After Lin Yue and Zhou Yutong saw the post, they were furious. Lin Yue immediately called Zhang Yanyan and sent several voice messages in quick succession, her tone so frantic it sounded ready to explode.
“Yanyan! You need to look at the university forum! Someone anonymously posted a thread slandering you! They’re saying you’re a gold digger who toyed with someone’s feelings, and they even attached some misleading photos. This is outrageous!”
Zhou Yutong sent her a message right after, every word dripping with anger. “Yanyan, it’s obvious someone is deliberately targeting you. The comments are blowing up, and a bunch of people who don’t know the truth are piling on. Hurry up and take a look—how are we supposed to refute this?”
At the time, Zhang Yanyan was curled up on the sofa of her villa, playing a game on her phone. Her fingers flew across the screen, and just as an intense team battle ended and the results page popped up, her phone began vibrating nonstop. Lin Yue’s call came through directly.
She quickly swiped to answer. Lin Yue’s furious voice immediately blasted through the receiver. Zhang Yanyan also opened the forum link Lin Yue had sent and skimmed through the post and its comments.
The more she read, the tighter her brows drew. A flicker of anger rose in her heart, but more than that, she felt disdain for Song Ze’s underhanded tactics.
So this was all he was capable of? He couldn’t win her over, so he resorted to spreading rumors. His way of thinking was pitifully small-minded.
Apart from him, no one would waste so much time secretly taking photos, fabricating stories, and portraying himself as a “devoted victim.” After being rejected, he had chosen to retaliate in such a despicable way. It was utterly disgusting.
Lin Yue’s voice exploded through the phone. “This was definitely Song Ze’s doing! You rejected him, so he used this disgusting tactic to slander you. He’s completely unhinged! Let’s go to the forum right now and confront him. We’ll expose everything he’s done!”
Zhou Yutong’s voice joined in from beside the phone, filled with urgency. “Exactly! Yanyan, let’s clear things up right now. We can’t let him slander you like this. Everyone needs to see what he’s really like!”
“Don’t rush, and don’t confront him directly.” Zhang Yanyan’s emotions remained unchanged, aside from a trace of faint impatience. “No one will believe anything we say right now. We’d only put ourselves at a disadvantage. Let the rumors spread for a while.”
“What are we supposed to do, then? It hurts to watch everyone insult you like this!” Lin Yue cried anxiously.
“I’ll ask the university for two days off tomorrow and stay home for a while. I’ll handle this. You two stay out of it and focus on your classes,” Zhang Yanyan said. “I’ll buy you milk tea when it’s over.”
After hanging up, Zhang Yanyan switched her phone to silent mode, reopened her game, and paid no attention whatsoever to the abuse flooding the forum.
She had already made up her mind. Rather than clarify everything immediately, it was better to let public opinion ferment. That would give her a perfectly reasonable excuse to take a break, while also forcing Song Ze’s true intentions into the open. Her counterattack would be far more effective afterward.
Early the next morning, Zhang Yanyan messaged her counselor, saying only that she wasn’t feeling well and wanted to take two days off to rest. Her counselor readily approved the request.
Meanwhile, on the campus of Tengyuan University, the rumors about Zhang Yanyan had already spiraled out of control.
The defamatory post had been online for less than a day, yet its likes and comments had already surpassed ten thousand. Discussions about it had also spread through student groups at universities across Rongcheng. Students who knew nothing about the truth had been led by the post, and the insults were growing increasingly vicious.
“The finance department’s freshman representative looks so self-righteous, but she’s actually a gold digger?”
“She played with someone’s feelings and then looked down on him for being poor. How is someone like that qualified to be a representative?”
“No wonder Song Ze pursued her so aggressively. Anyone would be furious after being treated like a backup option. I’d make a scene too!”
The finance department’s class group was in complete chaos. The few students who knew the truth and tried to defend Zhang Yanyan were instantly drowned out by waves of skepticism. Some classmates even whispered about her behind her back, saying that her true colors had finally been exposed and that she had taken leave because she was too ashamed to come to class.
