Chapter 2: Please Call Me Xishi
“The little girl who was lost from Chen family ten years ago?” Lou Ming raised his eyebrows in surprise.
“She was abducted and sold by traffickers.” In order to protect Lou Ming’s safety, He Qi investigated everyone who had entered and exited the compound, even Chen Yu, who had just returned to the Chen family, “She was sold to a remote mountain village in Qingmu province, young master Chen just picked her up two days ago.”
“She had been abducted?” Lou Ming frowned unconsciously, if one asked him which kind of people were the most disgusting in the world, the trafficker must be one of them.
Lou Ming put down the half-read magazine in his hand, stood up, walked to the window and lifted the curtain. He only saw a particularly thin figure, hair tied with a loose ponytail, while she was standing with her hands raised.
“I… I really came here to pick something up, you see, the thing is still in my hand, I… I’m really not a bad person.” Chen Yu shivered while trying to explain as best as she can.
She’d grown so big, she also had seen a lot of ghosts, but she had never seen a gun before ah, this was frightening people to death ah, sob sob…
Lou Ming frowned, “Tell them to put down their guns, don’t frighten a little girl.”
“Yes.” He Qi said a few words to his receiver and the two guards outside immediately put their hands down. At that time, the monitoring room also checked the video recording within the past half an hour and found that an unknown object actually fell into the yard ten minutes ago, it was the compass that Chen Yu held in her hand.
“Have you checked properly?” Lou Ming asked.
“Yes, we’ve checked it properly, miss Chen did come in to pick up the thing.” He Qi replied.
“Then let her go back.” Lou Ming put the curtain down and sat back on the sofa again.
“Yes, I will let Zhang Wu send her back.” He Qi said as he picked up the receiver again, wanting to give more instruction.
“No need for that, just send her out of the yard and let her go home.” Lou Ming thought something and said this sentence.
“Third young master, I think that it’s better to let Mayor Chen know about this matter.” He Qi reminded, after all, this house was a restricted area in the military compound. Chen Yu broke in for no reason this time, they can still let her out, but she won’t be so lucky next time.
“She was kidnapped when she was a child, and now that she just returned to this new environment, she must be feeling insecure. If you let someone to send her back, Mayor Chen would know that she made trouble and the little girl would feel more uncomfortable at home.” Lou Ming said, “What’s more, she was scared by you just now, I estimate that she won’t come back again in the future.”
“Yes.” He Qi hesitated, but finally decided to follow Third young master’s instruction.
After He Qi finished assigning the task to his subordinate, he saw that there was no water left in the Third young master’s cup, so he carried the kettle and added some more water.
“How high is the courtyard wall?” Lou Ming asked all of a sudden.
He Qi blanked for a while before responding quickly, “290 centimeters.”
“It’s that tall ah.” Lou Ming smiled, “That little girl has a good skill.”
Didn’t know if it was an illusion, but He Qi felt that Third young master Lou had a good impression towards the young daughter of the Chen family. His guess was soon confirmed.
When she was pointed with guns, Chen Yu felt that if she didn’t explain herself there, she would at least get a layer of her skin shed. So she shouted that her father was the Mayor, fight for an opportunity, and because of that, the other party only warned her and let her free.
Chen Yu covered her small heart with her hand for three seconds just to make sure that she’s still alive before running back to her house.
She skillfully climbed over the wall and tree, and returned to her bedroom on the second floor. After sitting down for a while, a knock rang from the door.
“W-who?” Chen Yu asked, still full of guilt.
“It’s me.” Chen Yang’s voice came from outside.
“O… oh.” Chen Yu hurriedly stood up to open the door, and smiled after looking at her own brother.
Chen Yang saw her sister’s head full of sweat, he couldn’t help but wondered, “How come you’re sweating?”
“Ah?” Chen Yu raised her hands in panic and wiped the sweat on her face, she dryly smiled, “It’s… to hot.”
“You haven’t turned on the AC?” Chen Yang noticed that Chen Yu’s room was very hot at this moment. The weather in August was the hottest time in the capital, and even though it’s already evening, it was still very hot.
Chen Yang walked into the room and picked up the remote control to help Chen Yu turn on the AC. He knew that many children in the countryside were very economical after coming to the city, so he thought that Chen Yu was also reluctant to turn on the AC for this same reason. He wanted to say something, but was afraid of hurting his sister’s self-esteem. After contemplating for a while, he decided to say, “Summer in the city is very hot, it’s best to turn on the AC when you’re inside the house, otherwise we would worry if you get a heatstroke.”
“En, en, I know.” Chen Yu didn’t even notice her brother’s careful attention for her glass heart.
“Then, go and take a bath, we’ll eat dinner in a bit.” Chen Yang put down the remote control.
