"No!" Liu Zhi Yong cried and fell to his knees. "Please show us mercy! We didn't mean to offend your son!"
Fu Gang gave him a puzzled stare before waving him away.
"Get lost, brat. I don't have any business with you."
I watched my "best friend" scamper away, abandoning me alone to the mercies of the rich. With friends like that, who needs enemies?
"Can I help you, sir?" I repeated, refusing to back down. I knew bullies. They fed off fear. The moment I displayed a sign of weakness, they would immediately capitalize on it to oppress me further, thinking that I was easy prey. Already, I could hear the readers mocking me for saving Fu Er Dai's life and saying that I deserved whatever death Fu Gang was about to dish out.
Those edgelords really needed to step out of their houses and touch some grass. Maybe they had been reading way too many toxic cultivation genre web novels filled with killing. Didn't they see the disclaimer at the front of every A Will Eternal episode? Underage viewers should be accompanied by parents when watching, and please refrain from copying the actions of the characters in the show in real life because it was fiction.
Hell, Bai Xiao Chun was actually far from bloodthirsty and didn't go around killing people unless absolutely necessary.
"No, it's the other way around." To my astonishment, Fu Gang suddenly bowed deeply, his hands at his sides. Beside him, Fu Er Dai also lowered his head humbly. "We saw the videos yesterday. I would like to thank you for saving the life of my useless and foolish son."
"I apologize for my arrogant behavior," Fu Er Dai said, staring at the ground. "I behaved like some big shot, but I couldn't do a single thing when I was in danger and passed out like a pathetic loser. I owe you my life."
"We would like to repay you," Fu Gang continued, finally straightening. He handed me a check. "Here's ten million yuan, as thanks for saving my son's life."
"What? No, I can't accept this…"
"Please. It's the least we can do." Fu Gang paused for a moment, thinking. "Forgive my audacity, but I've also done some research on you. You appear to be smart and do well academically. My company can offer you a scholarship and provide you a job with a high salary after you graduate from university."
"No, no need for that! I prefer the freedom to study whatever I want. And while I haven't decided on my career path yet, I have several ideas on what I want to do in the future. I have no intention of being tied down."
"Understandable. I expect great things from you." He then nodded at Fu Er Dai. "I hope you continue to get along with my son in future."
With that, he turned around and returned to his limousine. His bodyguards rolled up the red carpet and followed after him before the luxury vehicle reversed and sped out of the campus grounds. Fu Er Dai remained deferring to me humbly, but I insisted that he join his classmates without following me around.
Speaking of which, where did Yi Hao and Er Hao go?
"Wow, I didn't expect that!"
Now that the coast was clear, Liu Zhi Yong appeared once more at my side, peering at the driveway where the limousine previously occupied. He also glanced at Fu Er Dai, who cut a more subdued figure after the events of yesterday.
Take that, edgelords. No doubt they still decided on their nihilistic view of protagonists being obligated to kill every single person who offended them, but there was a reason why such behavior was frowned upon in reality. Like I said, they needed to get out of the house more often and touch grass. This wasn't Rebirth of the Urban Immortal Cultivator. Chen Fan was certainly not supposed to be a role model.
"Hello? Tian Xing? Are you listening?"
"Yeah. Were you asking something?"
"No, but at least have some sort of reaction! Man, sometimes you're scaring me!"
"Oh? You want me to react?" I raised an eyebrow. "Am I supposed to say something about you running away and leaving me alone earlier when you thought there was trouble?"
"Uh…that…um, I thought you could handle it by yourself! And hey, you heard what Fu Gang said, didn't you? That he had no business with me!"
"Uh huh." I was too lazy to argue with him. As long as he didn't backstab me, there was no reason to drive him away. Let him buzz around me like a fly. At least he could serve as comic relief.
I noticed that Hui Zhang and Huang Xiang Jun were watching me from a distance, among others. Most of my schoolmates were whispering amongst themselves, staring at me in awe or jealousy. I ignored them. Like, why the hell were they jealous?
Oh, right. The ten million yuan check that was now in my pocket. I had to be on my guard, but given that I had just beaten up Yi Hao and Er Hao in front of everyone yesterday, saved Fu Er Dai's life and survived an assault from an alien creature, none of them would be stupid enough to try and rob me.
"Make sure you treat me to a nice dinner!" Liu Zhi Yong was as thick-skinned as ever, still having the audacity to ask me for that when all he did was run away whenever he thought I was in trouble. I smirked.
"Nope, I'll have to bring my family out for dinner first."
"C'mon! I'm part of your family. I'm your bro, right?"
I snorted and decided to ignore him for the rest of the day.
*
Apparently, Fu Gang wasn't the only visitor.
After school that day, when I was on my way home, I found someone waiting for me outside school. Unlike Fu Gang, she wasn't bold enough to make a splash by appearing in my high school in a limousine. Rather, it was more advantageous for her and her organization to keep a low profile. In fact, I was already halfway between home and school when she suddenly showed up and called out to me.
"Li Tian Xing!"
"Oh, you are…" I blinked and nodded, instantly recognizing the beautiful girl in front of me. "Lin Xue."
