Chapter 23: This Time, It’s About Stopping a Jump

The matter with Qin Muchu was finally resolved. Although Yang Qi still felt a bit unhappy about it in his heart, he was generally satisfied. What pleased Yang Qi was that he had overcome his own internal hurdle.

This time, for Yang Qi, the hardest part wasn’t figuring out how to deal with Qin Muchu, but how to deal with the “inner demon” in his own heart.

After leaving the Qin family manor, Yang Qi didn’t go directly back to the Courtyard. Instead, he drove the Phantom Chariot towards the seaside. The Phantom Chariot had no electromagnetic fluctuations, and its light energy, at the very least, couldn’t be detected by Earth technologies like radar. That’s why Yang Qi dared to drive so recklessly over the sea and sky.

The Phantom Chariot and the Superpower List were a secret, a secret he couldn’t tell anyone or let anyone discover.

The Phantom Chariot had automatically loaded all the route navigation maps from Earth when it first appeared, so Yang Qi wasn’t worried about getting lost at all. Soon enough, he found himself flying over the southern seas of Huaxia. He was still a bit concerned about the Courtyard, so he decided to turn back.

He put away the Phantom Chariot and carefully entered the Courtyard. By this time, the little ones were already asleep, and Huang Man had also been discharged from the hospital. Over the past few days, Yang Qi had been using Hypnosis on these little ones to help them enter deep sleep. Every little one’s sleep quality was one hundred percent, which helped them recover their strength and slowly develop their brain potential.

The light in Granny Bai’s room was still on. Yang Qi pushed the door open, chatted with the old lady for a while, and persuaded her to sleep earlier. After helping her tidy up some books nearby, he was about to leave when the old lady called him back and gave him a letter.

The letter was sent from Shanghai, and the sender’s name was Du Jianguo. He was also a very important person for the Courtyard to be able to keep going. Du Jianguo sent a sum of money to the Courtyard every year to help the children there with school and living expenses, sharing a lot of the burden for Granny Bai. Moreover, Du Jianguo would send letters every few months to encourage the children in the Courtyard.

He opened the letter.

“Dear Xiao Yang, how are you? Uncle Du heard that the illness on your body has healed, and I am very happy for you. You have always been a strong and sensible child, and things will definitely be better for you in the future. Leave the pain in the past, and save hope and happiness for the present and the future!…”

The letter wasn’t long, mostly filled with encouraging words, and it also answered some questions from their last correspondence.

These few hundred words warmed Yang Qi’s heart.

Although he had never met Du Jianguo, Yang Qi always considered him a benefactor.

He immediately wrote a reply. Yang Qi told Du Jianguo that he would definitely get into a good university. As for repaying the kindness, Yang Qi never said such things out loud. Words were useless; it was best to use actions.

That night, Yang Qi spent time familiarizing himself with the newly obtained ability, Emotion Control.

The next evening, after dinner, Yang Qi headed to school. Naturally, he didn’t coincidentally run into Chen Xiaoxiao again. He reached the main gate of Ruiyun without a word. From afar, he spotted the bespectacled boy Zhou Mi. Yang Qi sighed to himself; there was another trouble waiting for him here.

“Um, I did what you told me to do.”

When the bespectacled boy Zhou Mi saw Yang Qi, he jogged over, his face full of excitement mixed with a bit of caution. “I did at least three hundred finger push-ups every day, and at most four hundred.”

Yang Qi glanced at Zhou Mi’s hands. His ten fingers were still red and swollen. It seemed this bespectacled boy was really someone who could endure hardship, which was naturally the best outcome.

Of course, the Flying Stone Technique couldn’t be that easy to master. The student was a bespectacled boy who looked like he couldn’t even hurt a fly, and the teacher, himself, didn’t truly understand any Flying Stone Technique either.

This was like a huge joke played by the Superpower List and Yang Qi. However, Yang Qi accepted the challenge.

“Are you a day student?” Yang Qi knew most students from Zhou Mi’s Second High School were day students, so he asked. Seeing the other nod, Yang Qi said, “Then starting tomorrow, wait for me at that park over there at 5 AM every morning.”

After saying that, he walked straight into the campus.

“Yes!”

Zhou Mi waved his arm excitedly, shouting loudly in his heart.

At school, Qin Muchu wasn’t there. Yang Qi guessed he must be in the hospital treating his foot injury. After reporting in, Yang Qi left the classroom and didn’t attend the evening self-study session. He came to school today mainly to see Zhou Mi and also to watch the school basketball team’s practice.

Both of these things were related to tasks, so Yang Qi didn’t dare to be careless.

On his way to the basketball court, Yang Qi saw a large crowd gathered on the other side of the teaching building. Looking up, he saw a person standing on the edge of the rooftop on the top floor.

“Quick, go look! I heard there’s a senior high school student over there who wants to jump!”

A few people nearby said this as they hurried towards that side.

Seeing this, Yang Qi also curiously walked over.

Students jumping off buildings to commit suicide had become a social phenomenon, especially serious among middle school students. Most of them were from prestigious high schools, where academic pressure became the biggest reason for suicide. Of course, there were also other issues that came from this, like underperforming students being criticized, and so on.

