You're my wife, don't doubt it!

"Explain what?" Xiao Yao said, bewildered. "No need to explain, what's there to explain?"

Hearing Xiao Yao's cold tone, Shen Jie cautiously glanced at his expression, feeling even more uneasy.

The girl hesitated, then said, "Dog, listen to me..."

Xiao Yao shook his head irritably: "There's nothing to say, and you don't need to explain, because I believe you unconditionally, and I won't listen to a single word of this nonsense."

Shen Jie got the answer she wanted, nodded in satisfaction, and gave him a sweet smile from the bottom of her heart.

"Doggy, you never disappoint me," Shen Jie thought.

“What’s bothering me right now,” Xiao Yao explained, “I’ve reached my breaking point. If it were just me, it wouldn’t matter, but I can’t tolerate your reputations being tarnished like this—but I don’t know what I can or should do!”

Xiao Yao felt a deep sense of powerlessness.

Although everyone knows that covering one's mouth can cure all diseases, without that all-encompassing hand, it's useless no matter how much you know.

That day, Xiao Yao heard a new version of the rumor, saying that the reason he could sing dolphin voices was because he was "eunuch," in a physical sense.

After school, he found a note in his desk drawer.

A printed note.

The letter, signed by the Earl of Nottingham, suggested that they start by working on "the temple of the people" to get out of their predicament, and promised to set aside past grievances and provide assistance.

This suggestion appealed to both Xiao Yao and Yu Luying, but neither of them dared to hide it from the organization. After arguing, they forced themselves to agree and handed the note to Yu Bo as a clue to track down those who wantonly changed other people's minds, promising not to act on their own.

But deep down, Xiao Yao knew he was beginning to waver.

Can principles help us escape this gossip and this kind of verbal persecution?

If you are being oppressed, why can't you resist?

It was a weekend, and the weather wasn't great. By chance, the three little ones and Zhao Xiaomei got together for a small get-together. After having hot pot for lunch, someone suggested going to see a movie, and everyone agreed. It just so happened that the place where they had eaten wasn't far from the dark cinema near People's Square, so the four little ones walked there to digest their food.

As Xiao Yao approached the movie theater, he remembered the first time Shen Jie ran away from home. She dragged her bags to his house, only to be driven away by him—by Yu Luying—by himself—in short, she was driven away by everyone. He searched for her all night, and finally found her in this dark movie theater the next day.

He still remembers how Shen Jie, like a cat, lay on the sofa, looking miserable, and smiled at him.

Was there a smile? I can't quite remember, but whatever, that's the gist of it.

Zhao Xiaomei told the three children that she had been "cooperating" with the organization to do some memory recovery training these days, but the results were not ideal. Xiao Yao comforted her, saying, "Don't push yourself too hard."

“However, I recently discovered that I have an ability,” Zhao Xiaomei said, as casually as if she were saying, “I bought a bag last year”: “I can stop time.”

The three little ones stopped in their tracks and looked at each other in bewilderment.

“You all already know,” Zhao Xiaomei said with a slightly embarrassed smile and a hint of timidity in her voice, “right?”

“Hmm,” Xiao Yao pondered for a moment before answering truthfully, “The past you—another you—used this ability to leave a deep impression on me…on us…on everyone.”

Zhao Xiaomei told the three children that although she had "awakened" or "remembered" this talent again, she still lacked control over it.

In other words, when she wants to stop time, she may not succeed, but when she doesn't want to, it will happen from time to time, which confuses her.

With some time still to go before the movie started—and it wouldn't matter if there wasn't enough time—Xiao Yao encouraged Zhao Xiaomei to try one more time.

Zhao Xiaomei hesitated for a moment, but still did as Xiao Yao suggested.

She successfully stopped time.

The dark movie theater looked completely different in front of the three little ones.

The surroundings darkened, as if a movie was about to start.

The cinema in front of them, originally designed by László Hudec in the style of Shanghai, was covered with all kinds of brightly colored neon signs and directional signs. Under the illumination of several stage lights shining down from somewhere in the air, it was extremely eye-catching and exuded a charming magic, making everyone here feel that missing this show today might be a lifelong regret.

Of course, Xiao Yao and his few friends were not the only ones who wanted to go in and join the fun.

A long line of people of all shapes and sizes had already formed in front of the theater's ticket office. It was clear that many of them were wearing school uniforms from nearby middle schools, and there were also several wearing uniforms from St. Francis Middle School.

Xiao Yao was very curious about what country's currency the ticket booth accepted, so he squeezed to the front to check. He found that it was not a ticket booth at all, but a popcorn stand—but no one was buying the popcorn.

The shop assistant sat at his typewriter behind the counter, typing away, his expression a mixture of sadness and joy, obscured by the mountain of unsold popcorn.

There was a ticket book on the counter. People in line would register in the register, grab a ticket, and head straight for the cinema entrance.

Xiao Yao glanced at the register, which contained all sorts of entries. The only thing he was certain of was that there wasn't a single person who had written their real name.

This free, fully self-service, and unverified model is naturally incredibly efficient. By the time Xiao Yao understood the situation, Shen Jie and the other two people in the queue had already reached him.

After haphazardly registering following the instructions, the four people bought tickets and joined the excited crowd of spectators heading towards the theater entrance.

This “Big Dark Cinema” was built nearly a century ago and now has six screening rooms, one large and five small, but it is not the largest in the area.

