Chapter 18: Breaking the Ice Between Mother and Son

Chapter 18: Chapter 18: Breaking the Ice Between Mother and Son

Nan Zhi’s fried rice stall blew up!

After the incident with the thief, while some of the onlookers started to disperse, others grew curious—

Just how good was this egg fried rice, that someone would steal three servings of it?

They followed Nan Zhi back to her fried rice stall in its secluded corner, and the first thing that shocked them was, indeed, the 20-yuan price tag.

But before they even had a chance to complain, they were captivated by the intense aroma that erupted when the egg hit the hot oil.

Watching the perfectly separated grains of egg fried rice tumble about like a flowing river of gold, many people couldn’t help but swallow quietly.

’...It’s only 20 yuan. Why not give it a try?’

And so, just as Nan Zhi finished up her backed-up orders, new ones started pouring in.

Her modest fried rice stall was swarmed by customers, packed so tightly you couldn’t get through.

Nan Yi took so much money his hands went numb.

Many of the new customers had just witnessed the "live taping of *The Super Brain*," and were eager to test Nan Yi’s math skills.

They kept asking him things like, "What’s the sum of all the numbers from 1 to 100?", "How much should you charge us for 6 servings of fried rice?", and "There are chickens and rabbits in a cage. There are 35 heads and 49 feet in total. How many chickens and how many rabbits are there?"...

Nan Yi answered without a moment’s thought, his expression shifting from initial annoyance to eventual numbness.

It was the spitting image of a Cub being forced to perform for relatives during Chinese New Year!

The live comments were also filled with exclamations:

[So amazing! He’s definitely a genius!]

[Nan Yi’s barely old enough for kindergarten, right? Is early childhood education this advanced nowadays?]

[That’s clearly a natural aptitude for math. It would be a shame if he didn’t become a scientist in the future!]

[Could this be scripted...]

[If a four-and-a-half-year-old can memorize a script this long, I’d say that’s pretty damn incredible too!]

[She pulled an SSR-rank kid, Nan Zhi better raise him well! Suddenly I’m very worried about Nan Yi’s future...]

...

Nan Zhi had no idea she was about to be saddled with the label of "unreliable mother of a child prodigy."

She was completely immersed in making egg fried rice.

Although she’d repeated the motions dozens of times, she didn’t find it tedious at all. Instead, she was constantly reliving her twelve years in the Otherworld, allowing her body to re-familiarize itself with the movements, shaking off the rust.

Her intense focus made her lose track of time. Before she knew it, she had run out of ingredients.

Yesterday she’d sold 30 servings of fried rice. Today she had prepared twice that amount, yet she was finishing up even earlier than the day before.

This surprised Nan Zhi as well.

While packing up her food cart, Nan Zhi regretfully informed the remaining diners of the news.

The waiting customers were very disappointed, but a cook can’t make a meal without ingredients. No matter how disappointed they were, they had no choice but to turn and leave, not forgetting to repeatedly confirm if Nan Zhi would be setting up her stall again tomorrow.

By the time the last customer left, Nan Zhi had finished packing up her cart, her movements quick and practiced.

The neighboring stall was run by a woman selling grilled sausages.

Many customers liked to grab a sausage to go with their fried rice, which had taken the sausage business from cold to lukewarm.

Since there was no conflict of interest, the woman naturally had a good impression of Nan Zhi.

So, as Nan Zhi was about to leave, she offered a quiet reminder:

"That couple who also runs a food stall like you... be careful of them. They’re not good people."

Nan Zhi was taken aback for a moment, then quickly thanked her without asking any further questions.

She mulled over the matter the entire way back, not even noticing when she arrived home.

After putting away all her stall equipment, Nan Zhi felt an even heavier wave of exhaustion wash over her.

She quickly turned off the camera, planning to wash up and go to bed early.

The moment the camera was off, Nan Zhi turned and saw Nan Yi standing in a corner, watching her.

"Is something wrong?"

Nan Yi shook his head.

His small, fragile face held an extremely complex expression.

Beneath the wariness and defensiveness, there was a hidden longing and a spark of light that even he hadn’t noticed.

—Like a small animal that had been hurt many times but still exposed its soft belly to its mother.

Nan Yi asked, "Aren’t you going to say something?"

Nan Zhi tilted her head slightly, her hair pooling on her shoulder, exuding a poetic gentleness.

She thought for a moment, then praised him with genuine sincerity:

"Our Yiyi was so amazing today, so smart! Mommy is proud of you!"

Nan Yi let out a soft huff from his nose.

It was less an expression of disdain and more of a pout.

The dim light couldn’t clearly show the redness in the corners of his eyes, but Nan Zhi had a keen intuition.

Her voice grew even softer:

"What’s wrong?"

Nan Yi mustered his courage.

"Why didn’t you yell at me? You always used to yell at me."

It was a flat statement, and a genuine question.

Nan Zhi felt a sting in her nose.

She knelt down to look Nan Yi in the eye.

"Remember what I told you? I’m not the same person as the mom from before. I wasn’t lying about that."

Nan Yi stared blankly at Nan Zhi.

’He was actually starting to believe those words, which sounded like something out of a fairy tale...’

Late that night, mother and son fell asleep in the small, shabby room.

They faced each other, their bodies closer than before.

And they slept more soundly.

-

Not everyone could fall asleep so easily at night.

For many people, falling asleep was an effortless affair.

But for Lu Shixu, sleep was a luxury.

Whenever he closed his eyes, a pair of venomous eyes would appear amidst a raging fire, cursing him to a life of loneliness and a miserable death...

He opened his eyes.

And with them, the courtyard house located in a prosperous district of Yanjing North City seemed to awaken.

In the silent, long night, magnificent lamps illuminated the entire courtyard, making it as translucent as colored glass, like the fabled Heavenly Palace of the gods.

It was gorgeous and stunning, but utterly devoid of any human warmth.

Even Lu Shixu, residing deep within this Heavenly Palace, was nothing more than a lifeless statue.

But for some reason, at this moment, he suddenly thought of the livestream he’d watched earlier that evening.

He didn’t understand why he’d opened that completely irrelevant web broadcast, much less why he’d become interested in and couldn’t help but follow a woman his own assistant had branded as a scheming social climber.

His assistant had already investigated; this woman named Nan Zhi had no connection whatsoever to his past!

"...Old Lu? What’s up with you? Calling me in the middle of the night?"

His friend Tang Ji’s boisterous voice came through the phone’s earpiece, backed by the intense thumping of club music.

Lu Shixu pinched the bridge of his nose, ignoring the immense sense of absurdity he felt, and asked in a low voice:

"Do you know a woman named Nan Zhi?"

Tang Ji’s voice paused.

It was barely perceptible, almost like a lag in the connection.

Tang Ji nonchalantly denied it:

"Don’t know her! What, did you finally meet a woman who makes your heart flutter...?"

CLICK!

Lu Shixu hung up the phone without another word!

He placed his phone face down on the bedside table and rubbed his temples again, as if warning himself:

’This ends now.’

Lu Shixu snuffed out those strange, irrational thoughts.

Such things had no place in his rational and orderly world.

Turning off the light, Lu Shixu lay back down.

He closed his eyes, letting the heavy, viscous darkness envelop him, and continued to keep company with the abyss.