"Where did you go yesterday!?" She demanded, stomping up to me with her hands clenched into fists. "You always disappear even though I tell you to wait!"
"Sorry, I had somewhere I needed to go." Obviously, I had no intention of telling her that I was busily saving the world in a spaceship yesterday. If I hadn't warped onto the Crusader, the Saurian ships would have eradicated all life on Earth from orbit.
I doubted the reason would have worked, though. There was no way Lin Xue would believe me. And I wasn't sure I wanted her or her organization to find out about my Templar class cruiser floating around Earth.
"What do you want?" I was on my guard, looking around for her subordinates. The men in black. If they planned on abducting me back to their organization, then I was prepared to fight.
"Relax." Lin Xue sighed. "We aren't some shady organization who kidnap people for no reason. I wanted to bring you back for questioning and share more details on the creature you defeated yesterday. We've conducted some…tissue analysis from dissecting its corpse, but there's still so much we don't know."
"I'm not a xenobiologist. Even if you ask me, there's nothing I can tell you."
That was a lie, of course. I had no intention of revealing Aegis's existence or the knowledge of alien civilizations and the Holy Terran Empire. Aegis had requested that I kept them a secret for now because apparently the humans on Earth were not prepared. Whatever that meant.
"But you clearly have some special ability. And that shield! Where is that floating shield machine thing that you used to kill the alien from yesterday?!"
"What did she call me?" Aegis growled telepathically inside my head, but she wisely remained beyond the hearing of Lin Xue.
"Um, the shield machine disappeared shortly after that," I replied. "And I don't have any special abilities."
"Don't lie! You disappeared right in front of us yesterday! That's definitely a special ability! after you vanished, we couldn't detect you at all, despite searching the entire city! That was the teleportation power, wasn't it? You can teleport!"
"Uh, I think that was the shield machine you saw yesterday. She wanted to thank me, but she sent me back home after expressing her gratitude. I swear, I can't teleport." I raised my hand to the heavens. "And I don't know anything else. All I did was borrow that machine's power."
"Really?" Lin Xue asked incredulously. Yeah, she wasn't going to buy that, but there wasn't anything she could do. She shook her head, realizing that her interrogation was futile. Folding her arms, she watched me closely. "Still, you have potential. After discussion among the higherups yesterday, we decided to recruit you."
"Just because you want to recruit me doesn't mean I will join," I retorted, annoyed by her haughty declaration.
"O…of course," she replied, caught off guard. "But there will be benefits. We'll pay you a stipend, and as a fully employed agent, you will get benefits. You have a lot of potential, especially after that impressive display against the alien creature. I've never seen a regular high school student keep his cool and calmly fight a monster he has encountered for the first time. That sort of mental fortitude and talent are highly valued in our organization."
"I was just lucky."
"You don't expect me to believe that, do you?" Lin Xue rolled her eyes. "Anyway, I'm sure you're busy with the Gao Kao. How about this? You should enroll in one of our affiliated universities. Not only do we offer a wide range of majors, we also provide combat training. We'll find out what power you are and teach you how to control it accordingly."
"No thanks." I was about to repeat what I told Fu Gang about wanting freedom, not being tied down to any organization, and having my own career plans, but Aegis suddenly cut in telepathically.
"Commander, I think it might be beneficial for you to go along with her offer for now."
"Huh? I thought you will use my joining of an organization as an excuse to wage war on Earth."
"What do you take me for? I'm not Pandora. I was simply suggesting that you gain access to their resources and assets, take advantage of their connections, and make use of their influence to keep track of enemy presences. The Saurians are not our only enemies. Even though various alien civilizations have allied with each other to destroy the Holy Terran Empire, they are not a monolithic entity. The Alien Alliance is splintered into factions who often operate independently of each other. Furthermore, there are members of your species who might have been recruited as agents for these other alien species to enact plans to subjugate your planet under the rule of one of them…to prevent the Sol System from becoming part of the Holy Terran Empire and keeping the bulk of our strength and assets scattered and disunited."
So my job wasn't just to recover all the relics scattered across the galaxy, but also protect my home world from being subsumed into an alien power. Brilliant.
"I'll think about it."
"Really?" Lin Xue looked delighted. She approached me with her smartphone. "Let's exchange contact information. I'll provide you more details and a contract which you will have to sign through email, but I assure you that you won't regret this decision. In return, you'll have to undertake missions for us. Oh, don't worry, we understand your circumstances and will minimize calling you when you're busy with Gao Kao."
She lowered her voice. "Also, it's best if you keep the main details secret from your family. Just tell us we're a governmental organization providing a scholarship and a job after graduation, but don't tell them anything about special powers or aliens."
"Do you think they will believe me?" I asked dryly. "They didn't even believe the alien thing, thinking it's a hoax and that it was a normal terrorist attack yesterday."
"That's the official statement," Lin Xue replied with a nod. "The government has been covering up the whole thing and publicizing that it was a terrorist with prototype weapons. Honestly, even if we tell them the truth, the public will think it's a hoax anyway. So we provided a more believable explanation."
"Fact is stranger than fiction," I muttered in agreement. Then I held my right hand out to shake hers. "All right then. We have a deal."