Just in this originally quiet night, a woman's hysterical scream rang out!
"Ah!!!"
Fuck, Ren He was so startled by the volume that he snapped to his senses. What the hell was he waiting for, just run!
He hurriedly scrambled back down, crouching low to dash into the bushes in a different direction when he heard the window from before being opened and a man standing at it bellowed, "Are you sick? Are you sick? Climbing up to the second floor to peep?!"
"My bad, my bad," Ren He muttered as he headed off into the distance. He knew the other party definitely hadn't seen his face or clothes, but to be safe, he decided to wait a while before going back.
Just his luck to run into Duan Xiaolou at this time. Ren He quickly said, "Haha, time for a night jog, huh..."
"Why are you sweating so much?" Duan Xiaolou asked in surprise.
"Oh, I just ran a lap!" Ren He explained.
"There was a scream in the courtyard just now, do you know what happened?"
"It wasn't me," he said before realizing how that sounded, so he quickly continued calmly, "I don't know, I only heard the scream but don't know what happened."
With that, Duan Xiaolou didn't ask any more and the two continued on their night jog...
Later, Ren He heard that the male homeowner seemed to have been emasculated by that scream and was going through a divorce...
Seems like he had to be extra, extra careful from now on...
On the way home that evening, Ren He tucked the sheet of paper with the lyrics to "The Brightest Star in the Night Sky" that was in the drawer into his pocket.
...
In the Academic Affairs Office, Director Liu, who was already showing signs of balding, suddenly spotted Ren He's homeroom teacher Xie Mianhan and quickly called out, "Mr. Xie! Come here, I need to talk to you!"
Xie Mianhan looked puzzled, "Liu, what's up?"
"How's that student Ren He from your class doing lately?"
"Which aspect are you asking about?" Xie Mianhan was a bit confused.
"I mean... has he done anything out of line again?" Director Liu went straight to the point, "When we drank together last time, I told you why I didn't punish him. You need to do some good thought work with him. You've got to make him understand that, aside from the school's disciplinary issues, he should think about his own safety when taking such risks!"
At this point, Director Liu lowered his voice, "Think about what his father does. If he gets into trouble here at school, not just you or me, even the principal will be implicated. By then, nobody will care whether he wanted to engage in risky behavior on his own; they'll only blame us for not keeping a close watch!"
Director Liu always broke out in a cold sweat whenever he thought about this possibility!
Hearing this, Xie Mianhan slapped his forehead, "Liu, you've really hit the nail on the head. I got it, I'll go talk some sense into him right now!"
Xie Mianhan turned and headed toward the classroom, arriving at the door he smiled warmly at Ren He and said, "Ren He, come out for a second."
This was the first time the class teacher had spoken to him so kindly. Ren He was startled into goosebumps and called out, "Alright, Teacher, I'm on my way now!"
When Ren He arrived at the classroom door, Xie Miaohan got straight to the point: "Ren He, your academic performance has improved tremendously lately. I've been thinking about the last test, and you know, you really had no chance to cheat. Since your academic grades are so good, does that mean you no longer need to practice sports? You're not going to do something like jumping off a building again, are you?"
In front of the teacher, Ren He still knew the score. You are a student, so you can't just defy the teacher, right? He nodded and said, "I definitely won't jump from the buildings again. Rest assured, I was just confused and impulsive at the time!"
Xie Miaohan, hearing this, was overjoyed, and his impression of Ren He improved quite a bit. He patted Ren He on the shoulder: "Alright, go back and get ready for class!"
The weight that had just lifted from his heart finally seemed to settle.
Back in the classroom, Xu Nuo gossiped, "What did the class teacher want with you? Did you mess up again? Wait, no, he seemed quite happy just now."
"He's afraid I'll jump off a building again," Ren He said nonchalantly. At that moment, Yang Xi turned her head to look at him; their first encounter had been the time Ren He had jumped off the building.
Truth be told, she had no idea why Ren He had jumped off the building. Yang Xi asked curiously, "Were you trying extreme sports or something?"
Ah, finally someone referred to it not as jumping off buildings but as extreme sports. However, Ren He explained, "Actually, I wasn't doing extreme sports; I was risking my life on a mission…"
Nobody could understand what Ren He meant by 'doing a mission'.
The next day, Director Liu was idly drinking tea and reading the newspaper when suddenly he remembered the matter he had discussed with Mr. Xie, the class teacher, the day before. He put down the paper and rushed to Xie Miaohan's office, "Liu, how did the talk go yesterday?"
"Haha, you're talking about that, eh?" Xie Miaohan laughed, "Actually, this student is quite sensible. He got the point the moment I started educating him, and he immediately promised never to do anything dangerous again. All good now!"
"That's great, that's great. If something were really to happen to him at school, neither you nor I could avoid the blame; our lives would be ruined here!" said Director Liu with a hearty laugh. However, the next moment, his expression froze as he looked out the window across to another teaching building…
There, on the second floor, a teenager was climbing up the building using the anti-theft bars, almost reaching the third floor…
"Damn it, Liu, what kind of education did you give him?" Director Liu was so shocked he could have wet himself. Who else could that climber be, if not Ren He?!
Xie Miaohan turned sharply to look out the window, just as flustered as Director Liu. What happened to the promise of no more dangerous behavior, to the explanation of a momentary lapse in judgment?! But at that moment, Xie Miaohan suddenly remembered what Ren He had said: would absolutely not jump from buildings again!
Turns out the freaking subtext was to switch events!
And here he was, thinking the student had improved. Improved my ass!
Underneath the teaching building a large crowd of students had gathered to watch Ren He climbing with his bare hands. Some girls watched in horror, their mouths covered, afraid that Ren He would fall, while some people suddenly thought this student was really badass…
Yang Xi and Xu Nuo, along with Duan Xiaolou, were the first to react, quickly running to the third floor to wait for Ren He, who hadn't quite climbed up yet. They reached out their hands as he approached, "Grab onto us!"
Ren He yelled urgently, "Get out of the way, get out of the way!"
The Divine Punishment System required him to climb without any external help, and he had made it this far on his own – wouldn't accepting help now mean all of his previous efforts were for naught?
"Can you not, like, just let me be? I got this, move aside, I'm coming up!" Ren He shouted in dismay.
Xu Nuo was stunned. Why was this happening just as things had quieted down for two days, and why wouldn't they let anyone help?!