Let Me Sink - Chapter 1

Chapter 1

I was the vicious female supporting character in a BL novel.

The quiet, beautiful boy in our class named Shen Qi, who always sat in the corner, was the tragic protagonist shou of this book.

Because of his delicate looks and gentle, yielding personality, he was often subjected to malicious discrimination and bullying by certain classmates.

On one rainy night, he even became the target of those abusers’ sexual violence, and spent the rest of his life trapped in a rotting swamp where the sour, moldy stench kept fermenting, with no hope of ever seeing daylight again.

The person I had a crush on happened to be Pei Huai, the abuser who pretended to be gentle with him. And I was the vicious female supporting character who constantly provoked and humiliated the protagonist shou, only to die a violent death in the street.

When I learned the truth…

I had just blocked Shen Qi on his way home from school.

It had just rained, and the alley was dim and damp.

The boy I had pinned against the wall was wearing a red-and-white school uniform washed almost pale. His slightly overlong black bangs half-covered his fine brows and pretty peach-blossom eyes as he looked at me with confusion and wariness.

Though he was taller than me, he was thin and delicate, his face pale, and he had no real presence of intimidation.

“Sorry.”

Coming back to myself, I let go of him and explained,

“I just didn’t understand today’s lesson.”

“I wanted to ask Classmate Shen a few questions.”

Shen Qi was very good at studying. Outstanding, even. It was only later, after those scumbags ruined him, that his grades plummeted. He did not even take the college entrance exam.

He pressed his lips together, saying neither that he believed me nor that he did not.

Then he glanced at the backpack that had fallen into the muddy water by the roadside when I had caught him off guard, grabbed his wrist, and dragged him into the alley.

The boy lowered his long lashes, hiding the emotion in his eyes very well, then said softly to me, “It’s fine. What question did you want to ask?”

His brows and eyes were gentle. He looked utterly harmless.

I raised a proper smile.

“I thought about it carefully.”

“It seems too late today.”

“Let’s wait until Classmate Shen is free tomorrow.”

During the day, Pei Huai had helped Shen Qi out when several boys were bullying him. I had keenly sensed something off, which was why I had come to block him and warn him.

Now, thinking back to the original novel, I only found it laughable.

Pei Huai was an even worse hypocrite than I was.

While pretending to be a savior extending a helping hand,

he was in fact secretly playing the lofty bystander and the mastermind behind the violence. He watched others fall into despair, then appeared as if he were their salvation, when in reality he was dragging Shen Qi into an even deeper mire.

I thought of that rainy night three years ago when I had been soaked through.

Had Pei Huai also tacitly allowed his older stepbrother to insult me, then appeared like a sudden god to hand an umbrella to my devastated self?

Disgusting. So disgusting.

A wave of nausea rose in me.

When I came back to myself,

Shen Qi had already picked up the backpack from the ground.

I lowered my eyes and looked over.

He crouched down, unzipped the backpack, took out a nearly used-up roll of tissues, and carefully wiped away the dirty water left on it.

The boy’s thin back arched like a curved blade. His sharp, gaunt jaw and pale cheeks with hardly any flesh on them all revealed his poverty and malnutrition.

In the novel, Shen Qi’s parents had died when he was young. He was an orphan.

Although he had applied for government subsidies and picked up plastic bottles to sell in his spare time after school, the bullies extorted all that money from him. Not a single cent was left for himself.

I usually liked to carry cash on me.

My fingertips twitched. I took a few hundred yuan from my pocket, walked to his side, and handed it to him.

“It was my fault. I got your backpack dirty. Take this money and buy a new one, all right?”

Shen Qi looked at me in surprise, then shook his head.

“It’s all right. I can just wash it clean.”

His eyes were lowered, gentle and forgiving.

“Take it.”

I forced the money into his hand and said,

“A few hundred yuan means nothing to me.”

“But this money could cover a month of meals for you.”

The boy’s long lashes trembled. He squeezed the money in his palm, his face flushing a little with embarrassment, and thanked me softly.

“I’ll pay you back later.”

“Mm. Don’t worry about it.”

I smiled gently at him.

In truth, whether he paid it back or not did not matter.

Since I had seen through Pei Huai, Shen Qi no longer counted as my love rival. When my own interests were not involved, to a great extent, I was more inclined, or rather quite enthusiastic, to play the part of a good person.

I said goodbye to Shen Qi.

I watched his back as he left.

I opened WeChat and had just deleted Pei Huai when my vision inexplicably went black. In a daze, a shadow swept past me, and the moon turned bloodred.

When I opened my eyes again, everything had returned to normal.

Frowning, I looked around at the nearly empty surroundings.

Just now… had that been an illusion?

What I did not realize was that Shen Qi’s departing figure had been somewhat frantic. In fact, his steps had been unsteady, and he was urgently trying to hide himself in the next alley.

In the darkness, the boy leaned back against the wall.

He tilted his head up. Branch-like red-black curse markings surfaced on his neck, cold sweat beading on his forehead. His right hand pressed down hard on the tender emerald vines that kept crawling out from the blue veins of his left hand.

He bit his lip, enduring the pain that seemed to tug at his very heart, and steeled himself to snap the vine off. Blood stained his entire hand.

“It’s fine, it’s fine.”

The boy muttered the words obsessively over and over. He looked at the severed vine writhing on the ground, picked up the money that had accidentally fallen, and staggered away without looking back.

He had only gotten sick and infected a few days ago.

He was not a monster.