Reversal (1/2)
Before entering the design firm, Su Zesui had noticed the flower shop next door.
Perhaps because as a child, his big brother often brought flowers home, he had a natural fondness for them.
Flowers in bloom were a celebration of life, a display of vitality and resilience. He hoped this freedom and brilliance could give Mr. Gu some strength as well.
The shop was run by an elderly woman with kind eyes. Despite being in the middle of a busy street, she calmly trimmed her flowers—a woman who seemed both well-off and passionate about life.
As soon as he entered, the woman occasionally glanced at him, making socially anxious Su Zesui nervous. He quickly picked a few tulips and moved toward the counter to pay.
At that moment, the woman finally spoke, smiling kindly. “Young man, I have a good eye for people. I think you’re a very good child.”
Su Zesui was a little confused and didn’t fully understand her meaning, but politely said, “Thank you.”
“Don’t let the voices online affect you. There are many people quietly supporting you who can’t speak up.” The woman gently pushed away his card. “Consider these flowers a gift from me.”
“Th-Thank you.” Su Zesui was far from naive. Memories from two lifetimes gave him a wealth of experience, and he instantly grasped the key meaning behind her words.
He fidgeted with his clothes, standing in place. Just as the woman returned to her small stool to trim flowers, he finally mustered the courage to ask, “W-What happened online?”
Thinking of Gu Yilan’s recent state, he hurriedly added, fearing rejection: “I don’t have a phone… c-can I borrow yours to see?”
The woman hesitated, initially about to refuse.
But the boy, holding a few flowers and lowering his head, occasionally muttering a pleading word, looked as if he might cry at any moment. It stirred sympathy.
The woman sighed and handed him her phone. “If your family doesn’t want you to see it, there must be a reason.”
But Su Zesui couldn’t hear her words.
It was as if he had finally glimpsed a shadow of the truth through a thick fog. He struggled to chase after it, desperate to see the reality someone had hidden behind their back. In his panic, nothing else mattered.
He fumbled to open the social media platform. Without searching, the negative trending topics were already prominently displayed.
Tapping into them, he found mockery and derision of his past live streams, interspersed with vicious personal attacks. Some came from IDs he recognized—people who had once praised him lavishly during live sessions.
And now, as if they were different people, they cursed him, slandered Mr. Gu, called him a scourge, threatened to block the entrance to his company, and said they would team up to ruin him financially and drive his company into bankruptcy…
——Mr. Gu had been so good. This was clearly his own fault—why, why was Gu Yilan being dragged into it?
Su Zesui felt struck by lightning. His legs gave way, and he sank to the ground, trembling uncontrollably, nauseous, yet his fingers continued scrolling through the hateful comments.
Gu Yilan had shielded him from such storms, giving him a sense of peace. Until he voluntarily peeked out from beneath that protective umbrella, he hadn’t realized how ferocious the outside storm could be.
Before he could scroll any further, the phone was abruptly snatched away.
A pair of strong arms lifted him into a warm embrace, conveying heat and safety.
Only then did Su Zesui notice the elderly woman approaching, worry etched across her face, speaking words of concern he didn’t hear fully. Behind her, Gu Yilan was holding him, somehow having arrived at the same spot.
His back was gently stroked, the fallen tulips were picked up, and Gu Yilan’s familiar voice sounded in his ear: “It’s okay. Don’t be afraid.”
“Brother, they—they’re all insulting you…” Su Zesui clutched him tightly as they walked out, voice trembling and breaking, “They’re wrong. They’re all talking nonsense.”
“I know.” Gu Yilan nodded to the elderly woman and carried him toward the car. “Forget them. Let’s go home, okay?”
But the hateful words had been too vicious. Su Zesui, caught in the whirlwind of online abuse, continued to speak, voice choked with tears: “Why did they say that? None of it is true! Why say those things? They used to… they used to like us.”
Gu Yilan didn’t know how to comfort him.
Faced with real malice, words felt utterly powerless.
Seeing the boy in such a fragile state, he didn’t trust leaving him in the passenger seat alone. He decided to send their location to the driver.
“Let’s go home, sleep, and forget all of this, okay?” Gu Yilan felt the dampness on his clothes, paused, and continued, “We’ll delete the account. We’ll never use that platform again.”
Su Zesui hiccupped through his tears, sniffing and sobbing, “I… I want to… explain to them.”
“No need,” Gu Yilan replied without hesitation. “Sometimes avoiding something isn’t cowardice—it’s a way to handle emotional stress. What you need to do now is just… forget it.”
“But… but… they’re insulting you,” Su Zesui protested.
“I don’t care,” Gu Yilan said calmly.
Su Zesui sniffled again. “B-but… they’re saying really nasty things.”
“The internet is like that,” Gu Yilan explained. “It amplifies the worst in people. But after a while, the insults die down. No matter how harsh they are now, no one will remember them later.”
Su Zesui didn’t speak anymore. He was silent, though the wet patches spreading across the chest of his shirt told Gu Yilan everything—he was crying even harder.
“There’s no memory on the internet. It’s really okay,” Gu Yilan said, feeling powerless to comfort him with words. Instead, he patted the boy’s back firmly, over and over, trying to convey some sense of security through touch.
They waited outside the flower shop for about half an hour. Once Su Zesui was safely seated in the car’s backseat, Gu Yilan’s phone rang again.
