Chapter 232: Returning to My Mother’s Home
Sheng Wanyan carefully tucked Gu Tingxiao’s hands back under the heavy quilt before slipping out of bed to wash up and have breakfast.
Mother Gu and the other women of the house had already prepared the morning spread. Once she finished eating, Wanyan found herself with nothing pressing to do, so she sat down in the living room to sketch alongside the children.
It wasn’t until after lunch that Gu Tingxiao finally woke up. Spotting his wife sitting contentedly by the coffee table with her drawings, he strode over and settled onto the sofa right next to her.
“There’s fresh rice kept warm in the cooker,” Wanyan said, lightly nudging his arm with her elbow. “Go and have a bowl.”
Gu Tingxiao nodded, his voice thick with sleep. “Are you hungry, honey?”
“I just finished eating a little while ago, so I’m perfectly fine.” Wanyan smiled. She had managed a hearty lunch and didn’t feel the need to join him.
Once he finished eating, Gu Tingxiao sliced a fresh plate of pears and brought them over to the table. The neighborhood children generally preferred frozen pears, which they would eagerly fetch from the storage racks in the snowy backyard. Since the youngsters declined the fresh slices, Wanyan shared the fruit with the family elders instead.
“Wanyan, why don’t we arrange a formal prenatal checkup for you right after the holidays?” Mother Gu suggested. In truth, her primary motivation was simply a doting grandmother’s desire to catch a glimpse of her future grandchild.
Wanyan hadn’t visited a clinic since her arrival in the Capital, and since she was rapidly approaching her next milestone, a checkup was an excellent idea. “Alright, let’s head over to the hospital once the New Year rush settles.”
Hearing this, Grandma Gu gazed tenderly at Wanyan’s midsection. “The little sprout has been remarkably gentle. No wild kicking or fussing at all—such a considerate child.”
Wanyan brushed her palm over her slightly rounded belly, her face melting into a soft smile. The baby truly was exceptionally well-behaved, only offering a light, fluttering kick every now and then.
Whenever the baby shifted, Gu Tingxiao would fixate on her stomach for hours. In his eyes, the tiny life was a completely miraculous, mesmerizing wonder. Wanyan vividly recalled the very first time she felt the baby move; Gu Tingxiao had been so thoroughly stunned that he became completely incoherent, staring at her abdomen without blinking for nearly half the day. When he finally gathered the courage to touch her, his movements were so agonizingly gentle, driven by a frantic terror that his rough, soldier’s hands might somehow startle her or the child.
Recalling his protective awe, a tender warmth bloomed in Wanyan’s chest, casting a beautiful, radiant halo of maternal affection around her.
Sitting directly across from her, Gu Tingxiao looked up and was instantly transfixed. His wife looked breathtakingly charming. Her innate gentleness and grace were displayed so completely in the soft winter light that he found himself entirely lacking the vocabulary to describe how beautiful she looked to him.
Sensing his intense, unblinking gaze, Wanyan shared a silent, knowing look with her husband. She shot him a mock-reproachful glare, her eyes darting toward the relatives. With so many family members occupying the living room, why was this man acting so boldly? He was truly shameless, entirely unbothered by an audience, but she still valued her dignity!
Later that afternoon, Mother Gu gathered the eldest sister-in-law to organize the formal gifts for tomorrow’s traditional visits to their respective maiden homes. Because these offerings directly reflected the public reputation and prestige of the Gu clan, Mother Gu executed the preparations with meticulous care.
She prepared an identical bundle for each household: a tin of premium malted milk powder, two thick strips of cured bacon, a whole wild pheasant, and a pound of delicate pastries. Even the Wang family’s allotment was prepared with the exact same premium standards, completely denying them any opportunity to gossip or claim they were being slighted by the high command.
Knowing that Wanyan’s parents were currently stationed up at the northern frontier base, Mother Gu deliberately exempted Gu Tingxiao from a standard in-law visit, instead directing him to carry a choice selection of holiday provisions over to a few of his father’s local contacts to express the family’s respect.
Gu Tingxiao gathered the parcels and headed out into the compound. Since it was the quietest stretch of the Spring Festival, the lanes were virtually deserted, allowing him to execute the errands and return within an hour.
The first day of the Lunar New Year was fundamentally dedicated to these quiet, domestic preparations, leaving the family with very few formal tasks. Father Gu, however, was an exception; as a high-ranking military official, his national responsibilities never truly paused. He departed for the military headquarters before dawn and didn’t rumble back into the driveway until the lunch hour. His administrative tier demanded year-round vigilance, and regardless of the calendar date, he routinely marched down to the command center to guard the region’s security. Mother Gu had long since acclimated to the grueling nature of his career, flawlessly managing the domestic front to keep his sanctuary secure.
Once the evening meal concluded, the household retired to their respective wings early, preparing for the flurry of cross-town travel scheduled for the following morning.
Whenever her schedule permitted, Mother Gu loved traveling back to her own parents’ ancestral estate. She had initially hoped to escort Wanyan along to introduce her to the extended maternal clan, but observing the fragile early months of her pregnancy, she abandoned the idea. Though both estates operated within the highly secured compound, the outdoor drafts were brutally sharp, and maintaining absolute caution was the wisest path.
