The First Chapter: The Fallen Man

  "Shouldn't you have told us about your plan by now?" A hoarse male voice came from the phone. "How long do you want to keep it? We've already told you everything!" Another phone rang with a pleasant young woman's voice. This was just a simple conference call between three people, one of many that took place every day on this planet. "Not yet. When your naive plans fall through, I'll naturally tell you about mine." In an office decorated in a pure brown style, a man wearing black-framed glasses twirled a pen in his hand as he spoke with the two people on the phone. The pen cap had a picture of Cupid, the angel of love. "Ben, you're too arrogant! We're all candidates, you shouldn't hide so much from us!" "Ben, you'll regret what you've done!" The voices on the phone grew louder. "I have confidence." The man with glasses smiled and hung up the phone. He stood up and walked to the large floor-to-ceiling window, looking out at the bustling city below, and drew a mushroom shape on the window with his pen. "Three scripts... which one is better?"

  Win/Lose Game

  The First Chapter: The Fallen Man

  "Let me tell you something."

  "What?"

  "Was it you who told me to say this? You promise not to regret it?"

  "Alright, go ahead."

  "Let's break up."

  Inside an apartment in Manhattan, New York—

  Russ lay on his single bed, staring blankly at the phone beside his pillow. He regretted it. But he knew that regret was useless, and his girlfriend had called to talk about this heartbreaking thing, even if he disagreed or strongly opposed it, the result would not change. Now, perhaps she should be called ex-girlfriend."Once shorter than once...this time less than two months..." Russ muttered to himself. The last love two years ago lasted for about three months, and then his girlfriend betrayed him and ran away with someone else. After that, he almost hated all women in the world to the extreme, but a month ago, his current girlfriend had restored his confidence. But now, everything was shattered. Women were always women, and they were all the same, with no distinction in their nature, and changing hearts was just a matter of time. Decades ago, words like "infidelity" and "promiscuity" were mostly used to describe men, but now most women also had the right to use these words, and even had a tendency to take away this right from men."Women... filthy creatures!" A thought that had been dormant for two years burst out again. "Despicable!" Russ got up from bed, washed his face with cold water in the bathroom, and made a decision he had made two years ago. Tears flowed down from the corners of his eyes without warning. It was just a lost love, just being dumped, not once or twice, why cry? Russ himself didn't know, he only knew that this time he had invested the most emotions. If even this failed, his vow to "never fall in love again" would probably come true."Lost love is just a very ordinary thing!" Russ told himself, and this sentence kept repeating in his mind, unknowingly, he walked to the desk, opened a book, a book that he had read repeatedly several times this week - "Exploration of Criminal Psychology". Russ was not a policeman or a criminal, nor did he plan to be one in the future. He read such books just out of curiosity, and some obscure words he couldn't even understand. The page he opened was the one with the bookmark, which talked about an old case that almost everyone knew now - the serial murder of prostitutes in London, England, now commonly known as the "Jack the Ripper" case."Female depreciation syndrome..." Russ began to mutter, "No way, I won't get this boring disease, even if I hate women, it's not to the point of hatred..." Russ flipped through a few pages and threw the book aside, sat on the sofa, opened a pack of cigarettes, and did what he often did - smoked from the first one to the last. Russ knew that deep down, he actually admired Jack the Ripper, but his fear was greater than that admiration.

  An hour had passed, and Russ just sat there smoking, not in the mood to do anything. At this time, the quiet phone that had been lying on the bed for an hour suddenly rang - it was the ringtone his girlfriend had chosen for him - to know, Americans rarely pay attention to mobile phone ringtones, which they consider a meaningless thing. "Hello... it's me, I thought about it, and we should make up." The voice of his girlfriend came from the phone. "Are you kidding me?" "No, I just feel a bit sorry for you." "You mean, you didn't even think it through before suggesting we break up?" "Yeah, yeah, just say whether you're willing to make up or not!" "...". Russ didn't speak, he didn't know how to respond. For anyone else, this would also be a difficult question to answer. "Fine, that's your choice, there's no chance now!" His girlfriend ended the call, and the phone rang with a busy tone. "Damn bitch!" Russ, who rarely swore, suddenly blurted out these words in his mind, he angrily slammed the phone to the ground, "What does she take me for?!"

  Every day, there are always some unpleasant things that happen, and this is unavoidable. Contradictions and mistakes exist between you and me, and they can never be erased. Just like a mobile phone that has been smashed, even if it's repaired, it will no longer be the original phone, but a phone with cracks. Many people know this truth, but they are unwilling to face it.

  After an unknown period of time, Rus opened his computer and entered the website he created - a website called "Luo Ren". This website gathered many people like him who were not successful in their careers and were dissatisfied with their lives. However, they rarely expressed their grievances on the website; instead, they discussed their ideals and views on current events. It was more like a gathering place for social elites, or even global elites - "Luo Ren" was an open and free non-commercial forum for netizens around the world. Rus would spend some time every day to check on his "child", and today was no exception, despite the strange occurrence. If the administrator of a non-commercial forum didn't frequently go online to manage it, the website wouldn't be able to sustain itself.

