Ch 149: The Cannon Fodder Won’t Play Along Anymore [QT]

By the time he finished speaking, he finally noticed the uniformed police officers who had come in together with Mu Xing.

Zhao Yuan was fierce and domineering at home, but outside he was cowardly to the extreme—even taller classmates at school could order him around at will.

Now, seeing the police, he was instantly scared stiff.

His earlier words had been unpleasant, but after all, he was still just a young child, and no one would seriously argue with him.

One officer spoke kindly. “Little one, where are your parents?”

“They went out to play cards,” Zhao Yuan stammered nervously.

Mu Xing followed up at just the right time. “Every time they get paid, they’ll go gamble for a while.”

The officers exchanged glances. One crouched down and asked, “Where do they usually go?”

Zhao Yuan, still confused, blurted out a location. Those two were often so addicted to gambling that they wouldn’t come home even at mealtimes. When he was hungry, he would have to go look for them himself.

One officer stepped outside to make a phone call.

He did it deliberately out of the child’s hearing, but Mu Xing’s senses were sharper than most people’s, so he still caught the words: the policeman was reporting gambling activity at a certain place and telling his colleagues to move in quickly.

He glanced at Zhao Yuan, his mood lifting noticeably, and for the first time since arriving in this world, he actually smiled.

That smile somehow set Zhao Yuan off again.

Toward outsiders, he was meek and submissive, but at home—especially in front of Mu Xing—he was nothing but vicious.

He shouted, “What are you laughing at? Are you mocking me? Why aren’t the dishes washed—what did you sneak out for?”

Suddenly, he realized, “Did you do something bad? Is that why you brought the police here? I’m telling you, when Dad and Mom get back, you’re dead.”

A seven- or eight-year-old child, with “dead” on his lips all the time—it was deeply unsettling to hear.

The younger officer couldn’t help but speak. “Little one, he’s your brother, you can’t be so rude.”

Zhao Yuan rolled his eyes. “My mom said he’s not my brother. He’s just freeloading off our family.”

Hearing this, the officer looked toward Mu Xing. The frail boy stood there with his head lowered, expression hidden.

He must be heartbroken.

But Mu Xing wasn’t sad at all. He simply couldn’t be bothered to look at Zhao Yuan’s stupid face.

The officers glanced around the tiny room where Mu Xing lived, snapped a few photos, and their pity for him deepened.

And for the Zhao couple, whom they hadn’t even met yet, their disgust grew stronger.

After a while, a phone rang again.

Mu Xing overheard the officer saying, “…bring the Zhao couple over first, we still have things here. Yes, to the Zhao house.”

Not long after, Zhao Pingkang and his wife were escorted back.

Both looked sullen, but seeing several officers waiting inside their home, they froze in shock.

Zhao Pingkang quickly said, “Officers, I didn’t do anything wrong! I just played a little cards, that’s all.”

The officers who had come back with them barked, “We’ll talk about your gambling later. There’s a more serious matter now.”

The Zhao couple stiffened in place.

The young officer beside Mu Xing asked, “Someone reported that you abuse children. Is this true?”

Abuse children?

The couple was stunned, their eyes immediately landing on Mu Xing standing next to the police.

They realized instantly.

Zhao Pingkang’s wife, Chen Yan, began to shriek, “This is slander! Slander! We’re so poor, and I give my whole heart to raising the kids. I go without food and clothes so both children can study. Who’s so malicious as to report me?”

Mu Xing pressed his lips together and pulled up the sleeve of his school jacket.

Children’s skin is tender, and his was fair. On his thin arm were bluish marks—some like finger bruises, others from rough collisions.

The police hadn’t noticed at first.

But once the younger officer saw, he immediately turned away, unable to bear it. He snapped angrily, “He’s just a ten-year-old child! How could you do this without feeling the least bit guilty?”

Chen Yan cursed Mu Xing silently as a bringer of bad luck.

She wailed, “This is injustice! My husband and I didn’t get much schooling, we’re uneducated, and when kids disobey and don’t study properly, we can only discipline them with the stick. In this world, is there any parent forbidden from disciplining their own children?”

