Blood Neon

Chapter 48

Chapter 48

A Chance Encounter

"Come on, bro, it hasn’t even been that long and you’ve already forgotten?"

Zhang Qiming gave him a light slap on the shoulder.

Da Ming awkwardly accepted the normal attack and waved his hand behind him as he replied.

"Eh, don’t rush me, give me a sec to think. What was I trying to say back then?"

"Forget it, you’re not remembering anything today."

Zhang Qiming scoffed and cursed with a mocking smile.

He knew the guy too well. If this guy ever remembered something he’d forgotten, an earthquake would probably have to happen first—no doubt about it.

The two of them talked as they walked down the stairs and out of the teaching building.

Like most students, they chose to descend via the wide main staircase and exit through the front doors of the teaching building.

Just like most middle schools, No. 3 High School also had both a junior high and a senior high division.

The senior high was located on the west side of the school, facing the junior high on the east side. In between stood a clock tower that also served as a partial administrative office, partial storage area, and school history exhibition hall.

At both ends, east and west, there were additional staircases meant to split the flow of students, but usually only students in nearby classrooms would use those.

The two divisions had separate athletic fields, and morning exercises were usually held in their respective plazas in front of the buildings.

.

Following the flow of the crowd, they arrived at the field.

In the senior high division of No. 3 High School, each grade level had around three to four hundred students. So altogether, all three grades added up to just over a thousand students.

One thousand might not sound like a lot, but in reality, when that many people stood spread out, it still gave a pretty overwhelming sense of a packed crowd.

On the way to his class’s designated spot, before obediently standing in line, Zhang Qiming kept glancing around, trying to spot a few key figures on his enemy list—but none of them showed up.

The memory of getting beat up came back to him.

And in that regard, it was actually kind of strange.

Back when it had just happened, he’d been furious inside.

Sure, it was usually the same old thing—more of them, fewer of his own—but that time, the other side had brought in people from outside school to gang up on him. That was a violation of the unspoken rules of their little game, and he felt it was completely dishonorable.

Calling in street thugs for backup—he couldn’t stand for that.

Despite the pain in his body, Zhang Qiming had sworn to himself that once he got back to school, he’d make sure Wang Ze and the rest would pay dearly for it.

...So it caught him off guard, realizing he wasn’t angry at all anymore.

Could it be that the pretty girl had soothed his rage?

As he moved his limbs to the rhythm of the exercise routine blasting from the loudspeakers, Zhang Qiming let his mind drift into wild speculation.

It was true—the sudden appearance of Lin Ying, that unbelievable girl, had practically pulled all his attention away.

If it weren’t for the aches in his body still flaring up when touched, he’d have nearly forgotten about the whole beating incident. The anger that had once filled him was now completely gone.

Thinking carefully, starting from Monday night, for three straight days, a not-so-tall girl with a powerful presence had appeared by his side—when he had always been alone before.

The buttery bread in the morning, the special curry stew at lunch, and if he were to count further, the egg tarts and peach crisps she left for him today.

Not to mention her every smile and frown—impossible to forget.

Time spent with Lin Ying, in retrospect, felt like it had stretched on for so long—so long it seemed like they’d known each other for years.

But at the same time, it all felt so short, like a dream—gone the moment he woke up.

Sometimes, he even found himself wondering: did she really exist?

Was there really such a person in reality?

A being with human rationality, the appearance of a girl, and yet something indescribable lurking behind her.

It was hard not to doubt whether he’d lost his mind, started hallucinating.

That sort of thing—didn’t it happen sometimes? Imagining a friend only you could see, like “Nobita is talking to that friend called ‘Doraemon’ again, how pitiful.”

So on the day after the incident—Tuesday—when he opened his eyes in bed and recalled everything from the day before, he seriously wondered whether he'd been hit in the head so hard that he'd gone mentally unstable.

To the point that he’d hallucinated a cute girl spending the night in his home.

Then came Wednesday morning, and again this morning.

Every time he opened his eyes, sunk in the low-pressure gloom of waking up, he’d feel like everything that had happened before was just something from a dream.

