Chapter 991: Beautiful Girl (36)

All of her hope collapsed in that instant.

Because of the statements made by the two parties involved, the school finally decided to expel Tang Guo on the grounds that her own conduct had brought a negative influence upon the school.

After that, Xu Meihui returned and learned of everything. She first scolded her daughter, then began taking her everywhere in search of justice.

She resigned from her job for her sake. The incident made the news, and the story of her daughter being kept by wealthy heirs spread to nearly every corner.

In the end, they naturally failed to obtain justice. Life still had to go on, so Xu Meihui found another job.

Her new boss knew her as well and knew she had a daughter who had supposedly been kept by rich young masters. Xu Meihui was only in her thirties, with refined tastes, excellent self-care, and an elegant temperament. Her boss often harassed her. Unfortunately, Tang Guo witnessed it, and that ultimately led to the tragedy.

Looking at her homeroom teacher, Tang Guo said, “Teacher, I really didn't do any of those things. Right now, all I want is to study hard and get into a university I'm satisfied with.”

The homeroom teacher believed her.

She believed the girl standing before her with those clear, untainted eyes.

“Then I'll report this to the school and see if we can communicate with those two boys and have them help clarify the truth.”

As long as those two wealthy heirs were willing to step forward and testify, the matter could be resolved.

As for the other rumors around the school, they lacked any evidence in the first place, making them much easier to control.

To be honest, she was reluctant to lose such an excellent student and genuinely sympathized with her.

“Thank you, Teacher.”

Their conversation had gone on for quite some time, and by now the next class had already started.

When Tang Guo arrived at the classroom door and had yet to speak, the Chinese teacher cast her a look of disgust.

“You’re late. Stand outside and listen.”

“I hope all students will pay attention to their moral character,” the Chinese teacher said, adjusting her glasses. “Especially in a sacred place like school. Don't bring bad habits in here and affect the other students.”

“A student should behave like a student. School is a place for studying, not for showing off and dressing like a peacock. That kind of behavior damages the image of the school.”

After those remarks, the teacher ignored Tang Guo and continued with the lesson.

Only after class ended did she walk down from the podium. Passing by Tang Guo, she frowned.

“Student, I hope you don't bring certain unhealthy influences into the class and affect the other students.”

“Teacher Chen, what kind of influence are you referring to?” Tang Guo looked directly at her.

Teacher Chen's expression darkened.

“You know perfectly well what you've done. Do I really need to spell it out? You were twenty minutes late earlier. Where exactly were you fooling around this time?”

She had never liked Tang Guo.

The girl was beautiful, somewhat proud, and particularly unpleasant in her eyes.

Once, she had accidentally met Xu Meihui, a young and beautiful woman who was also a manager at a major company.

At the time, Teacher Chen had immediately thought to herself that for such a young single mother to reach a managerial position, she must have gone through countless unspoken rules.

Later, when the rumors about Tang Guo spread, she became even more convinced of her suspicions.

If the upper beam wasn't straight, neither would the lower beam be.

For a beautiful woman, wasn't climbing the corporate ladder easy enough?

Perhaps Tang Guo herself had been conceived accidentally and had only been born because Xu Meihui had no choice.

“Teacher Chen,” Tang Guo said calmly, “you can ask the homeroom teacher whether I was fooling around with her.”

The moment those words came out, everyone around burst into laughter.

---

Translator's Note

Okay, this one is going to be a little longer than my usual translator's notes. 😂

I've had some thoughts about the earlier arcs of this novel sitting in the back of my head for a while, and since I started translating from much later in the story, I never really had a chance to talk about them when they actually happened. So consider this me finally getting around to rambling about something that has been on my mind for a while.

One thing that really stood out to me when I first read this novel was Tang Guo's attitude toward people who had wronged her.

And I don't mean simply that she was the type to go, "You wronged me, so I'm going to hold a grudge forever." It's actually much more nuanced than that.

