The atmosphere inside the Lane family villa was toxic.
Faye had returned home early, her eyes red and swollen. Instead of retreating to her room to cry over her humiliation at the theater, she went straight to her mother, Vera. There was a manic, vindictive glint in her eyes.
"Mom," Faye whispered, her voice trembling with a mixture of fear and excitement. "I know where Ren got her money. I heard it today in the Principal's office. Lawyer Charles mentioned a transaction. Ren received five million dollars."
Vera was applying nail polish. Her hand jerked, smearing a streak of crimson across her finger like a fresh wound.
"Five million?" Vera's voice rose an octave. "She's a high school dropout. What could she possibly do to earn five million?"
"Exactly," Faye said, her voice dripping with implication. "She doesn't paint, she doesn't play music, and she has no skills. All she has is that face. And we know she hangs around powerful men in the Capital... men like Lawyer Charles."
Vera's face turned a sickly shade of pale, then flushed with anger. The implication was clear.
"I knew it!" Vera slammed the nail polish bottle onto the table. "That shameless girl! She picked up these dirty habits in the countryside and now she's selling herself to the elite in the Capital? I cannot let her ruin the Lane family reputation!"
"Mom, calm down," Faye said, placing a hand on Vera's arm. "We don't have proof yet. If we accuse her now, Dad might think we are just jealous because of the Mayor. We have to wait. Let her fail the Physics Competition first. Once she's exposed as a fraud academically, and we reveal her 'dirty money,' Dad will have no choice but to kick her out."
Faye recalled the way Charles had fawned over Ren in the office. The memory burned like acid in her stomach.
*Ren, just wait. When you score a zero on the exam, let's see which big shot comes to save you then.*
***
Wednesday afternoon. The Physics Laboratory at Wolven High.
With only two days left until the preliminary round of the National Physics Competition, the tension in the room was palpable.
Mr. Ke, the physics teacher for Class 9, was supervising the top students as they ground through advanced simulation papers.
Ren sat in the very back row. Her desk was conspicuously empty of textbooks or exam papers.
Instead, she had spread out a stack of yellowing, fragile parchment papers. She sat with her chin propped in one hand, spinning a pencil with the other, occasionally jotting down a complex equation in the margins of the ancient manuscript.
Xavier sat in the front row. He had just finished a grueling simulation paper from the Capital University High School. He stretched his neck and glanced back.
When he saw Ren staring at her "scrap paper" again, a frown etched itself deep into his forehead.
He remembered Faye's tearful accusations. He remembered Charles's strange indulgence. And he remembered the rumor of the five million dollars.
A complex mix of disappointment and a sense of "noble duty" swelled in his chest. The Xu and Lane families were allies; he felt he couldn't just watch Faye's sister destroy herself.
Xavier stood up. The chair scraped loudly against the floor. He walked to the back of the room and stood in front of Ren's desk.
"Ren," Xavier said, his voice cold and authoritative. "The exam is in forty-eight hours. If you aren't going to do the practice papers, you should at least read the textbook. Stop wasting time deciphering these... old newspapers."
Ren didn't look up. Her pencil scratched softly against the parchment.
"The practice papers are too simple," she said indifferently. "Boring."
Xavier let out a short, incredulous laugh.
"Simple?"
These were internal papers from the Capital. Even he, the top student in Moon City, had to struggle for hours to solve them. And she called them simple?
"Is it fun to lie to yourself?" Xavier lowered his voice, leaning in so the other students wouldn't hear. "I know you have connections. Maybe you earned some quick money recently—that five million Faye mentioned. But Ren, listen to me. Youth and beauty don't last forever. Relying on men to solve your problems is a dead end. Only knowledge and grades belong to you."
Ren finally stopped writing.
She slowly raised her head. Her dark eyes were clear, calm, and utterly void of the shame Xavier expected to see. She looked at him with the mild annoyance one might feel toward a buzzing fly.
"Are you done?" Ren asked.
Xavier choked on his own self-righteousness. "I am trying to help you. Your attitude right now is going to lead to a disaster in the exam hall."
***
Just as the tension between them threatened to snap, the laboratory door was pushed open.
Principal Shaw walked in, beaming with pride. Behind him walked an elderly man wearing a modest grey tunic suit and thick-rimmed glasses. Despite his simple attire, the man carried an aura of immense academic authority.
"Students, pause for a moment," Principal Shaw announced, clapping his hands. "I have a special guest. This is **Dean Jiang** from the Physics Department of Capital University! He is the head of the problem-setting committee for this year's National Competition. He is here to inspect our preparation!"
The room erupted in gasps.
