The Young Mu Yang!

Some people said Li Mu Yang was a good-for-nothing.

This made Li Mu Yang especially furious. This should have been a family secret—how had it been leaked and spread until everyone knew?

A warm breeze brushed his face, with green grass and red flowers all around.

Clang—

The loud sound of metal striking metal rang out.

Someone kicked a battered iron bucket into the lake. It bobbed on the surface a few times before sinking with a series of glugging sounds.

Li Mu Yang abruptly opened his eyes and stared blankly at the few people standing before him.

"Li Mu Yang—I don't think you should be called Li Mu Yang. You should be called Li Dead Pig instead, right? You sleep in class, sleep after class, and even sleep during outings. Can you sleep better than a pig?" a handsome boy said mockingly.

"Zhang Chen, could you stop insulting pigs? Pigs may be greedy, lazy, and sleep all day, but at least they're fat-headed, big-eared, and snow-white. They look stupidly adorable—but look at Li Mu Yang. He's pitch-black and scrawny, like a piece of charred coal. How could he possibly compare to a pig?" Yang Jun said sarcastically. His words drew laughter from everyone.

"Li Mu Yang, weren't you going fishing?" A chubby boy picked up the simple bamboo fishing rod propped beside the lake and said with a grin, "Looks like you didn't catch much. The bucket's empty—not even a single fish. What a pity. Just now, everyone was saying that Li Mu Yang had fished all afternoon and would surely have a great haul, so we could feast tonight and have a whole-fish banquet. You're such a disappointment."

Li Mu Yang rubbed his eyes and secretly wiped the moisture from the corner of his mouth with his sleeve.

That movement stirred even more excited laughter from the onlookers.

"What's wrong?" Li Mu Yang asked in confusion. "What do you want?"

"Li Mu Yang, we just came to see you—to see how well you were sleeping." Zhang Chen reached over and flicked Li Mu Yang's long bangs aside, looking down arrogantly at him as he sat in the grass. "Did you sleep well today?"

"Pretty well." Li Mu Yang nodded with utter honesty. He really had slept very comfortably. It was just that he still hadn't found the answer to the question that was making him anxious—should he go watch the opera with Cui Xiaoxin?

"What did you dream about?"

Li Mu Yang's dark face turned red. He lowered his head and said shyly, "I can't say."

"Come on, tell us." Zhang Chen wore the expression of a cat playing with a mouse. This was a game they often played. They were the cats, while Li Mu Yang was their designated little mouse. "Don't worry. We won't laugh at you."

"I can't say." Li Mu Yang shook his head again.

"Did you dream about our great beauty Cui?"

At the back of the crowd, a pretty girl with long hair draped over her shoulders and dressed in a white gown raised her brows slightly. Clearly, she did not like them dragging her into the fray.

Li Mu Yang looked thoughtfully at Zhang Chen and said, "You're immature."

"What?" Zhang Chen's eyes widened at once, unable to believe what he had just heard. "What did you say?"

Had this guy taken the wrong medicine?

Li Mu Yang was the class oddball. Because his skin was pitch-black and he looked like a chunk of charcoal, everyone liked to call him Black Charcoal or Blackie.

And because Li Mu Yang loved sleep as dearly as life itself—sleeping in class, sleeping after class, and even sleeping while out playing—everyone had given him the nickname God of Sleep.

Because he was spectacularly black and could sleep for ages, Li Mu Yang had become famous here. Whenever anyone saw him, they would say, "Hey, that's the Black Charcoal from our place," or, "He can really sleep. He can sleep from first period in the morning all the way to fourth period. The teacher broke his ruler beating him, and he still didn't wake up—"

Li Mu Yang was the class treasure, the mascot.

When everyone was in a good mood, they teased him. When they were in a bad mood, they bullied him.

Zhang Chen was in a very bad mood today because he had secretly confessed to Cui Xiaoxin earlier, only to be rejected. The Literary Examination was just a month away. If he couldn't establish a normal relationship as boyfriend and girlfriend with Cui Xiaoxin now, he could only watch helplessly as this delicate flower drifted away with the wind and vanished from his life.

The more he thought about it, the more dejected and miserable he became. Zhang Chen wanted to find something to vent his anger on, and that was when he happened to see Li Mu Yang sleeping soundly in the corner.

But even this little mouse dared to fight back and mock him? That had never happened before.

"You're immature." Li Mu Yang repeated what he had said just now. Though it was only four simple words, their destructive power was astonishing.

Zhang Chen's expression darkened. He glared viciously at Li Mu Yang and enunciated every word. "You want to die?"

Li Mu Yang rubbed his hair, which had become a mess from sleeping, and said, "You casually throw out threats like that—I do have a question to ask. People cross the Bridge of Helplessness every day. How many of them have you personally sent across?"

"Beat him up!"

Zhang Chen roared furiously and charged straight at Li Mu Yang at the head of the others.

Tall and graceful, with eyes bright as stars, Zhang Chen had a robust, powerful body honed by frequent games of polo and cuju. As he ran, he was imposing and fierce, with the force of a tiger charging through the wind. It looked as though one collision would send the skinny, shriveled Li Mu Yang flying.

Everyone thought so.

At that moment, Li Mu Yang was like a little boat tossed about on the open sea, or a lamb trembling before the Tiger King. All it would take was one raging wave, one pouncing leap, and he would be annihilated on the spot, his soul scattered to the winds.

Li Mu Yang stood motionless where he was, looking as though he had been scared senseless.

Around his pupils, black as Ink Stone, blood vessels began spreading densely through the whites of his eyes.

At first, they were faint and thin, nearly invisible to the naked eye. But soon, they joined together into patches, becoming increasingly clear and terrifying.

At a glance, it looked as though his pupils had been wrapped in red ink. Those pitch-black pupils were black holes like suns in the firmament, while vast swathes of bloody red surged and roiled around them.

Thin scales grew across the back of Li Mu Yang's clenched fist, like a piece of transparent fish scale. Purple light flickered across them, turning the small patch of black skin on the back of his hand purplish-red.

Li Mu Yang's heart seethed with violent fury, as though some pent-up dissatisfaction needed release, as though he bore grievances vast as the sky that he could not voice.

Zhang Chen ran closer, then slammed a fist toward Li Mu Yang's face.

Smack—

Li Mu Yang raised a hand to block it.

"Ah—"

Someone cried out, while others closed their eyes in fright.

How could Li Mu Yang's thin arms and legs possibly withstand Zhang Chen's steel fists and iron arms?

A triumphant smile spread across Zhang Chen's face as he looked at the loathsome black face so close to him, his eyes filled with contempt.

"This poor little mouse—how dare it tease a cat?"

The instant their fists met, the smile froze on Zhang Chen's face. Then he felt a vast, surging force rush into his fist.

He could not withstand it. He had no power to resist.

Boom—

Zhang Chen's body flew high into the air before crashing heavily into the grass in the distance.

The entire scene fell silent enough to hear a pin drop, save for the gently swaying willow branches in the distance and the insects chirping without a care.

Li Mu Yang had actually sent Zhang Chen flying with a single punch?