Lin Yue and Zhou Yutong were so angry they wanted to lash out at everyone, but they remembered Zhang Yanyan’s instructions. All they could do was occasionally force out a reply saying, “It’s not like that. You’ll understand when Yanyan comes back.” No one listened.
Everyone assumed that Zhang Yanyan had been crushed by the overwhelming abuse and was hiding at home, heartbroken and miserable. Some even believed she was guilty and didn’t dare face anyone.
But no one knew that Zhang Yanyan was having an incredibly comfortable time at the villa during those two days.
Every day, she slept until she woke naturally, then played games on her phone. Whenever she got hungry, the housekeeper prepared delicious meals for her. As for the insults on the forum, she could barely be bothered to look at them. She didn’t take them seriously at all.
Two days passed in the blink of an eye. Public opinion on the forum had reached its peak, and the defamatory post remained at the height of its popularity. Song Ze had even been secretly using an alternate account to stir up trouble in the comments, trying to make the abuse even worse.
Then, late at night, a new anonymous comment suddenly appeared beneath the defamatory post. It included a compressed file, and its title contained only a few words:
“Real evidence exposing the person behind the rumors. Download at your own risk.”
The poster was a newly registered blank account. But when people opened the compressed file, its contents left everyone utterly stunned.
There were screenshots showing the registration details of the anonymous posting account, its IP location traced to the shared network in the male dormitory of Tengyuan University’s computer science department, a screen recording of the posting process, and the uncropped original versions of the deliberately edited photos.
There were even surveillance screenshots showing Song Ze secretly photographing Zhang Yanyan multiple times.
The chain of evidence was so complete that there was no room for denial. Song Ze’s actions had been exposed from beginning to end.
The moment the comment appeared, the forum erupted. The comments that had originally attacked Zhang Yanyan were rapidly replaced by a flood of posts turning against the real culprit.
“Holy crap! It was all Song Ze’s doing! He couldn’t win her over, so he spread rumors. What a vile person!”
“The evidence is so thorough that there’s no way he can deny it. I actually felt sorry for him before, but he’s nothing more than a pathetic clown!”
“To everyone who insulted Zhang Yanyan—does your face hurt now? She was completely innocent!”
People soon dug up Song Ze’s past behavior as well: how he had relentlessly pursued Zhang Yanyan despite being rejected clearly and repeatedly, and how he had grown resentful because of it.
Compared with what he had done now, his ugly character became even more obvious.
The abuse on the forum shifted away from Zhang Yanyan entirely and landed on Song Ze instead.
At that moment, Song Ze was lying on his bed, scrolling through the forum. When he saw the comment and the evidence attached to it, his face instantly turned deathly pale. Cold sweat broke out all over his body, and the phone nearly slipped from his hand.
He frantically refreshed the page, hoping to delete the comment, but the account was anonymous, leaving him with no way to do so. The compressed file had already been saved and forwarded by countless people, spreading beyond control.
He wanted to explain himself, but with the evidence laid bare, anything he said would sound feeble and hollow. All he could do was watch as more and more abuse flooded the comment section and his name was repeatedly dragged through the mud on the forum.
Early the next morning, Song Ze went to the university. Everywhere he went, he was met with strange looks. Students passing by him lowered their voices to whisper, their pointing and staring pricking him like needles.
When he returned to the dormitory, he discovered that his roommates’ attitudes had changed as well.
They used to invite him to meals and call him along to class. Now they deliberately kept their distance. They went out to eat in groups without him, never spoke to him in class, and even avoided his usual spot in the dormitory’s common areas.
No one wanted to get involved with someone who used such underhanded tactics behind people’s backs. They were all afraid of bringing trouble upon themselves.
Song Ze was isolated in a corner of the dormitory, fidgeting restlessly as panic gripped him. He couldn’t think of any way to fix the situation and could only watch helplessly as everything spiraled out of control.
Meanwhile, at the villa, Zhang Yanyan casually glanced at the forum that morning. Seeing public opinion had completely turned against Song Ze—that he had been berated into silence and isolated by those around him—a faint, cold smile curled at the corners of her lips.
The time had come.
