Chapter 50
On the way back, Sister Yang said to Qiao Wei, “Thank goodness for you.”
“Whenever I see someone in authority, my palms start sweating, and I can’t even speak,” she said. “Why aren’t you afraid?”
Qiao Wei said, “Sister-in-law, they are cadres, not officials. Everyone serves the people. Aren’t Regimental Commander Zhao and Yan Lei also cadres? They serve the people just the same. We are the people, so there’s nothing to fear.”
Regimental Commander Zhao nudged Sister Yang with his arm. “Don’t talk nonsense.”
Sister Yang quickly said, “Yes, yes, yes, serving the people.”
They first went to Regimental Commander Zhao’s home to pick up Yan Xiang.
Returning home, after washing up and coaxing Yan Xiang to sleep, Yan Xiang said, “Mom, I read Yingzi’s textbook.”
Qiao Wei asked, “Can you understand it?”
Yan Xiang nodded.
Qiao Wei asked, “Is it interesting?”
Yan Xiang shook his head.
Ever since Qiao Wei discovered the attribute buff on Yan Xiang, she had been thinking about starting the child’s great educational undertaking.
According to her estimation, relying on the book “little cloth dolls adventure”, Yan Xiang should have already completed the literacy volume for the primary school stage.
So, she changed it from her reading to Yan Xiang, to having Yan Xiang read to her.
Yan Xiang was very happy; the role reversal made him feel that he had grown up.
Qiao Wei felt this method was very good, until today when she went to the Residential Compound public toilet to stake out with Sister Yang, leaving Lin Xixi to take Junzi, Wu Nier, and Yan Xiang to play in the Residential Compound.
When they exposed Xia Hehua as the source of the rumors and went back to pick up the children, Lin Xixi was holding Wu Nier and playing on the slide, while Yan Xiang was sitting alone on the swivel chair, spinning slowly, yet looking up at the blue sky with his neck tilted back.
Back home, Yan Xiang suddenly asked, “Mom, what is outside the sky?”
He was not an ordinary child, so although he was still of Kindergarten small class age, Qiao Wei still explained basic astronomical knowledge to him.
Universe, planets, stars; falling to Earth involves rotation, revolution, the atmosphere, then extending to geography, the core, mantle, crust, and also physics, gravity.
Before Yan Lei came home from work, Qiao Wei had been explaining things to Yan Xiang for an entire day.
Yan Xiang understood it all.
At this moment, Qiao Wei realized she had made another mistake.
While saying “Genius Prodigy” with her mouth, in the end, she still treated Yan Xiang as a realistic gifted child.
Realistic gifted children have high IQs, attend youth classes, and take university entrance exams at thirteen or fourteen. That is a realistic gifted child.
But a “Genius Prodigy” is not a realistic gifted child. A “Genius Prodigy” is a character trope in novels, just like the overbearing CEO, the innocent white flower, the black lotus, or the Dragon Aotian.
Getting into university in one’s teens does not count as a “Genius Prodigy”, it is just a real gifted child.
A “Genius Prodigy” must become a world-class hacker at seven, control the global financial lifeline at eight, and build a nuke with their bare hands at nine to count.
The Creator used a casual stroke to give Yan Xiang this attribute, but did not give him the era environment to leverage this attribute.
Schools have now cancelled exams.
Qiao Wei had heard from Yingzi that advancing in primary school grades relied on reciting quotes from great leaders.
Moving from second to third grade required reciting five, and third to fourth required ten.
Gangzi also said that there was news from the school that there might be further reforms, with classes only in the morning, and going to learn industry and agriculture in the afternoon.
They were in the town and lacked the conditions to learn industry, so it was highly probable they would go to the fields to learn agriculture.
In this special era, even as a transmigrator, Qiao Wei had no way to change anything.
She could only stroke Yan Xiang’s head and kiss his smooth little cheek. “Sleep early. Tomorrow we have to go pick up more stones; Dad said we’ll fix the road together on Sunday.”
The age-inappropriate darkness in Yan Xiang’s eyes disappeared, and the joy and brightness unique to a small child appeared. “Okay!”
Qiao Wei stroked his head again before leaving.
Returning to the west room, Yan Lei was still reading.
He would dispose of each book after reading it, stacking them in the kitchen to use as kindling.
Seeing Qiao Wei enter, he inserted a bookmark and closed the book. “Sleeping?”
Qiao Wei had been lying sideways on the kang coaxing Yan Xiang, her body propped up, making one shoulder sore.
She pounded her shoulder. “Not yet, I’ll be asleep soon.”
Yan Lei got up and gave her the desk chair, he sat on the desk himself, and kneaded her shoulders.
