35: A confused Chinese language teacher

Inside the studio, it was quiet enough to hear the faint breeze from the central air conditioning.

Lin Que did not turn on the lights, letting the city neon lights outside cast fragments of light and shadow onto him.

He had just hung up a call from an unknown number.

The caller's voice was polite, claiming to be Fang Zhenyun from October, but the sense of oppression in his words almost overflowed from the earpiece.

"Teacher Jian Shen, I think there is some misunderstanding between us."

"Perhaps you do not understand that in Huaxia, the literary circle is very small, and the road is very narrow."

"Sometimes, choosing who to walk with is more important than walking with your head down."

Lin Que did not speak.

"Wang De'an from New Tide is an idealistic good person,"

"but ideals cannot be eaten as meals, nor can they support a true literary status."

"My place is the closest path to the top of the mountain."

Seeing that Lin Que remained silent, Fang Zhenyun chuckled lightly.

"I heard that you care a lot about privacy? That's very good; geniuses always have some quirks."

"But as you know, there are no airtight walls in this era."

"I just do not hope that one day, due to some unnecessary misunderstandings, let some people with ulterior motives dig up things you are unwilling to bring to light..."

On the other end of the phone, Fang Zhenyun's voice carried a relaxed composure as if everything was under control.

Lin Que finally spoke, his voice processed through a voice changer, with no emotion discernible:

"Are you finished?"

Fang Zhenyun was taken aback.

"My future does not need to trouble you."

After speaking, Lin Que directly hung up and blocked the number.

He leaned back against the chair, quietly watching the mobile phone screen reflect his own cold face.

Presumably, Fang Zhenyun would never dream that he had already spent a lot of money to fortify his network.

How could he suffer the losses he experienced in his past life a second time?

It is not hard to guess what Fang Zhenyun will do next.

People who are used to controlling the chess game, after finding that the chess pieces are disobedient, often like to overturn the chessboard.

"Want to overturn the chessboard?"

He muttered softly to himself.

"Then you must be prepared to have the table smashed together with it!"

This feeling of being spied on and threatened made him extremely uncomfortable.

Lin Que stretched and pulled himself out of his exhaustion.

He opened Jian Shen's mailbox, prepared to process some reader letters, and then shut down and go home.

On the screen, Xu Lan's email was already lying there.

[Teacher Jian Shen, good evening. The latest batch of filtered reader letters has been placed in the attachment, you can take a look when you have time.]

[In addition, Xiao Duo's side has been properly settled.]

[Comrades from the Women's Federation are applying for a personal protection order for her mother, and we will continue to follow up afterwards.]

[Once again, on behalf of them, I extend my most sincere thanks to you.]

Seeing the four words "properly settled", Lin Que's tense nerves relaxed for a split second.

He remembered in the video sent by Xu Lan, how desperate the eyes of that mother and daughter were, curled up in the corner.

It was worth it.

Then, he casually clicked on the zip package in the email attachment, which still contained categorized scanned letters.

He originally wanted to browse casually and close it, but his gaze was firmly nailed by the filename of one of the letters.

That was an untitled letter, with a note added to the filename:

[Confusions from a Chinese Language Teacher]

Chinese Language Teacher?

Lin Que's fingertips paused, and inexplicably clicked it open.

The style of the letter paper was very familiar, it was the special manuscript paper of the Jiangcheng No. 1 High School teaching and research group, printed with a faint school badge.

The handwriting was neat, carrying a neatness and strength honed from years of blackboard writing.

It was Shen Qingqiu's handwriting.

Lin Que could even imagine what she looked like when writing this letter.

Most likely in the office late at night, frowning, with a cup of cold tea beside her, her pen tip hovering over the paper multiple times, deliberating every word and sentence.

[Respected Teacher Jian Shen, hello.]

[I apologize for writing to you presumptuously. I am an ordinary high school Chinese Language Teacher and a loyal reader of The Miracles of the Namiya General Store.]

