Shen Mo

Biodata

Background / History

Poverty and abuse

Shen Mo grew up in a poor household with an alcoholic, physically abusive father, Shen Yaqing. His mother had died by the time of the school-bullying incident. He collected trash and sold recyclables to cover tuition and textbook fees, while consistently placing among the top ten students in his class. He hoped to enter college, leave Dongji, and start a new life 17 18 28.

At school, Tao Manru and other girls subjected him to insults, hair-pulling, slapping, and spitting. They destroyed his homework and test papers, threw his schoolbag into a toilet, and enlisted outside thugs to torment him. His appeals to teachers, the dean of students, and the principal failed; he believed that every intervention ultimately punished him rather than his abusers 18.

Rooftop crisis and rescue

After telling his homeroom teacher, Guo Dongmei, that he would not return the following school year, Shen Mo climbed onto the fifth-floor rooftop of Teaching Building Two after his first final exam. He refused to trust the administrators asking him to come down, but Guo Dongmei’s appeal persuaded him to wait for her son, police captain Zhou Yi 17 18.

Zhou Yi acknowledged his suffering rather than lecturing him. When Shen Mo remained determined to die, Zhou invoked the wish bottle he had secretly buried beneath a large locust tree and promised protection and justice. Shen Mo began reaching for Zhou’s hand, but a familiar bully’s shouted insult shattered his resolve and prompted him to jump 19.

Zhou caught his hand at the edge, injuring his own arm in the process. With Liu Zhi’s help, he pulled Shen Mo to safety. Seeing Zhou risk his life transformed Shen Mo’s tentative trust into intense devotion 20.

Protection and the blocked investigation

Later that day, Gangzi and his accomplices attempted to seize Shen Mo outside school. They had already taken nude photographs of him and, acting on Tao Manru’s instructions, intended to abduct and film him. Liu Zhi’s officers arrested them before they could carry out the plan. Zhou then secured Shen Mo’s promise never to turn to crime, in exchange for continued protection 21.

After Shen Mo gave his statement, he admitted that he feared going home because his father beat him for returning late. Shao Mingbao escorted him home and threatened Shen Yaqing into promising to stop the abuse 23.

Shen Mo refused apologies offered through the bullies’ family connections. The county bureau subsequently declined to open a criminal case, citing “no criminal facts,” despite recovered photographs and Gangzi’s confession that Tao Manru had directed him. Publicity surrounding Zhou’s rescue brought municipal pressure to handle the case properly, and bureau leadership later ordered the investigation reopened 26 28.

Break with his father

Tao Guozheng, Jin Min, and Zhu Xiangmin pooled 100,000 yuan to obtain a private settlement through Shen Yaqing, also promising him a job at the Culture Bureau. Shen Mo briefly believed his father’s carefully prepared dinner represented genuine affection, only to discover that the kindness accompanied a request to abandon the case 28.

He disowned his father, declaring the money repayment for eighteen years of upbringing, and left home. The next morning, he submitted a written request withdrawing his application for criminal reconsideration. Zhou respected his decision and declined Shao Mingbao’s suggestion of retaliation against Shen Yaqing 28.

Fate in Zhou Yi’s previous life

In the original timeline remembered by Zhou Yi, Shen Mo built a criminal empire spanning entertainment, real estate, internet information services, and other industries. He accumulated substantial wealth and nearly legitimized his position, becoming chairman of the Liaodong Business Association and a member of the provincial political consultative conference. His arrest implicated nearly half of Liaodong’s officialdom 17.

His revenge included killing Li Xiugui, the school administrator whom Zhou remembered as having molested him. Li disappeared years later, and his buried body was discovered in 2016 20.

At his trial, Shen Mo said that he had once wanted to be good but had received no help when he desperately needed it. A week before his scheduled execution, he requested permission to retrieve his childhood wish bottle; the request was denied. These memories prompted Zhou to reconsider whether helping the eighteen-year-old Shen Mo could prevent that future 18.

Appearance

• Build and features: Frail, with delicate facial features 21 23.
• Clothing: Wears a high school uniform 23.
• Distinguishing condition: Frequently arrives at school injured, with bruises on his face 17.

Personality

Shen Mo is proud and academically persistent despite poverty and abuse. Guo Dongmei describes his eyes as filled with both defiance and sorrow. Before the rooftop crisis, he continued working toward college even as bullying and isolation made that goal increasingly difficult to sustain 17 18.

Repeated institutional failures leave him deeply distrustful of authority. Nevertheless, he remains responsive to genuine kindness: he waits because of Guo Dongmei’s care, responds to Zhou’s acknowledgment of his pain, and is devastated when his father’s apparent affection proves transactional 18 19 28.

His loyalty to Zhou becomes nearly unconditional after the rescue. He privately regards Zhou as his “light” and “faith,” vows to repay him even at the cost of his life, and believes that any wrong in following Zhou would be the world’s fault rather than Zhou’s. Watching the police arrest his tormentors also awakens a desire to wield comparable power himself 20 21.

Abilities & Skills

Academic ability

• Consistently ranks within his class’s top ten despite supporting his own education through recycling work 17.
• Aspires to qualify for college and escape his abusive surroundings 18.

Criminal organization and business leadership

• Original timeline only: Independently builds a large criminal empire across several industries 17.
• Gains business-association leadership and a provincial political consultative conference position while attempting to legitimize his wealth and influence 17.
• Zhou remembers him as an underworld figure capable of manipulating events and people; this is not an established ability of the rescued student in the altered timeline 21.

Relationships

• Zhou Yi — Rescuer and sworn protector, addressed as an older brother. Shen Mo promises to avoid crime and becomes intensely devoted to him 19 20 21.
• Guo Dongmei — Homeroom teacher who repeatedly challenges his bullying and obtains Zhou’s help; her appeal delays his suicide attempt 17 18.
• Shen Yaqing — Abusive father. Shen Mo severs their relationship after learning that he accepted money to settle the bullying case 23 28.
• Mother — Deceased parent whom Shen Mo longs for during both his despair and the apparently happy family dinner 18 28.
• Liu Zhi — Police officer who assists in the rooftop rescue and leads the arrest of Gangzi’s group 20 21.
• Shao Mingbao — Officer who intervenes against his father’s violence 23.
• Yang Liu — Officer who helps with his statement and brings his fear of returning home to Zhou’s attention 23.
• Tao Manru, Zhu Lili, and Meng Yao — School bullies whose politically connected families obstruct the case against them 26 28.
• Li Xiugui — Administrator who dismisses the bullying; in the original timeline, becomes a target of Shen Mo’s revenge 20.

Notable Quotes

“I once wanted to be a good person, too. But this world never gave me a chance! When I fell into despair and struggled with all my might, not a single person around me reached out a hand!”
— Final statement at his trial in the original timeline 18

“Consider that money repayment for raising me these past eighteen years. From now on, I have no father like you, and you have no son like me!”
— Disowning Shen Yaqing 28