Lin Mo took the phone, pressed the answer button, and turned on the speakerphone.
“Hello?” Shen Qingyue’s voice came through the receiver, gentle and clear. “Lin Mo, are you home yet?”
Su Qing stared at Lin Mo, her expression cold.
“…Not yet,” Lin Mo said, trying his best to make his voice sound normal. “I have some things to take care of.”
“Are you still out? Then please be safe.”
Shen Qingyue paused for a moment. “I just wanted to remind you that the physics test is next Wednesday. It covers chapter 3 to chapter 5. If you have time tonight, you might want to review a bit.”
“Okay, thank you.”
“Also…” Shen Qingyue’s voice grew softer. “You looked really tired yesterday. If the pressure of studying is too much, you should try to relax a little. Your health is the most important thing.”
Her words were natural and sincere. Even through the phone, Lin Mo could feel her genuine concern.
“I understand. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. Well… see you tomorrow.”
“See you tomorrow.”
The call ended.
Silence descended upon the room once more. Su Qing stood there, quietly watching Lin Mo.
Then, she reached out, took the phone, and deleted the call log.
“That seemed like a pleasant conversation.”
Lin Mo maintained his dazed, hypnotized state, but his heart was full of bitterness: ‘Pleasant, my ass. This is going to be the death of me!’
Su Qing tucked the phone back into Lin Mo’s pocket.
“She’s so good to you,” Su Qing whispered. “She’s gentler than me, more considerate, and she knows how to care for people better than I do.”
Su Qing walked to the wall and stood facing it.
Lin Mo saw her shoulders trembling slightly. He couldn’t tell if she was crying or taking deep breaths to control her emotions.
His back was burning with pain. Lin Mo suddenly remembered a time from their childhood when he had been naughty and climbed a tree, only to fall and scrape his knee. Su Qing had cried while putting a bandage on him, her hands shaking so much that she messed it up three times. He didn’t know why that childhood memory suddenly surfaced now.
“But Lin Mo, do you know?”
Su Qing kept her back to him, her voice muffled. “Gentle things are often the most fragile. No matter how beautiful the moonlight is, it cannot pierce through thorns.”
It sounded like something copied from a book or a game, but Su Qing said it with absolute seriousness. Lin Mo felt both bitter and slightly amused. This girl even started acting like a poetic intellectual when she was angry.
Su Qing turned around and walked up to Lin Mo.
“That is enough for today. Now, you will wake up from your hypnosis. You will forget everything that just happened. You will only remember that we came here to get some things and that you were a little tired, so you rested on the sofa for a while.”
She snapped her fingers.
Lin Mo cooperated by blinking his eyes, pretending to come to his senses. “What just happened? I think I spaced out for a second?”
“You’re just too tired.”
Su Qing walked toward the door, picking up the collar from the coffee table as she passed. “Let’s go. Uncle Zhang is still waiting.”
Lin Mo followed her. As he passed the coffee table, he caught a glimpse of the collar out of the corner of his eye.
Lin Mo imagined what would happen if that thing were actually put around his neck and Su Qing gave his “hypnotized” self a Thought Stamp. A chill ran down his spine, making the burning pain on his back feel slightly less intense.
On the way back, neither of them spoke.
Lin Mo watched the night scenery fly past the window and quietly reached into his pocket—it was empty. Both the snacks and the cards were gone.
Meanwhile, the spots on his back where the ruler had struck were still throbbing with pain.
—
The high school seniors didn’t get Saturday morning off and had to continue with classes. When Lin Mo arrived at the classroom, Zhou Xiaoyu immediately approached him.
“Why do you look so terrible?” Zhou Xiaoyu frowned. “Did you not sleep well last night? Don’t tell me…”
“Studying,” Lin Mo interrupted her, stuffing his bag into his desk.
“Studying until your waist hurts?” Zhou Xiaoyu smiled mischievously. “With whom were you studying?”
“Shut up.”
The first period was math.
Lin Mo forced himself to stay alert, but because of the waves of pain from his back, his attention kept drifting.
