The real young master thought he was hated by everyone

Time always seems to pass particularly quickly when one is focused. When the driver came to pick him up after evening self-study on Friday, Li Heng even felt as if he had just formally entered the first high school yesterday.

As previously agreed, he was supposed to return home with Xie Duzhi today and stay until Sunday evening.

Having just taken an exam, there wasn’t much homework this week. He thought the tutoring teacher could give him a few extra hours of lessons, holding this thought, he was disappointed to hear over the phone that they wouldn’t be going home.

Because there was no one at home.

His elder brother had gone on a business trip to the north and had just left on Thursday; his second brother happened to have an art exhibition to hold.

As for their parents, Xie Duzhi wasn’t quite clear on the specifics, but in short, they were out of town and unable to return in time for some reason.

The tutor would come over to give him lessons, scheduled for the morning.

“Can I go to school for self-study in the afternoon and come back in the evening?” he asked Xie Duzhi. “The teacher will be in the office grading papers, and I can directly ask if there’s anything I don’t understand.”

He felt that studying at school would be slightly more efficient than reading at home.

Xie Duzhi didn’t say much, only indicating that he would have the driver come pick him up later and asking if he wanted someone to bring him food.

“If it gets too late, I’ll just take the subway myself.” According to his deskmate, sometimes self-study on weekends could even go later than usual—there was a possibility that the teacher, after finishing grading, might spontaneously call students to the office for a chat.

Li Heng felt that he didn’t perform very well on this week’s test.

There was a possibility he would be at the bottom of the class, which could also affect the average score.

The probability of the teacher calling his name was much higher than that of his deskmate, who usually performed steadily.

Xie Duzhi nodded and said, “Okay.”

At least when Xie Duzhi spoke to him, he didn’t feel any hint of so-called “autocratic behavior.”

Even before bed, he could still see Xie Shenzhi specifically screenshotting and blurring other people’s moments on social media, complaining about how difficult it was to get along with Xie Duzhi, how indifferent he was to human feelings, and simultaneously inviting him to move to a community a bit farther from the first high school to live together.

He felt that Xie Duzhi just appeared tough but was actually very gentle.

It was just that his demeanor—or rather, his character—made this gentleness subtle and hard to perceive, easily overlooked.

A truly indifferent person wouldn’t take the time to notice a cat’s habits and preferences, or deliberately place a pot of cat grass in the most conspicuous spot in the living room, which clashed with the surrounding environment.

Nor would they go out of their way to replace the family’s robot vacuum cleaner with a completely silent version, allowing the cat to freely run around on it.

Although Xiaozhi didn’t show any gratitude, often darting out from a corner to scratch at him, there were still people who noticed these details and kept them in their hearts.

The tutor arrived at 7:30 in the morning and tutored him until nearly noon, leaving him six exam papers to work on. They said they would focus on weak question types and knowledge points next week, urging him to do them well.

After having lunch and resting a little to digest the morning’s knowledge, he took the exam papers and headed to school.

Before leaving, he made sure to say hello to Xie Duzhi, who was working, and also brought Xiaozhi, who was trying to expand his territory, back to his room.

As he entered the classroom at the start of self-study, he noticed a small bag of fuchsia candies and a few pieces of chocolate on his desk.

It was something his deskmate had brought from home to thank him for the jerky he had shared these past few days.

The chocolate was from a popular foreign handmade brand, and it was also his deskmate’s favorite.

During the break, he repeatedly asked Li Heng about the flavors, and after getting Li Heng’s evaluation of “it seems to be about the same as what you buy in the supermarket,” he indignantly declared that if he ever cared about such a tasteless person again, he would just be a puppy.

But during the next break, he was thrilled again by Li Heng’s high praise for the cherry gummies and started enthusiastically boasting about his older sister—those gummies were made by her.

Fortunately, the exam papers from yesterday hadn’t all been graded. Just after eight o’clock, the class monitor called for the end of class, and fearing that the teacher would call someone at any moment, he hurriedly grabbed his backpack and dashed out of the classroom without looking back.

It was still early, and the driver hadn’t messaged him yet.

Li Heng slowly packed his things, chatting casually with his deskmate.

“The first place to eat on the left side of the Snack Street, are you going there now? I feel like more people line up on weekends since nearby office workers and college students come over to join in on the fun.” His deskmate’s eyes kept darting to his desk. “Li Heng, I’ve noticed you seem to only like sweet things.”

He still had two pieces of chocolate left from the ones he shared at lunch.

After thinking for a moment, he gave his deskmate a piece, telling him to just say if he wanted to eat.

“I’ll bring you gummies tomorrow.” His deskmate pressed on, “My sister also made bayberry juice.”