That feeling was kind of strange when you tried to explain it. But really—those who got it, got it.

…

With the magnetic male voice in the broadcast drawing out a long “Stop~~,” the daily mandatory morning exercise session finally came to an end.

As expected, the teacher from the moral education office in charge simply announced dismissal.

Unless there was something important to announce, once exercises were done, students were generally free to go—no extra arrangements.

For the students, this was the perfect time to head to the campus shop to grab some snacks and replenish their energy, or to blow off some youthful steam at the ping pong tables.

Naturally, couples would pair off to go play somewhere together—no one really bothered to stop them.

According to Lin Ying, this generation of theirs lived under what's called a "relaxed education" model.

At the time when they were chatting, he’d been pretty sleepy and hadn’t asked what exactly that meant, but it probably just meant what it sounded like—education with more freedom, right?

He didn’t really get it. Wasn’t education supposed to be like this anyway?

The warm autumn sun felt good on Zhang Qiming’s skin, making him yawn.

—He couldn’t shake the feeling that he kept thinking about that girl.

Once he realized this, he felt a little embarrassed inside.

.

His drifting thoughts were interrupted by Zhou Tianming behind him.

Tall as he was, Zhou naturally stood at the back of the line. Now, he had walked through the crowd to come over, asking with a note of concern,

“What’s up with you? Why are you just standing here like a statue today—what are you thinking about?”

Seeing Zhang Qiming basking in the sun with a peaceful look on his face, the image of an old man nearing the end of his life popped into Zhou Tianming’s head. He couldn’t help but worry that maybe this guy had really been hit too hard a few days ago and something went wrong.

“It’s nothing, just spaced out a bit,” Zhang Qiming turned back and replied absentmindedly.

He couldn’t exactly answer with, “Thinking about a girl,” now could he.

That might as well be saying, “Thinking about peaches.”

“You sound totally drained, no energy at all.”

The other person said this while pushing his shoulder with both hands and starting to walk. “Alright, let’s go buy some bread first before you keep thinking. I’m starving.”

Hearing the word “food,” Zhang Qiming suddenly realized he was a bit hungry too.

After all, he’d only eaten the sweets Lin Ying had left behind in the morning. By now, close to lunchtime, it had all been digested.

His family hadn’t come back yesterday either. They’d only sent a WeChat message at night, saying work had run too late so they wouldn’t catch the train and would return the next day instead.

So if nothing unexpected happened, she should be coming home this afternoon. He would probably see her after school.

After so many years, aside from a slight awkwardness buried deep down, Zhang Qiming had more or less accepted his stepmother.

After all, she treated him fairly well—at least she hadn’t done any of the awful things stepmothers in novels and TV dramas were always doing.

.

Usually at this time, the two of them would go to the campus shop to buy something to eat.

Things like grilled sausages or mushroom pancakes—those were all bestsellers at the shop.

Whenever it was this time of day, the tiny store, barely over ten square meters, would be packed full of people.

Since there were two school divisions but only one shop, traffic here was measured in people per second. You could say that if you wanted to wait for someone whose movements you couldn’t predict, this was absolutely the place to do it.

Zhang Qiming’s attention, however, was focused entirely on the shadow lingering in his memory and on not getting squeezed by the people around him. He didn’t notice anything else.

Then suddenly, an annoying voice rang out beside him.

“Yo, isn’t this little Ming?”

He instinctively turned his head and saw a few students leaning lazily against the wall.

Three boys and one girl, all of them with modified school uniforms. The girl was dressed especially flashily.

“So you can still come to school, huh? When I heard you took leave, I thought you were too ashamed to show your face.”

The leading boy sneered.

It was Wang Ze and his group.

Zhang Qiming frowned slightly, and then felt someone pat his back.

It was Da Ming. After seeing those people, he suddenly looked like he’d remembered something, and a smile appeared on his face.

“Ah, right, this is what I was talking about earlier.”

“Huh?” Zhang Qiming asked quietly.

“Nothing. You’ll know in a second even if I don’t say it.”

Zhou Tianming casually cracked his fingers, producing a crisp “ka-ba” sound.