“Okay.”
Waiting until Chen Yang walked out, Chen Yu sighed and leaned against the door, patting her small chest while secretly whispering ‘It’s a close call’.
After Chen Yu took a bath, changed her clothes and went downstairs, the food in the kitchen was almost ready too. Because they wanted to give a welcome dinner to Chen Yu, the Chen family who usually only had simple meals on the weekday, rarely made a table full of dishes today. During dinner, Mother Chen kept on picking dishes to Chen Yu’s bowl, Chen Yu can’t refuse easily, so she could only eat until her stomach almost bursting.
“After two days I’ll send someone to change your residence’s registration, do you want to change your name?” Mayor Chen asked.
“Change name? Why should I change my name?” Chen Yu tilted her head in puzzlement.
“Then it won’t be changed, let’s still call you Chen Yu.” Although Mayor Chen wanted to keep the name she saved for her daughter, but, after all, Chen Yu had already used to this name and it was inconvenient to change it.
After hearing this, Mother Chen couldn’t help but ask, “Who helped you get this name? Why is it called Chen Yu [fish], was it because you like eating fish as a child?”
“No.” Chen Yu shook her head, “My name is the old man’s… cough…grandpa’s choice. It was supposed to be picked from the ‘prince’ side character that means ‘fine jade’. But when I went to the village register, the village head uncle made a mistake and wrote it as fish from carp fish. When grandpa found out, the account had already been registered, and grandpa was too lazy to change it so he just use it until now.”
[T/N: Chen Yu’s Yu written as fish鱼 whereas prince王子’s side character: 瑜 is from美玉, see the similarity between 王 (wang) and 玉 (yu), so it’s supposed to be 陈玉 rather than陈鱼]
“Fish from ‘carp fish’ is also very good, it sounds very lively oh.” Mother Chen smiled.
Mayor Chen also nodded with a smile.
“Do you think it’s lively?” A trace of doubt flashed in Chen Yu’s eyes, “Do you have other associative connection?”
“Associative connection?” Mother Chen glanced to her husband and son, but the two people were also very confused.
“Chen Yu 陈鱼, Chen Yu 深鱼.” Chen Yu reminded them, “The four ancient beauties.”
“Xishi?” Chen Yang reacted the fastest.
“That’s right.” Chen Yu’ expression was ‘I knew you guys can guess it’, “Because of this, my classmate didn’t call my name when I was in school, they all like to call me Xishi or Meiren, you can also call me this way.”
[T/N: a story about the four greatest ancient beauties (Meiren = beautiful person), one of them was called Xishi, who’s so beautiful that when she went to the stream, the fish would stare endlessly at her face, forgot how to swim, and sink to the depths of the water, thus the idiom 沉(sink)鱼 (fish) 落雁 ]
“…” The three people of the Chen family fell into a strange silence once again, the experienced Father Chen reacted the fastest and he quickly adjusted his state of mind, “It’s a very interesting nickname, then we’ll also call you Xishi in the future.”
Chen Yang’s hand that was holding chopsticks shivered, he glanced at this blackened sister of hers. Even if she’s his own little sister, but Chen Yang still can’t ignore his conscience and persuade himself that this is a beauty. He looked at Mayor Chen silently, as if to ask, ‘are you sure that calling her Xishi isn’t ironic?’
[Panda: Okay, I know some of you guys might be offended by this, I personally don’t like this too, but Chinese people have this beauty standard that was rooted from way back then that ‘white skin is beautiful’, it’s just because dark-skinned people usually meant that they are peasants who have to work under the sun, while white-skinned people meant nobles who usually stay indoor. Not to mention Chinese people do tend to be suitable with fair skin rather than darker skin. Please read this with a grain of salt.]
“Alright then.” Chen Yu said happily.
Mother Chen who originally still wanted to say something, looked at how her daughter that seemed to be very happy, and finally decided to say nothing but put a piece of ribs in her daughter’s bowl and said, “Xi… Xishi, eat this piece of ribs.”
“Thank you, mother.” Chen Yu raised her head and smiled genially to express her gratitude.
Mother Chen looked at her black daughter, her eyes became red, she secretly decided to take her daughter out tomorrow for a full set of beauty treatment and strive to get her daughter closer to the path of beauty as soon as possible.
When the several people were eating dinner, Aunt Liu, the nanny, suddenly walked in and said, “Master, Madam, someone came to give present for the young lady.”
“Who?” Mayor Chen asked doubtfully.
“It seems to be the Lou family’s Third young master.” Aunt Liu said.
“Xi… sister, do you know Lou Third young master?” Chen Yang really can’t call out ‘Xishi’.
