Chapter 39: Leaving Home with Youxue

The principal was still waiting, and Xia Yu decided not to dwell on the issue further. He agreed first.

If it didn’t feel right later, he could just participate half-heartedly. After all, he wouldn’t lose anything.

After Xia Yu left, the Chinese teacher approached the principal.

“Principal, are you really going to secure a recommendation from Huada for Xia Yu?”

The Chinese teacher didn’t doubt the principal’s capability. Other teachers at the school might not know, but he was fully aware.

The principal’s wife was an honorary principal at Huada.

The principal laughed out loud. “I said that if he can achieve a decent score, I’ll get him a recommendation. But to get a recommendation, he needs to be among the top ten. How could he ever achieve that!”

“You rascal!” The Chinese teacher laughed as he scolded.

“Alright, don’t hang around here. Go finish your report!”

The Chinese teacher returned to his office, spent an hour revising his report, and then hurried to Xia Yu’s class for the last lesson.

Standing on the podium, he glanced at Xia Yu below and sighed.

The poor kid was deceived by the principal, thinking the district competition would be that easy?

Both he and the principal believed Xia Yu had underestimated the difficulty of the district competition, thus being tempted by the Huada recommendation. In reality, Xia Yu had already assessed the difficulty to a much deeper extent.

Xia Yu had no doubts whatsoever about achieving a good result.

What troubled him now was that the district competition would attract significant attention. When that happened, people would inevitably ask when he had learned to play the piano, and how would he explain it?

That wasn’t even the main issue. The real problem was that An Siyao might find him because of this competition!

After all, he had learned piano from that girl, practiced with her, and she would definitely recognize his playing.

Even if he switched to violin, it would be the same.

Maintaining his secrecy was his top priority, so Xia Yu had already considered withdrawing.

He would just play a few notes carelessly to get through it.

Having made his decision, he curiously searched online for information about the competition.

There were quite a few related messages and news articles, but Xia Yu had never paid attention before.

He opened the official announcement and focused on the prize money.

The first prize was one million, the second prize fifty thousand, the third prize thirty thousand, and the rest of the top ten received ten thousand each.

Looking at that one million, Xia Yu’s breath quickened. He told himself to stay calm. Even one million, or ten million, or a hundred million, he would eventually have.

Besides, one million wasn’t that much. A second-hand house in Zilang City started at a million.

After calming himself down, he casually started slacking off and then headed to his part-time job at the coffee shop after school.

Just after getting off the subway, his phone rang.

It was Yuxue calling.

This surprised Xia Yu. The girl had never called him at this time before.

Had something happened?

His heart sank, and Xia Yu pressed the answer button.

From the phone came Yuxue’s voice, on the verge of tears.

“Big brother, Dad…”

“What’s wrong? Did that guy get beaten up by someone?” Xia Yu’s first thought was that Xia Dongyang had a problem. As a man with a sense of pointless pride, it wouldn’t surprise him if Xia Dongyang had a conflict with someone.

“No, Dad is missing.” Yuxue’s voice was choked with sobs. Because she was too upset, she couldn’t get to the point.

“I’m coming home now. You tell me slowly.” Xia Yu turned around and got back on the subway. “Isn’t it good that he’s gone? Why are you crying?”

“But someone came and said Dad sold the house.” Yuxue started crying.

Xia Yu, however, relaxed a bit.

Although he hadn’t expected Xia Dongyang to be so despicable as to sell the house and run off, losing the house wasn’t a big problem. Without a house, they could just move out, which would be better to stay away from Xia Dongyang and prevent him from scaring Yuxue.

If it had been before when he worked as a cashier, this would have been a major disaster for Xia Yu. After all, if Xia Dongyang had already run away, he wouldn’t give monthly food and tuition money anymore, and his salary as a cashier wouldn’t be enough to support him.

But now, with a monthly income of ten thousand, he was already earning more than most citizens of Zilang.

However, he only had two thousand on him and would need to borrow some from the manager.

Maintaining the call with Yuxue, Xia Yu sent a message to the manager, telling him that he had an emergency and couldn’t come today.

The manager replied with a simple “OK.”

After getting off the high-speed rail, Xia Yu took a taxi directly to his home.

Upon entering the building, he saw Yuxue standing in front of the door.

