Chapter 67: As a father, is there anything wrong with me disciplining my son?

"Hey, what are you doing!"

Qiao Yingzi stamped her foot in anxious exasperation.

She truly hadn't expected Hecheng to call the police yet again at the slightest disagreement.

This was entirely different from last time.

The previous time, Fang Yifan had proactively brought over a turtle to provoke Hecheng, and Uncle Fang Yuan was the one who ended up taken away. Although she had felt it was a bit excessive back then, it was still understandable.

But this time, Fang Yifan hadn't provoked him proactively—well, alright, there had indeed been a faint undertone of provocation when he was showing off earlier, but Hecheng hadn't acted out at the time.

Yet now, the moment an opportunity presented itself, he flew into a rage and made a huge fuss by calling the police again.

She felt this was simply going too far.

The person involved this time was none other than Fang Yifan.

If things went south, it could potentially ruin Fang Yifan's future.

"What on earth are you trying to do?!" Li Tiegun also roared at Hecheng, a mix of shock and fury on his face. "What kind of deep grudge or hatred is this? Why must you always try to ruin a classmate's life over a minor disagreement? Are you psychologically warped?"

The commotion here caught the attention of Fang Yifan and his mother, who were engaged in their usual routine of chasing and hitting each other nearby.

Tong Wenjie hurried over, and upon hearing what had happened, she lunged at Hecheng with claws bared.

"You little bastard, you want to ruin my son? I'll fight you to the death!"

Li Tiegun quickly stepped in to block her, advising, "Don't resort to violence, or even if you're in the right, you'll be in the wrong!"

"No way! I'm going to fight him today!" Tong Wenjie struggled, still trying to pounce on Hecheng with a ferocious expression. "This is our family business, what right does he have to stick his nose into it?"

"You nailed it!" Hecheng smiled. "Precisely because it's family business, I had to step in and manage it!

To fail in teaching is the father's fault!

As the dutiful son Fang Yifan's father, is there any problem with me disciplining my son?"

"What?!" Both Li Tiegun and Tong Wenjie froze, completely failing to understand why Hecheng would say such a thing. Then, they turned their gazes in unison toward the blushing Fang Yifan, realizing there must be a backstory here.

Even Qiao Yingzi felt embarrassed on Fang Yifan's behalf.

Well, well!

From this perspective, Hecheng's intervention in this matter wasn't entirely unprovoked or forcefully imposed...

Yet everyone knew that was just harsh talk from a bet. The loser was supposed to call the other father, but Fang Yifan hadn't actually called him that, and one couldn't seriously consider oneself Fang Yifan's father just because of it.

Moreover, doing this right in front of Fang Yifan's mother... it was utterly awkward!

"Fang! Yi! Fan!" No one knew a son better than his mother. The moment Tong Wenjie saw her son's expression, she guessed roughly what had happened. Facing such a supremely "filial" son, she gritted her teeth in pure rage.

In a different context, upon learning of this, she might have laughed it off with a few scolding remarks, and perhaps later that night, when alone at home, she might even indulge in a fleeting daydream, secretly feeling that her son was quite filial after all.

But right now, facing Hecheng who had called the police, and remembering that Fang Yifan's biological father had just been sent away by Hecheng only to return shortly, and now Hecheng was calling the police again to get her son locked up—even though her son had essentially pimped her out, and Hecheng was undeniably both tender-aged and drop-dead handsome—she had zero mental capacity to entertain any of these ambiguous thoughts or go with the flow.

In front of Teacher Li, in front of Qiao Yingzi, and in front of her good nephew, she felt her son had completely disgraced her!

The routine chasing and hitting performance commenced once more.

However, it didn't last long.

That was because the police officers arrived very quickly.

After all, this incident potentially involved offenses against a minor.

When everyone gathered in the teachers' office, they exchanged glances with rather peculiar expressions in their eyes.

Hecheng smiled and broke the root cause wide open: "That's right! Officers, it's me who called the police again! And once more, the trouble was stirred up by this unfilial son, Fang Yifan!"

Indeed!

The police officers who arrived this time were the exact same group who had received the report a month ago and taken Fang Yifan's father away.

