Yi Nanye’s words made Jiang Yuan’s heart give a faint thump.

Jiang Yuan finally understood why Teacher He had attacked him.

“There wasn’t enough money for medical treatment?”

“That was only part of it. The main problem was that they couldn’t find a matching organ donor. After investigating He Jianming, we learned that someone had contacted him. If he could kill you, his daughter would get a matching organ right away, and he wouldn’t have to worry about the medical bills after that.”

“How’s Teacher He doing now?”

“Since he was mentally unstable and might do something dangerous out of hatred for you, he was sent to a sanatorium for psychological rehabilitation. But not long after learning that his daughter had died, he killed himself in the sanatorium’s bathroom.”

“What??”

Jiang Yuan froze.

Teacher He was dead??

“What he did wasn’t limited to hurting you. He killed himself out of guilt, because he’d also killed the organ donor. The organ donation process isn’t easy to get through, but someone was willing to step in and smooth things over for him—as long as he took you out. Then the surgery could happen right away.”

“But he failed. That meant he’d be investigated, and the people behind all this naturally wouldn’t waste any more time on him.”

After Yi Nanye finished speaking, Jiang Yuan suddenly lost his appetite, even though he was genuinely hungry.

“So if it weren’t for me, no one would’ve contacted Teacher He. No matter how desperate he was, he would’ve accepted things as they were. It was only because he was given hope he shouldn’t have had that he killed someone—and then tried to kill me.”

“You could put it that way.”

Yi Nanye shrugged. That was simply how things were.

“I suddenly feel like I’m going to throw up…”

He’d barely eaten when a wave of intense nausea hit him, leaving him miserable. Civilians had died at protests about him before, but they’d been so far away that it hadn’t felt real.

But Teacher He was someone he saw every few days. In Jiang Yuan’s memory, he was a dedicated, kind teacher who never let his emotions spill over into his work. Even as recently as yesterday, Jiang Yuan hadn’t known Teacher He’s family was in such dire straits.

“Do you wish you’d just let He Jianming kill you, to give him what he wanted?”

“No. Even if I could choose again, I’d still stop him. I just feel sick, that’s all.”

He wasn’t the one to blame. Jiang Yuan wasn’t so childish that he’d assume everything was his fault. He’d expected something like this to happen—he just hadn’t thought it would happen so soon.

No…

It was just that, under Yi Nanye’s protection and supervision, he took a helicopter to and from school every day, so he never came into contact with people like that. But Teacher He was part of the school, which was how he’d gotten close.

“It’s good that you feel sick. It means your values are still in the right place. I told you before: if I were you, I’d have killed myself a long time ago. In a situation like this, even a good, normal person would be driven insane. That’s what worries me most.”

Yi Nanye could believe that Jiang Yuan was a good person. But the cruel things that kept happening around him would gradually change him—make him extreme, fragile, and oversensitive, until he became a monster who could no longer empathize with anyone.

“Is that so? But you don’t need to worry about me. I’ve realized just how vile the people who incited Teacher He are. Not one of Codename Jiang’s supporters is normal. They all deserve to die.”

“And what if you’re Codename Jiang yourself?”

“Then I’ll take responsibility and wipe them out.”

“That sounds nice, but if you’ll forgive me for saying so, He Jianming had another reason for doing what he did. Someone told him his daughter could’ve received treatment, but the matching organ was given to someone else because that person’s condition was more urgent.”

“And what’s the truth?”

A bad feeling began to rise in Jiang Yuan’s chest.

“The other person was a board member of a publicly traded company.”

“Heh…”

Jiang Yuan didn’t even know what expression to make.

“And among Codename Jiang’s supporters, besides cultists and terrorists, there are countless exploited people who’ve seen through society. They’re at the bottom of the social ladder. Codename Jiang used them, yes, but he also kept his promise and gave them a chance to rise to a higher class in the future world.”

“From what I know, some of the information provided by the people from the future was withheld. I hate Codename Jiang because he killed me, but I don’t deny that he did other things.”

Yi Nanye clasped the wrist with her wristband and turned her phone screen toward Jiang Yuan to show him that she’d disabled the monitoring.

“Even so, you still firmly stand with the people?”

“Of course!”

Jiang Yuan nodded without the slightest hesitation.

“They’re right about seventy percent of the time and wrong about thirty. I’m not naive enough to think the people at the top are all good. These issues are too complicated, and I can’t be bothered to think them through. I just need to follow the leaders’ orders.”

When he finished, Jiang Yuan slowly pulled his phone from his pocket. The recording screen was open.

“Yi Nanye, you’ve taken a loss today. You were trying to get me to say something, weren’t you?”

Yi Nanye stared at what Jiang Yuan had done. After a few seconds, she suddenly burst out laughing.

“I really can’t underestimate you. I only wanted to talk and do a little psychological evaluation—to see whether things like this might make you waver in the future. I didn’t expect you to see me that way. I’m a little disappointed, honestly. How about we work something out?”

Yi Nanye realized she really had come out worse, and started making excuses on the spot. It’d be a bit of a problem if the people upstairs heard what she’d said.

“Work something out? There’s nothing to work out between us!”

Jiang Yuan snorted. Yi Nanye’s expression immediately darkened.

“You…”

“Because I don’t deserve to stand on the same side as you.”

Jiang Yuan’s cocky grin vanished. He put his phone on the table and tossed it straight to Yi Nanye.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Yi Nanye caught Jiang Yuan’s phone. She hadn’t expected him to finally get something he could use against her, only to hand it right back.

“This is the only way I could think of to get on your good side. What else can I do?”

Jiang Yuan was the one at a disadvantage. So he might as well stay there and let Yi Nanye keep complete authority over his supervision. That was the only way she’d keep speaking nicely to him. Otherwise, they’d be at each other’s throats forever.

“So this is reverse psychology?”

“Think whatever you want.”

Jiang Yuan didn’t dare threaten Yi Nanye. If anything, he had to keep her happy. He’d nearly been blown to pieces today. If Yi Nanye got even the slightest bit lazy, he’d be dead!

Yi Nanye was a pain, sure, but there was no doubt she could protect him better than anyone else. If he could give her extra incentive to do so, all the better.