Chapter 1: Campus Life (1)
When the season bloomed ever so incandescently, it hinted the beginning of the school year—the time for the fresh meat's entrance to the start of a new adventure.
At the same time, it's also considered the hottest period for recruiting new students, "the fresh meat" into their association.
The seniors attempted to trick all the newcomers to come under their tutelage.
They'd tell those innocent birds of sweet nothings.
This is how they'd entrap them.
"Hey, Han Song, do you want to eat out?" A voice called out.
"….You go! I'm not very hungry…" Han Song rolled over to the side and snorted.
"I also won't go out…. bring leftovers." Ye Ke readjusted his sleeping position to a more comfortable setting and dozed off, completely unaware of the events happening outside.
He dreamt of the past.
He remembered his twelfth year of summer in high school.
He'll never forget the expression of the class teacher's face when he walked into the classroom with a smartphone in hand.
The bell had already rung yet the class teacher hadn't walked over to berate him.
So he ignored it.
He teased and joked with the girls near his surrounding desk. In return, they laughed. They hung onto every word of his as if it were of great importance.
"Ye Ke, come out." The class teacher with a pair of black rimmed glasses said gently. Her eyes were a little red and her body quivered. He believed surely that he was in a great deal of trouble.
Ye Ke sighed. He wondered what sort of excuse he should make as he was rather late, after all. Would playing sick work? Nah, that's a cliche line and one long overused. He pinched his nose before going out into the hallways.
"Teach—" In the next second, the class teacher quickly pulled him into her embrace.
His eyes widened, his mouth parted slightly… what was this?
He had no time to digest the softness of the chest nor the sweet alluring fragrance she exuded because her next sentence felt like he encountered a tumultuous rainstorm.
"Your parents had a car accident on the way back. I've already requested you to leave school. Come with me, I'll take you to the hospital." The chord of her voice was soft, trembling almost.
Ye Ke's mother was a great friend of hers. Though it couldn't be spoken in school, Ye Ke called and thought of his class teacher as an aunt in private.
The medical team wasn't fast enough. They came to the scene of the accident a little too late because Ye Ke's parents died on spot, their body deprived of life.
Once the class teacher and Ye Ke arrived in the hospital, the two were sent directly to the lower floor, the morgue.
What awaited him was two bodies covered in white sheets.
Ye Ke slumped on the floor.
This can't be real, he thought.
This is fake, he thought.
The body under the white sheets aren't my parents, he thought.
He wanted it so badly to be true because he couldn't… he wouldn't accept the true reality.
But he knew deep down that all of it was real.
So he knelt on the white stainless floor, stayed motionless while depression cane to him.
He wanted to cry but there were no tears left to cry.
Thereafter, Ye Ke completed his studies, graduated high school with ease, received his inheritance and compensation left by his parents, and applied to a university in Suzhou, a city west of Shanghai.
He retained his status as a child whose parents were unable to provide under the eyes of the government and was thus sent to military services.
Two years passed, he refused to stay within the military any longer and returned to society the moment the chance provided itself and entered the university once more.
He was twenty-one.
Due to prior services in the military and the mere fact that the tuition fee cost less than six thousand yuan, Ye Ke's tuition fees were waived and hence lived a university life without carrying a debt in his back.
"Motherf*cker! Get out of the bed! How can you find a girlfriend in a male dominant and competitive society when you bastards are like this?!" Zhou Kai kicked the door open and roared loudly.
Zhou Kai was an amusing fellow.
He clamored everyday day in and day out regarding the need of finding a beautiful girl to spend his precious time with but however, when given the opportunity, he was lipped-tight.
Whenever words came out, it was nothing but mere stutters.
"I brought food! It's on the table." Another voice said.
Ye Ke and Han Song awoke the moment they heard the pounding and kicking of the door.
"Okay… I'll give you money later." Han Song yawned.
He was a little chubby, had some fats in his body here and there. His eyes were downcast as he licked his lip, apparently unhappy of being awakened abruptly from a good sleep.
"Nah, it's alright." Wang Hao hollered and placed the food he had on his hands on the table.
His friends call him Old Wang because he's simply a stick—a tall, thin stick that looked like it'd break any second. He's like an old man that looks like it'd pass out any moment because he was a frail stick.
Chen Zihan walked into the dormitory without greeting the others.
He passed them and quickly sat down on a chair, turned on the desktop computer, typed his password, placed the headphones on his head, and began losing himself in the online world.
Chen Zihan was a young man with deep-seated internet addiction.
All six of them lived in one dorm.
According to university regulations, a dorm should have no less than six people. In total, there were thirty-five young men in the building with one dorm having fewer individuals.
Ye Ke put on a plain shirt and jumped off the top bunk bed.
He looked out the windows.
It was dark.