Chapter 22

The chubby kid repeated the gossip circulating among the students, then tugged at Lu Chi's uniform sleeve and asked, drenched in sweat, "What do we do?"

"Stay calm." Lu Chi fanned Pan Tianbo with his palm and said with a smile, "You look pretty hot. Want some water to cool down?"

"Lu Chi, stop messing around. We need to find a way to prove you didn't cheat!" Pan Tianbo wiped his face, saying furiously, "We can't let them spread nonsense like this. Everyone will believe it."

Lu Chi smiled faintly, took out his math textbook and workbook from his bag, and said with a smile, "But the key question is, how am I supposed to prove I didn't cheat?"

He couldn't exactly retake the exam in front of the entire grade, could he?

Pan Tianbo froze at that.

Ever since Lu Chi entered the classroom, the students had been secretly paying attention to his conversation with Pan Tianbo. Hearing Lu Chi's words, one student sitting in the classroom suddenly sneered. "Of course you can't prove it, because you did cheat. Otherwise, how could a lousy student who failed every subject in the monthly exam possibly score so high after taking half a month off?"

Lu Chi turned around and saw that the speaker was Li Xu—the Chinese class representative of Class 11, Grade 2, and his former roommate from Dorm 202.

"Li Xu, you've gone too far!" Before Lu Chi could respond, Pan Tianbo finally snapped and demanded, "What evidence do you have that Lu Chi cheated?"

"What evidence does he have that he didn't cheat?" Li Xu sneered back.

"You—" Pan Tianbo choked on his words, then grabbed Lu Chi's arm. "Lu Chi, hurry up and prove it to him."

The corner of Lu Chi's lips curved up. He casually rubbed Pan Tianbo's chubby, round, fluffy head, then gave Li Xu a half-smile. "Our laws have always upheld the principle that whoever makes a claim bears the burden of proof. So the proper thing is for those questioning whether I cheated to provide evidence, not for me to prove my own innocence. If they can't produce any evidence, then they're spreading rumors. Though rumors do not necessarily stop with the wise, I believe that since Li Xu is so certain I cheated, he should be able to provide evidence—or perhaps you can explain exactly how I cheated. It couldn't possibly be that I copied from the students around me, right?"

The other students were stunned as well.

That was right. Yanda Affiliated High School's exams had always been modeled after the college entrance examination, so students were mixed up when examination rooms were assigned. And to prevent cheating, the seating arrangements always had an arts-class student beside a science-class student, or a Grade 2 student beside a Grade 3 student. Everyone had different test papers. Even if someone wanted to copy, there was nowhere to copy from.

Li Xu, caught off guard by Lu Chi's counterattack, froze on the spot. His face alternated between green and white as he stood there blankly for a while, then he muttered, "Maybe you saw the test papers beforehand. Otherwise, how could you have scored so high?"

This time, even the bystander students could no longer stand it. "Enough, Li Xu. Lu Chi only returned to school on the day of the exam. We all know that. How could he possibly have seen the test papers in advance?"

Li Xu, having been thoroughly rebuked by his classmates, immediately lost face. He gave a cold laugh and said in a strange, mocking tone, "How would I know? I don't hang around with thugs outside school. I'm not familiar with that kind of sneaky business—"

Lu Chi gave Li Xu an indifferent look. The aura that erupted from him in that instant frightened Li Xu into falling silent. He subconsciously grabbed at his uniform pants, then craned his neck and demanded, "Why are you looking at me like that? You want to hit me?"

Lu Chi looked silently at Li Xu. After a long while—so long that the students in the class started getting nervous—Lu Chi suddenly smiled and said, "Nothing. I just think that with your imaginative way of thinking, Li Xu, you'd be well suited to writing novels."

The moment Lu Chi smiled, the atmosphere in the classroom suddenly relaxed. The bell for morning self-study rang sharply, and class monitor Zhao Liang immediately stood up. "Morning self-study has started. Everyone, stop talking. Turn your English dictionaries to page 122. The English class representative will lead everyone in reading the vocabulary..."

Li Xu turned around with an ashen face. Before doing so, he still shot Lu Chi a defiant glare and muttered under his breath, "I wasn't wrong..."

Li Xu's deskmate secretly tugged at his clothes. "Stop talking. What if Lu Chi really knows thugs outside school and gets people to wait for you outside the school gate?"

Li Xu: "..."

Pan Tianbo glared angrily at Li Xu, who had been left speechless by Lu Chi yet still refused to admit defeat, and spoke up for Lu Chi. "Those people say such awful things... Lu Chi, aren't you angry?"

Lu Chi smiled faintly, stroking Pan Tianbo's round head as he asked, "Would you get angry because strangers or people who dislike you did something unpleasant?"

Pan Tianbo answered bluntly, "Of course I would!"

Lu Chi: "..."

"But I wouldn't. I don't care what strangers think, and I don't want to let this stupid shit make me angry. It's not worth it." Lu Chi casually let out a curse, patted Pan Tianbo on the shoulder, and smiled. "If it were you saying those things, I might be a tiny bit sad."

Pan Tianbo asked in utter confusion, "Why?"

Lu Chi gave Pan Tianbo a smiling look. "Because we're friends!"

A suppressed smile spread from the corners of Lu Chi's dark, clear eyes, and Pan Tianbo was slightly stunned by the sight.

The next second, the feeling of being trusted and valued by a friend was like taking a sip of hot water in the dead of winter. A comforting warmth instantly flowed through his whole body. The chubby kid couldn't help smiling until his eyes curved. "That's true. Getting angry over those people really isn't worth it. They don't know you at all!"

After a pause, the chubby kid added, "So it's fine if you're not angry. Anyway, I believe you! Yue Bin and the others definitely believe you too!"

Hearing that, Lu Chi smiled and nodded—he felt that the luckiest thing about transferring to Yanda Affiliated High School was meeting good friends like Yue Bin, Zhang Yang, and Pan Tianbo.

"Hey, hey, can everyone hear me—"