She wiped at nonexistent tears. “Since family shame is already out, I’ll say it. This older boy of mine has always had sticky fingers. Just the other day, he stole five hundred yuan from his father. When we found out, we were furious and beat him. If you don’t punish this kind of behavior, how will he ever learn? Isn’t that right?”

Mu Xing was so angered by this twisting of the truth that he laughed.

He raised his head, staring straight at Chen Yan with unblinking eyes. “My grades have always been in the top ten of the school. I can even earn scholarships. Zhao Xing is always at the bottom of the class. Why is it that the one who studies hard is always beaten, while the one who refuses to study isn’t even scolded?”

“I never stole anything. Dad gambles away his pay the moment he gets it—there’s never any money left at home. Altogether, this house might not even have five hundred yuan.”

“I’ve heard it all. I’m not even your biological child.”

“If you never intended to raise me properly, then why bring me home in the first place?”

The small child questioned his foster parents with a blank expression, showing not a trace of sadness. Original translation at HololoNovels dot com. But precisely because of that, the officers nearby felt an even sharper ache in their hearts.

This child was truly heartbroken.

Chen Yan still had some slyness to her. Hearing Mu Xing speak like this, how could she not guess who the police meant by “someone reported it”?

The neighbors around here had known each other for decades. Who would meddle in this?

It had to be this little ingrate’s doing.

She burst out in anger: “Well, well, your wings have grown hard, and you even dare talk back now. I picked you up from a garbage heap, raised you, fed you, clothed you, sent you to school, and what, I hit you a couple times and you call the police? Why don’t you just fly to the heavens?”

As she spoke, she reached out to hit Mu Xing, but the nearby officer was quick to block her.

“What are you doing?” the officer barked. “You’d strike him right in front of us?”

“Why can’t I hit him?” Chen Yan shrieked like a shrew. “I raised him ten years! I’m his mother! I discipline my own son and you police want to interfere? Watch me beat this little ingrate to death today!”

The officer restrained her. “Since he isn’t your biological child, we have reason to suspect there’s more to the matter back then, possibly even involving abduction. You’ll both be coming with us to the station.”

Chen Yan struggled. “What abduction? I was doing a good deed! If I hadn’t saved this brat back then, he would’ve died in the trash!”

—

Mu Xing was taken alone into a room. An officer brought him water and food, and later some medicine for his injuries.

When Mu Xing removed his clothes, the bruises all over his body made the officer grit his teeth.

After tending his wounds, he asked: “Later we’ll be taking you for a DNA test. Zhao Xing, do you want to keep living in that home?”

Mu Xing shook his head.

The officer nodded.

Everything afterward went smoothly: the test confirmed without surprise that Mu Xing had no blood relation to the Zhao family.

When pressed about the past, Chen Yan insisted she had found him near a trash heap.

Then came the investigation, the evidence.

The injuries on Mu Xing, Zhao Yuan’s words, the neighbors’ accounts, and testimony from his school all proved he had long been subjected to abuse.

When the charges were finally read to Zhao Pingkang and his wife, they at last grew fearful.

“Zhao Xing! Xingxing! Your mother and I love you, you know the house never lacked for you. Tell the police you forgive us. We’ll change, we’ll treat you better, we’re uneducated and didn’t know better. We’ll never hit you again, alright?”

“…”

Mu Xing looked at the pair coldly, not even bothering with pretense.

Seeing this, Chen Yan realized there was no hope and began cursing: “You ungrateful brat! I always knew you had no conscience! Listen, even if we go in, it’ll be at most three years. Just you wait. You dare betray us, when I get out I’ll kill you!”

“So vicious at such a young age. No wonder your parents abandoned you.”

“Bah! If it were me, I’d have strangled you at birth!”

“…”

Mu Xing turned and left.

From then on, the couple had nothing to do with him.

The police found no trace of his real parents. When they asked about his wishes, Mu Xing said directly he wanted to go to a welfare home.

Those two were nothing but lunatics. Even if the police found him a foster family, he’d worry about bringing harm to them.

He reapplied for identification and changed his name from Zhao Xing to Mu Xing.

When asked why he chose that surname, he only said he wanted nothing more to do with the Zhao family.

By the time he packed his things to move into a welfare home called “Hope,” Zhao Pingkang and his wife had already been convicted of child abuse.

