Chapter 82#

The Disabled Big Shot’s Stepson#

“Ghost-catching competition!?”

On another weekend, Ye Shiyuan gathered the sixteen children in the hall and announced that a ghost-catching game would be held on the first floor of the castle for the next three hours. The teachers would play the ghost catchers, and the children, in addition to avoiding being caught, could also “kill” the ghost catchers by snatching the identification tags behind them.

Simply put, it was a large-scale survival strategy game.

As soon as the words fell, they immediately caused a burst of exclamations.

Lin Xiaodong was so sleepy that he could hardly open his eyes. The consequence of watching two movies overnight last night was that he was listless all day today. He had intended to take a good nap during the selection, but he didn’t expect Ye Shiyuan to come up with such a trick again.

“I want to sleep,” Lin Xiaodong said weakly. “If I don’t sleep, I’ll die suddenly.”

System: “I don’t know who insisted on watching two movies last night despite the advice…”

But there was no way. He had brought it on himself and could only endure it with tears and gritted teeth.

However, as if he knew what Lin Xiaodong was thinking, Ye Shiyuan calmly told them that there would be punishments for being caught by the ghost catchers. After the competition, they would have to run three laps around the artificial lake. So everyone, please don’t be lazy, think hard, and try to be caught by the teachers as late as possible.

Hearing this, Lin Xiaodong immediately cried out in his heart and could only return to the team, racking his brains for a strategy to cope.

The rewards for this competition were very generous. Snatching the tag of one ghost catcher would earn thirty medals, and the top three would receive even more additional rewards—hearing this, all the children except Lin Xiaodong showed an eager expression.

“The ghost catchers will set out in twenty minutes. You can take this time to make full preparations. I have told you the rules: no malicious injury, other than that, everything is allowed,” Ye Shiyuan said to them. “But I have to remind everyone that within these three hours, the teachers can return to the hall at any time to check the surveillance videos. As compensation, when a ghost catcher appears near your location, the identification tag behind them will also sound a warning.”

“Now, the competition begins!”

With a whistle, several children took the lead and ran out impatiently. The rest were thinking cautiously about how to hide and how to counterattack correctly and safely. After all, just hiding wouldn’t get them any medals.

One by one, small groups began to form. Lin Xiaodong looked at their intense discussions, withdrew his gaze, turned around, and prepared to leave.

“Wait a minute!”

Suddenly, a crisp voice came from behind. Lin Xiaodong paused and looked back, finding that it was the short-haired little girl who ranked first in the number of medals obtained.

“What’s the matter?” he asked calmly.

“I want to cooperate with you,” the short-haired little girl said.

Lin Xiaodong remembered her name was probably Lin Shanshan, because the girls of this generation of the Lin family were named with double characters.

“Cooperate? Why?” Although he was sleepy, he still forced himself to ask.

Lin Shanshan pursed her lips and said, “Because the teachers are all adults, and I am still a girl, I definitely can’t outrun them. You are the oldest among us and the only one who might outrun the teachers. So I hope to cooperate with you. I will be the bait then, you go snatch the tag, and the medals obtained will be split equally between us.”

“Aren’t you going with them?” Lin Xiaodong raised his chin, signaling the circle of children around Lin Qi. “There’s strength in numbers. There’s more than one teacher.”

“So we need to discuss tactics. I heard the teachers’ conversation just now. If they catch us, they also have rewards. But unlike us, their rewards are physical items and cannot be divided. So even if they set out together, they won’t sincerely cooperate,” Lin Shanshan pushed her glasses and analyzed in a very military style. “We can lead them away and defeat them one by one.”

Lin Xiaodong looked at her with some amazement. This little girl looked like she had just started seventh grade this year, a year younger than Lin Qi.

“Let’s talk while walking,” he said, essentially agreeing to the request for cooperation.

On the other side, after announcing the start of the competition, Ye Shiyuan went to Lin Pei’s bedroom on the second floor.

The black-haired man sat in his heavy wheelchair as usual, but he didn’t seem to be in a daze as usual, nor was he forcibly enduring due to pain. In fact, Lin Pei showed a rare calm today.

He was holding a tablet in his hand, observing the surveillance of the whole castle. Although the sixteen children had all started to act, the man’s gaze was always fixed on the middle of the nine-square grid—where it happened to be the scene of Lin Xiaodong and Lin Shanshan crossing the corridor side by side.

The youth and the girl, a bit shorter than him, walked on the long corridor filled with sunlight. The smiles on their faces were so real and bright, and the beautiful and harmonious scene made everyone who saw it smile knowingly.

But Lin Pei pursed his lips tightly, and for some reason, his eyes showed a dark gloom.

Ye Shiyuan didn’t notice Lin Pei’s abnormality. He was still very happy that Lin Pei was finally willing to pay attention to the growth of those children today.

In the man’s view, this was a good omen. Whether Lin Pei could stand up again or not, at least, the head of the Lin family couldn’t always live in this isolated castle.

