Chapter 37: Zhou Ziyang, are you doing this just to spite me!?

Page 1 of 3

Xia Wei’s childhood was just as fraught with hardship.

From the time she was old enough to remember, her family had already begun its decline.

Back then, her parents quarreled every few days, and once a month they would have a major fight.

Her father was incapable of making a living, so every day he either drank at home or played cards with his friends.

Her mother, Xu Qing, was an ambitious woman. She was also quite beautiful, and dressed herself impeccably every day.

When the family still had money, her father naturally saw nothing wrong with it.

But once the money ran out, he began to lose his confidence. He started cursing her mother.

“Why do you dress up so beautifully every day? Are you going out to seduce men?”

Xu Qing was no pushover. She had married Xia Wei’s father for his money in the first place. Now that he was broke, she had no reason to show him any mercy.

The two of them became bitterly antagonistic. They quarreled, and sometimes even came to blows.

Back then, Xia Wei was utterly helpless. She would secretly hide beneath the dining table, covering her ears with both hands.

Every quarrel between her parents was like a summer storm, filled with thunder and lightning.

That was the kind of family Xia Wei grew up in. Later, her parents divorced. For a while, Xia Wei lived with her paternal grandparents, but they disliked her. They called her a burden and said that Xu Qing was a harbinger of misfortune—that the family had fallen into ruin only because her son had married Xu Qing.

After that, Xia Wei’s father abandoned her to Xu Qing.

Xu Qing, in turn, sent Xia Wei to live with her maternal grandparents in the countryside.

“Sweetheart, once Mommy makes enough money, I’ll bring you back to the city.”

And so Xia Wei’s childhood passed in a state of constant upheaval.

She had no permanent home, and naturally, she was never able to make any close friends.

By the time her mother and Zhou Ziyang’s father had settled down, Xia Wei was old enough to enter high school. She still had very few friends, so whenever she had something she wanted to say, she wrote it in her diary.

It was her one outlet.

Under her mother’s guidance, she became strong and unyielding.

She wrote that she had to study hard.

“Mom has created such a good environment for me to study in. I can’t disappoint her.”

When Xu Qing reached that passage, a trace of relief appeared on her face.

That was her daughter—the daughter she had raised.

After Xia Wei entered her senior year, she rarely wrote in her diary anymore. Even when she did, the entries were always about getting into a good university and following her mother’s arrangements.

Until recently.

“Today, Zhou Ziyang suddenly stopped me…”

When Xu Qing read those words, the satisfaction on her face instantly vanished, replaced by solemnity.

The entry had been written the previous month.

Xia Wei wrote that Zhou Ziyang had stopped her and asked her to be his girlfriend.

“I was stunned.”

“How could we possibly be together? His father married my mother.”

“Ever since then, I don’t know why, but I keep thinking about him.”

“How strange. I actually dreamed about him today.”

“Today, he talked with another girl from our class for a long time. I don’t know why, but I felt this dull ache inside. I hate it when he talks to other girls.”

“He came first in the entire class.”

“Why does he act as if I don’t exist?”

“Is he deliberately trying to draw me in by keeping his distance?”

Xu Qing turned the pages one by one. The more she read, the more grave her expression became.

By the later entries, her face had even taken on a chilling cast.

Page 1 of 3

Page 2 of 3

Xu Qing had taken excellent care of herself. Her hands were slender, delicate, and fair. Yet as she read on, she could not help clenching her fingers until the pages of the diary were crumpled.

It was difficult to describe the expression on her face.

Fury. Rage.

How dare he bully her daughter?

Was he trying to ruin her daughter?

Xu Qing felt an angry pressure building in her chest, and before long, her breathing had grown heavy.

Looking past appearances to the essence of things, the truth about second marriages was that each spouse ultimately cared only about their own child.

Zhou Guowei would lose his temper whenever Zhou Ziyang was involved.

And Xia Wei was Xu Qing’s entire world.

Why had Xu Qing married Zhou Guowei? For love? In the end, it was merely because she wanted to give her daughter a respectable family background.

Her daughter was everything to her.

She wanted Xia Wei to get into a good university, then find a spouse from a better family and take her away from this small county town.

When Xu Qing had been seventeen or eighteen, she too had been an idealistic girl with dreams and ambitions.

She had been beautiful and excelled in school, even though she had only attended a vocational secondary school.

At that time, attending such a school did not necessarily mean one had poor grades. Often, it simply meant one could not afford to continue one’s education.

Xu Qing remembered it clearly. Her grades had been among the best in her class, but her father had refused to let her continue studying. He had said she was nothing but a money-losing burden and would do better to come home and marry as soon as possible.

