vstars Chapter 154 Returning to Shou County
Chapter 154 Returning to Shou County
After Fan Hua left, Li Wanqing briefly explained the cooperation to Cheng Baichuan.
“I know it’s not appropriate for someone of your status to get involved, so the money I used to invest was the money I got from the Renxing Brigade when they severed ties,” Li Wanqing explained.
Cheng Baichuan nodded. "I have no objection, but are you sure you can really trust that Fan Hua?"
After all, we only met on the first day.
Li Wanqing nodded. "He Mei mentioned this cousin before; he seems to be a trustworthy person."
"Besides, I signed a contract, so even if he's really been scammed, he can't escape it."
"Alright then!" Cheng Baichuan agreed verbally, but still decided to have someone keep a close eye on things privately.
"The leader called me today. There are results from Shou County. Let's pack up and go back to Shou County together in a couple of days."
There was an indescribable sadness in Cheng Baichuan's voice when he said this.
Li Wanqing understood her feelings; after all, this kind of thing was indeed quite difficult for people to accept at first.
"What about Liu Yufen?" Li Wanqing asked.
Cheng Baichuan was just about to bring up this issue when he said, "I will take her back by train alone, ostensibly to deal with Cheng Zhenxing's matter."
"You and Nuonuo will ride in Chief Cheng's car, along with Dr. Cao and your uncle."
"Is Uncle going back too?" Li Wanqing was a little surprised.
Cheng Baichuan nodded. "After all, he has met Xiao Qiu before."
Li Wanqing suddenly realized that she had almost forgotten about this. "When are you planning to leave? I'll talk to the cultural troupe about it tomorrow."
Cheng Baichuan thought for a moment and said, "Let's do it on the sixteenth of the first lunar month."
That's the day after tomorrow.
Things happened rather suddenly, and time was a bit tight; Li Wanqing still had a lot of things to deal with.
This trip to Shou County, including handling some matters, will take at least a week.
Li Wanqing handed the keys to Aunt Li and asked her to look after the house.
With the military region leaders intervening, Commander Xu readily granted the leave to the cultural troupe.
Only Guo Chunxiang was a little reluctant to part with it.
"I'll be so bored now that you're gone," Guo Chunxiang sighed, her head throbbing at the thought of her bunch of mischievous kids at home.
"Since you're going to be so troublesome, why don't you leave Nuonuo at my house?"
Guo Chunxiang thought about it more and more and felt that this method was feasible. With Nuonuo around, the three mischievous kids would behave a little better.
Li Wanqing laughed and said, "I can't make that decision."
Guo Chunxiang felt deflated when she recalled Commander Cheng's strict and vigilant manner.
He complains if I try to play with Nuonuo too often.
If he doesn't go to the military camp, he's being watched the whole time.
Leaving the child at her house... is probably not an option.
"Alright, when I get back I'll bring you some local specialties from Shou County," Li Wanqing comforted her.
Guo Chunxiang's face fell at the thought of this. "This little thing must have come to collect a debt. I've been having severe morning sickness lately, especially during the Lunar New Year. There were so many delicious foods, but I didn't eat much of them."
"These past two days, we've been kept alive by Aunt Li's pickle jar."
Li Wanqing knew about Guo Chunxiang's morning sickness and had sent her many gifts, but unfortunately, Guo Chunxiang's morning sickness was quite severe.
However, the pickled vegetables made by Aunt Li were sour, crisp, and refreshing, which saved Guo Chunxiang's life twice.
"I'll bring it back first. You can eat it after your morning sickness subsides."
Guo Chunxiang loved to hear this. She touched her belly and said with a smile, "This pregnancy is different from the previous three babies. Old Shao is overjoyed and is certain it's a girl."
"Commander Shao has already spread the word throughout the entire military region," Li Wanqing said with a smile.
When Cheng Baichuan talked about it, he still looked disgusted.
The original words were: "This is the fourth child, and Lao Shao is still just as unreliable as he was with the first child."
However, Battalion Commander Shao wasn't afraid of being looked down upon at all, since he kept calling her "daughter, daughter" all the time.
.......
On the morning of the Lantern Festival, Li Wanqing cooked a pot of glutinous rice balls, some with white sugar and peanut filling, and some with black sesame filling.
Nono likes peanuts with white sugar, even though they're both sweet. But the little one dislikes black sesame seeds because they look dark and unappetizing.
The glutinous rice balls were made by Li Wanqing herself the night before. To accommodate little Nuonuo, the glutinous rice balls were not very big.
Nuonuo ate 15 in one go. If Li Wanqing hadn't been worried that she would have indigestion from eating too much, the little one could have eaten even more.
As for Cheng Baichuan, the competitive eater, he ate at least 50.
Luckily she made a lot, otherwise there really wouldn't be enough to eat.
Li Wanqing likes to cook glutinous rice balls with fermented glutinous rice, but Nuonuo and Cheng Baichuan don't like the taste of fermented glutinous rice.
So her portion was cooked separately.
Aunt Li made the fermented rice using the method she learned from Sichuan Province, but the Liang family didn't really like it, which benefited her.
The full moon on the fifteenth was round and bright. The air in this era was not too polluted. The moonlight shone on the ground, so bright that you didn't even need a flashlight to walk.
There's another custom here on the fifteenth day of the first lunar month: picking green vegetables at midnight.
However, there are very few people growing vegetables outside in this area; they are either vegetable plots belonging to the military region or to villagers from the surrounding villages.
Neither of these places is ideal for picking green vegetables.
Moreover, we live in an era of scarcity, where everyone's food is precious.
Even if there are naughty children, they all know they can't actually mess around in the vegetable garden.
At most, I would just go to the field to pick a leaf or pull up a scallion.
So everyone just turned a blind eye.
After the Lantern Festival, Cheng Baichuan left early in the morning with his luggage.
In order not to arouse Liu Yufen's suspicion, he planned to leave by train alone with a group of people.
Once on the train, Liu Yufen's heart gradually relaxed. "Third brother, your brother has suffered a lot this time. You must help him when you get back."
"He's unemployed right now, you need to help him find a job."
Along the way, Liu Yufen would cry her heart out one moment and complain about Cheng Baichuan the next.
Cheng Baichuan rarely spoke; she said she was tired and then stopped talking.
Li Wanqing and Cheng Chi set off around 9 a.m. Li Wanqing gave the key to Aunt Li and left.
No one else was notified.
The leader's official car is a relatively large military jeep, but it only has five seats in total.
However, due to the large number of people this time, two vehicles were used in total.
Li Wanqing rode in one car with Nuonuo and Meng Renjie, while Cheng Chi and Cao Xuefeng rode in another.
There were also two or three guards.
It takes two days and one night to travel from Sichuan Province to Shou County by train; driving is much faster.
However, because there were children with us, the car was moving slowly and kept stopping and starting.
When we arrived at the Shouxian Guesthouse, it was already the afternoon of the 17th day of the first lunar month.
Cheng Baichuan's train wouldn't arrive until evening, so Cheng Chi and the others went directly to the Public Security Bureau.
There are two things I'm here for: one is the issue of Cheng Baichuan's background, and the other is Liu Yufen's collusion with human traffickers.
This was an unexpected bonus; even Li Wanqing hadn't anticipated that the so-called human trafficker "aunt" would suddenly bring Liu Yufen into the picture.