After all, they were all in the same jurisdiction.

Running into them again was completely normal.

"..." Hecheng thought it was normal, but the two police officers were completely bewildered by him, and with strange expressions, they began to inquire about the sequence of events.

"He's talking nonsense! Officer, this isn't any kind of drugging! It's just that Fang Yifan, as an older cousin, wanted to help his insomniac younger cousin get a good night's sleep. It's all a misunderstanding, a complete misunderstanding!" Tong Wenjie hurriedly explained, her eyes darting toward Hecheng with an undisguised desire to murder him.

Drugging a minor was no laughing matter.

If this charge stuck, her son's future would be completely ruined.

It was far more serious than her husband buying a state-protected second-class animal, the golden coin turtle, last time.

"Nonsense!" Hecheng retorted. "Lin Lei'er knew nothing about this at all. If I hadn't exposed it, Fang Yifan would still be lying that Lin Lei'er suffers from insomnia. In truth, Lin Lei'er doesn't have insomnia at all; he goes to bed at eleven, yet Fang Yifan claimed he fell asleep after one. Clearly, there is an ulterior motive here!"

Hecheng possessed sharp eyes and keen ears. Even from a distance, the conversation between Fang Yifan and Lin Lei'er had been clearly transmitted into his ears.

"Rubbish! What ulterior motive could there be? They are close biological cousins who love and care for each other, how could he possibly harm his younger cousin!" Tong Wenjie argued anxiously. "Lei'er, hurry up and tell the officers!"

"Um!" Although still a bit dazed, Lin Lei'er followed his aunt's lead to help defend his cousin. "My cousin treats me really well, there's no way he would harm me!"

The two police officers nodded and turned to look at Hecheng.

Just like last time, they really didn't want to deal with this kind of messy triviality, but Hecheng had called the police for a second time. At first glance, he was clearly a person who liked to stir things up... no, a person who took things very seriously.

Furthermore, from the previous incident, it was evident that while Hecheng was a stickler for details, he wasn't making things up randomly. Although he sometimes seemed a bit excessive and lacked a certain warmth, everything he said was logical and backed by evidence!

They didn't dare to rashly jump in and categorize the case, lest they be accused by the pedantic Hecheng of trying to smooth things over and gloss it over.

"What ulterior motive could there be?" Hecheng said indifferently. "Hard to say for sure. Leaving aside jealousy or psychological distortion, let's look at his true objective this time—odds are, it was to pick up girls!"

"Pick up girls?" Everyone fell into a thoughtful silence.

Qiao Yingzi, however, understood everything instantly and glared fiercely at Fang Yifan.

It must have been that Fang Yifan wanted to take advantage of his proximity to keep pursuing Taozi, yet didn't dare confess it directly to Aunt Tong, so he used medicine to make Aunt Tong's currently most cherished nephew drowsy, thereby easily achieving his goal of moving into her neighborhood.

She could understand that logic.

But she could not accept that Fang Yifan had lied to her and orchestrated such a messy ordeal, causing her to get into a conflict with Hecheng on his account.

"He wanted to chase Huang Zhitao, and probably Qiao Yingzi too." Seeing that they all understood yet none of them spoke up, Hecheng continued to lay it bare.

"He wanted to live in the same residential complex as them, but was afraid her mother wouldn't agree, so he drugged the nephew his mother currently pities and values the most, leaving Lin Lei'er in a stupor so that his mother would feel heartache and proactively decide to move. And now, he's succeeded!"

"That's not how it happened!" Fang Yifan was also starting to panic, hastily defending himself. "I admit I did want to move to Shuxiang Yayuan, but at first I intended to take the sleeping pills myself to get drowsy. I had already prepared the juice to drink myself, but then Lei'er came into the room to ask me a homework question, and the moment I turned around, he drank the juice instead. If you don't believe me, ask Lei'er!"

"Yes!" Lin Lei'er recalled the moment and nodded in agreement.

Tong Wenjie and Li Tiegun both let out long sighs of relief.

If that was the case, the nature of the incident completely changed, and it was no longer a major issue.