Back to the present.

One day in September, I got home after school and started prepping dinner.

Quick intro again: my name’s Zong Jun, eighteen, a student at Qingteng High School in S City. My grades are average. No special hobbies. I don’t do any clubs. I just take on work I can handle to earn some living money. For certain reasons, I’m currently fostering a fourteen-year-old girl.

Dinner was simple—tonkatsu with a fried egg, a side salad, and a bowl of radish-and-pork-rib soup.

I carried the dishes to the table, and right then I heard the front door open.

“Yo, Baiyu, you’re back?” I kept tying my apron and greeted the girl walking in from the entryway to the living room.

That’s my adopted daughter. Her name is Zong Baiyu, fourteen, and she attends the middle school affiliated with my high school.

She’s petite, only up to my chest. Short hair down past her ears; the left side is tied into a small strand. Her face is baby-cute, utterly adorable. But the curves that should be there are definitely there—honestly, you could call them impressive.

She makes me think of the creeps online who keep spreading that scary line, “three years is a jackpot, even a death sentence wouldn’t be a loss.” If those perverts saw “death row jackpot” Baiyu, they’d be unable to hold back their criminal urges. Even though she hides a stun baton and pepper spray in her bag, I still can’t relax.

I’m not trying to brag about my daughter, but if a talent scout discovered Baiyu, she might become a nationwide idol!

I do love Baiyu, no doubt. But she seems to be in her rebellious phase, and it’s giving me headaches.

Like how the left side, the one with the tied strand, has a stud earring. And her pretty short hair is layered with ash-blond. It doesn’t make her look delinquent, just… I’m not used to it.

Most crucially—

She ignores me completely!!!

“How’s school? Having fun?” I smiled and tried to get a read on how she was doing. Baiyu didn’t answer. She didn’t even look at me. She walked right past.

I felt a bit deflated. Seeing her head up to her room, I couldn’t help saying, “Dinner’s ready.”

Baiyu detoured into the kitchen, picked up her portion from the table, and carried it to her room to eat.

Turns out she can hear me just fine. She just doesn’t want to respond.

Ah, ah… I’m such a failure of a father.

Sighing, I opened the fridge, took out a can of black tea, sat at the table, cracked the can, and took a big gulp. I mixed rice with the fried egg and ate, my mind still spinning.

She wasn’t like this when she first came here…

Back then, Baiyu was shy and hadn’t stepped out of the shadow of losing her parents. Quiet, yes, but she was kind to me and would talk. Why she became like this, I still don’t know. One day she just stopped communicating.

We speak at most three sentences a day. She won’t eat at the same table; she carries food to her room, so I have to plate everything in two portions or she refuses to eat. She’s never watched TV in the living room with me.

Kids in their rebellious phase are terrifying!

I never had one myself, so it feels like there’s a chasm between me and Baiyu.

If it were only rebellion, I could understand. But I’m really worried lately. Her homeroom teacher told me some bad things.

She’s become withdrawn. Her grades are slipping. More importantly, she’s been skipping for no reason, especially evening study hall. Basically hasn’t gone at all this week.

And when I was tidying up recently, I found really expensive cosmetics in the living room. I give Baiyu some allowance every month, but those products are pricey—one tiny bottle is almost half my monthly pay. Besides that, I fished a set of clothes from the laundry basket outside her bathroom that I’ve never seen her wear.

The style… I can’t spell it out. Very little fabric. Extremely sexy.

She probably meant to wash them herself and forgot… Unbelievable. Baiyu tosses even her bras and panties straight to me to wash, but she washed that sexy set herself. Looks like she didn’t want me to know. And she had no intention of explaining.

She never lets me into her room, so I don’t know how many more clothes like that she has. I’m too embarrassed to ask.

If you could put yourselves in my shoes as a dad: your daughter comes home very late and won’t say where she’s been. Suddenly she has lots of money to buy expensive makeup and those clothes I’m too embarrassed to describe. And she’s rebellious. You’d think of the worst too, right?

Uh… that… that…

Comp… comp… **…

A father who has such rotten suspicions about his daughter is terrible. I want to punch myself in the head.

Yes, Baiyu’s a bit rebellious. Yes, she suddenly has a lot of unaccounted-for allowance. Yes, she did buy a bunch of sexy clothes…

Ah, crap. I can’t stop my mind from going there.

I got anxious and sank into deep self-reproach. Am I not giving enough allowance every month? But I asked many neighbors; they give their kids less than half of what I give Baiyu.

While I was stewing and hadn’t even finished dinner, Baiyu came downstairs.

She took her plate and bowl to the sink, then grabbed her little bag and walked past me. Looked like she was heading out.

I was hesitating about sitting down and having a calm talk, but she was already changing shoes at the entryway. I hurried over.

“Baiyu, wait.”

She turned, and we bumped right into each other. Her soft, full chest brushed my left arm. It wasn’t hard, but her body was angled because her shoes weren’t on right, so she stumbled left. The white bag in her hand fell, and the contents scattered.

All kinds of cosmetics spilled out, and the corner of a black lace mini skirt peeked from the bag…

“Ah.” Baiyu let out a small gasp, then grabbed her bag and stuffed everything back in fast.

“Sorry, sorry.” I apologized earnestly and bent down to help pick up.

Baiyu smacked my hand away with a sharp slap, hugged the bag, and glared, clearly annoyed. “What are you doing?”

I wanted to ask about what just fell out, but Baiyu looked like a cat with its fur standing on end. I sensed this wasn’t the right moment to ask and let it go.

“So, are you going somewhere tonight?”

I tried probing, and she shot me a look like I was stupid.

“To school.”

Total lie! Your teacher told me you haven’t gone to evening study hall in ages!

I got a little angry, but didn’t show it. I smiled instead. “I see. Be careful on the way.”

Baiyu muttered, clearly unhappy, then hurried out clutching her bag. She didn’t even say the usual “I’m heading out.” She slammed the door, loud.

After she left, my face fell at once. I sprinted upstairs to my room.

I changed into clothes I rarely wear. I put on a mask, sunglasses, and a baseball cap. I checked the mirror. If I went out like this, people would think I was a creep and call the cops on me.

I thought it over and took off the sunglasses. Slightly better.

I headed out right away. You can probably guess what I’m going to do.

Yep, I’m going to tail Baiyu and see if she’s doing something a girl absolutely must not do.

If she is, she’ll face the wrath of a father’s love!