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Luo Wei's expression turned strange. "You? A believer of the Goddess of Justice?"
The Goddess of Justice, Justitia, was the deity of morality and law, holder of authority over truth and judgment, and one of the seventeen , well, now sixteen — principal deities of The Church.
It wasn't that Luo Wei looked down on Vina. It was just that from the start of last semester to right now, not one thing Vina had done remotely resembled justice.
If all believers of the Goddess of Justice were like her, the word "justice" probably needed quotation marks around it.
Vina caught her look and jumped. "You can doubt my character, but you cannot doubt my faith! I am a devoted believer of the Goddess of Justice. I will defend morality and law to the death. I will expose every hidden truth to the death!"
The moment she shot upward, Luo Wei barely held her down with one hand. "Enough. Stop moving. If you're truly a good person, I won't wrong you."
"I am a good person!"
"Shut up."
Luo Wei clamped both hands around her neck and forced her still.
She led a mob to strip the original owner of her clothes. She spread rumors that the original owner sold her body. After all that, she still had the nerve to call herself a good person?
And yet. Vina's reaction didn't feel like a lie.
With her intelligence and her acting ability, she probably couldn't pull off something this convincing.
A sharp suspicion surfaced in Luo Wei's mind. Were the original owner's memories even real? Had those things actually happened, or were they something the original owner imagined?
She genuinely wasn't sure anymore.
"Vina." Luo Wei loosened her grip slightly, studying the unshed tears pooling in Vina's eyes. "If I hadn't produced evidence of my nobility and The Temple had arrested me as a commoner, would you have brought a group of thugs to humiliate me?"
"I am a lady," Vina snapped, with feeling. "A lady. I would never do such a thing."
"Really?"
Then what exactly was the Vina she'd seen in the original owner's memories?
"I already said I wouldn't. How many times do I have to say it!" Vina seethed.
Luo Wei frowned, turning several theories over in her head.
Was the original owner's memory faulty? Or was the Vina in that memory not actually Vina at all?
Could the person the original owner saw have been someone else wearing Vina's face?
To impersonate Vina well enough to swagger up to the city gates without suspicion, that person had to be an advanced magic apprentice or a Mage, or at minimum had their backing. And their social standing couldn't be lower than Vina's.
Tsk. Another problem to deal with.
Luo Wei released Vina's neck. Her sharp expression melted away in an instant, warm and apologetic as if a mask had slid into place.
She gently rubbed the red marks she'd left on Vina's throat with her fingertips, her face full of remorse. "I'm so sorry, Vina. I misunderstood you. Can you forgive me?"
Vina went cold with alarm at the sudden shift. Then the apology registered, and she rallied. "Forgive? Hmph! Don't you dare think for one second that I'll — "
She stopped. Rolled her eyes. Swallowed the rest.
"Fine. I forgive you. But you have to forgive me too."
Because Luo Wei was an absolute freak.
That face, purer than any angel's. That heart, blacker than anyone's. She could flip her expression faster than the weather changed, and no one who talked to her ever knew when she'd suddenly turn. Vina was genuinely scared now. She just wanted to put as much distance as possible between herself and this lunatic.
"Good." Luo Wei smiled warmly. The hand on Vina's neck did not move. "We're still good friends, right, Vina?"
Who wants to be friends with you!
Vina was boiling with grievances, but the hand at her throat kept every word locked behind her teeth.
It made no sense. Those hands looked so slender. How were they so strong? She'd nearly choked Vina into meeting her great-grandmother up in heaven.
In the end, under the weight of Luo Wei's iron grip, Vina surrendered.
"Yes. We're still good friends."
Luo Wei stroked the skin of her neck slowly. "Then as my good friend, you should help me out when I'm in a tough spot, shouldn't you?"
Damn it. Back on the pirate ship.
Vina laughed through the sting of tears. "I should. What do you need?"
"Simple. Go out and ask around among the other students. Say you heard someone is planning to steal the self-criticism letters from the bulletin board tonight. Ask if they know who it is, and whether they could help steal yours back while they're at it."
Under Vina's stunned stare, Luo Wei lowered her hand, bent down, and picked up the apology letter from the floor. She held it up where Vina couldn't miss it.
"If you don't, this letter just might find its way to every corner of the academy. Wouldn't that be a shame~"
Vina: ...
If you needed help, you could have just asked! If you'd asked from the start I would have said yes! Why did you have to terrify me first — and drag it out like that in three acts!
She cried for real this time, bitter and exhausted.
Night fell.
Luo Wei made one last check of the perimeter she'd marked out, then climbed into a tree near the bulletin board. She carried a wire mesh net over her shoulder and a fat stack of parchment under her arm , clean copies she'd spent three hours writing out by hand.
Earlier that evening she'd had Vina quietly spread word that someone intended to steal the self-criticism letters tonight. Anyone who hadn't already planned to steal one might now decide to follow along and see what they could get.
Once a letter went up on the bulletin board, it stayed for six months.
On top of that, some of the students on that list still had to stand in front of the entire school tomorrow and read their letters aloud. If the letters disappeared tonight, they'd be spared that public humiliation.
Putting herself in their shoes, Luo Wei had no doubt there were people too proud to just sit and wait. They'd sneak out tonight.
The thief, whoever it was, wouldn't steal just their own letter. They'd have to take a random handful to avoid exposing themselves.
And people are nothing if not hopeful. Once word got out that someone was coming to steal, others would trail behind, counting on luck. If their own letter wasn't among the ones taken, they'd quietly help it along.
There was already a scapegoat out front to take the blame. No one would look further back.
Why did she have all this figured out so precisely?
Because she also wanted that embarrassing letter of hers gone.
Veronka told her to catch people. She said nothing about protecting the letters.
Just past one in the morning, something rustled in the grass beneath the bulletin board.
Luo Wei went sharp and still, her dark eyes locked on the ground below.
An absurdly fat guinea pig pushed out from the grass. It rose up on its hind legs, front paws lifted, and surveyed the area with careful, deliberate eyes.
Luo Wei narrowed her gaze. That posture was far too human. This was no ordinary rodent.
The guinea pig scanned the area, found nothing alarming, and zipped up onto the bulletin board in one quick leap. Its claws found one letter of self-criticism with practiced precision and peeled it free.
Before it could browse the selection for more, Luo Wei dropped from the tree. The net came down in a single clean sweep, and the guinea pig was caught.
She glanced at the bulletin board, then looked down at her catch. Her red lips curved.
"Senior Noel. Sorry about this. Please come with me."
The guinea pig let out a frantic series of squeaks, scrabbling at the mesh.
"If you keep playing dumb, Senior, this becomes your new scandal. Right after the water theft."
The guinea pig went still.
A dejected voice rose from inside the net. "Couldn't you have just looked the other way, Junior?"
➤ Next: The Heartbroken Student Theodore
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