The girl grabbed Xia Yu’s hand. She was no longer panicking now, but she was still discouraged by the sudden loss of the home where she had lived for over ten years.

Patting her head, Xia Yu looked at the group of people inspecting the house.

Xia Yu immediately recognized that these people were not decent.

“Did they say any bad words to you?” Xia Yu asked Yuxue. If the girl answered yes, he wouldn’t mind teaching them a lesson.

“No,” Yuxue replied. Now the country was rectifying social conduct, and no one dared to act recklessly.

He asked Yuxue to wait outside while he walked inside.

“Hey, brother is back,” a man in the living room whistled at Xia Yu. “Your dad sold the house. I heard from your sister that he’s also missing. Do you want to come stay at my place? My bed is big enough for two.”

The other three men laughed.

Xia Yu didn’t respond. He approached the man and punched him to the ground.

The remaining three immediately jumped up, ready to fight.

Although Xia Yu could take on four men, there was Yuxue outside, so he didn’t want to provoke them.

He held up his phone toward the four men and said, “If you lay a hand on us, I’ll call the police. I’m sure reporters will love the news about a high school brother and sister being driven out of their home by four villains. Plus, my sister and I are photogenic, heh.”

The four men, especially the one punched by Xia Yu, turned red with anger, jumped up to retaliate but were held back by their companions.

“Calm down! Calm down!”

“If it gets into the news, we’re done for!”

“Stay calm, stay calm.”

After suppressing the four men’s arrogance, Xia Yu began to ask, “How did Xia Dongyang sell the house to you guys?”

Xia Yu felt something strange. Although Xia Dongyang wasn’t a good father, he had at least stayed around for all these years without abandoning him and Yuxue. Why would he suddenly sell the house and run away?

The four men ignored Xia Yu at first but were threatened again with the same reasoning.

“We are just a lending company. He used this house as collateral for one million. We don’t know anything else,” one of them said.

“No, you do know.” Xia Yu walked toward the four men.

The four men looked nervously at Xia Yu approaching, fearing he would hit them again.

But their pride as villains prevented them from retreating.

Coming to the man he had previously knocked down, Xia Yu grabbed his collar.

“What are you doing? I already said I don’t know…” the man began.

Before he could finish, Xia Yu punched him in the stomach.

“Do you know now?” Xia Yu used intimidation.

The four men looked at Xia Yu in fear, except for the man he was holding, the other three instinctively took a step back.

They began to question who was the real villain between them and Xia Yu.

“We heard he was scammed by Gong Liuzi,” the man revealed the truth.

After letting go of him, Xia Yu rubbed his forehead. He knew Gong Liuzi, a gambler.

Although Xia Dongyang was a bit of a rogue, he had some principles. He didn’t touch drugs or alcohol, except for his obsession with women. Xia Yu never expected him to be so foolish as to fall into a trap set by Gong Liuzi.

Without saying anything else, Xia Yu went into the bedroom, grabbed a suitcase, packed clothes for himself and Yuxue, and picked up the black cat, then walked out the door.

Taking the black cat from Xia Yu, Yuxue looked back at the washing machine on the balcony.

The contract Xia Dongyang signed included not only the house but also all the furniture inside. Xia Yu didn’t know if this contract was legal, but he knew that if he took the washing machine, he would shift from being in the right to being in the wrong. These four men might then do something bad.

On the way, Xia Yu and Yuxue didn’t speak.

Xia Yu had already planned to move out from Xia Dongyang’s place. Losing the house wasn’t a big deal for him, but leaving home in such a humiliating way, and the reason being that Gong Liuzi had scammed Xia Dongyang, made Xia Yu angry.

Gong Liuzi knew about Xia Yu and Yuxue’s existence and Xia Dongyang’s character. He must have known what would happen to Xia Yu and Yuxue after scamming Xia Dongyang into selling the house.

Moreover, judging from Xia Dongyang’s sudden disappearance, the scam by Gong Liuzi wasn’t just about the million from the house sale. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have run away immediately.

The previous visit by the tattooed man and Xia Dongyang’s unusual behavior had already hinted that something was going to happen, but he hadn’t expected Xia Dongyang to fall so hard this time.

If he hadn’t changed part-time jobs, he wouldn’t know what to do at this moment.

Getting revenge on enemies wasn’t Xia Yu’s style. He began plotting in his mind how to give Gong Liuzi a little payback.