“This is the last piece. If you don’t like it, just save it for me.” He looked a little aggrieved. “Or we can each have one right now and finish them off.”

That way, he wouldn’t be left with lingering thoughts.

It should be noted that when he found out the chocolate he had given away was of no interest to Li Heng, he had thought about it for nearly an entire afternoon and evening.

He really liked his new deskmate’s generous and kind temperament, but he was also reluctant to part with the chocolate.

He didn’t expect Li Heng to refuse.

But the reasoning of “sharing what I have with my new friend to take back to share with my brother” was simply too difficult to resist, especially when the speaker had a slight embarrassment in his tone and his eyes were slightly bent.

The chubby boy was dazed but resolutely handed the chocolate he had just received back to him: “Li Heng, you should take it back to share with your brother.”

“I don’t mind; I can hold on. My dad is coming back in two weeks; he said he would bring me something!” 

Li Heng was a bit amused by his deskmate but held it back.

“Then I’ll bring you something to eat tomorrow.” He finally said.

The two of them went downstairs together, agreeing to line up for milk tea. As they descended, he received a message from Xie Duzhi.

He said goodbye to his deskmate at the staircase, feeling light on his feet as he turned a corner and walked toward the school’s main gate.

Xie Duzhi personally drove over to pick him up. After opening the car door and sitting in the passenger seat, Li Heng realized he had switched to a new car.

The new car looked quite similar to the previous one on the outside—at least he couldn’t discern much difference—but the interior space seemed to be considerably larger, and the dashboard had an extra pull-out portable table.

It even had a built-in lamp, allowing him to place his books on it to do homework.

“From now on, let the driver use this car to take you.” Xie Duzhi seemed quite satisfied.

Before Li Heng could speak, he asked again, “Shall we go have milk tea?”

Li Heng felt a subtle sense of being pampered and recalled that the other party had indeed mentioned trying it next time.

“But it’ll take some time to queue, and if third brother is busy, we won’t go.” he said, but his eyes couldn’t help but reveal a glimmer of anticipation.

But Xie Duzhi had specifically come for this; before leaving, he had already rearranged all the tasks he needed to handle that evening.

“Let’s go.” The young man started the car’s engine, planning to park it near the snack street.

The main gate and the snack street were not far apart, just a matter of turning a corner.

“…… Third brother,” Li Heng, who had a decent sense of direction, fell silent for a few seconds before speaking with a hint of complexity, “It seems we’re going the wrong way.”

Xie Duzhi’s car had turned east.

The young man subtly twitched his wrist but quickly maintained his usual expression and said, “It’s more convenient to park this way.”

Li Heng had no doubts and turned to talk about the candies and chocolates his deskmate had given him.

The gummies were very sweet, and the chocolate tasted good, so he saved a bit of each, hoping to share the happiness of making friends with his family.

Xie Duzhi didn’t particularly like sweets, so he focused more on the chocolate.

He was still recalling the descriptive words his deskmate used for the chocolate—what was it? Rich, smooth, and nuanced—when he didn’t notice the Xie Duzhi’s expression momentarily relaxing, only to quickly return to calm, with no waves of emotion.

Li Heng, having warmed the chocolate in his school uniform pocket, handed it to him, saying, “If you find the milk tea too sweet, you can eat this to balance it out.”

Dark chocolate doesn’t have much sweetness.

Xie Duzhi suddenly smiled and nodded.

Of course, Xie Duzhi ultimately didn’t have milk tea. By the time they reached the front of the line, the fresh cream for that day’s snow-topped drinks had run out, leaving only juice and coffee available on the menu.

Considering that they still had to correct mistakes and review other tutoring lessons in the evening, Li Heng regrettably gave up on the fruit bucket that looked so good on the poster and ordered the same bubbly coffee as Xie Duzhi.

“There are coffee beans at home.”

Xie Duzhi swallowed the functional drink mixed with orange sparkling water but still couldn’t understand why someone would deliberately line up for an hour for this.

In his view, coffee should be coffee, and sparkling water should be sparkling water.

These are two completely different things that cannot be mixed together for any reason.

He canceled the order that was in progress, paid again, and ordered the fruit bucket for Li Heng, then furrowed his brow and finished the cup of mixed drink, unwrapping the piece of chocolate he originally intended to save as a keepsake.

It should be a Belgian brand.

Xie Duzhi noted the markings on the packaging and took the packed fruit bucket with pride, continuing their earlier conversation about coffee as he walked. “If you’re feeling tired while studying, just send me a message.” 

He went to brew some coffee. 

Perhaps the coffee beans at home were more expensive, or maybe it was some psychological effect, but at one-thirty in the morning, Li Heng realized he wasn’t the least bit sleepy. 

