Chapter 655: Sight

After seeing Sun Xiaoqin out, Li Huowang, alone in his somewhat messy bedroom, exhaled and sat down on the stool. He opened the calendar and saw Yang Na's birthday was only a few days away. Li Huowang quietly pondered what birthday gift he should give Yang Na, in addition to the surprise of her being discharged from the hospital on her birthday.

"Wait," he thought. "How many points do I actually need to get into Yang Na's university?" Li Huowang lightly tapped the screen, and the search result showed a number that made him gasp. But soon, Li Huowang gritted his teeth, his eyes filled with determination. "I'll give it my all," he muttered. "Since I promised Yang Na, I must achieve it. I've been through everything; why would I be afraid of this?" True to his word, Li Huowang immediately searched for study materials on his phone and began to read them with intense concentration.

*Creak* —the door to Li Huowang's bedroom slowly opened. When Sun Xiaoqin, dressed in her pajamas, saw Li Huowang looking down at his phone, she nodded with satisfaction and quietly backed out. "Yes, playing with the phone is good. Young people should play with their phones."

Time passed, and the neighborhood gradually grew quiet. In the deep stillness of the night, only the sound of Li Huowang's fingers rubbing his temples could be heard. Finally, at one in the morning, Li Huowang closed his eyes and lay back in despair, his mind buzzing. "Alright, I was wrong," he admitted. "I'm genuinely scared of this. Why is it so profound? I definitely learned this in class, so why can't I understand it now?"

Some things cannot be achieved merely through willpower and effort. If you don't understand, you just don't understand. This material truly couldn't be self-taught. Li Huowang realized he needed systematic learning. Haphazardly studying at home would likely mean he'd never get into Yang Na's university. "What should I do?" he wondered. "I need to find a way. Even if I can't catch up by her sophomore year, I should at least be able to by her senior year."

Li Huowang closed his eyes, contemplating, when he suddenly felt the banknotes in his pocket. An idea for a solution immediately came to him. "Could I use this money to buy online courses? Or online training?" "Oh, right, and the red envelope my mom gave to Yi Donglai. That should be enough when added together." With this thought, Li Huowang immediately got to work. Ignoring the exhaustion of one in the morning, he opened his phone again and began searching.

Just as Li Huowang was planning his grand university entrance exam strategy, he suddenly sensed something, and his brows furrowed tightly. "Are you kidding me?" he thought. "Are the neighborhood committee aunties still working this late? That's a bit too dedicated, isn't it?" Li Huowang reached out and pulled back a corner of the curtain, looking outside, but he didn't see anyone. "Am I too tired?" Li Huowang wondered. He decided to lie down on the bed. He closed his eyes, forcing himself to sleep, hoping to forget the unusual sensation he'd felt earlier and see if it would disappear once his energy was restored.

However, tossing and turning, the feeling of being watched made it impossible for Li Huowang to sleep. At that moment, he finally understood what it meant to feel daggers in his back. He hadn't been mistaken! Something was indeed watching him.

"I'll see what it is!" Li Huowang suddenly sat up from the bed. He pulled back a corner of the starry curtain again, carefully searching the dark neighborhood. It was very dark outside, making it extremely difficult to find someone hiding there. After standing for over half an hour, Li Huowang finally followed the direction of the gaze and discovered who was watching him. The person stood motionless in a dark corner, like a piece of wood. Through the dim light, Li Huowang perceived the person seemed very tall and thin. After shaking his head vigorously, the figure in the darkness seemed to change its appearance. It was so dark outside that Li Huowang thought he must have been mistaken.

"Could it be...?" Li Huowang recalled the crazy things Qian Fu had told him earlier. "No way, how is that possible? Why am I thinking of that guy? Am I going crazy?" Whatever it was, Li Huowang felt he had to see it with his own eyes. After all, whatever was lurking in the darkness certainly couldn't be Auntie Qi from the neighborhood committee.

Li Huowang quickly picked up a pillow and placed it on the stool, adding other items to make its reflection in the window look more like a person. Li Huowang did this, of course, to avoid alerting whatever was out there. He himself slowly got onto the floor, crept out of the bedroom, opened the anti-theft door, and went outside. To avoid making any noise, Li Huowang didn't even put on his shoes. He quietly went down the fire escape, using the cover of the green belt to slowly approach the spot. As Li Huowang drew closer, the outline of the figure gradually became clearer.

"Huowang!" A shout from within the neighborhood made Li Huowang instinctively look up. He saw Sun Xiaoqin, in her pajamas, anxiously sticking her head out of his bedroom window, peering out. When Li Huowang looked back at the previous spot, he found that the outline had vanished. The area was still pitch-black, but there was nothing there. "It ran away? Where did it go?" Li Huowang frantically searched.

"Son! Where are you? Don't scare me!" Sun Xiaoqin leaned more than halfway out of the window, looking into the neighborhood. Hearing the worry in Sun Xiaoqin's voice, and seeing windows gradually lighting up around the neighborhood, Li Huowang reluctantly stepped out. "Mom, I'm here! It's nothing, something fell, and I came down to pick it up." "What are you picking up in the middle of the night? Can't you pick it up tomorrow? Come up quickly!" Li Huowang glanced at the darkness again, then turned and went upstairs.

For the rest of the night, Li Huowang lay on his bed with his eyes open until dawn. While eating breakfast, Li Huowang's mind was still preoccupied with what that thing had been last night. First, he was certain that, whatever its purpose, this thing was watching him, and it was real. The gaze he had sensed earlier was probably only half from Auntie Qi; the rest was from this other entity. "But why would this thing be watching me?" Li Huowang was utterly baffled. He had no value whatsoever. Hiring someone specifically to watch him would cost a lot of money.

"Son, what's wrong with you? Have you started enjoying staring blankly?" Sun Xiaoqin asked, picking up the tray with one hand and quickly wiping the table with a rag in the other. "Why aren't you playing games? Go on, I've already turned on the computer for you." "Mom, I don't want to play games," Li Huowang said, rubbing his forehead, feeling a headache. He couldn't tell his mother about this, or she might think he was having another episode. "Nonsense! How could a young person like you not want to play games? Go on, play quickly. Don't live like an old man. I'll cut you a fruit plate in a bit. What fruits do you want?" Li Huowang sighed, stood up, and returned to his bedroom.