the load-bearing walls, the stabilizers.

After lunch with her childhood friend, Li Shuangjie spotted Zheng Lanyu on the sports field. The newly appointed Physical Education Committee Member was carrying several large cartons of bottled water, looking every inch the pitiable little laborer. In weather this hot, he was bound to sweat.

The boy was pure and lovely. Beads of perspiration glistened on the lofty bridge of his nose, and beneath the sunlight they looked almost precious.

She had been the one to tell him to move the water at lunchtime. They needed to rehearse the opening ceremony, and everyone would be exhausted in the afternoon. They had to stay hydrated.

“Come on. Give him a hand.”

She and Song Encheng rolled up their sleeves and went forward. Each of them took two cartons, and Zheng Lanyu’s expression immediately relaxed.

When she asked whether he had eaten, Zheng Lanyu replied that he had. Since he needed to carry things, he had eaten a little more than usual.

Had he eaten another lovingly prepared lunch from his mommy? Zheng Lanyu’s cheeks suddenly reddened. No, he said. He had told his mommy that he would eat in the cafeteria. Everyone else did that, and he needed to learn how to fit in.

“You’re an idiot, aren’t you?” Li Shuangjie raised an eyebrow. “You have family members who cook beautiful meals for you, and you choose to eat the school’s garbage instead? Have you really started thinking of yourself as a dog?”

“But then I wouldn’t fit in…”

“Tsk. You’re always fussing over useless things!”

Zheng Lanyu said nothing. He merely smiled and shook his head, clearly disagreeing with her.

Li Shuangjie now understood his personality. He was not pretending to be foolish. He truly possessed the beautiful, lovable character of a girl.

This little foreign devil really was unbearably adorable—adorable enough to slap!

Her hands were itching again. She desperately wanted to slap him.

It was obvious whenever Li Shuangjie wanted to slap someone. Her bright black eyes would gleam, and her hands would begin to twitch despite her efforts to restrain them.

Most people would never notice these preliminary signs, but Song Encheng certainly did.

His heart filled with displeasure. Jealousy burned into the foreign boy’s flushed, overheated cheeks. Pale skin tinged with red—he was obviously doing it on purpose!

That shameless little green-tea boy!

Song Encheng only wished he were fairer and more prone to sweating. He tried to make himself sweat by carrying two extra cartons of water, but he had always cultivated the dark-skinned athlete look. His deliberate show of exertion merely caused Li Shuangjie to look at him in surprise.

“Did the food you ate earlier not even make it to your stomach?”

Song Encheng could only mumble, “It did!”

He would hold his breath until Li Shuangjie slapped him.

The result was that he held his breath all the way to the rehearsal room, while Li Shuangjie continued chatting with Zheng Lanyu about the sports meet, completely unaware of him.

Song Encheng set down the water dejectedly and was about to leave when Li Shuangjie casually caught hold of him.

“Are you still training in the evenings these days?”

“I am.” He did evening training almost every day.

“Then let’s train together. I need rehabilitation, and I’m preparing for the sports meet.”

“Sure!”

Song Encheng smiled, revealing his little canine teeth.

He was no longer dejected. He left in high spirits.

Song Encheng departed. There were not many students in the rehearsal room yet; most were doing homework or chatting.

Zheng Lanyu asked Li Shuangjie whether there was anything else he needed to do.

Of course there was. He had to go to the multimedia room and bring back a speaker.

Zheng Lanyu did not know the way. Li Shuangjie muttered that everyone treated her like a navigation system.

The two of them headed toward the multimedia classroom.

The moment they had set out, Li Shuangjie asked, “How is the organizational work for the sports meet going? Divide the students into groups. Some people are entering many events and might place, while others are only there to make up the numbers. Assign those people to write announcements and earn points for the class. Understand?”

“I understand.”

Zheng Lanyu took out a small notebook and wrote it down.

Li Shuangjie noticed.

“You even write this stuff down…”

That was what she said, but Zheng Lanyu’s conscientious attitude pleased her greatly.

Not bad, this boy. He might act foolish and seem a little slow, but this was exactly the sort of thing leaders liked to see.

She took the notebook and flipped through it. On the first page was written:

“There are no eternal friends, only eternal interests.”

Oh?

This boy had something to him.

He really had taken her words to heart.

She continued turning the pages. They were filled entirely with her sayings. Even casual remarks beginning with “Remember this” had been recorded in black and white.

At school, one should address her by her position, which was why he always respectfully called her Class Monitor.

The class monitor slapped him because he was kindhearted and morally upright.

Whenever the class monitor slapped him, he had to say thank you and was not allowed to sulk.

One had to think carefully about matters within the system.

“The class monitor and I have a master-and-dog relationship.”

“Hey!”

Li Shuangjie was so startled that she nearly jumped.

“You don’t need to write that down!”

If anyone else saw it, they might assume the two of them were playing some sort of alphabet game. Li Shuangjie’s hard-won reputation could not be ruined by this boy.

The earlier entries did not need to be preserved either.

Li Shuangjie lowered her brows and simply tore out all the pages, throwing them into the nearby trash can.

“Ah!”

Zheng Lanyu cried out in alarm.

He reached out to stop her, but it was already too late.

“Why did you do that?”

He raised his limpid green eyes.

A trace of indignation flickered across his face as he bit his thin, rosy lips.

“Don’t you know? Those were…”

I wrote them down specially.

His lashes lowered, and he fell silent.

Li Shuangjie was stunned. She had not expected him to take offense. Wasn’t he supposed to have a wonderfully mild temper?

