4. The Mysterious Disappearance of the Senior Student

Li An never checks his phone during class.

Chen Xuan left her phone in the office before class. Xu Hongxin, on his third day at work, had already muted notifications from the group chat. As soon as Ma Tao finished speaking, Xu Hongxin swiftly closed the game page and opened the WeChat group. Li An also tapped into the group chat to join the excitement.

In the chat history, Director Dong had sent a message half an hour ago about a meeting scheduled for nine o'clock Monday morning. The first part was routine, giving advance notice of the meeting's topic—discussing additional classes in the Academy for students preparing for summer exams.

The crucial information was in the latter half. As Ma Tao had said, the main campus had allocated two spots for “premium course teachers” to the Yudong campus. At Blue Sky, no full-time teacher doesn’t aspire to become a premium course teacher.

First, the class fee share is higher—for example, a regular piano teacher earns sixty per class, while a premium teacher can get one hundred. Second, the benefits are better. Besides social insurance, premium course teachers receive extra housing and meal subsidies each month. Third, and most importantly, resources are preferentially tilted towards them; the school provides full-scale packaging and promotion for premium teachers.

The selection of premium course teachers is a major event at Blue Sky, usually held only after all campuses’ year-end performance reviews.

“It’s good news, really,” said Xu Hongxin, who was the earliest among the four to join and had already experienced such an event, “but it has little to do with us. Performance and student numbers are the main criteria.”

Ma Tao, of course, knew this. “I just find it odd. I heard from the office that only Yudong got two spots this time—none for the other campuses.”

Xu Hongxin replied, “Can we focus on something practical? Have you decided what to eat for lunch?”

Ma Tao was so distracted by Xu Hongxin’s remark that he lost interest: “Alright, I’m out.” The four went back to their own tasks.

At noon, Ma Tao and Xu Hongxin teamed up for Sha County snacks downstairs, leaving only Li An and Chen Xuan in the office.

After updating Wang Xiaohu’s student growth files, Li An pulled out his plastic-packaged instant noodles from the drawer.

“Instant noodles again?” Chen Xuan looked up, teasing, “Is this your way of living well?”

“You’re getting clever,” Li An replied, quickly tearing open the noodle pack, dropping the noodles into his lunchbox, and squeezing the sauce packet dry like toothpaste. “Aren’t you eating again?”

“It’s too hot—I have no appetite.” Chen Xuan had only been in Rongcheng for three months, and who would have thought the comfortable spring would turn into such a stifling summer. “Feels like you can’t survive here without air conditioning.”

Li An could relate. “Still, you should try to eat a little. Eat regularly and on time, or you’ll ruin your stomach while you’re still young.”

Chen Xuan laughed, “You sound like an old man.”

Li An didn’t respond, picking up his noodles and heading out. “Enjoy your air conditioning.”

“Where are you going?” Chen Xuan called after him.

“Scrounging for buns.”

Watching Li An’s departing silhouette, Chen Xuan stopped twirling her pen. She realized that lately, she’d been actively seeking out conversations with Li An more and more often.

...

At the front desk, Li An enjoyed Chen Meili’s buns and sipped noodle soup, feeling extremely satisfied.

“It’s really a shame your husband doesn’t open a bun shop,” he said, swallowing half a bun. “Seriously, the filling is even better than my mom’s recipe.”

Wang Meili grinned ear to ear. “Next time I’ll bring you fried buns—they’re even tastier.”

“How can I accept that? I can only eat a dozen or so at most,” he joked, making Wang Meili laugh again.

“Hey, Sister Wang, what’s the deal with the half-year bonus at Yudong?” Li An took the tissue she handed him and wiped his mouth. “I heard all teachers are supposed to get it?”

Wang Meili shook her head regretfully. “This year, it’s up in the air. Our campus’s performance for the first half of the year is at the bottom among the four campuses.”

Li An was puzzled. “Didn’t we rank first in new student enrollments among the four campuses in the first quarter? Even if the second quarter was worse, we shouldn’t be last.”

Wang Meili shook her head. “Do you know how many old students renewed their courses this semester?”

Li An admitted he didn’t.

“Only twenty-three—almost half less than last year,” Wang Meili sighed. “That’s a loss of about two hundred thousand in performance.”

“I see.” Li An nodded thoughtfully, thanked Wang Meili for the buns, and returned to his classroom.

So the half-year bonus was probably gone, but the unexpected information he overheard left him shocked. When students suddenly leave an educational institution en masse, there are usually two reasons.

Either the institution had a major accident, or a large number of teachers resigned and took their students with them.

But at Yudong, the current loss of students was far more complicated.

Over the past six months, there had been no major incidents, nor had teachers resigned en masse.

Where had the old students gone?

There was an insider.

Li An was almost certain that several teachers were actively poaching students from Yudong—and doing so brazenly.

This kind of thing is well known to teachers who have spent a few years in training institutions; in fact, most have done it themselves. Institutions usually turn a blind eye.

Because from a labor perspective, when the market hasn’t set a clear standard for lesson fees at social institutions, the institution never lets up on squeezing teachers’ pay.

Li An used to have nine private students, three of whom he poached from institutions. But he’d taken them gradually over two years, and compared to the profits he generated for the institution, he didn’t feel he’d acted unethically.

But right now at Yudong, some teachers were truly unscrupulous. With such a large-scale loss of students, what had the academic affairs office been doing all this time?

And considering that the main campus gave Yudong two premium teacher slots at this particular moment, Li An felt there was even more to the story.

‘Yu Xiaobei’s teacher-student index has risen to fifty-seven.’

Just then, a system prompt flashed and interrupted Li An’s thoughts. He summoned the panel—beside Yu Xiaobei’s name, the number had changed to 57 out of 100.

He noticed, after half a day, that every child’s teacher-student index was followed by a “100.”

After pondering for a while, Li An closed the page.

Wait.

What’s meant to come is already on its way; there’s no need to waste today worrying about tomorrow.

He refocused and began his daily piano practice.

Soon, the scales from Classroom 3 echoed through the whole corridor, so loud that many young piano students gathered at the door to peek in.

Next door, Lin Pengfei’s lessons were repeatedly affected by the sound, making him a bit annoyed—especially when his students asked if he could play that loudly.

—

A fulfilling Saturday came to an end when Li An bought a fan and returned home. That night, he and Ba Wan each added an extra sausage to their dinner, then together, enjoyed the breeze and drifted into a sweet dream.