A big and a small person stood under the banyan tree, standing for a long ti before Zhang Wenda, having cald down, spoke again: “Indeed, you’re not wrong. To remove the rules, it’s not worth risking your life. It’s not profitable at all—if you lose your life, how can you make big money?”
Upon hearing that Zhang Wenda had co to terms with it, Aunt Aunt’s bearded face smiled with satisfaction. “Let’s go back. Mimi and I will help you co up with a plan together.”
“Actually, when I arrived, I found there was a boy by Mimi’s side, and I was quite happy. Before that, apart from Mao Mao, she never had a friend.”
“And she never thought to look for reasons within herself? With her temper, who could stand her?” Zhang Wenda pretended to take it lightly, turned around, and began walking toward Gou Mao.
Just as he followed Aunt Aunt one step behind into Gou Mao, Song Jianguo suddenly jumped in front of him, looking at him nervously.
“What’s wrong?” Before Zhang Wenda could finish asking, the other opened both hands and covered Zhang Wenda’s eyes, pushing him backward as they walked back. “Mouse, let’s go.”
“What are you talking about?” Zhang Wenda forcefully pried Song Jianguo’s hands apart, and Lamp Spirit rushed over in panic, trying to block with his body, but Zhang Wenda still saw.
He saw his younger self lying on the ground, being beaten by instructors. At that mont, they looked very tall—at least three tis taller than young him—and their bodies exceptionally burly.
They struck his belly with tattooed right fists, then kicked his face with a foot.
His head was smashed open, blood flowed down through black hair, finally gathering at the chin into droplets.
Under such blows, his face and body were covered in injuries, and his face was swollen purple‑red.
Seeing the scene, mories exploded in Zhang Wenda’s mind—those deeply buried experiences he had tried to forget, each day living there worse than a dog.
Zhang Wenda stood frozen on the spot, the red core on his arm glowing continuously, and the three beside him appeared even more nervous than him.
“Don’t get excited. Don’t get excited. They wouldn’t dare kill anyone here. If you really go over, maybe soone might really die,” Lamp Spirit said.
Aunt Aunt beside also soothed: “Don’t act impulsively. Since it’s already happened, let’s go back and figure it out together. This happened in the past. There’ll be a way to solve it.”
“Mouse, calm down, calm down, don’t forget the rules of the network world. Absolutely don’t have contact with your past or future self.”
Zhang Wenda silently watched, watching the instructors’ smiling faces, watching what they once called being good for him; everything that had once blurred beca real again.
Suddenly Zhang Wenda smiled. His gaze shifted from the distance to the three before him. “What are you doing? I didn’t plan to do anything. Just take a few beatings—no one’s dying.”
“They wouldn’t dare kill . I’m not angry. It’s over. To this is just the past, not the future. It’s over, I should let it go. I have let it go.”
“That’s right. Every place has rules. I can’t let my past self bring trouble to my present self. It’s over, and this ti I’ll absolutely avoid it.”
After speaking, Zhang Wenda looked seriously at his forr self once more, then turned and walked away.
Yet just as he was about to leave, a suppressed sob ca from behind him: “Mom…”
At that instant, Zhang Wenda froze as if struck by lightning, the past sadness and despair flooding into his mind.
Upon hearing this, the beating instructors burst into laughter, stopping their actions. They took cigarettes from their pockets and began to smoke.
They stepped on Zhang Wenda’s head with their shoes, kicked his bloody nose. “Wasn’t he arrogant? Didn’t he refuse discipline? Didn’t he break rules? Why is he crying?”
“Kid, try running again. I’ll kill you—do you believe that?”
Seeing he didn’t move, Aunt Aunt frantically signaled the other two. The three hurriedly dragged Zhang Wenda toward the exit.
As the three roughly guided Zhang Wenda out, the instructors released him. Zhang Wenda saw a white‑coated figure wearing glasses walk from the crowd of onlookers.
He smiled with a device in hand that was emitting blue light.
At the sight of that device, Zhang Wenda’s eyes almost instantly turned red; at the flash of the red core, his trendous strength sent the three flying.
But just as he was about to charge again, Aunt Aunt’s voice ca from behind: “Zhang Wenda! Think carefully! If you rush over now, you might die!! If you die, how will you make big money and drive fancy cars? Since it’s in the past, you ought to let it go!”
One step, two steps, three steps—Zhang Wenda forcibly stopped, the trembling corner of his mouth slightly lifting. “You’re right. It’s all in the past.”
He turned and began walking toward the exit step by step. “It’s all in the past… all in the past… must follow the rules…”
He continued walking, as if walking away from the shadow of the past, even though arc noises and screams ca from behind.
“I won’t let you off! Just you wait! I won’t spare you!!” Suddenly Zhang Wenda heard the young version of himself shouting with tears and anger from behind, like an arrow piercing him, pinning him to the spot.
At that mont, a voice he would never forget rang out again.
“Heh heh, you kids addicted to the net, even if you grow up, you end up as either thugs or prostitutes—people discarded by society, fit only to live at society’s bottom. Am I afraid of you?”
Zhang Wenda closed his eyes in agony and started walking briskly. Just as he nearly reached the exit, an anguished roar of his own ca flying at him like a long arrow, fastening him in place.
“You think your authority can suppress everything? Think we’re just kids? Soday! Soday! Soday we’ll grow up!”
“You just wait! Soday! We will have our power! We will have our own voices!!”
“When that ti cos! We’ll use gas! We’ll use novels! We’ll use all our power! We’ll make you beco like Qin Hui, eternally nailed to the pillar of historical sha! Even a thousand years later, people will rember what trash you really did!! We will finally shout it out with our language!! Yang Yongxin! Fuck your mom!!”
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