Dean Jiang! He was a titan in the world of physics. His textbooks were the bible for every science student in the country. To see him in person was like seeing a rock star.
Even the usually composed Xavier straightened his back, his eyes shining with admiration. This was the level of intellect he aspired to reach.
Dean Jiang smiled kindly, waving a hand. "Don't be nervous. I'm just looking."
He walked through the aisles, glancing at the students' work. He stopped at Xavier's desk and picked up his completed simulation paper.
"Hmm," Jiang nodded approvingly. "Good logic. Clean derivation. You have a solid foundation, young man."
Xavier's heart swelled. He flushed with pride. "Thank you, Dean Jiang. I am Xavier Xu."
Principal Shaw chimed in, eager to show off. "Xavier is our top seed. He is from the Xu family."
Dean Jiang nodded, preparing to leave. "Keep working hard."
As he turned, his peripheral vision caught something in the back of the room.
A girl was sitting there, wearing a baseball cap. Her desk was devoid of the standard study materials. Instead, she was hunched over a pile of... ragged, yellowed paper?
Dean Jiang frowned. Was there a student slacking off so blatantly?
He walked toward the back row, intending to offer a few words of correction.
Xavier's heart sank.
*It's over,* he thought. *Ren's arrogance has finally caught up with her. Getting scolded by Dean Jiang will ruin her reputation before the exam even starts.*
He wanted to step in, to offer an excuse for her—maybe say she was sick.
But before Xavier could speak, Dean Jiang reached Ren's desk.
The old man's gaze fell on the papers under Ren's elbow.
He froze.
His eyes, previously calm and scholarly, suddenly bulged behind his thick lenses. His mouth opened, but no sound came out.
He looked like he had been struck by lightning.
One second.
Two seconds.
"This... this is..." Dean Jiang's voice trembled violently. He reached out a shaking hand, wanting to touch the paper but terrified of damaging it. "Is this... is this the..."
Ren looked up, annoyed by the interruption. She shifted the paper away from his reaching hand.
"Don't touch," she said coolly. "Your hands might have bacteria."
The entire classroom went deathly silent.
Principal Shaw looked like he was about to have a heart attack.
Xavier felt his knees go weak.
*She just told the Dean of Capital University that he has bacteria?*
"Ren!" Principal Shaw shrieked. "Apologize to Dean Jiang immediately!"
***
But Dean Jiang didn't get angry.
Instead, his face flushed red with pure, unadulterated excitement. He bent down, bringing his face inches from the desk, examining the scribbled German text and the complex matrix equations.
"It's real..." Dean Jiang breathed, his voice filled with awe. "This is Heisenberg's handwriting! These are the original field notes from 1925 on Matrix Mechanics! My God! The academic world has been searching for this manuscript for fifty years! It was rumored to have surfaced on the Berlin black market last week and was snatched up by a mystery buyer... It's here? In a high school classroom?"
He looked up at Ren, his eyes burning with fanaticism. "Little classmate! You... you bought this?"
Ren spun her pencil lazily. "Yeah. Cost me five million."
"Five million?" Dean Jiang squeaked. "Only five million?! That is robbery! This is a national treasure! This is the Holy Bible of Quantum Mechanics! If this went to auction, museums would kill each other for it! Fifty million wouldn't be enough!"
*Boom.*
Xavier felt like a bomb had exploded inside his head.
The world spun.
*Five million.*
This was the "dirty money" Faye had talked about?
This was the "waste of time" he had lectured her about?
Ren hadn't spent the money on clothes, jewelry, or buying her way into society.
She had spent a fortune to buy a piece of scientific history.
And she was treating this priceless, holy artifact like... scratch paper?
Dean Jiang was now practically begging. "Little classmate, please! Can I take a photo? No, wait, can I just look at the next page? I have questions about his derivation of the commutation relations! I will trade you my entire laboratory's budget just to study this for an hour!"
Ren sighed, looking at the old man's desperate face. She pushed the stack of papers toward him.
"Fine. Look at it. But be careful, don't drool on it."
Dean Jiang looked like he had been granted an audience with God. He hurriedly pulled a pair of white cotton gloves from his pocket—he always carried them—and reverently touched the edge of the paper.
Xavier stood frozen in the aisle.
He looked at the scene before him. The most respected physicist in the country was bowing over Ren's desk like a humble student, while Ren sat back, looking bored and unimpressed.
Xavier's earlier words echoed in his mind, mocking him.
*"Only knowledge belongs to you."*
He realized now how ridiculous he must have sounded.
He was proud of solving a simulation paper.
She was casually correcting the original manuscript of a Nobel Prize winner.
They weren't even in the same universe.
**[Chapter 60 End]**