Chapter 25: Claypot Rice
The “let’s have lunch” Bai Hanshan spoke of was at none other than the third floor of the school cafeteria.
When stepping on the red carpet in the reception hall at the stair landing, Gu Qinghuan still managed to keep a straight face. But once they reached the small private room on the third floor and the server handed them menus before leaving, she could no longer hold it in.
“I didn’t think I’d be eating here this soon,” Gu Qinghuan said, picking up the menu.
Bai Hanshan didn’t open his. He let her choose first, picking up the teapot to pour tea into both their cups before speaking. “This place isn’t as over-the-top as you imagine.”
Gu Qinghuan looked up at him. “Senior Bai, that’s only because you’re used to it that you think so.”
He didn’t deny it. “Anyway, as long as the current president has an exclusive private room here, he can come dine anytime in his name — and it all gets charged to his account.”
Gu Qinghuan was genuinely curious about this president, but for now, ordering food came first.
The third-floor cafeteria menu that day was all Cantonese cuisine. After a quick glance, Gu Qinghuan hesitated. “If I say I want claypot rice, will it make me seem really tasteless?”
Bai Hanshan almost couldn’t hold back a laugh. He eased the muscles on his face before saying, “Since the chef put it on the menu, it’s meant to be ordered. If you want it, have it.”
If she had been with Jiang Chuchu, Gu Qinghuan wouldn’t have asked — she would’ve just ordered it. But with Bai Hanshan sitting across from her, she couldn’t help holding back a little.
Hearing his answer, she felt a bit embarrassed, but still straightforwardly ordered the claypot rice.
Bai Hanshan also ordered her a mango sago pomelo dessert, while he got shrimp balls and rice noodle rolls for himself.
While waiting for the food, Bai Hanshan explained the current internal structure of the student council to her.
Mingde High’s student council was slightly different from other schools’. The main reason was that when the current head took over, he disliked being called “student council president” and changed the title to simply “president.”
Aside from the president, the office had only one vice president. There was no Organization Department — those duties were arranged by the vice president, with other officers cooperating as needed. Major issues were decided in officer meetings or general member meetings.
As for the Academic, Publicity, Arts, Sports, Welfare, and Discipline Departments, they weren’t much different from a normal student council.
Each department had a director and a deputy director, with no more than five officers per department.
Gu Qinghuan did a quick calculation. “So the maximum number of members in the student council is… 44?”
“Counting you, the maximum is 45,” Bai Hanshan corrected.
She felt a little embarrassed. “I’m not part of any department?”
“No — right now, you belong to the office. Your position is the president’s secretary,” Bai Hanshan said.
More like a passing fancy of a toy, Gu Qinghuan muttered inwardly.
She straightened up. “Then aside from keeping an eye on Senior Xia He, what else do I do?”
Since they were giving her a dedicated office, she felt bad not doing some kind of work.
Bai Hanshan thought, As long as you can keep Xia He in check, you don’t have to do anything else.
Of course, since Xia He didn’t want his identity exposed yet, Bai Hanshan wouldn’t say that aloud.
“The specifics will depend on how the president assigns them. Later, I’ll send you the president’s WeChat. Add him,” Bai Hanshan said.
The WeChat Xia He had previously added her on was a special alternate account. The main account was the one he used as president.
Finally getting to add the president made Gu Qinghuan a bit nervous. But after she sent the friend request and got no reply, she relaxed again, turning her focus to the claypot rice placed in front of her.
As expected of the third-floor cafeteria — a dish that looked so ordinary tasted completely different.
The grains of rice were glossy and fragrant, each one distinct. The crispy layer at the bottom was golden and crunchy without being burnt. The lap cheong sausage was perfectly balanced in fat and lean, delivering both salty and sweet flavors without greasiness or dryness. The baby greens looked so vibrantly green they didn’t need any photo filters, with no earthy or bitter taste at all. And the ribs in the center were so tender that the bone slipped free with just a press of the tongue — the meat, still connected by soft membranes, was a pure delight to chew.
Gu Qinghuan polished off the entire claypot rice, the joy of a good meal making her eyes squint in contentment. “So good.”
Bai Hanshan almost wanted to order another serving — seeing her eat with such gusto made his own appetite grow.
“Want to order anything else?” he asked.
She quickly shook her head. “No, I’m already full.”
A little disappointed, he didn’t order more for himself either. Fine, maybe next time.
After lunch, Gu Qinghuan said goodbye to Bai Hanshan and headed home.
Meanwhile, at the Jiang household after lunch, Jiang Chuchu felt her stomach swell — not from eating too much, but from pure anger.
Earlier, her father Jiang Youwei had promised to investigate the Yu family’s background. Today, he finally handed her the compiled report.
The people Jiang Youwei hired had done an even more thorough job than the Yu family themselves — they’d organized Yu Xin’s entire life history in chronological order, with photos and accounts from teachers, classmates, and neighbors.
A girl’s more than ten years of life, condensed into a few thin sheets of paper, each black-and-white word hitting like a punch.
Her adoptive parents, unable to have a son, had paid a fortune teller, who told them they needed to first raise a child “fated to have a younger brother” in order to bring the son they longed for into their lives.
By chance, they encountered the people abandoning Yu Xin and, instead of calling the police, decided she was a gift from the heavens. They took her home and told neighbors they had adopted her from an orphanage.
Within six months, the adoptive mother really did become pregnant.
In the first few years, they still remembered the fortune teller’s warning — if they drove Yu Xin away, perhaps the son she had “brought” them would also be taken away. So they gave her food and took her to a rural clinic when she was sick.
But as time passed, they became utterly unrestrained.
Neglect? No — outright abuse.
Sometimes it wasn’t even that Yu Xin had done something wrong — if they were in a bad mood, they would beat or scold her, or blame her for mistakes they themselves had made.
Yu Xin had managed to survive largely thanks to neighbors and a few kind-hearted people at school who helped her in secret. If her adoptive parents found out, they would only feel humiliated by her and beat her even more severely.
Jiang Chuchu’s chest tightened the more she read.
Although the Yu family had found Yu Xin before the high school entrance exams, they’d worried that her presence might affect the fake daughter, Yu Yuan, so they put Yu Xin in a hotel to live until after exams.
They didn’t think to prepare anything else for her — she still wore old clothes and they never announced her true identity.
This led to rumors at her middle school that “Yu Xin stays in a luxury hotel every night and only comes out in the morning,” with insinuations she was being kept by someone.
Even the homeroom teacher’s best efforts to clarify didn’t help much. In the end, the teacher had to let Yu Xin stay in her staff dormitory to quiet the gossip.
The luxury hotel suite — Yu Xin hadn’t even enjoyed it for half a month before it had severely affected her pre-exam mindset, causing her grades to fluctuate wildly.
Fortunately, she managed to steady herself and scored high enough for a top high school.
After the exams, before the results were even released, the Yu family appeared again. Seeing only her grade drop in the last semester, without checking her actual exam scores, they were disappointed and simply arranged for her to attend Mingde High.
Looking at Yu Xin’s high school entrance scores, even from a different district, Jiang Chuchu could tell from each subject’s marks just how outstanding she was.
She wanted to curse the Yu family, but with Jiang Youwei still sitting across from her, swearing at people older than herself in front of her father didn’t feel right — so she held it in.
She kept reading — and found Yu Xin’s life after moving into the Yu household was even worse than she’d imagined.
