On the Seven Towers

This chapter does not require subscription. It is a brief biography of Li Jia.

Because the 56th chapter was blocked before, but the previous and next chapters are connected, so this chapter must have content. Then let's talk about Li Jia's story. Skipping it will not affect the previous and next plots. However, if you take a look, you will have a better understanding of Li Jia's performance.

Li Jia was born on October 9, 1988, and is from Honghu, Hubei. Li Jia's father is a middle school math teacher, and his mother is an employee of a garment factory. His parents hope that their son will become successful, and they are very strict with him. Li Jia has been introverted and very obedient since he was a child. He did whatever his parents said. When he was a child, he also participated in many calligraphy classes and composition classes, and later went to study computers.

Li Jia's parents like to compare him with people around them. One of Li Jia's neighbors is a girl named He Xian who has been in the same school as him from kindergarten to elementary school. She has excellent grades and often plays with him. However, as a girl, He Xian sometimes bullies Li Jia. As an excellent student, she is often the comparison object that Li Jia's parents say is stronger than Li Jia. Although Li Jia has a good relationship with her, he is always suppressed. This made him particularly unconfident in front of girls.

Li Jia, who worked hard, had always had good grades. Due to the stress of the exam in middle school, he did not get into Huanggang Middle School, which his father had always wanted him to take, but entered Honghu No. 2 Middle School. Although the latter is a key middle school in the city, this disappointed his father. In order for him to get into a better university, his father restricted his study and life more strictly. His mother also agreed with his father on this issue, which made Li Jia feel lonely and depressed.

In junior high school, Li Jia found a pen pal named Xue Ye. Li Jia called himself a fossil to show his inner loneliness and desolation. They often wrote letters. Li Jia didn't know what kind of person the other party was, but only knew that she was a girl far away in the northeast. But this did not prevent him from imagining the other party as his goddess and the object of his salvation. He wrote a lot of his troubles in the letter, and the other party was like a gentle big sister, always enlightening him. Xue Ye liked poetry, and with her encouragement, Li Jia began to write poems for her. Every time he got a little praise from her, he could feel excited. Encouraged by Xue Ye, Li Jia tried to submit his work, and finally published a poem in a local literary magazine. Li Jia's poem is called "Fossils", which is about fossils that long for sunlight, which are squeezed into the ground by the movement of the earth's crust and can never turn over. It uses the word "silent" twenty-two times. This tune was actually recognized by the editor, and he himself was deeply surprised.

…

The sharp rocks want to crush me, I don't move, silent

The cold springs want to freeze me, I don't resist, silent

The gushing lava wants to swallow me, I don't shout, silent

I just lie silently, just like the silent darkness, imagining the silent sunlight.

…

At this time, he also had his own ideal, to become a wandering poet.

However, when his father found out about this in his second year of high school, he was very angry. His father felt that Li Jia not only wasted his time on meaningless "forced sorrow", but also maintained a correspondence relationship with an unidentified person for such a long time. Not only did he tear up the letter Xue Ye wrote to him in front of him, he also scolded his manuscripts as worthless. But Li Jia still wrote secretly, and finally his father burned all the manuscripts in a rage. He also wrote a letter to Xue Ye's address, asking her not to affect Li Jia's studies and asking her not to contact Li Jia again. Li Jia was very angry, but he finally endured it. But Li Jia didn't know that his father secretly copied his manuscripts and burned the original manuscripts.

During the college entrance examination, Li Jia performed poorly for the first time and failed to get into a top university. During the time of repeating, he felt great pressure from home. His father's lament and his mother's tears often accompanied him. Li Jia couldn't stay at home later, so he had to lie that he went to the library to review. In fact, he went to the park to read. Every day after dark in the park, he would look at the stars in the park, which was also a moment when his heart could be comforted. Since then, Li Jia has particularly liked the starry sky. The starry sky gives him the feeling that light is born in the darkness, and this light is not scorching, but just shines on him quietly. It makes him feel safe and not easy to get hurt.

A year later, Li Jia's exam luck finally came, and he was admitted to Huaxia University, a 985 university. He originally wanted to study literature, but his parents stopped him. In the end, he had to apply for economics and studied all the way to a master's degree. Although he had a lot of freedom after entering university, he was never able to contact his pen pal named Xue Ye again, and his passion for poetry was still a little bit left. He had a notebook with some of his later poems written in it. But he never showed it to anyone, nor did he submit it. He only wrote a few words when he was in a bad mood.

Li Jia's previous experience made him timid and cautious when communicating with girls, so although he was honest and made many female classmates think he was a reliable and good person, he never had a girlfriend.

Li Jia has never had many close friends in reality. Everyone thinks that this person is honest and lacks fun on the one hand, and he is also introverted and rarely opens his heart on the other hand.

After entering university, he made a fool of himself on the podium several times, such as stuttering on the stage, or simply being unable to speak. However, after experience, he has become more generous in this regard. Because he was always controlled by his father, Li Jia still maintained his previous diligent study habits in school and his grades were very good. Therefore, he was recommended to study for a master's degree in the same major at the same university.

It is worth mentioning that during his undergraduate studies, Li Jia had a crush on a young lecturer in advanced mathematics, Ma Yuqing, but his crush on Ma was always secret and painful. The only thing he did was to sprinkle a card with a small poem on it in her handouts after class, but he was timid and did not sign his name, but only wrote the pen name of Fossil. Unexpectedly, this poem was taken out and ridiculed by Teacher Ma. She said at the time: "A literary youth handed me a card as a math teacher and gave me a mysterious poem. If you write your name, I will at least admire your courage. Unfortunately, there is no such thing. I can only say that this card is useless." This was the most painful and embarrassing thing in his college experience. It also made him more timid in front of girls.

Xiao Chen was his classmate in graduate school. They lived in the same dormitory and had a good relationship. Xiao Chen often encouraged Li Jia to muster up the courage to face girls, and helped him contact internships to increase his knowledge. Later, Li Jia made a lot of progress in dealing with people, but he still had no progress in dealing with girls. On the one hand, he is very eager to have a girl like Xue Ye who recognizes and loves him, and on the other hand, he has a deep inferiority complex towards girls, so he is very passive.

Li Jia gives people the impression of a tense person. Although he smiles, it is difficult for ordinary people to get in touch with his heart, and he is very cautious. Most people think that he is a good person who is easy to get along with, helpful, and has normal values. He is also easy to compromise and obey. Little do they know that this is not his moral excellence but just a habit. All the moral education of his family and school has left a clear mark on his outer shell, but it has not penetrated into his heart. In his heart, what is the soul tortured by others and himself? Even he himself has no clear understanding, and even he himself is confused by the external part.

When he traveled through time, Li Jia was a second-year graduate student, 26 years old.