1 The Entry

In the sweltering heat, a petite girl got out of the dull, old, yellow taxi and stood before the heavy and gigantic iron gates of the school. Even from outside, one could guess the amount of money put into building and maintaining this fancy place.

Lush green gardens all around, a big gray marble fountain at the entrance and historical architecture of the school, equipped with the most modern facilities boasted the wealth of the owners as well as the people who attended this private school. It looked like a city in itself.

*A huge campus worthy of its fame indeed!*

This girl stood at the gate in awe for about thirty seconds to take everything in.

Since the new academic year was yet to start and it was so hot to begin with, no one was to be seen on campus grounds. She glanced at her watch and realized that she was late. She turned her head to look around and found a small post just beside the gate.

The post had a sliding window where a guard was sitting. She had already spotted him looking at her curiously from the corner of her eye. But as soon as she turned around, the man pretended to be busy in some work. She knocked on the window to ask him for directions.

The guard opened the window.

"Hello, my name is Mei Qingyang and I…"

Before she could utter anything else, the guard gave her a look of disdain. He then pointed to a small luxurious gray building inside the campus and said in a slightly high tone, "You! You are finally here? Madam has been waiting for your arrival."

He pressed a button and the small side gate opened up for her. He then looked at the clock adorning the wall at his side and imparted some more knowledge to her, "Five minutes more and I wouldn't have let you in. Since you're new, I am telling you beforehand. The school honors punctuality and discipline more than anything. If poor pests like you start disrupting madam's schedule like this, she won't have peace of mind ever. Do you have any idea how busy she is?"

Mei Qingyang bit her lip and scanned the guard from top to bottom with her big marble like green eyes that exuded coldness and apathy.

To her, this was not unexpected to be honest. She had long heard about this school at her home. And seeing that even the guard of the school was wearing clothes made of better material than the dress she was wearing now, she could tell that the guard was looking down upon her. And this green skater dress she was wearing was even one of the best she owned!

Because she was always told by everyone around her that she looked too cold and aloof, despite her best efforts to be more amiable, she had decided upon this green dress today to make a favorable impression on everyone.

Sure it was too hot right now, but the color and pattern definitely provided a contrast against all the yellow and orange trees whose leaves had started changing their color due to approaching fall season. She had thought that it would be a relief to anyone saturated with all the fall colors and perhaps put on a good first impression?

"What are you looking at? You still have time to linger around here? Why don't you just go inside?", the guard was getting a bit impatient with this lowly girl who was wasting his and his master's time without any purpose.

He also freaked out a bit after he got a frosty glare from this girl. *I need to report it to madam for sure.*

She thanked the guard politely for his help and headed towards the small building that the guard had pointed to earlier. Looking around, this office building was just on the right side of the big fountain. From outside, only shining glass walls were visible, guess it was easier to keep an eye on everything at front from here.

Although it seemed quite small compared to the tall buildings behind it, it had two floors and was the exclusive office of the owner of the school and her new boss, Yu Rong.

Yu Rong was the younger sister of Yu Ming, the third richest businessman in the M nation. They had established this school for the rich people to send their spoilt kids to have their way.

However, what this school was famous for was their charity. They had established a system where they provided free education from elementary to high school to the children at the other end of the spectrum; the poor kids.

These children were either orphaned or their parents could not afford raising them and thus, 'sold' them to this school in hopes for them to get some skills and get a job after graduation.

Everything was provided for these children including lodging and boarding. It was advertised as 'real life simulation of the society' for the kids. It showed everyone equal before education and how rich and poor mingled harmoniously.

The reality though, was far from the rosy picture portrayed. The poor children were basically recruited as servants to the rich kids. The admissions were taken till middle school to mold younger children easily into the servant mentality. They did all the menial work for the rich kids and thus, the gap between the skills was wide.

Furthermore, the campus also housed a college with degrees offered in humanities, sciences, management and engineering. But since, it was not free, only wealthy people could afford it.

The servants also did not retaliate because if they actually curried the favor of their masters, they would end up being permanently employed by their rich counterparts in their businesses, either as personal servants or some small employee in one of the businesses of their parents.

Getting admitted to this school was considered as the ticket to a stable job for the poor. Thus, everyone would bear the discrimination and humiliation quietly for a happier future.

This system obviously served the Yu family well since they were swimming in money. Large donations poured in from the wealthy parents when their children were happy. Of course those parents were aware of what was going on behind the scenes. They actually wanted their children to learn how to trample on insignificant lives and get their way in the world.

Furthermore, since the course was supposedly rigorous both during school and college, it was not unusual for kids who could not cope up with the stress to end up in hospitals or commit suicides. Any deaths or injuries related to bullying of poor by rich could easily be disguised as stress induced.

Most interestingly, the pairing of master-servant was almost always done with opposite gender, a guy would almost always have a girl servant and vice-versa, but largely depended on the master's preference.

The servants also had small rooms attached to their master's suite room. These suite rooms were equipped with 5-star hotel type of facilities. And the servants needed to stand-by in service of their owners 24*7.

Unfortunately, it took money to raise the poor kids for free, so one master usually had only one school sponsored servant. The ones who could afford multiple servants sponsored by their parents, had more.

There was a strict rule of bringing outsiders to the school when taking admissions, and so, if some wealthy kid took admission to the school later in life, they were only allowed to get servants from the school. They could not bring their trusted aides from their respective families.

Children of both the groups were taught since an early age to keep their mouths shut. The rich students who would take pity on the poor ones and try to stand up for them would be bullied as well.

"Hmph! Dad was right, everything on the outside looks impeccable!" Mei Qingyang muttered to herself as she looked around for any obvious signs of bullying.

The Ministry of Education of M nation had tried to investigate the school for they did not believe Yus' claims of happy and just society that they showed to everyone, but everything was in vain. Not only had they failed to reveal this school's true colors, they had even lost most of the people they had sent for investigations to various weird accidents.

The circumstances of those people's deaths were very suspicious, but police could never find out the culprits. Of course, the police force was all in cahoots with these people who basically ran the whole country.

This had frustrated the Ministry of Education a lot. Not that the ministers here were not sending their own kids to this school or that they did not side with these guys to begin with. But the current Education Minister of M country, Mr. Jiang Nuo was an honest man. He really wanted to open everyone's eyes about this much coveted school and their heinous system.

There were many spies of the school in the Ministry as well, because the employees also happened to be parents of kids studying there. They did not want their children's future to be affected by unnecessary meddling of their minister.

Mr. Jiang had tried very hard to keep his operations secret, going as far as sending his only son to the death door. But he did not know who to trust anymore. Even his closest friends in the Ministry ended up sabotaging all the work he had done. In the process, he ended up losing his son as well.

What was more frustrating was that the school was very good at producing prodigies. Despite all the shortcomings, the wealthy kids were very competitive and did pour their all into learning and getting ahead.

And thus, the school was not only famous at the home country, but internationally as well. It was another thing that they did not admit international students to keep their dirt within the country itself.

"I wonder if I will be able to see brother's room," she surmised by herself again.

While this frail looking Mei Qingyang with a small suitcase was walking towards the gray building, she was trying to spot any obvious signs of some kind of bullying. Though she could be content about this just being the beginning of her assignment, she only had one year for now. If she did not show any results, she would be called back. And another mission would result in failure. If she did not die before the end of the year that is.