“Youth is good,” he looked at Lin Shanshan and Lin Xiaodong in the surveillance discussing seriously, and even added fuel to the fire by sighing, “Lin Shanshan, this girl, is indeed the smartest and has the highest emotional intelligence I have seen in all these years. It’s not surprising to me that she can find Lin Xiaodong’s strengths.”

Lin Pei raised his head expressionlessly and stared at him coldly.

“You are also a teacher. What are you doing coming up here?”

“What?” Ye Shiyuan was speechless. “But I’m not…”

In the man’s cold gaze, after a few seconds, he surrendered and took the initiative to ask the supervisor for an identification tag, and went downstairs to catch ghosts.

The door of the room was closed tightly again. The bright sunlight and fresh air were blocked outside the window by the thick dark red curtains. In the dark room, Lin Pei was alone, sitting silently in the wheelchair, only the tablet in his hand was still shining with a faint blue light.

He was in a daze for a while, not knowing what he was thinking, and felt like he was thinking of nothing.

When Lin Pei came back to his senses, Lin Xiaodong’s figure had already disappeared from the surveillance.

He suddenly felt a wave of boredom.

Casualy placing the tablet aside, Lin Pei pushed the wheelchair, preparing to lie on the bed for a while. Suddenly, a weak voice came from the door of the room: “Hello, is anyone here?”

He turned his head abruptly, only to see a familiar eye peeking out from the door crack.

“You…”

When he saw Lin Pei’s face, which seemed serious but was actually blank, Lin Xiaodong immediately pushed the door open and slipped into the room, patting his chest and letting out a long sigh.

“Great, you are in the room,” he complained. “Who on earth let Mr. Ye down too? It’s too terrifying, playing a ghost-catching game with a group of middle schoolers using counter-reconnaissance and professional criminal investigation knowledge, is this playable?”

The culprit Lin Pei: “…………”

He coughed and changed the subject imperceptibly, “What are you doing in my room? Who allowed you to go to the second floor?”

“No way, Mr. Ye is too terrifying,” Lin Xiaodong shrugged his shoulders. “And I tried my best, a hero saving a beauty, dying a worthy death. By the way, your bed is so big, can you lend it to me to lie down for a while?”

The youth looked at Lin Pei eagerly; he was almost sleepy to death.

Lin Pei originally wanted to ridicule him for what he was doing not resting well last night, but seeing the bloodshot eyes in Lin Xiaodong’s eyes, he finally swallowed the words that were at the tip of his tongue.

“The sofa is fine, the bed is not,” he said coldly.

“Still thinking I’m dirty…” Lin Xiaodong muttered and turned over, falling on the sofa next to him. The moment his head touched the pillow, he immediately closed his eyes and fell fast asleep, snoring.

After a moment of silence, and finding that he was indeed asleep, Lin Pei then slowly pushed the wheelchair to the side of the sofa.

He looked down at the youth’s serene sleeping face, his gaze starting from the smooth forehead, inch by inch downward, almost greedily sweeping over the slightly trembling eyelashes, the young and tight neck, and the fair and slender legs…

“I’m asleep, not dead,” Lin Xiaodong suddenly opened his eyes and looked at him helplessly. “What are you doing? Staring at me all the time.”

At the moment he met the youth’s clear eyes, Lin Pei’s heart missed a beat.

“I am the head of the Lin family, and you are a person of the Lin family, living in my castle,” but the man never showed weakness easily, so he just glanced at him and said flatly, “Is there anything wrong with me looking at my property?”

“Stop right there, when did I become your property?” Lin Xiaodong’s eyes widened. “That’s sophistry!”

“Is it?”

Lin Pei curled the corner of his mouth.

He clicked on the contact column on the tablet, found Ye Shiyuan’s number, and was just about to click it when Lin Xiaodong, who had flipped up, grabbed his wrist: “Don’t!”

But the overly cold feeling when he grabbed it made him stunned. Lin Xiaodong looked at Lin Pei, whose face suddenly changed, and asked stupidly, “Why is your hand so cold?”

“Let go!”

Lin Pei shook him off abruptly. The man took a deep breath, feeling that the fiery temperature of Lin Xiaodong’s palm almost burned him.

Lin Xiaodong sat up straight, and as if he had just noticed, looked around, and immediately frowned, “Is this a haunted house you are living in? It’s so chilly, not turning on the light in broad daylight and pulling a curtain, no wonder your hand is so cold, if you don’t bask in the sun, you’ll get moldy.”

He stood up and walked to the window, so fast that Lin Pei didn’t even have time to stop him.

Only a “swish” sound was heard. With Lin Xiaodong’s action of pulling the curtains open, the sudden bright and dazzling light made Lin Pei instinctively narrow his eyes.

His eyebrows were tightly knitted, and he reached out his hand to block the top of his forehead.

As if the sunshine of the whole world was scrambling to burst into the room, fine golden dust floated in the air, and the high-spirited youth stood with his back to the window, hands on his waist, giving him a brilliant smile.

“Look, isn’t this much better?”