The couple chatted idly. Qiao Wei said, “Division Commander Pan looks like a scholar.”
His speech and temperament were very elegant.
Yan Lei said, “He ‘threw down the pen for the sword’.”
Qiao Wei glanced at him.
Yan Lei asked, “What are you looking at?”
Qiao Wei turned her face away. “Nothing.”
Yan Lei gritted his teeth. “It’s just ‘threw down the pen for the sword’.”
Qiao Wei chuckled. “I didn’t expect you to know this term.”
Yan Lei tutted and said, “Whenever Division Commander Pan is mentioned, this term is bound to come up. I don’t know how many times I’ve heard it, how could I not learn it?”
“But to be honest, using these four-character terms when speaking really feels different,” he admitted.
Even he himself felt that using them made him seem like he had some culture.
“That’s simple,” Qiao Wei said. “When you read, make a vocabulary notebook. Copy down good words when you see them. After a long time, your vocabulary will increase. Use them more, and at least your speech will look different on the surface.”
“But these are just superficial. What is truly valuable is you yourself, not these.” She looked at him with a smile.
Yan Lei applied force with his hands, and Qiao Wei let out an ‘ouch’, scolding him, “Returning kindness with enmity, I was praising you.”
Yan Lei: “Tch.”
But the corners of his mouth couldn’t help but turn up.
Qiao Wei certainly knew that Yan Lei would get better and better in the future.
He would constantly improve himself and become a great leader in the future, with the official authority of Division Commander Pan, where a gentle smile could make people feel a sense of oppression.
He would get better and better because he was the male lead.
Qiao Wei did not tell him about the matter of Yan Xiang being a “Genius Prodigy”.
One was the male lead, the other was a “Genius Prodigy”, both were attributes and definitions given to them by the Creator. It exceeded their cognitive dimension.
These were not important.
Since she had come to this world, whatever male lead, whatever “Genius Prodigy”, none of it counted.
She was already in this world, and this world was real to her. They were now her husband and child.
Before sleeping, Qiao Wei went out to use the toilet, and before entering the room, she casually adjusted the cushions on the bamboo bed.
Returning and lying down, she continued chatting with Yan Lei. “I saw that the Division Commander’s home is quite simple too. Look at our home, is there anything inappropriate?”
One benefit of going to the leader’s home was that it gave her an understanding of the daily necessities and environment of people at a certain level at this time. She had a rough standard in her heart now.
Yan Lei was puzzled. “What’s inappropriate about our home?”
“Just that bamboo bed of ours, the recliner, those cushions of mine, and so on.”
Yan Lei was even more puzzled. “What’s inappropriate about those?”
Weren’t those all common in the countryside? It was only because they were in town; if they really went to the city, they would be considered unsophisticated by city people.
“Those cushions are okay too?” Qiao Wei pressed.
“What could be wrong with them?” Yan Lei said. “Today Old Zhao even asked me if I was tight on money.”
Qiao Wei: “?”
“He said that for a lumbar support, why not use cloth of the same color, and one of them is a different color. It’s quite untidy.”
Qiao Wei chuckled. “And then?”
“I said it was just matched to look good.” Yan Lei said. “He also asked why there was a rice pounding rack in the yard, and if there was a pounding hammer, why not a mortar underneath?”
Qiao Wei laughed uncontrollably. “What did you say?”
“I said it was for you to wash clothes, to save effort. He said you were very inventive. But he held it in for a long time before finally blurting out that it was a bit silly, and that the pounding hammer didn’t look light, so using it to pound clothes wouldn’t save much effort.”
Qiao Wei laughed and rolled into his arms. “Didn’t you tell him that it was for spinning, not pounding?”
Yan Lei caught her. “He kept nagging me about how I finally stopped washing clothes, so why was I washing bowls again, so I couldn’t be bothered to tell him.”
Qiao Wei lay on him and kissed him. “Don’t mind him, he doesn’t understand your good points, as long as I understand.”
It kissed him into a daze.
But Yan Lei pinched her waist, and suddenly said with a bit of regret, “It’s a pity about today?”
Qiao Wei: “Hm?”
“Taking you to show your face before Division Commander Pan, you really should have dressed more decently.” Yan Lei lamented, “But with Old Zhao and his wife both there, I didn’t have the nerve to let you go change clothes. After all, it wasn’t just our business.”
When he returned home today, the Qiao Wei he saw was wearing the new clothes she had just picked up from the tailor yesterday. Washed and worn, they had a good drape, and were loose and comfortable. Qiao Wei liked them very much.