At the front of the room, the math teacher was explaining a function problem.
Lin Mo’s mind was elsewhere: ‘Su Qing didn’t send any messages or say anything after getting back last night. I didn’t see her this morning, either. What is she doing right now?’
Just as he was thinking, a sharp sting shot through his back. He had accidentally leaned against the back of his chair.
“Sss…”
He didn’t notice that Shen Qingyue, sitting in the row in front of him, shifted her shoulders, though she didn’t look back.
The bell finally rang, signaling the end of class. Lin Mo slumped over his desk as if he had been rescued, letting out a long sigh of relief.
“Lin Mo.”
He looked up to see Shen Qingyue.
She looked worried. “Lin Mo, are you hurt?”
Lin Mo was startled. ‘She noticed?’
“No,” Lin Mo said, feigning a relaxed tone. “I just didn’t sleep well yesterday…”
“The way you sat down just now was very unnatural,” Shen Qingyue said softly. “And you’ve been avoiding leaning against your chair the whole time.”
Lin Mo was surprised that Shen Qingyue, while listening intently to the lecture, had managed to observe so many details and realize something was wrong with his body.
He didn’t know what to say.
Shen Qingyue hesitated for a moment before taking a tube of ointment from a small medical kit in her bag—the kind specifically for bruises and sprains.
‘Is she Doraemon? How does she have everything in her bag?’
Lin Mo began to feel a bit curious about what else was inside Shen Qingyue’s bag.
“This is very effective,” Shen Qingyue said, placing the ointment on Lin Mo’s desk. “I… I usually use it to prevent sprains when I’m running. If… if you need it.”
Having said that, she quickly turned and left. Her steps were hurried, and the tips of her ears were red again.
It was always like this—she would run away as soon as her ears turned red from shyness.
Lin Mo looked at the tube of ointment. It had pale blue packaging with English text he couldn’t understand. He picked it up; the tube still carried the warmth of her palm. It felt nice.
Lin Mo suddenly remembered what Su Qing had said last night: “She’s so good to you.”
It was true. She really was.
Lin Mo unscrewed the cap and squeezed out a bit to smell it. It had a grassy scent.
Just then, the classroom doorway suddenly went quiet for a moment.
Lin Mo looked up and saw Su Qing standing at the entrance.
Today, she was wearing her full Student Council uniform.
She held a folder in her arms as her gaze scanned the room, lingering for a moment on the ointment in Lin Mo’s hand.
Their eyes met in mid-air.
After about three seconds, Su Qing turned and walked away.
Lin Mo lowered his head and looked at the ointment in his hand.
The ointment was still warm, but for some reason, he started to feel a bit cold again.
At that moment, at the end of the hallway in a deserted corner…
Su Qing leaned against the wall, her eyes brimming with tears.
A moment later, she pulled a tube of ointment similar to the one in Lin Mo’s hand out of her briefcase. She threw it straight into the trash can.
Su Qing took a deep breath and wiped away her tears.
Two little versions of Su Qing appeared in her mind: one was an Angel Su Qing with wings, and the other was a Demon Su Qing.
‘I told you already. As long as Lin Mo and Shen Qingyue are in contact, he definitely won’t want you anymore,’ the Demon Su Qing chattered incessantly. ‘Su Qing, why are you still hesitating? You’ve spent so long imitating that girl just to make Lin Mo like you, but what has that accomplished? Don’t be an idiot. If you keep listening to that fool’s advice, Lin Mo really will leave you. Take action. You don’t want to see Lin Mo and that girl together in the future, do you?’
The Angel Su Qing looked weak and lacked confidence, but she still tried to make a final plea.
‘You mustn’t do anything reckless. That will make Lin Mo hate you completely.’
‘Hate what? How would Lin Mo even know what you did? Even if he finds out, I’ll just hypnotize him and make him forget. If that doesn’t work, give him a Thought Stamp so he’ll only love you for the rest of his life.’
‘That’s not right. You love the real Lin Mo, not a Lin Mo who’s been hypnotized and forced to follow an order to love you.’
“Both of you, shut up!”
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