He took a deep breath, stood up from his chair, and vigorously rubbed the belly of the little cat sprawled on his bed. With renewed energy, he finished the English weekly report his teacher had assigned him. 

Sunday was much like Saturday, except that the tutor came over in the afternoon. He only went to school in the morning for a brief self-study session, naturally missing the scene in the evening where the teacher graded papers, calculated total scores, and called students to the office for discussions. 

After class, he saw a message from his deskmate. 

His deskmate, who he thought wouldn’t be called for a meeting, had made a calculation error in the last question of the math exam from the very beginning. In English, he marked the answer sheet incorrectly, narrowly exceeding the special line set by the school based on the difficulty of the exam by ten points, and had been lectured by the teacher for over half an hour, dredging up old issues from the first-year final exam, losing both face and reputation. 

Thinking that the teacher would definitely announce the rankings during Monday’s class meeting, Li Heng decided not to bother sending a message. 

He followed the method that Gu Mingyue had taught him and reworked the problem he had just completed, feeling much clearer in his thought process. 

When he opened his phone again, he was inundated with messages about red packets. 

In the group he pinned to the top, named “A Family,” messages congratulating him on his score flooded in. Xie Sizhi even transferred a study fund to his bank card, starting with his score and ending with six zeros. 

Only the honest big brother’s message, “Stay humble and keep it up,” was drowned in the barrage of messages, and he had to scroll for a long time to find it. 

Li Heng long-pressed to reply with a fist emoji of a cat, then clicked on the other red packets. 

It was supposed to be a test of his learning outcomes and previous foundation, yet he was the last to know his score. 

He had exceeded the special line set by twenty points, which seemed insignificant and even a bit poor in the whole school, yet it seemed no one cared about his ranking, behaving as if he had been admitted to Q University or B University. 

Feeling shy and embarrassed, he also felt an inexplicable joy, as if all his efforts had been seen and affirmed. 

On Monday noon, Uncle Fu even made a special trip to the security room to bring him a large thermos full of black-bone chicken and angelica soup. 

The old man wore a cheerful expression, saying there would be a soup of dove with astragalus and goji berries tomorrow, urging him not to feel too much pressure about studying, and to eat and sleep well, emphasizing that growing up was the most important thing. 

Having already eaten a big bowl of rice in the cafeteria before being called to the security room, Li Heng suddenly felt a bit overwhelmed—at least in terms of food intake. 

Fortunately, he had someone to share this huge pressure with. 

Most of the soup ended up in the stomachs of his deskmate and the elusive Gu Mingyue. 

“I passed the preliminary selection!” Gu Mingyue quietly pulled him to a small grove next to the school playground. “The training camp will be after the competition, and after the competition, I can travel for a while before entering the training camp to prepare for debut.” 

“A month to debut, just as school starts.” Li Heng counted the days on his fingers. “By then, I’ll be the one with the best math skills among the stars, and also the only star from the mathematics department at Q University.” 

“Brother, wait for me to come back with a gold medal, and we can travel together, okay? That way you can tell others that you are good friends with Gu Mingyue—just show them the photos if they don’t believe you.” He blinked, smiling at him like a proud little fox. 

Before Li Heng even had the chance to congratulate him on his wishes coming true or express his dissent about traveling, he saw Gu Mingyue, who had just been so arrogant, being dragged away by the coach by the ear. 

The coach took him away. 

He decided to wait until Gu Mingyue returned from the competition to discuss the travel plans in detail. 

If he hadn’t done well in the exam, he might not be able to go out to play because he’d have to prepare for retaking the year. 

It wasn’t until the next evening that Gu Mingyue sent over a location in the capital and asked if he wanted some roast duck sent over. 

“Although it’s not very tasty, it’s the most famous roast duck in the country.” In the chat box, little Gu argued earnestly. 

Thanks to Gu Mingyue, over that week, he had “virtually toured” all the famous spots in the capital without leaving home, even reinforcing a few geographical knowledge points along the way. 

But when school ended on Friday, he still couldn’t return to the Xie home smoothly. 

The little cat was missing. 

Surveillance footage showed that the exceptionally clever cat had last appeared in the kitchen. 

The spherical lock on the window hadn’t been secured, and the cat used its paws to push at the gap, managing to pry the window open just enough, then squeezed its head through, gradually making the gap larger and sneaking out. 

After reviewing the scene, Xie Duzhi reached this conclusion. 

After all, in the entire villa district, entry and exit required an electronic ID card, so the likelihood of a thief was slim. Even if there were a thief, it was unlikely they would pull the window open from the outside and take nothing but a cat. 

They turned a few circles nearby but found no trace of the little cat, who might have hidden somewhere or fallen asleep in a tree and didn’t hear them calling. 