Meanwhile, another girl in her class was not as pretty as Xu Qing and did not study as well, yet she could travel every month and had endless new clothes to wear. Later, after failing to get into a university, she went abroad to study. She had since settled overseas and even moved into a luxurious mansion.

Xu Qing simply could not accept it.

It was all because she had been poor. She had been trapped in a small city.

Marry someone she did not love?

Back then, Xu Qing had sworn that if she ever had a child, she would give that child the very best.

Giving birth was not a parent’s greatest gift. Supporting a child and lifting them toward a better life was.

Everything she had been unable to enjoy in this lifetime, she would give to Xia Wei.

She gave Xia Wei the finest conditions and raised her to be beautiful, so that Xia Wei could climb even higher.

But now—

Xia Wei had actually written in her diary:

“Lately, he’s all I can think about. I can’t concentrate on studying at all.”

“So annoying! It’s all your fault, Zhou Ziyang!”

“I think I may have started to like you.”

When Xu Qing read that sentence, her expression became terrifyingly cold.

As someone who had lived through such things herself, she could see at a glance that Zhou Ziyang was deliberately teasing and provoking her daughter.

How could that boy be so wicked?

What exactly was he trying to do?

The college entrance examination was almost upon them.

Xu Qing absolutely would not let that little punk ruin her daughter.

After finishing the diary, Xu Qing no longer had the heart to continue cleaning the room.

She tidied herself up, then stood and prepared to drive to the school.

She could not wait another moment.

Meanwhile, everything at school remained calm.

Even though less than a month remained before the college entrance examination.

Page 2 of 3

Page 3 of 3

Zhou Ziyang felt no pressure at all.

In the classroom, he continued to sleep when he felt like sleeping and play on his phone when he felt like playing.

Since May 6, Storm Technology had never once failed to hit the daily upper limit. Every day, the market opened at the limit-up price.

On the first day, a fifteen-percent rise brought him eight hundred and ten thousand yuan.

The next day brought five hundred and sixty thousand.

The third day brought six hundred thousand.

In the span of only three days, Zhou Ziyang had already become a millionaire.

As the saying went, once one had enough food and clothing, one could afford to think about propriety.

When Zhou Ziyang had first been reborn, his mind had been occupied entirely by making money and studying. Now that vast sums of cash were flowing in while he did practically nothing, he no longer had to worry about making a living. Naturally, his thoughts began to turn toward romance.

After all, Zhou Ziyang was only eighteen years old.

He was built like a young bull.

Fortunately, this new life had begun smoothly.

He had started out as the top student in the entire school, and Zhou Ziyang’s name had long since become famous across campus.

Even with the college entrance examination approaching, girls would occasionally come over, hoping to get acquainted with him.

Among them were several second-year students from the arts and athletics programs.

Whether students in those programs were wild or not was hard to say, but they were certainly beautiful.

After class one day, two girls came to the classroom to ask about Zhou Ziyang.

The one in front had a striking figure. She was about five feet seven inches tall and wore a red off-the-shoulder top that revealed a slim waist without a trace of excess flesh. She had on a pair of tight dark-blue denim shorts, and her pale, slender legs were paired with a set of Adidas trefoil sneakers.

Her eyes were bright and alluring. She had not even spoken, yet she already seemed to be gazing at him with tender affection.

She came straight over to find Zhou Ziyang and asked in a sweet voice, “Excuse me, are you Zhou Ziyang, senior?”

Zhou Ziyang asked what she wanted.

The girl looked a little embarrassed and said that she wanted him to tutor her.

Xia Wei nearly exploded with anger when she heard that.

The college entrance examination was almost here, and this girl wanted Zhou Ziyang to tutor her?

To Xia Wei’s surprise, Zhou Ziyang agreed immediately, though he added, “Tutoring you is no problem.”

“Then how are you going to thank me?”

“Well… I could treat you to a meal, senior?” the girl replied shyly, her large, watery eyes sparkling as her face flushed.

“Is that all? Just a meal?” Zhou Ziyang, however, was willing to accept anything that came his way.

The two of them began chatting right outside the classroom.

Xia Wei had been diligently working on her test paper, but as she listened to Zhou Ziyang converse with the girl, she became so furious that she nearly snapped her pen in half.

Was he deliberately trying to draw her in by keeping his distance?

Fine. She would not get angry.

She would not get angry.

“Zhou Ziyang, are you doing this on purpose to make me mad?” Xia Wei shouted, leaping to her feet.

She no longer cared about anything else.

Her eyes were red, and she glared at Zhou Ziyang with bitter resentment.

Page 3 of 3