The novel repeatedly brings up this idea that who gets to decide when the victim has forgiven enough? Who gets to decide when they should let go? Who gets to decide that someone has apologized sufficiently and therefore everything should be okay now?

I understood the idea the first time I read it.

But I don't think it really sunk in until my second read.

Because the first time around, there were definitely moments where I found myself thinking:

"Tang Guo... maybe you can let this one go?"

And I don't mean that I thought the male lead was innocent. 😂

Especially in the earlier arcs, the man did some seriously messed-up things (I mean his soul restrictions kick in REAL quick). And, same goes for the other "supporting characters" They had their reasons sometimes, or they were just selfish, they may just not put Tang Guo in their eyes at all, or even be dealing with their own trauma, and all of that does matter when understanding why they behaved the way they did—but understanding someone is not the same as saying they were right.

There were times when I genuinely thought some of the tragedies could have been avoided if Tang Guo had simply explained things, cleared up a misunderstanding, or been willing to take that final step (espeically with the male lead filter on when it comes to the guy).

Because she could have.

She's intelligent. She's capable. She often understood exactly what was happening.

But sometimes she deliberately chose not to.

She would basically give the other person the choice: If you want to understand me, then come and ask. If you want to hold onto your pride instead, that's your choice too.

And then she would let them live with that choice.

I remember reading some of those earlier arcs and thinking, "Girl... you could make this so much easier." 😂 (Is my intelligence is the same as the system for saying that?)

Because eventually some of these characters realize what they did wrong. They realize that they love her, or care for her (although, this does end up being the case due to her manipulations). They regret the way they treated her. Even with the male lead, he changes. He starts doing everything he can to make it up to her and treat her well.

And looking at just the male lead for example; Tang Guo does forgive him.

That's actually an important part of this whole thing.

She isn't saying, "You hurt me once, therefore you are unforgivable forever."

She can recognize that someone has genuinely changed. She can accept an apology. She can forgive. She can even treat that person kindly again.

But she doesn't necessarily forget.

And she doesn't necessarily give them back exactly the relationship they had before.

That was probably where I struggled the most on my first read.

Because there were moments when the male lead was being an absolute sweetheart, doing everything he could for her, and I was sitting there thinking:

"Okay, he's learned his lesson! He's doing everything right! Maybe you can just let this go now? Maybe you can marry the man already?" 😂

And Tang Guo would basically tell him:

"I've already forgiven you. Why are you still being greedy?"

And on my first read, part of me was like...

But... why not?

If he's genuinely changed, if he genuinely loves you, if he's doing everything he can to make things right, why keep that final boundary?

And then I reread it.

And somehow, the second time around, I was much more on her side.

Because forgiveness isn't the same thing as forgetting.

It isn't the same thing as pretending nothing happened.

It isn't the same thing as restoring the relationship to what it could have been if the hurt had never happened in the first place.

And it certainly isn't something that an outsider gets to demand from you.

You can forgive someone and still not want a relationship with them.

You can forgive someone and keep your distance.

You can forgive someone and decide that you don't trust them with the same things anymore.

You can forgive someone and still remember exactly why you decided to walk away.

And sometimes you simply don't forgive at all.

That's a separate matter too.

I don't think every grudge is automatically justified forever. Sometimes we really do have to ask ourselves whether we're holding onto something unnecessarily.

But I also don't think the person standing outside the situation gets to decide that for us.

Because we don't actually know what someone else experienced.

We can empathize. We can imagine ourselves in their position. We can try to understand.

But we're still imagining it as ourselves. We don't have their memories. We don't have their history. We don't have their particular fears, experiences, or all the little things that made that particular hurt what it was for them.

Something that seems insignificant to you might be deeply painful to someone else.

It's like... if someone threw a lizard at me as a prank, I'd probably be absolutely horrified. 😂

Someone else might just laugh and go, "It's a lizard. Who cares?"