  "Today is an ordinary day, some things that affect my mood happened. My girlfriend and I broke up... of course, it wasn't me who dumped her. Now, I'm extremely disappointed in women, but I'm very clear that I won't commit suicide, nor will I choose to be gay, I'll live a healthy life as before, continue doing a good job on the website..."

  Lus finished writing a not-too-long-or-short blog post, then leaned back in his chair, his mind a complete blank, unsure of what to think about. His gaze remained fixed on the top left corner of the screen, where his ID on the "Luo Ren" forum was displayed - JACK.

  China · Wuhan · A certain high school ——

  "The results of this joint examination have been released. According to the regulations of the Education Commission, students' scores cannot be made public, so I will only announce the top scorer in each subject for now. Please help distribute the test papers." The teacher said to the students below, holding a list.

  The boy sitting alone in the last row of the fourth group seemed to be ignoring the teacher's words, and was writing something on his notebook with his head down. All seats in this class were double-occupancy, except for his.

  "Chinese, first place, Li Ming, 135 points. English, first place, Li Ming, 128 points. Politics, first place, Li Ming, 90 points. History, first place, Li Ming, 93 points." As the teacher read out the names of the top students in each subject, the students below began to whisper among themselves, and some people's eyes turned to the boy sitting alone in the last row of the fourth group. Only he himself did not notice that someone was looking at him, and continued to write with his head down.

  "Mathematics, first place, Wang Zishan. Geography, first place, Chen Shi." After the top students in the last two subjects were announced, the number of people looking back at the boy in the last row did not decrease, but instead increased.

  The test papers were quickly distributed to each student's hands. The boy in the last row picked up his English test paper, lazily glanced at the score - 128 points. The name column was written with two words "Li Ming". He also picked up the math test paper, a big 24 points entered his eyes, next to the geography paper was marked with an even bigger 17 points, the bright red handwriting almost tore through the paper. "Hehe..." Li Ming smiled, crumpled all six test papers into balls and threw them behind him, then continued to write something with his head down. In the corner of the wall behind him, there were already many such paper balls.

  The bell rang, signaling the end of class. The teacher was the first to leave the classroom, while the students responsible for cleaning stayed behind. The other students packed up their bulging backpacks and left in twos and threes. Only Li Ming remained, sitting in his last row seat, writing furiously on his notebook until he finished the page. He looked up to find that only two students sweeping the floor were left in the classroom. "Alright, today's task is done!" Li Ming stretched lazily, stuffed his notebook into his desk drawer, and walked out of the classroom. Unlike the others, he didn't carry a heavy backpack; instead, he left with empty hands. On his seat was only a flat, empty double-shoulder bag.

  Li Ming's home is two bus stops away from school, but he doesn't like taking the bus. He walks back every day. It's not that he can't afford to spend a dollar, nor does he have any interest in exercising. He just thinks there's nothing to do at home, so he kills time on the way. Li Ming lives alone and doesn't need to worry about his parents nagging him for coming home late like others do. At home, he can do things that he can't do at school: for example, lying on the sofa smoking a whole pack of cigarettes; or going online at an internet cafe at two or three in the morning. These are things that ordinary students wouldn't dare to imagine, at least not in the eyes of his classmates.

  The long night was endless, and it was hard to fall asleep. Many students couldn't relate to this feeling. They usually did their homework or studied until after 12 o'clock, then fell asleep like a dead cat. Li Ming didn't have such an experience. He didn't even have all his textbooks, and there wasn't much worth learning; he also didn't need to hand in his assignments, which seemed to be a privilege granted by his teachers for a long time. Most importantly, he just didn't want to learn. In his opinion, the six subjects taught at school were useless, whether he was good or bad at them. Today, he stayed home and smoked a pack of cigarettes, then went to bed before 12 o'clock but couldn't fall asleep. It wasn't because he had something on his mind or was thinking about problems; his brain was empty, and he simply couldn't sleep. The time on his phone quickly jumped to 2 o'clock, and he still didn't feel sleepy. So, like usual, he got out of bed, put on his clothes, and went out. The nearest internet cafe was within a ten-minute walk from home.

  China's internet cafes are open all night, at least in Wuhan, despite laws that prohibit them from operating past a certain time. Li Ming sat in front of an LCD computer screen, the image on his monitor different from those around him. It wasn't a network game, nor was it chat software, a movie or animation, and certainly not the kind of video some middle-aged men secretly watch when they shrink their media player to a tiny size while hiding in a corner. What was displayed on his screen was a forum, an American one.

  Li Ming is currently viewing a webpage which is today's log written by this forum administrator.

  A blog written by someone with the username JACK.