“No?” Chen Yu, who was drinking soup, shook her head.
“Then why did Lou Third young master send someone to give you a present?” Chen Yang asked.
Chen Yu was baffled too.
“Let’s go and see.”
Mayor Chen took the lead and walked toward the living room. Chen Yu followed her mother, and when she stepped inside the living room, she immediately sensed a familiar evil aura, and she whispered under her breath ‘shoot!’. As soon as she looked up, she saw a man in a uniform exactly the same as the one she saw in the small building this afternoon.
Does heaven wants to kill me?!
What to do, what to do, how should I explain this? How did I go out, why did I go out, I obviously was sleeping in my room, how could my thing fell into someone else’ yard ah? The more Chen Yu thought, the more she couldn’t find any words to explain, as if she had nothing left to live for, she looked at He Qi in the center of the living room. No wonder he let her go so easily this afternoon, it turned out he wanted to settle the scores at an opportune moment.
He Qi naturally also noticed the change in Chen Yu’s expression, he smiled secretly, thinking what Third young master guessed was right, this little girl was really afraid that Mayor Chen would know of her little adventure.
“Assistant He, you’re here.” Mayor Chen recognized the other party as assistant He Qi who’s always around Third young master.
“Mayor Chen, this is the gift prepared by Third young master for the young lady.” He Qi said as he handed the delicately wrapped teddy bear doll in his hand.
“This is?” Mayor Chen was a little dumbfounded as he asked, “How come Third young master suddenly think of giving a present to my daughter?”
“Third young master said that he had promised to give young lady Chen a gift when she was still very young. It was only later that Miss Chen was lost, and although the gift had been bought, it can’t be delivered anymore. Today, Third young master accidentally heard that Miss Chen had been found, so he remembered about this matter again, thus sending me to especially deliver the gift. This can be considered as him fulfilling his promise to Miss Chen.” He Qi turned around and looked at the dumbfounded Chen Yu, “Miss Chen, Third young master said that the gift is a bit old after 15 years, hope you don’t mind.”
“I… I don’t mind.” Chen Yu stuttered nervously.
“Then, please accept it.” He Qi smiled and handed the gift to Chen Yu.
Chen Yu stretched out her hand and looked nervously to He Qi, afraid that the man would say something else.
“Since the gift has been delivered, then I won’t disturb you any longer.” He Qi took his leave.
“Please pass my thanks to Third young master.” Mayor Chen didn’t expect that Lou Ming would remember what happened 15 years ago, furthermore, he sent the gift at the very first day his daughter returned home, so he immediately felt moved.
“I will definitely pass it.” He Qi nodded, then turned around, wanting to depart.
Chen Yu saw that he was really just coming to send her a gift so she felt pleasantly surprised. Her impression of the Third young master in that building became much better, and she thought what to do to express her gratitude, so she called out to He Qi, “You… wait a bit, I-I have a return gift to give Third young master.”
After she finished speaking, she didn’t wait for the other’ reaction before she ran up the stairs while cuddling the bear, and soon, she came back empty-handed. She ran to He Qi and unfolded her right hand, revealing a piece of yellow paper that was folded as a paper crane.
He Qi was puzzled as he looked at Chen Yu.
Chen Yu explained, “This is a safety talisman, which could be used to keep you safe if you bring it with you, although… the packaging is a little bad, but the effect is still good.”
Can this still be counted as packaged? This was the thought of everyone present.
“I will pass it to Third young master.” He Qi took the paper crane and put it carefully inside his pocket, then once again said his goodbye before leaving.
He Qi quickly returned to the small building and knocked on the study door.
“Have you sent the present?” Lou Ming asked while drawing something with his pen without looking up.
“Delivered, the other party also sent a return gift.” He Qi said as he took out the paper crane out of his pocket and put it on his palm.
When he heard about the return gift, Lou Ming raised his head in surprise, his eyes fell on the yellow paper crane with a frown.
“Miss Chen said that this is a safety talisman, although the packaging is a little bit lacking, but the effect is still good.” He Qi said with a smile in his eyes.
“Really?” Lou Ming stretched out two fingers to pinch the little crane paper in front of his eyes, after he pulled the wings, he found the little words on it, “Thank you.”
The corners of Lou Ming’s mouth was slightly raised, he thought that this little girl was quite polite. However, this yellow paper was indeed similar to the rune paper used to draw incantations, and the incantation style really resembled the one given to him by the Great master Mao.
“Are you going to change shifts?” Lou Ming heard the movements outside.
“Yes, Third young master, see you again next week.” He Qi respectfully gave a salute before turning around and departed from the study room.
Ten hours, it looked like the evil aura on his body became even worse, Lou Ming unconsciously showed a bitter smile.