Since Mu Xing had no blood relation with them and was legally severed from their household, the couple was instead charged with intentional injury and sentenced to three years in prison.

—

Life in the welfare home wasn’t easy for ordinary children.

Life was frugal, staff were few. Over thirty children lived there, the oldest fifteen, the youngest not yet speaking.

Their greatest joy was weekends, when volunteers might visit.

That meant good food, games.

But Mu Xing found this life satisfactory.

The director was a kind auntie. Though the home was poor, it was clean. The staff had been there many years despite low pay, working almost out of charity.

When the police delivered Mu Xing, it happened to be the weekend. The children weren’t in school and crowded around curiously.

The director’s eyes grew red hearing his story as she looked at the frail boy.

That night, to welcome him, the home’s cook made a huge pot of fragrant bone soup. He threw in big pork bones with meat, stewed until tender, so soft the meat slid off with a light suck, rich broth flowing warm down the throat. It was a rare feast for the children.

They were overjoyed. Because of the rare meat, they greeted Mu Xing with warmth from the start.

After a few days, Mu Xing realized the children here were taught well.

Though not rich in things, the director and staff worked hard to guide them as best they could.

Four children shared a bedroom. Original translation at HololoNovels dot com. Every morning, the kids would tidy up their beds on their own, folding the quilts neatly, then take turns cleaning the room.

At mealtimes, each one held their bowl, quietly waiting for the chef to serve them food.

Some of the older children would help the little ones who couldn’t quite reach.

Most of the clothes they wore were donations from charities—very old, but always clean.

The chef was a kind middle-aged uncle, plump, always smiling, looking like a Maitreya Buddha. Mu Xing once overheard a few of the aunties whispering that this uncle put nearly his entire monthly salary into buying meat for the children.

There were more than ten little ones not yet old enough for elementary school, and of course, there was no money to send them to kindergarten.

The director had cleaned out a classroom and decorated it with bright stickers. Every week, volunteers would come to teach the little kids lessons.

But it was obviously not enough.

Mu Xing soon realized that, overall, the children in the orphanage didn’t perform very well in school.

From the children in his own room, he learned that many of them left school after middle school to go work. With poor grades, they couldn’t get into high school, and they didn’t want to keep studying.

Still, many older brothers and sisters who had left would return during the holidays.

Some brought gifts, some brought money.

But most of them were just workers at the very bottom of society. The director never accepted their money, only telling them to live their lives well, that it was enough just to come back and visit.

Although Mu Xing changed where he lived, his school didn’t change.

The homeroom teacher, having learned about his situation, applied for extra aid and tuition waivers. Since Mu Xing had always been an excellent student, the application was quickly approved.

He no longer had to pay to attend school.

The original boy already had strong grades, and after Mu Xing took over, his powerful spirit gave him an eidetic memory. The contents of textbooks were far too simple for him.

Less than a month after moving into the orphanage, the ten-school joint exam happened.

Mu Xing scored full marks across every subject, taking first place in the exams, which made his homeroom teacher—who had worried that changing environments might hurt his grades—finally breathe a sigh of relief.

He was awarded a prize of ten thousand yuan. That same day, he handed the envelope straight to the director.

The director was startled. When she heard it was scholarship money, she smiled, returned it, and told him to save it himself.

Mu Xing shook his head. “I have nowhere to spend it, and I can win more scholarships in the future.”

When the director still wanted to refuse, Mu Xing said, “If you don’t take it, I’ll throw it away. I don’t want it anyway. And don’t save it for me either. Use it to buy meat for everyone.”

As he spoke, he stared firmly into the director’s eyes.

She was unconsciously drawn in by the child’s clear black pupils. His words struck deep into her mind.

She nodded without realizing it.

Mu Xing continued, “I think, after school every day, since I don’t have much to do, I can give the children some lessons.”

The director was stunned.

Mu Xing explained, “Help them build a foundation. When they start school officially, they’ll be able to keep up better.”

He quite liked this place. The little ones were very cute.

If he had never come across it, that would have been one thing. But now that he had, he couldn’t just watch these already unfortunate children fall further behind in life simply because their basics were weak.

The director’s face lit up with joy. “That would be wonderful! With our top student Xingxing here teaching, the children will definitely do well.”

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