Xie Duzhi rubbed his brow and voluntarily took on the task of writing the missing cat notice while Li Heng only provided a photo—after all, he still had a dozen test papers left to complete. Even if he planned to search the community carefully the next day, he needed to deal with some homework first. 

“Tomorrow I’ll have someone contact a professional cat-finding team, so don’t worry too much.” he stood at the door, “The kitchen window is still open; it should come back by itself.” 

He wasn’t good at comforting people, so he could only blandly recount the glorious achievements of the cat-finding team, as if it were a guarantee, saying, “They will find it.” 

“Third Brother, don’t worry too much; everything will be fine.” Li Heng bit his lip, feeling a bit unsure how to explain. “Xiaozhi is very smart; it used to hide from stray dogs in the community, so maybe it just didn’t hear me looking for it today, or it will be back tonight… I just can’t understand why he suddenly ran away.” 

It was only about two weeks ago that the cat had snuck into his backpack, following him everywhere. 

He worried that because he had only been focused on his studies lately, ignoring some signals the cat had sent, it might have made the cat feel unwanted, leading it to leave. 

Moreover, there was a fear of the “unexpected.” 

“It might be because of mating season.” Xie Duzhi thought for a moment and could only find this one plausible explanation. “Male cats won’t actively go into heat; perhaps there are other owners in the vicinity with unspayed female cats that are in heat.” 

“But I had him neutered after I picked him up.” Li Heng was confused, and the guilt and anxiety that had been repressed before surged back. “…He shouldn’t be in heat.” 

“Hormonal residue and memory behaviors can cause this phenomenon.” Xie Duzhi tried to keep his tone gentle. “Maybe when we find the cat, we’ll know.” 

Though he said this, he couldn’t help but look up ways to find cats on search engines, trying several relatively reliable methods. 

For example, spreading used cat litter nearby. 

Following his usual thought patterns, he figured that at times like this, he should draft countermeasures based on the worst-case scenario. With the college entrance examination approaching, excessive emotional fluctuations caused by unpredictable events were not good for Li Heng’s health and would negatively affect his mental state. 

The best method was to find a similar-looking cat and claim that his cat had been found while he was at school, using Uncle Fu to bring it back. This would minimize direct contact, allowing for confirmation of the cat’s status through pictures and videos, and finally confess the truth after the entrance exams were over. 

Li Heng felt resentful and even angry at him; he wouldn’t mind as long as the emotional aspect couldn’t be balanced. As an older brother, he at least had to fulfill his responsibility. 

Moreover, the cat’s disappearance could mostly be blamed on him. 

He should have installed a locator on the cat when he decided to keep it; such a basic oversight should not have happened. 

While Xie Duzhi reflected on his mistakes and oversights over the past period, a wall away, Li Heng, who was told not to worry, couldn’t close his eyes and couldn’t settle down to write the exam paper. Almost every time there was a breeze, he stood up with the utmost patience to confirm if there was a cat meowing. 

The cat-finding team would arrive at nine, and Li Heng in the living room felt mentally exhausted before six-thirty, thinking of going out to search again while worrying that he might accidentally disrupt some subtle traces and hinder the team’s progress. 

Xie Duzhi hadn’t even looked at the financial morning report. 

After thinking for a long time yesterday, he realized he couldn’t accept the possibility that the cat wouldn’t come back. 

The atmosphere in the living room felt strange, a silence laced with anxiety. 

Just when Li Heng couldn’t help but check the time for what felt like the hundredth time, the doorbell rang suddenly with two crisp sounds. 

He almost jumped up to open the door. 

At the door was a tall young man whose sunglasses nearly covered half of his face, with two aviation boxes at his feet, one on the left and one on the right. 

“Sorry to disturb you.” He saw Li Heng, looked surprised at first, then politely greeted him, lifting the aviation box in his left hand. 

Inside was a curled-up, sleeping Siamese cat. 

“Excuse me, is this the Siamese cat that went missing from your home?” the man asked, casually taking off his sunglasses and tucking them into his shirt pocket, revealing a somewhat familiar face. “Yesterday, he was meowing outside my second-floor window, wanting to come in…” 

“To play with my Jiao Jiao.” He paused but didn’t mention how this cat had snuck into his house while he was getting off work; he only vaguely mentioned it. 

“My house has a lot of surveillance outside, and it just so happened to catch him squeezing through the fence here.” The young man glanced at the missing cat notice on the entranceway and smiled, showing a wry expression. “…It seems I found the right one.” 

As he smiled, Li Heng suddenly remembered where he had seen him before. 

Not only on screen but also in that nightmare, he had seen him. 

He was the youngest-ever Best Actor, and also a good friend and senior of Bai Ruan in the entertainment industry.