Scanning the room, she noted that Gu Tingxiao was currently the most unrestricted person in the villa, so she drafted him to act as her personal escort. Tingxiao hadn’t managed to pay his respects to his maternal grandparents since his deployment ended, so he gladly joined her.
Wanyan waved them off from the porch, before returning to the warm hearth to chat comfortably with Old Master Gu and Grandma Gu. The second sister, Gu Tingting, was thoroughly enjoying her extended holiday at the estate and had personally procured an abundance of luxury treats to pamper the elders.
“Third Aunt! Come look at the cannon I constructed!”
Gu Tingting’s young son, Lin Longyi, bounded across the rug, eagerly displaying a miniature model cannon he had meticulously engineered using spent ammunition casings. It was a highly successful project that had occupied his attention for over a month.
“My goodness, look how extraordinarily clever you are!” Wanyan praised, turning the heavy metal toy over in her hands with genuine admiration.
Hearing her sincere compliment, Lin Longyi’s small chest swelled with immense pride. “The exact moment my new little cousin is born, I’m going to teach him how to build one just like it!” he declared, confidently patting his chest to prove his status as an exemplary older brother figure.
Sitting nearby, his little sister, Lin Yuxia, felt her intense competitive streak flare to life at his declaration. She instantly rejected his premise. “It’s obviously going to be a little sister!”
“I said it’s going to be a brother!” Longyi countered.
“A sister!”
“A brother.”
“A sister!!!”
Listening to the rapid-fire bickering between the young siblings, Wanyan let out an amused chuckle, entirely unsure how to mediate the grand debate.
Ultimately, it was the second sister who executed a decisive halt to the skirmish. “What on earth do you two think you’re doing?” Gu Tingting barked, her maternal authority cutting through the room. “Are your hides itching for a proper scolding? March over to the corner and stand in time-out this instant. If you wake the younger children with your shouting, you’ll answer to me.”
Realizing they were being condemned to a formal corner time-out, the brother and sister immediately cast desperate, pleading looks toward Grandma Gu. The old matriarch merely offered them a brief, neutral glance before looking away, deliberately pretending she hadn’t witnessed a thing.
When it came to child-rearing, seasoned elders understood that intervening during a parent’s discipline was a critical mistake; if they undermined Gu Tingting’s authority now, the children would quickly internalize that their mother’s commands could be bypassed.
Seeing that their safety nets had vanished, the crestfallen siblings had no choice but to trudge over to the corner hand in hand to serve their sentence. The exact moment they turned their backs to the room, their fierce rivalry dissolved into a beautiful display of trauma-bonded sibling solidarity, completely devoid of the sharp hostility they had exhibited moments prior.
“If I don’t implement a firm hand every three days, these two will literally rip the tiles from our roof,” Gu Tingting sighed, shaking her head.
Wanyan felt a pang of maternal sympathy as she stared at their pitiful little backs. “The children are remarkably sweet and conscientious, Tingting. They already possess a beautiful awareness of what it means to be protective older siblings.”
Gu Tingting followed her gaze, her expression softening slightly. While harboring that protective awareness was undeniably a beautiful trait, this particular duo managed to lock horns over virtually everything, meaning she constantly had to engineer scenarios to fortify their bond. “Don’t waste your sympathy on them, Third Sister-in-law. These two are thoroughly used to running wild.”
Wanyan nodded understandingly. After all, Gu Tingting was their biological mother; she comprehended her children’s temperaments perfectly and knew exactly what educational parameters to enforce.
Yet, while Wanyan was feeling a wave of tender heartbreak for the toddlers one second, her eyes went wide with absolute disbelief the next. She finally measured the true depths of Gu Tingting’s domestic struggle.
These truly were two fiercely untamable children who possessed absolutely zero fear of retribution. A mere ten seconds ago, they had been a picture of profound, tragic sibling love—yet the moment they settled into the corner for their punishment, the silent war erupted anew.
“Listen to me, Sister,” Lin Longyi whispered aggressively under his breath, his boyish pride refusing to yield a single inch. “I’m telling you, it’s absolutely going to be a brother.” He was a stubborn boy who lacked the basic instinct to concede an argument to a girl; even if the opponent was his own flesh and blood, securing a strategic victory mattered above all else.
With a father serving in the Army and a mother commanding a post in the Air Force, yielding under pressure simply wasn’t encoded in his DNA. Lin Longyi had inherited his father’s relentless tactical tenacity, while little Lin Yuxia had clearly inherited…
“I said it’s a sister!” she hissed back.
“It’s a brother! A brother!”
“If I say it’s a brother, then it’s a brother.” Lin Longyi was several years older, and his rapid-fire, articulate vocabulary easily overwhelmed little Lin Yuxia’s defenses.
Thoroughly cornered and deeply frustrated by her brother’s relentless, monotone chanting, little Lin Yuxia clamped her hands tightly over her ears. But little Lin Longyi leaned closer, his mouth hovering right against her knuckles as he continued to drone his theories like a nagging monk.
Within seconds, the psychological warfare broke the toddler’s resolve, and big tears began spilling over Lin Yuxia’s cheeks. Why on earth was her older brother so incredibly agonizing to deal with? He had literally nagged her to tears!
“Waaah!!! Mommy, Brother is being bad to me!” she wept, pointing a trembling finger at him. “Brother is acting like a terrible, nagging phantom again!”