Qiao Wei giggled. “Are my new clothes not good-looking?”
“At first glance, like an old lady in the village, but after looking a few more times, it’s actually quite good.” Yan Lei admitted. “It’s just too plain, I feel like I’ve wronged you. And going before a leader, I wanted you to look decent.”
“Plain is good.” Qiao Wei’s eyes flashed with a cunning light. “We proletarian communist warriors, why do we need to be so flashy? This is your petty-bourgeois vanity at work.”
Yan Lei didn’t argue with her, only held the back of her head and kissed her. If one spoke of petty-bourgeois thinking, she used to be the heaviest. Anything related to the countryside, she looked down on and despised.
She had really changed now. The newly added bamboo bed, bamboo chairs, and homespun cushions in the house were all full of rustic flavor, making him feel incredibly close. In fact, when he returned home today and saw her sitting on the bamboo bed wearing new homespun clothes, he felt very relaxed.
Compared to the stylish dresses made of doudou cloth that cinched the waist and showed off the hips, he preferred her wearing these new clothes. Because being relaxed was the state one should have when returning home.
Regimental Commander Zhao and Sister Yang also lay down.
Regimental Commander Zhao said, “Why don’t you…”
Sister Yang: “Hm?”
“Why don’t you return those few dresses to Qiao Wei.”
“I was thinking about this too. Why did she start wearing homespun cloth? It shouldn’t be, Yan doesn’t lack that little bit of money.”
“Logically speaking, yes. Let me ask him tomorrow…”
That night in the Military District Residential Compound, while everyone was taking a stroll, someone saw Regimental Commander Fan following behind Division Commander Pan’s guard, walking deep into the Residential Compound. That was the residential area for high-level cadres. Was he going to see Division Commander Pan?
When they finished their stroll and were fanning themselves with cattail-leaf fans preparing to go home, they saw Regimental Commander Fan walking home in a hurry, his face could be described as very ugly.
When Division Commander Pan’s guard found Regimental Commander Fan, his wife had taken the children for a stroll, and no one had told him what had happened or why he was going to see the Division Commander. He went in confusion and returned in a rage.
By the time it was time to sleep, the neighbors could still hear crying, fighting, and scolding coming from the Fan family.
Early the next morning, Qiao Wei’s morning run, which she had insisted on for one day on Thursday, was interrupted again.
Fortunately, because she had mentioned the matter of Xiangxiang’s breakfast to Yan Lei, Yan Lei did make breakfast for Xiangxiang in the morning before leaving.
Qiao Wei walked out of the house yawning and stretched in the morning light. She twisted left and right, three times each, to loosen up her muscles, and turned her head: “…”
How many times has this been? Every morning, the three cushions on the bamboo bed would change positions.
She remembered clearly that last night before going to sleep, she went out to use the toilet and casually arranged them: original color, original color, blue.
Now, it had once again become: original color, blue, original color. These past few days, every morning when she woke up, that blue cushion was sandwiched between the two original-colored ones. Properly, squarely, neither leaning nor slanted.
There was no need to think to know who did this. Qiao Wei could probably understand.
She clearly remembered a story her mother told her, saying that when her mother was young and watched TV, in those scenes where the host sat behind a desk, the logo on the front of the desk was squarely in the middle position. It emphasized being centered, it emphasized being upright.
But later, by the time Qiao Wei was in primary school, the program’s logo was even cut into two halves, with the first half in the top right corner and the second half in the bottom left corner, having a kind of displaced, casual beauty. That was, of course, because with the development of the national economy, aesthetics had also upgraded.
But unfortunately, Comrade Yan Lei’s aesthetics currently clearly remained at this step of “center, symmetry”. Qiao Wei covered her forehead.
This day, at the meeting, Division Commander Pan sternly criticized some cadres for lacking ideological awareness, and for not being able to lead their family members to progress together.
He suggested launching a new spiritual civilization construction movement, requiring cadres to lead by example, and actively and proactively restrain their family members and lead them to progress together.
The specific measures were that each cadre must first engage in criticism and self-criticism, and then upon returning home, must properly educate their own family members.
In addition, the Propaganda Department was to print a batch of propaganda posters, with pictures and text, to be posted in the bulletin boards of the military family living area, to publicize to the military families what civilized behavior is, and what uncivilized behavior is.
The image of the Military Unit could not be smeared by individual family members with low quality.
In addition, the results of this wage grading also came out. Several old cadres’ wages were raised by one grade, a full 14 yuan increase. It was equivalent to half a month’s wage for an ordinary worker.
Regimental Commander Zhao was on the list, his wage increased.
Regimental Commander Fan was not selected.
