In full view of everyone, Jiang Yuan followed the invigilator out of the classroom and found a patrol teacher to explain the situation.
The patrol teacher frowned and sized Jiang Yuan up from the side. "Are you sure you're not mistaken? Maybe that note doesn't belong to her."
"It is hers. A student reported her." The invigilator folded her arms, looking disdainful. "A student like her who cheats is just stubborn. Even when caught red - handed, she still refuses to admit it."
"I didn't!" Jiang Yuan retorted. "You can compare the handwriting on the note to see if it's mine."
Standing in the corridor, the cold north wind blew on her face. Jiang Yuan gradually calmed down a bit. She looked at the patrol teacher pleadingly.
"As long as the handwriting doesn't match, you'll know the note isn't mine."
It made sense. The patrol teacher thought the girl in front of him didn't seem like the type to do such a thing. Just as he was about to say something, the invigilator interrupted.
"Of course the handwriting doesn't match. A person who wants to cheat would never expose themselves. Maybe a student around you wrote the note and threw it to you."
"You're just being unreasonable." Jiang Yuan gritted her teeth, her face flushing red. Her clear and bright eyes were filled with anger.
The patrol teacher looked at the invigilator, then finally sighed and waved his hand. "I'm not your invigilator. Your invigilator should know best what happened. I'll make a record. Let her go see the counselor."
The invigilator glanced at Jiang Yuan triumphantly, as if saying, "I knew I didn't catch the wrong person."
"Go explain it to your counselor. I'll call him too." In front of Jiang Yuan, the invigilator asked who her counselor was, found the number, and dialed it directly.
Jiang Yuan's counselor was a graduate student who had just graduated this year.
"Hello, is this Teacher Xu? Yes, it's me. Just now, one of your students was taking an exam. A girl named Jiang Yuan was cheating. I'm sending her to see you now... Okay."
After hanging up the phone, she put on that arrogant look again when facing Jiang Yuan. "Alright, I've explained the situation to your counselor. Go see him."
With that, she returned to the exam room to continue invigilating the students.
Jiang Yuan stood there, looking down at the ground. Her body trembled slightly. The cold filled the surrounding air, bringing an unbearable chill.
The phone in her pocket "dinged". The crisp new - message alert sound on QQ brought her back to her senses. She slowly opened it and saw a message from her counselor.
[Counselor: Jiang Yuan, I'm waiting for you in my office. Tell me what happened. I think there might be a misunderstanding. You're not this kind of person.]
At that moment, Jiang Yuan's eyes welled up with tears. A warm current surged in her heart, dispelling the cold.
Since she had once helped the teachers in the counselor's office with odd jobs, most of the teachers in the office knew her.
She put the phone in her pocket, tilted her head back to hold back the tears, and strode towards the counselor's office.
When Jiang Yuan reached the office door, she took a deep breath, raised her hand and gently knocked on the door, then pushed it open. She looked around and saw Teacher Xu sitting at his desk, holding a pen as if he was making a record. Teacher Xu looked up, saw Jiang Yuan, put down the pen, and pointed to the chair opposite. "Come, sit down first."
Jiang Yuan sat down. Teacher Xu asked, "Jiang Yuan, the teachers in our office trust your character. We've seen it. Can you tell me the specific situation?"
Jiang Yuan told him everything in detail.
"Did you have a conflict with Zhou Xiangmeng before?" Teacher Xu frowned slightly.
Deep down, he didn't like Zhou Xiangmeng. She was a troublesome person who often returned to the dormitory late.
Whenever the dormitory aunt informed him, he couldn't help but be nervous, afraid that something might have happened to this female student outside.
And he was new here, serving as a counselor for the first time, entrusted to take care of freshmen. So he was careful about everything.
"Sort of." Jiang Yuan was silent for a while before spitting out these words, looking dejected.
"This is a bit tricky." Teacher Xu rubbed his temples. "We have to get her to talk to prove your innocence, or find out the source of that note."
The note might have been left by someone in the previous exam, or the one before that. It was even possible that the classroom had never been cleaned and it was left by a student in class.
It was like looking for a needle in a haystack, which would take a lot of time and effort.
The quickest way was to get Zhou Xiangmeng to talk.
"Jiang Yuan, go back and have a good talk with Zhou Xiangmeng. Try to get her to change her story. I'll also talk to her. I won't record your disciplinary action for now."
Teacher Xu was new to the job, with no connections and no real power. He was just an ordinary counselor.
He probably couldn't help much.
Jiang Yuan silently glanced at him, nodded to thank him, and then got up to leave.
After leaving the office, she looked up and was surprised to see Chi Xu.
He was leaning against the wall, his head down. The bangs on his forehead covered his eyes, so it was hard to tell his emotions. The corridor was dim. The incandescent light came on with a sound, and the cold - white light shone on his face.
From darkness to light, from loss to possession.
"Why are you here?" Jiang Yuan's heart skipped a beat at this moment. She tilted her head slightly, then pretended nothing had happened and shifted her gaze casually.
It seemed that with Chi Xu by her side, she was not afraid of anything. She looked straight ahead fearlessly.
"If I hadn't come, I wouldn't have known you'd suffered so much injustice." The boy smiled gently at her. His words were full of blame, but his expression clearly showed concern. "Why didn't you tell me?"
Chi Xu took a step forward, leaned down slightly to look at Jiang Yuan eye - to - eye. Her slightly red eyes reflected his figure. He let out an almost inaudible sigh.
"Yuanyuan, you still have me. I'll help you."
Who would have thought that a simple exam would turn into a plagiarism and cheating incident?
When he was bored in the apartment waiting for Jiang Yuan to finish the exam and come back, Lin Suye suddenly sent him a message, saying that Jiang Yuan had been framed for plagiarism by Zhou Xiangmeng and taken away.
At that moment, Chi Xu admitted that he was panicked. He had never been so flustered before. He almost put his shoes on the wrong feet when he went out and rushed to the counselor's office in a hurry.
"It's just Zhou Xiangmeng. As a human, she must have weaknesses. If necessary, we can ask everyone who took the exam in the previous classrooms one by one to find out who left that note."
"I don't believe we can't find out. How difficult can it be to find a note..."
He said it so easily, with a carefree look on his face.
But Jiang Yuan knew that this matter was not as simple as he said. If only it were that simple...
She wouldn't have to trouble the teachers, wouldn't have to trouble Chi Xu, and wouldn't have to waste time and energy.
Without warning, Jiang Yuan gently put her arms around the boy's neck in front of her, buried her head in his neck, and said in a muffled voice, "Okay, I know. Let's look for it together."