After the fight, he might as well get a haircut on the way.
The school gate was unusually lively today, packed shoulder to shoulder with students. The crowd had actually forced an old man selling snacks from a pushcart more than twenty meters away. Furious, the old man stamped his feet while a group of students cracked sunflower seeds and grinned as they apologized to him.
Although the entrance was teeming with people, a perfectly empty circle had formed around Zhou Yan and the other alphas as everyone instinctively kept their distance. They waited menacingly for today's main character.
Zhou Yan squatted on the steps with a cigarette in his mouth, narrowing his eyes at Xia Siqiao.
Xia Siqiao carried his schoolbag in his right hand and walked slowly and comfortably. He strolled up to Zhou Yan with the ease of someone taking a casual walk outside his own home after dinner.
He Pei happened to be standing by the roadside with an unhappy expression, waiting for his driver, and witnessed the entire scene.
He watched the commotion before him with cold eyes.
Xia Siqiao folded his arms across his chest and calmly swept his gaze around.
Some of the surrounding students eagerly pulled out their phones to record. Others felt the school bully was using his power to pick on someone and lingered nearby hesitantly, but did not dare step forward.
Lin Huai stood in the crowd looking as though none of this had anything to do with him…
If one ignored the emergency number he had already secretly dialed on his phone.
Even He Pei, the school heartthrob who was usually indifferent to outside affairs, had unexpectedly stopped across the street to watch coldly. Was he also waiting to laugh at Xia Siqiao?
Xia Siqiao gave a soft laugh.
Zhou Yan jumped down from the steps and lazily crushed out his cigarette. "Well, well. You've really got guts."
"But I'm not completely unreasonable. If I brought a few alphas to gang up on one little piece of trash who hasn't even presented yet, the bullies from other schools would laugh at me if word got out."
His lackeys obligingly laughed when he finished. Zhou Yan waved a hand and continued, "How about this? Say three times, 'Daddy, I was wrong,' right here, and I might consider going a little easier on you today."
He paused, extended a finger, and pointed toward the ground. "If you kneel here while you say it, then we'll call today's matter settled. How about that?"
Xia Siqiao tossed his schoolbag and uniform jacket aside, pressed his tongue against the roof of his mouth, and impatiently rolled his neck from side to side before loosening his wrists. "To tell you the truth, I've been putting up with you all day. Daddy is very pleased that you're willing to admit your mistake, but a child who deserves a beating still has to be beaten."
"All of you. Come at me together."
"I'm in a hurry to get my hair cut," he added with an extremely sincere expression.
Xia Siqiao's contemptuous attitude and mockery finally enraged the naturally proud alpha again.
Zhou Yan approached with a vicious expression, gesturing for the others to stay where they were. With the physical advantages unique to an alpha, his arms were muscular and powerful. He swung a heavy fist, the muscles in his arm bulging as he lunged fiercely and quickly at Xia Siqiao. "You fucking–"
Xia Siqiao slipped aside to avoid the sharp rush of the punch, immediately turned, gathered his strength, and raised his right leg. A heavy kick landed on Zhou Yan's lower back and sent him crashing to the ground.
The kick had been so forceful that Xia Siqiao's entire leg tingled faintly afterward.
Xia Siqiao crouched down with a cold expression. He drove his knee into Zhou Yan's body just as the latter tried to spring back up, pressed his face hard against the concrete, and said word by word, "If you still don't know how to speak properly next time, Daddy is going to step on your head."
Gasps instantly sounded all around them as everyone stared in disbelief at Xia Siqiao, who had always been timid and cowardly before.
Zhou Yan could not move. With his face pressed against the cold ground, veins bulging at his temples, he forced out a roar through gritted teeth and reddened eyes. "Why the fuck aren't you moving? Have you all gone stupid?"
Xia Siqiao quickly sprang up and retreated. The other four finally snapped out of their daze and rushed him together, and the group instantly became tangled in a brawl.
Xia Siqiao fought with vicious, brutal ferocity. He was ruthless to others and just as willing to be ruthless to himself.
He rarely defended himself and focused almost entirely on savage attacks, willing to suffer a thousand points of damage himself if it meant dealing eight hundred to his opponent.
That reckless, almost suicidal style made the others more cautious instead. They fought with their hands tied by hesitation. Xia Siqiao was faintly at a disadvantage at first, but after a while, even while facing five opponents alone, he was no longer losing ground.
He caught one alpha with a backhanded grab, drove force through his waist and abdomen, and his slender arms erupted with astonishing strength. In an instant, he sent the tall alpha over his shoulder in a clean, beautiful throw.
Suddenly, a tremendous force slammed into the back of his chest, knocking him two steps forward. Xia Siqiao suppressed the waves of dull pain spreading across his back, spun around, and drove an uppercut brutally into the attacker's chin. The boy immediately clutched his jaw in agony and could not straighten up.
The last alpha charged forward. Xia Siqiao turned sideways, grabbed him in one swift motion, clamped both hands firmly on his shoulders, and drove a knee into his stomach in one seamless sequence.
The alpha collapsed instantly, clutching his stomach as involuntary tears streamed down his face and he dry-heaved without stopping.
At that point, all five naturally proud alphas were sprawled crookedly across the ground, defeated by Xia Siqiao, who had not even presented as a secondary gender yet.
Xia Siqiao licked the blood seeping from the corner of his mouth, picked up the schoolbag and uniform he had thrown aside earlier, then turned and kicked Zhou Yan where he lay. He gave a faint scoff. "Learn your lesson?"
Humiliated and furious, Zhou Yan simply shut his eyes and played dead on the spot.
Xia Siqiao swept a cold gaze over the crowd that was still watching nearby. Under that stare, quite a few people looked awkward and guilty. Xia Siqiao said nothing more. He casually slung his uniform over one shoulder, picked up his schoolbag, and turned away with his back perfectly straight.
Everyone silently lowered their heads and opened a path for him.
Lin Huai let out a breath of relief, wiped his face carelessly, and left.
Across the street, He Pei watched Xia Siqiao's straight-backed figure with an indifferent expression. The black luxury car finally arrived late. He Pei lifted one long leg and got in, and the car soon merged into the endless stream of traffic.
Xia Siqiao sat down in a hair salon with fine cuts and bruises scattered across his face.
Had he gotten beaten up and come in for a perm to cheer himself up?
The stylist, Tony, wondered silently. Holding his breath, he walked over. "What kind of perm are we doing today?"
Xia Siqiao's brow twitched hard. Expressionless, he stared at Tony in the mirror and pointed at the hair that looked even more tragic after the fight. "I'm here for a haircut. Cut all of this short. Just give me any normal hairstyle. Dye it back to black too."
Tony held the hairstyle catalog and stared in disbelief at Xia Siqiao, the customer responsible for practically half their revenue. Their supreme VIP did not want a perm anymore?
Who had done this? How badly had they beaten him that he had even lost his love of doing his hair?
Xia Siqiao urged impatiently, "Hurry up. I'm in a rush."