[I am moved by Grandpa Namiya's wisdom and compassion, and deeply convinced by the gentle power under your pen that stitches human hearts together.]

[But recently, I have fallen into huge confusion.]

[My students have recently been obsessed with an online novel called the human world is like a prison. You must have heard its name.]

[That is a book completely opposite to your works, using the coldest text, portraying a desperate world eroded by ghosts, spreading panic and anxiety.]

[And the recent "Last Train" plot has caused many students to develop severe psychological shadows.]

[As a teacher, I am heartbroken.]

[I tried to guide them, telling them that literature should be upward and warm.]

[However, my words appeared pale and powerless in front of that ultimate sensory stimulation.]

[What makes me feel even more powerless is that one of my students possesses a literary talent the likes of which I have rarely seen in my life.]

[Yet, he seems to be deeply attracted by the human world is like a prison, and his thoughts and pen are inevitably sliding toward that dark abyss.]

[I criticized him, and he wrote shocking texts to question me.]

[I tried to use your works to reform him, and he promised to study in front of me.]

[Yet he turned around and discussed enthusiastically with his classmates how to "control vicious ghosts".]

[I feel like a helpless gardener, watching a sapling most likely to grow into a towering tree, madly absorbing poison, insisting on growing into a twisted poisonous tree that blooms flowers of evil.]

[I do not know whether I should cut off those stray branches, or uproot it to eliminate future troubles.]

[Teacher Jian Shen, I know my question is ridiculous.]

[You are the God who constructs a warm world, yet I am asking you how to deal with a devil spreading despair.]

[But you once said in a reply letter that literature connects ideals and reality.]

[Then, when the darkness in reality is so strong that even the light of ideals appears weak, how should we conduct ourselves?]

[When a talent is inherently destructive, should we strangle it or let it go to see what kind of fruit it will eventually bear?]

[Please forgive my incoherent speech. Looking forward to your reply letter.]

[Respectfully submitted by a confused reader]

...

Lin Que finished reading the letter.

He did not smile.

That secret thrill of controlling everything and watching the fire from across the bank, quietly faded away under Shen Qingqiu's anxious questioning between the lines, replaced by an indescribable, heavy feeling.

This was asking me how to guide someone not to learn my surface, yet learn my true essence.

He leaned back against the chair, his fingertips gently rubbing the desktop.

He could feel Shen Qingqiu's struggle.

That was not Wang Shouyi-style stubbornness to maintain her own authority, but the truest anxiety and sense of responsibility of an educator facing an uncontrollable "genius".

She did not want to destroy him; she was just afraid that he would destroy himself.

"Cut off the branches, or uproot it..."

Lin Que softly recited the words in the letter.

What a familiar argument.

In his past life, he had also been "pruned" like this.

When he first entered the industry, the first script he wrote, was also a dark and gloomy suspense story, and as a result, he was told that the world under his pen was too dark.

Later he learned to compromise, and thus achieved success and fame.

However, that tree with its branches pruned became a scar in the bottom of his heart that would occasionally sting.

And now, looking at Shen Qingqiu's letter, he felt like he was seeing his own worried self holding scissors in his past life.

But now, he had a chance to choose again.

This time, no one could pick up the scissors again and get close to that tree.

He returned from his trance, his gaze falling back onto the email.

Perhaps, he could tell this gardener, that a "poisonous" tree has not yet been defined, and the flowers it blooms might not necessarily fail to brew good wine.

Lin Que took a deep breath, and he did not reply immediately.

He opened the creation document of The Miracles of the Namiya General Store, and typed the title of the new chapter on the blank page.

[The Music Man of the Fish Store]

He wanted to send a reply letter across time and space, inside Grandpa Namiya's general store, to this confused gardener.

The sound of keyboard tapping sounded again in the silent room.

This time, under his pen, there were no vicious ghosts, no despair, only a soul struggling between dreams and reality.

This reply letter was both for Shen Qingqiu, and for the himself of ten years ago who suppressed his edge.

Don't rush,

let the flowers on the tree bloom a little longer.

...