After thinking it over, she guessed that he did not understand the implications, so she explained, “There’s nothing wrong with writing things down. Someone like Zhao Ze would probably love it. But I don’t. I’m no saint. My words aren’t important enough to be interpreted like scripture.”

“But I really do think they make a lot of sense…”

Zheng Lanyu slowly released his tightly bitten lower lip.

The translucent, deep-red marks stood out clearly.

Together with the delicate furrow at the tip of his nose, the sight was devastating.

Li Shuangjie swallowed involuntarily.

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She wanted to slap him!

She wanted to slap him so badly!

She wanted to slap him until he cried—to keep slapping him until he wore that expression, until soft pink swelling appeared on his cheeks, until he panted in little breaths, overwhelmed just as he had been while carrying the cartons.

Weak, sobbing, kneeling on the ground and begging for mercy…

Damn it!

Li Shuangjie bit the tip of her tongue and forced herself to calm down.

They said beautiful women were masters of intrigue. This exotic beauty, sent as tribute from a foreign land, truly lived up to his reputation. Every frown and smile of his was enough to bring ruin.

She could not become a foolish, incompetent monarch.

“You! Cover your face at once!”

Zheng Lanyu obeyed, then asked why.

“Because you… you’re putting on an act!” An alluring act.

Li Shuangjie drew a deep breath and completely suppressed that inexplicable surge of heat before coldly explaining, “You writing down everything I say may look like personal worship to you. But what will it look like to everyone else? If people think Zheng Lanyu obeys only me, and that this was how he became the new Physical Education Committee Member, what will they assume? More and more people will come flatter me and fawn over me, and the atmosphere in the class will only grow worse!”

Zheng Lanyu was startled. He had never considered that possibility.

“Class Monitor, I—I didn’t mean it that way…”

“I know you didn’t. But what if someone with ulterior motives took it and twisted the story? As the saying goes, one teaches by word and example. You only need to keep my words in your heart. Some things are too explicit and should not be said openly.”

She took the fountain pen from Zheng Lanyu’s hand.

Then she began to write, her handwriting so elegant it looked capable of earning full marks on a civil-service essay.

On the title page, she wrote five words:

“Serve the people.”

“Remember this. I guarantee you’ll rise quickly.”

Li Shuangjie tossed the notebook back into his arms.

After moving the speaker, the two of them returned to the rehearsal room. They found a crowd gathered outside, none of them from their class.

Li Shuangjie frowned. She knew there was trouble to deal with again.

When the great class monitor arrived, everyone else scattered. She stepped forward to ask what was going on.

The leader was the organization committee member from Class Two.

“Our class wants to use this room for rehearsal too,” he said.

Tang Xin replied, “Class Eleven has already reserved it.”

“But you can’t possibly use it for the entire afternoon, can you?”

“We filed the proper request. We’re using it for the entire afternoon.”

The other boy looked displeased.

“Will the Student Union approve that?”

“It already has.” Li Shuangjie spoke without haste. “I personally submitted the application. Is there a problem?”

“How can you monopolize the rehearsal room like this…”

“Monopolize it? We went through the proper official approval process. I had to visit several departments before the request was granted.”

She raised a hand, and Zheng Lanyu immediately handed her the application form. She displayed it in front of the students from Class Two.

“If you’re capable, have your class monitor submit an application too. What exactly are you trying to accomplish by blocking the door?”

“You!” He ground his teeth. “Don’t be so ungrateful! Even the Student Union president is from Class Two. He could get this approved with a single word. It would take only minutes!”

“Hmph.”

Li Shuangjie gave a contemptuous laugh.

She slapped the powerful figures within her own class once. As for aggressive outsiders and invading species, they deserved two slaps—or perhaps the Eighteen Dragon-Subduing Palms.

“Fine. Have him get it approved.”

She rolled up her sleeves.

“You think our class is easy to bully? Is this the only rehearsal room in the entire school? Other classes have borrowed rooms too. Why aren’t you blocking their doors? Do you think I don’t know what you’re really after? Have you ever heard of diplomatic courtesy? You didn’t even send a formal request before showing up here. Besides, we’ve already carried the speaker in. Do you expect your class to reap the benefits while we do all the work? Don’t even dream of it.”

“Li Shuangjie! Don’t be so selfish!”

A boy from Class Two jumped forward.

Li Shuangjie had not paid him any attention at first. But once she saw his face, her eyes lit up.

Wasn’t this the scumbag who had been two-timing?

She immediately changed her tune.

“All right. I can see your sincerity—you’ve even delivered the wanted fugitive. Fine, your class can rehearse for one hour.”

She cracked all ten knuckles.

“As long as he lets me slap him once.”

“…Not a chance!”

The organization committee member gritted his teeth and looked around. At last, Pei Chuyuan arrived, late as usual.

The young man was radiant and immaculate, the inspection badge still pinned to his arm.

A dispute was unfolding outside the rehearsal room. He approached, only to hear the girl he loved say the words, “Let me slap him once.”

Why were you rewarding him?

Pei Chuyuan almost asked aloud.

The scumbag, emboldened by borrowed authority, said fearlessly, “Our president is here! You’d better think carefully!”

When Li Shuangjie saw that it was Pei Chuyuan, she narrowed her eyes.

“What? Are you going to take his side again?”

“No.”

Pei Chuyuan pressed his lips together.

A delicate flush passed over the tips of his ears.

“I came… to accept the punishment in his place.”