It was Su Mingyu.
Su Zesui felt the vibration too, and he knew Gu Yilan hesitated to answer because he didn’t want anything else to disturb the boy’s mood.
“I-I won’t listen,” the boy said softly, pressing a hand to his ear. “Brother, you take it.”
His voice trembled with a soft sob, revealing the helplessness and fragility he could not hide. Yet the words he spoke were considerate and heart-tugging.
Gu Yilan ruffled his hair and picked up the call.
“Hey, you free? It’s urgent. Get your team together for a meeting,” Su Mingyu’s anxious voice came through the receiver.
Glancing at the shivering boy in his arms, Gu Yilan swallowed, then spoke plainly: “Suisui knows.”
“What?! How did you let him know? You’re with him, right? How’s he doing?” Su Mingyu’s voice shot up several octaves.
“He’s not doing well. I’m taking him home to rest,” Gu Yilan said.
“Ugh… why now, of all times?” Su Mingyu muttered. “Listen, Suisui’s old friends from high school spoke up. They revealed how Zhou Qizhao bullied him back then. Damn it, Suisui never told me. I always thought he was doing fine at school… no wonder he didn’t want to go anymore…”
“Uh, anyway, things online have taken a turn. Some people think even a cornered rabbit will bite, while Zhou Qizhao’s die-hard fans claim no one should hit him. Both sides are clashing, and we need to seize this chance to turn the situation around.”
While listening to Su Mingyu’s summary, Gu Yilan checked the latest developments online.
Sure enough, three teenagers, around seventeen or eighteen, had independently recorded and uploaded videos without any request from Su Zesui.
The videos, lasting over ten minutes, detail how, before they started hanging out with Su Zesui, Zhou Qizhao verbally bullied Su Zesui, encouraged classmates to isolate him, and even teamed up with his clique to play pranks on him.
Whenever Su Zesui tried to resist, the bullies would mock him, “Can’t handle it?”—then heap more shame on him.
The three faces were familiar—it was the same group of rich kids who had come to their house to play games with Su Zesui that day: Feng Chengwen, Tong Jing, and Yuan Mingcheng.
Additionally, a few other classmates who had also suffered under Zhou Qizhao’s bullying stepped forward from silence to speak up, calling him out and defending Su Zesui.
Faced with these accusations, Zhou Qizhao, used to being admired, cracked under the pressure.
Having endured cyberbullying, he was visibly gaunt in the livestream, his face looking increasingly haggard. He even publicly lost his temper, lashing out and cursing at the netizens who insulted him, which caused more fans to turn against him and ultimately backfired, worsening the negative attention.
On his live stream, visibly weakened by the online backlash, his complexion turned sallow and he looked increasingly unhealthy. He even lost control and lashed out at his viewers who insulted him, which only drew more former fans to turn against him, causing the heat of public attention to backfire.
The online debate over this was in full swing—
[Isn’t Zhou Qizhao the one pretending to be innocent? People have dug up his past—he used to start his account by flaunting his wealth. How can so many people still blindly support him? (images)(images)]
[How much did the person above pay per comment? First, they deleted negative comments, now they’re using the “victim is to blame” tactic? Zhou Qizhao’s injury is real, but who knows if those speaking up for Su Zesui were paid by Gu Yilan.]
[I hate school bullying the most. Enough is enough. No more tolerance. Supporting Su Zesui this time.]
[Even if the verbal manipulation (PUA) is true, it still doesn’t justify hitting someone. One is a moral issue, the other crosses the legal line.]
. . . . .
Gu Yilan hung up Su Mingyu’s call, reported and deleted some of the worst comments, and only then held the phone up in front of the boy’s reddened eyes.
Su Zesui had been covering his ears the whole time. When he finally saw the screen, he slowly lowered his arms and looked at the man behind him, puzzled.
“There are a lot of people silently supporting you,” Gu Yilan said. “Your old friends also want to stand up for you. Don’t overthink it. I’ll take care of everything. All you need to do is rest and prepare for the preliminaries, okay?”
Su Zesui saw Feng Chengwen on the screen, along with the netizens defending him. His tear-swollen eyes widened slightly, a mix of disbelief and worry.
——Would they get scolded for speaking up for him too?
Seeing the boy staring blankly, his pupils gradually unfocused, Gu Yilan put the phone away and asked, “Feeling dizzy?”
Su Zesui nodded.
His head felt heavy and foggy, as if filled with paste, and his vision was blurring with black spots. His stomach was also churning, and he felt the urge to retch.
This was a lingering effect from previous psychiatric treatment—whenever his emotions hit extreme lows, his body manifested physical symptoms.
“Rest for a bit,” Gu Yilan said, placing a hand over his eyes to shield him from the harsh light. “Once we get home, I’ll carry you downstairs.”
Su Zesui didn’t even have the strength to nod. His head tilted, and he nestled into the man’s embrace, falling asleep.
Even in sleep, he seemed uneasy. He murmured incoherent words, his body twitched occasionally, and a cold sweat formed on his forehead, as if trapped in one nightmare after another.
Gu Yilan’s eyes were tinged with red. One hand patted the boy’s back gently, while the other kept typing urgent instructions to Su Mingyu.
Once home, his phone, which had only just been quiet, began buzzing with missed calls again.
He comforted the boy until his trembling body gradually calmed, then picked up his silenced phone to continue handling the online harassment.