This time, however, there were nine screening rooms that looked the same size – there was a mailbox in the middle for some unknown purpose, and each screening room had a set of posters and signboards at the entrance.

Upon closer inspection, most of them are B-grade productions with sensationalist titles that wouldn't even pass censorship. It's unclear whether they're just using clickbait or are serious about making things happen.

What's infuriating is that Xiao Yao, Shen Jie, and Yu Luying, looking at the male and female characters drawn on the poster, all felt that they looked like themselves.

But Zhao Xiaomei frowned and shook her head, unable to agree.

Xiao Yao tried to summon Don Quixote, but there was no response. The group concluded that there was definitely something special about this place.

Given that no valuable intelligence had been discovered and no threat of any kind had been encountered, they decided to continue their investigation before reporting the situation to Father Yu.

The first thing to do is to see what these mind-blowing movies are actually about.

Considering time efficiency, the group decided that each person would watch one film and then exchange information afterward.

The first choice is naturally those most exotic and popular ones.

Xiao Yao was stuck with a film that was hard to categorize as pornography, thriller, or pure horror. It was about a guy who was originally useless, but after obtaining a spell, he could force any woman to fall in love with him unconditionally. Only death could break the spell.

So the boy unscrupulously cast the spell, enjoying the harem of admirers, a scene that was extremely lewd and obscene.

Up to this point, Xiao Yao even felt that the male lead's resemblance to him was not so offensive anymore.

But what happened next was something he hadn't expected.

These women, controlled by magic and hopelessly in love with the male protagonist, waged a war among themselves in order to possess him exclusively.

The male protagonist, who knows nothing but that spell, is helpless and even enjoys it.

The film's style also abruptly shifted from lust and pleasure to bloodshed and madness.

Every woman who died tragically in the war, upon having her curse broken on her deathbed, would invariably use the most vicious prophecies to curse the male protagonist.

When the film reached its climax, and the surviving woman, covered in blood, pointed a large pair of scissors at the male protagonist's crotch, Xiao Yao could no longer bear it and fled the theater, covering his face.

He suddenly realized that the woman's face looked like Yu Luying's.

It was an extremely unpleasant movie-watching experience.

Xiao Yao slipped out of the screening room, wondering if he should find a corner to hide in for a while, so that Shen Jie and Yu Luying wouldn't complain about him for slacking off halfway through the screening.

But when I looked up, I saw that the two of them were already standing outside.

The two men looked strange. Although they were both waiting there, they stood two meters apart and did not speak to each other.

When the two saw Xiao Yao come out, they finally made a move and looked over together.

Xiao Yao guessed that the two of them had seen a program that was not something the other could tell them, and were hoping that he could step in to help them out. So he pulled Shen Jie aside first and asked her what was going on.

It turns out that what Shen Jie saw was a story that seemed to be a suspenseful detective story.

A still-attractive wealthy woman was strangled to death in her bed, with no signs of assault and no loss of property.

Rumors spread like wildfire, putting immense pressure on the police. Finally, they apprehended a suspect, an unremarkable middle-aged man.

Although both the physical evidence and his wife's testimony were very unfavorable to him, he still only admitted to having contact with the deceased, but refused to admit to murder under any circumstances.

The righteous prosecutor, fearing that the real culprit was someone else, suppressed the case and investigated the truth.

The investigation revealed that the deceased and the man were childhood sweethearts, but they parted ways after the man got together with his current wife.

Later, the deceased became wealthy, while the man and his wife struggled to make ends meet due to the wife's family's decline.

The deceased wanted to reconcile with the man, but the man's wife, upon learning of this, feared that her husband would change his mind, and thus committed the murder.

The man was ultimately acquitted, while his wife was sentenced to death.

On the day of the execution, the wife asked to see her husband one last time, and the police agreed.

The wife then asked to kiss her husband goodbye, and he agreed.

Finally, in front of her husband, who, though no longer young, was still tall and imposing, the petite wife stood on tiptoe, opened her lips, and bit the man's throat hard.

Bullets rained down on her body, but they couldn't make her give up until the man stopped breathing completely.

It turned out that the day before her execution, the wife received a letter from the deceased wealthy woman while in prison.

The letter was sent by someone entrusted by the wealthy woman before her death. It revealed a conspiracy between the wealthy woman and her childhood sweetheart that had taken place more than a decade ago.

It turns out that the man and his childhood sweetheart were both penniless back then, but his current wife fell in love with him at first sight.

So the childhood sweetheart made a deal with the man: the man would marry a wealthy woman, and then the childhood sweetheart would "accidentally kill" the man's wife so that he could inherit the property. After he was released from prison, the two would reunite.

Unexpectedly, after marrying his wife, the man did not give her any dowry due to her father's opposition. Meanwhile, his childhood sweetheart unexpectedly became successful and wealthy, and had no desire to get her hands dirty with murder again.

In the end, the penniless man asked his childhood sweetheart for money, only to be ridiculed.

Her childhood sweetheart, who was already a wealthy woman, told him that if he didn't want to lose his current peaceful life, he should behave himself. At the same time, she secretly arranged this letter as a last resort.

As for the truth behind the rich woman's death, Shen Jie, like Xiao Yao, left the screening room before finishing the movie.

"Hey, why didn't you finish watching it!" Xiao Yao was already engrossed in the story, and the sudden ending made him stomp his foot in frustration.