As far as Yang Qi knew, student suicides by jumping happened every few years at Ruiyun High School. One reason was that the academic pressure at Ruiyun High School far exceeded that of ordinary schools. The other reason indirectly reflected the school’s teaching problem of overemphasizing academic performance while neglecting the development of students’ mental resilience. Of course, this wasn’t unique to Ruiyun High School; this was the case for most of the education system in Huaxia nowadays. This was more serious than schools only emphasizing book knowledge and ignoring practical and hands-on abilities.

The teaching building at Ruiyun High School had five floors at most, which just met the national standard. At this moment, the girl who wanted to jump was standing on the rooftop of this building.

“Yingying, don’t be impulsive. Squat down first. Whatever you have to say, we can talk it out properly. There’s nothing that can’t be solved.”

A pleasant female voice came from the other side of the rooftop, trying to persuade the girl who wanted to jump.

“Solve it? Yeah, jumping down will solve everything.”

Hearing this, a look of despair and a seemingly liberating smile appeared on the girl’s face, which sent shivers down the spines of all the students opposite her.

“Lou Yingying, I was wrong. I really know I was wrong. I shouldn’t have said those things about you. Please, come back. I beg you, don’t scare us like this.”

Then a male voice spoke up, his voice trembling and filled with extreme fear. It seemed this girl’s intention to jump was related to him.

“It’s not your fault. I know this is all my own problem. I can’t blame you for what you said.” The girl who wanted to jump, Lou Yingying, had a very strange smile on her face. “It’s fine, you can talk, keep talking. After I jump, I won’t hear anything you say anyway.”

After saying this, she took another step closer to the edge of the rooftop, the smile still on her face.

“All of you, step back. Don’t provoke her any further,” the pleasant female voice said to the people around her. Then she turned back to Lou Yingying and said, “Yingying, please don’t be impulsive first. No matter what happened, I will help you. Do you believe me? So, for now, please walk back, okay?”

The owner of this pleasant voice was Chen Xiaoxiao. The girl wanting to jump was her classmate, who often got mocked by some boys because of her poor grades and looks. Today, she was mocked by a boy again. Maybe for some other reason too, she suddenly ran out of the classroom towards the rooftop. Her emotions were very agitated and different from usual.

After Chen Xiaoxiao finished speaking, she was anxious that no teacher had arrived yet. She had to carefully inch closer to Lou Yingying’s position.

“Xiaoxiao-jie, don’t come over!” Lou Yingying immediately took another step towards the edge of the rooftop. Seeing Chen Xiaoxiao stop, she then said, “You can’t help me! You can’t help me! Don’t try to persuade me anymore. Just let me jump. That will end everything!”

“Yingying, the teacher is here. If you have anything to say, talk to the teacher. The teacher will definitely help you too.” Seeing the teacher had finally arrived, Chen Xiaoxiao immediately called out to Lou Yingying.

“Student Lou Yingying, don’t be impulsive. Talk to the teacher about whatever is going on.” Their homeroom teacher walked over, took one look at where Lou Yingying was standing, and was also startled. He immediately shouted.

“Teacher? Hah, how could you possibly help me? Even if you would, you can’t help me.” Lou Yingying’s emotions became even more agitated. The despair in her eyes deepened. She simply wouldn’t listen to the teacher’s persuasion.

Thud!

At that moment, an apple, thrown from who knows where, smashed onto a spot not far from where Lou Yingying was standing. The entire apple was smashed to pieces.

Everyone was stunned for a moment, including Lou Yingying.

“See? When an object is thrown to the ground with force, most of the time it ends up like this. If we had a watermelon right now, it would probably show you more clearly what you might look like after jumping from here. Just picture that scene in your mind.”

A voice, slightly lazy and teasing, sounded. A person walked out from the crowd of onlookers. It was Yang Qi. He had quickly gone upstairs earlier and happened to run into a classmate holding an apple, so he borrowed it.

“Yang Qi? What are you doing?”

Chen Xiaoxiao saw Yang Qi and was stunned for a moment. Then she tried to call him back. How could he provoke Lou Yingying like this now?

The homeroom teacher and the other students felt the same way. They didn’t understand what this person was trying to do.

Yang Qi paid no attention to them and walked straight onto the rooftop.

“You, what do you want? Don’t come over!” Lou Yingying immediately shouted.

“I’m not trying to do anything. I just want to come up and see how exactly you’re going to jump.” A smile played on Yang Qi’s lips as he kept walking forward, acting as if he didn’t care at all whether Lou Yingying jumped or not, like he was just out for a stroll.

As he walked, he continued with a mocking tone, “I think you need a lot of courage to jump from here. So many family and friends you haven’t had time to say goodbye to, so much wonderful youth you haven’t had time to enjoy, so many interesting future experiences you haven’t had time to have… Honestly, if you’re brave enough to end everything with one jump, to give up so many things you find hard to part with all at once, I almost admire you. Oh, right, being this brave… your parents probably don’t know about it, do they?”

“Don’t talk about them! Don’t mention them, don’t!” Lou Yingying’s emotions became extremely agitated. She shouted and screamed, tears streaming down her face.

At this moment, Yang Qi was less than five meters away from where Lou Yingying was standing.