They slowly approached the desk, carefully opened the list, and ticulously added my na into it, trying to mimic Coach Yuze’s handwriting.
Smooth enough operation so far, wasn’t it? Yeah, well, the obvious obstruction enters the story now. Apparently, Coach Yuze, always makes sure to lock his room before he leaves without fail, but just had to forget doing it that one specific day. Of all days!
It’s not like their lovely little plan would’ve worked anyway, though.
My friends finished doing their deed, turned around to leave, and lo and behold, the great Coach Yuze stood there in the doorway like a valiant statue, arms crossed.
Before they could even say anything, they were presented before our Headmaster, Lin Yuexian, in his office.
The three of them stood nervously before him, legs shaking like jelly. Jian didn’t even wait a single mont before he started to snitch. "It was Qinyue’s idea!" he blurted out imdiately.
Qinyue shot him the angriest look you could imagine.
"What?!" Jian continued defensively. "Headmaster Lin, she said it was Operation Add Whatever-"
"Silence!" Headmaster Lin ordered with a booming voice.
As for , I had just changed my clothes and was chilling comfortably at my ho when one of Tianlan’s guards visited my house and inford my parents that I was being called into the academy for so urgent work.
Headmaster Lin didn’t even wait until the next day to deal with this situation, he wanted to be done with it that very evening. And this is the sa guy who gives us long lectures on patience and taking ti with decisions.
I entered the Headmaster’s chambers nervously and looked at my three friends waiting for , all looking guilty and scared. Even Master Juechen was present since he was our class teacher and apparently needed to witness this.
I bowed respectfully to the headmaster and then he began explaining to in detail the grand adventure my friends had gone on.
You might think they’d let us go with a warning for such a relatively petty thing, right? But nope. Absolutely not. You see, the headmaster had always hated . He’d always find reasons to just harass as much as possible whenever he got the chance.
Why such intense hate, you ask? It’s one of those old people things, you know.
They’re just so hellbent on having everything under their control. And when sothing doesn’t go "according to nature" or their expectations, they get pissed off and wanna get back in control of it. Maybe that’s how they feel power and authority.
not having my qi activated even at the age of eleven didn’t sit right with him at all. I was like the one single ugly black dot on the seemingly perfect white paper they call their precious Tianlan Academy’s reputation.
"I have a question for you, Ziyang," Headmaster Lin said coldly. "Did you send your friends to add your na to the list?"
"He didn’t-" Qinyue was about to defend .
"I asked him," Headmaster Lin said sternly, cutting her off.
I looked at my three friends as each one of them heavily signaled with just their eyes to say "no" and deny everything. But I didn’t want to. They did it for , after all. I didn’t want them to be punished.
"Yes," I replied as calmly as I could manage.
"No! He’s lying!" The three of them imdiately began shouting in protest, but the Headmaster didn’t listen to any of it. To be honest, it didn’t actually matter if he believed that I was lying or not. He just wanted to punish regardless of the truth, and I knew it deep down.
The three of them were escorted outside by Coach Yuze, and then it was just , Headmaster Lin, and Master Juechen left in the room.
Headmaster Lin stared at for quite a long while in complete silence and finally spoke, "You want a trial, right? Fine. I’ll give you a trial."
He stood up slowly, walked towards at a deliberately slow pace as he looked at the sun setting outside the window. Once he reached , he looked down at with a completely blank expression. My heart started racing uncontrollably.
What punishnt was he gonna give? Would he simply take hold of and throw out the window? Or would he hand a dagger and tell to kill myself for being a disgrace to the academy? What exactly was he planning?
"You will run around the academy," he said simply.
’Thank God!’ I thought to myself with relief. Easy enough. I an, not that easy. It would take around three hours just to walk around the entire academy periter, but if I could jog at a steady pace, I could probably manage to make it in about two hours.
"Until the sun rises," he finished his line.
My heart dropped! I looked at Master Juechen, who seed genuinely shocked too.
"Headmaster Lin, perhaps the punishnt is a little too-" he tried saying.
"It’s final," Headmaster Lin said firmly, looking directly at Master Juechen. "Qi usually activates properly in children aged five to six years old. He’s eleven years old and has no qi whatsoever."
He then looked back at . "Sotis, qi also activates during periods of extre pressure and stress. You will run around the academy until dawn breaks. If you can’t activate your qi by then, you will be permanently expelled from this academy."
"But Headmaster-" Master Juechen tried speaking again, but Headmaster Lin simply left the room without another word.
Master Juechen looked at with pitiful eyes for a mont and slowly approached . He bent down to my eye level and put his arms around my shoulder comfortingly. "I’ll do it with you."
"But master, you don’t have to-" I tried to refuse his offer while I was deep down happy to know he was going to be by my side and was desperately hoping he’d stay firm in his decision.
"Let’s go," he stood up and held out his arm.
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