And to them, maybe it really is nothing.

But if lizards terrify you, then "Come on, it was just a joke" doesn't magically make the experience less horrible.

It's a ridiculously small example, obviously, but the principle is the same.

You don't get to decide how much something should have hurt another person.

And I think that's what finally clicked for me on my second read.

Because, honestly, I'm not exactly the most forgiving person myself. 😂

If someone really hurts me or breaks my trust, I can accept that they're sorry. I can acknowledge that they've changed. I can even forgive them.

And still think:

"I'm glad you're doing better. I just don't want you in my life anymore."

And apparently, depending on who you ask, that makes you petty, cold, unforgiving, or incapable of being the bigger person.

I think that's especially complicated because, at least where I come from, there can be a lot of pressure to forgive and accommodate.

Be nice! Don't hold grudges! Don't be difficult! Don't be petty! Be the bigger person!

And sometimes that pressure becomes even stronger when it's someone close to you.

"But they're family."

"But they've changed."

"But they're trying."

"But they apologized."

And eventually it becomes:

"You said you forgave them. Why are you still holding onto it?"

But... forgiveness and forgetting are different things.

And forgiving someone doesn't mean you have to pretend the relationship is exactly what it was before.

Sometimes you forgive and move forward together.

Sometimes you forgive and move forward separately.

Sometimes you forgive, but the relationship never becomes what it could have been.

And sometimes you decide that you simply don't want anything to do with that person anymore.

I think that's what I found so strangely liberating about Tang Guo on my reread.

She didn't let other people decide what her feelings were supposed to look like.

She could forgive someone without forgetting.

She could recognize that someone had changed without pretending that their past actions had never happened.

She could be kind to someone without giving them everything they wanted.

And if something had been broken badly enough that she didn't want to put it back together, she was allowed to make that choice too.

The funny thing is that, on my first read, I occasionally thought:

"Tang Guo, please. Let it go. This could all be so much happier if you just gave him a chance." 😂

Not because I thought what he did was okay.

Not because I thought she owed him forgiveness.

Just because I could see that he genuinely loved her later, and I could see how much easier things might have been if she had chosen to let go of some of that hurt.

But the second time around, after having the entire story much more fresh in my head, I found myself thinking:

Wait. Why does she have to be the one to make everything easier?

Why does she have to be the one who fixes the misunderstanding?

Why does she have to be the one who decides that what happened wasn't worth holding onto?

Why does someone else's remorse automatically mean that she has to erase the consequences of what they did?

She gave them choices.

They made them.

And sometimes she simply let them live with those choices.

And honestly?

I understood that a lot more the second time around.

Maybe that's why Tang Guo felt so liberating to me.

Because in real life, we often don't have the luxury of being completely honest about these things. Sometimes we have to compromise. Sometimes we have to maintain relationships. Sometimes we have to be polite. Sometimes we have to forgive because moving forward is easier than continuing to fight.

And sometimes we do genuinely want to forgive and move on.

But that doesn't mean the hurt disappears.

And it doesn't mean that everyone around us gets to decide that we're "over it" just because they think we should be.

I think that's what this reread made me realize about myself too.

The first time I read Tang Guo, there were moments when I wanted her to be a little more forgiving.

The second time?

Oh? Go off, queen. 😂

Maybe I've finally understood what she was trying to say all along.

Am I just projecting here?? Anyway, I've rambled enough (was this TN longer than the actual chap?) 😂

If I had been translating and posting this novel from the very beginning, you probably would have gotten way too many translator's notes about the first few arcs.

So I suppose you should consider yourselves lucky that I started hundreds of chapters later. 😂

But now I'm curious about everyone else.

What did you think about Tang Guo?

Did you ever find yourself thinking, "Okay, maybe she could be a little more forgiving?"

Did you understand her position immediately? Or did your opinion of her change as you kept reading?

Because mine definitely did.

On the second read, I was apparently converted. 😂

—Cy