In the afternoon, when the sun was gone and the sky turned sowhat gloomy, a wind picked up, and rain seed imminent yet not quite starting.
In the long, blistering sumr season, this mont stood out as a pleasantly rare break.
Li Sanjiang leaned back in a rattan chair, holding a cigarette in his left hand and cradling a teacup in his right, while an old-fashioned radio, encased in a wooden box on the wall, was broadcasting the news.
Li Zhiyuan sat next to him, head down, eating waterlon.
The news was covering the situation in the Middle East.
Li Sanjiang sat up, extinguished his cigarette butt in a Jianlibao can filled with water, and then picked up the can and shook it.
"Grandmaster, have so lon."
"You eat, Grandmaster isn’t craving anything."
"The lon’s not sweet."
"Oh, okay."
Li Sanjiang, with a smile, picked up a piece of lon, thinking his great-grandson was trying to trick him into eating it.
He took a bite and imdiately cursed:
"The heartless thing, I asked him to pick a good one for ; he tapped it all over and actually chose a bad one.
Those left over, take them to Run Sheng later."
"Brother Runsheng, they have so."
"No matter how much they have, it’s not enough. In the past, just Run Sheng alone ate a lot; now Zhuangzhuang’s appetite has been grood to match."
"Brother Binbin has been wracking his brains lately, hasn’t he?"
That morning, when he had handed a whole book of math problems to Tan Wenbin, although he couldn’t see it himself, he could feel the air freeze for a full half-minute.
Tan Wenbin hesitated many tis, wanting to say sothing but ultimately held back.
However, he just tossed that book of math aside in the beginning, not looking at it at all.
It wasn’t until he started learning about tools with Run Sheng, and after Li Zhiyuan specifically took the ti to explain so basics about fortune telling and physiognomy, that Tan Wenbin realized:
So things you try to avoid will always be waiting for you in the journey of life.
He had thought he was opening a brand new door, but when he actually entered, he found that this door was shared with the college entrance exam.
In the past, it would never have occurred to him that learning to recover corpses would also require getting through physics, chemistry, and math first.
But indeed, no amount of long-winded reasoning compares to visiting a corpse recovery’s family for a al.
Finally, he picked up that book of math problems and began to work on them.
His academic performance was always diocre and these problems were quite difficult, so he progressed slowly, but at least he hadn’t given up.
This led to his recent significant increase in appetite, which delighted him; he felt as if his brain was growing.
"Speaking of which, why are they still at war over there?" Li Sanjiang picked up a cloth next to him and wiped his hands, "I rember right after the country was founded, they were already fighting. Back then, the village even had banners and wrote big characters to support and stand in solidarity with them, opposing imperialism."
"Yeah, it seems like it’s been going on for a long ti."
The news broadcast concluded, moving on to the next program where the male and female hosts started chatting about reading books.
The male host cited an example of a nation that greatly respected knowledge; adults would spread honey on books, so when children looked at them, they would find knowledge sweet.
He also said that respect for knowledge and science was the reason that this nation had thrived after two thousand years of diaspora.
The female host echoed with emotion, praising them as the world’s acknowledged brightest nation.
Li Sanjiang scratched his neck with the handle of the fan and said, "That doesn’t seem right, does it?"
"Huh?"
"Little Yuanhou, tell , how does the smartest nation end up wandering for two thousand years?"
"You’re right, Grandmaster."
At this mont, Alii ca up from the staircase, carrying a large bowl in her hand.
Slling the scent of herbal dicine, Li Zhiyuan knew it was ti for his dicine.
He took it from Alii’s hand and placed it in front of him, picked up the spoon, and began to drink it spoonful by spoonful.
Before, when he only had nosebleeds, the dicine Aunt Liu made for him was rather mild. Ever since he went blind, the dicine beca much stronger, so much so that even the taste was bitterly numbing.
Li Zhiyuan could only comfort himself while drinking, by thinking "good dicine tastes bitter."
Li Sanjiang watched the girl with a smile and kept nodding his head.
After finishing the dicine, Li Zhiyuan said goodbye to Li Sanjiang and then took Alii back to his room. He entered first, fetching three bottles of milk.
Recently, Li Sanjiang had earned a large sum of money; the three families, including the Niu family, had all requested his services for funeral prayers.
Originally, when he heard that the three siblings of the Niu family had died almost at the sa ti, he was sowhat apprehensive, feeling it was because he hadn’t perford his last rites well.
But firstly, the three siblings were already notorious in the village, and secondly, their family mbers knew all too well how they had died.
When alive, they wished to kill him quickly for release, but after death, these younger generations beca fearful, anxious not to follow in their footsteps.
So, they hastily invited Li Sanjiang to oversee the prayer ritual and gave very generous red envelopes.
Li Sanjiang went, the funeral services were on the sa day; he rushed the services of all three families in one day, and the money he earned was particularly satisfying.
Then, he imdiately bought a lot of food and drinks for his great-grandson.
In Li Zhiyuan’s room, snacks were stocked in cabinets, and drinks were stacked in boxes.
If he hadn’t stopped him in ti saying it was enough, he feared he’d soon be competing with Aunt Zhang from the village in opening a little grocery store.
Li Zhiyuan didn’t like drinking milk much; it just had a hint of dairy with mainly a sweetness of saccharin.
However, Alii’s first collection box was already filled with Jianlibao, and now that she had just started the second box, it naturally needed so new items.
Both the boy and the girl sat in the rattan chairs, each holding a drink.
They had already played chess in the morning, so they decided not to play in the afternoon.
Li Zhiyuan bowed his head, facing an empty little tabletop, and began reading a book.
Although he still couldn’t see with his eyes, he was still able to read books, and after reading them, they all stayed in his head; now was a good ti to bring them out again to ruminate.
Alii probably knew what the boy was doing and sat close to him as she always did.
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