Jun Yang looked through Feng Qi’s phone thoroughly and he could not find anything that was out of place.

‘There is nothing in here that proves his innocence,’ Jun Yang thought to himself, ‘So why did he ask me to look at it? Could it be that he really wanted me to look at its exterior, its casing and so on? But how is that relevant to anything… The phone has nothing to affirm his innocence or his guilt for that matter… Wait a minute…’

As the thought flashed across his mind, Jun Yang felt gripped by a sense of disbelief. He quickly activated the phone and looked through it again. He scanned all the apps that were installed on Feng Qi’s phone and he found the evidence… or to be precise, he failed to find the evidence which was in fact the very evidence that the young man needed.

As stated by his earlier thought, there was nothing on Feng Qi’s phone to prove the young man’s innocence but on the flip side, there was nothing on it that prove his guilt either… but that was not supposed to be. If Feng Qi really did what Jun Yang was accusing him of doing, then there had to be something installed on Feng Qi’s phone but Jun Yang looked through it twice and he failed to find it.

The thing in question was none other than the Whatsapp social app, if Feng Qi was not a Whatsapp user, how was he able to release those pictures on their class’ group?

‘Is it a misunderstanding? Has he deleted the app for fear of me finding out? Or someone has faked his account?’ Jun Yang’s mind was a mess. There were too many conflicting evidence. The suspicion that was fed into his mind and the truth that was lying before his eyes were tussling. Jun Yang did not know who or what to believe.

“It seems like you have noticed the anomaly. There is no way I could have sent those pictures that you claim I did,” Feng Qi said when he noted the suspicion crawling all over Jun Yang’s face. If he was ever going to make an argument, now would be the time.

Jun Yang did not have any comment as a response to that because he did not know what to say and where he stood on the whole issue. He merely looked at Feng Qi. Feng Qi held his eyes and did not turn away from guilt or hesitation. If anything, all Jun Yang saw in the young man’s eyes was confidence.

Jun Yang was slowly being tipped into believing Feng Qi but he needed more than that. He was not going to throw his earlier conviction out the window due to a look from Feng Qi. But at least he was now open to the possibility that Feng Qi might be framed.

In other words, he needed more proof. Thankfully, Feng Qi was there to deliver.

“I can see on your face that you’re still not fully convinced,” Feng Qi continued. Jun Yang felt weirdly guilty like he was put on the spot for not trusting fully in Feng Qi but he knew the danger of blind trust.

Pei Ling came to him with a version of the story and he had chosen to trust hers to a certain degree because she came with evidence. Now, he was willing to consider Feng Qi’s side of the story but if this was everything Feng Qi had to present as his argument, then he was definitely coming up short.

Furthermore, presenting a story out of disparate and previously-meaningless tidbits like what Pei Ling did was a lot simpler than correcting an established preconception like what Feng Qi was doing.

“Perhaps, this will be able to clarify things further,” Feng Qi said as he presented another piece of compelling evidence. He turned Jun Yang’s phone in his hand and showed it to the young man.

Initially, Jun Yang was confused as to what Feng Qi was doing. This was after all, his own phone, what else could be on there to provide clarification to this incident? Even if there was something like that, he would have seen it already, wouldn’t he?

Jun Yang was not wrong, he had seen the evidence already but at the time, he did not give it a closer look, thus missing out on its implication. Now, Feng Qi was literally placing the evidence before his eyes so he would take a second look.

The screen on the phone was showing “Feng Qi’s” profile on the Whatsapp group. The “Feng Qi” who had released those series on the group chat.

Jun Yang frowned. ‘Why is he making me look at this? What is so special about this account profile?’

Jun Yang scanned the details on screen and something jumped out at him, an inconspicuous detail that made the young man frown.

“Ah, it appears like you have noticed it as well.” Feng Qi took his phone back from Jun Yang. He clicked a few buttons on it and then turned it around to show Jun Yang. In other words, Jun Yang was looking at his own phone and Feng Qi’s phone side by side. And something just did not add up.

For those who were not familiar with Whatsapp, a user had to register their phone number to open an account, essentially tying their phone number to it.

However, with the side by side comparison, that was not the case here.  Feng Qi’s screen was showing the information of his SIM card and his phone number definitely did not match the phone number that was used to register for the Whatsapp account of “Feng Qi”.

Of course, Feng Qi could have bought a second number just to register this Whatsapp account but if the goal for spreading the pictures was for the classmates to recognize them as a couple, using a fake number seemed awfully counter-productive.

Therefore, there could only be one conclusion…

[If you like my work, I would really appreciate a cup of joe as donation. Thank you. Donate here: ko-fi.com/lonelytree]