The lights were still on in Sun Caiping's room next door; she probably hadn't gone to bed yet.

Sun Miao'er had a sudden inspiration. "Xiaoman, take your homework and come with me."

Sun Caiping was educated. After all, the Sun family had not yet fallen into decline when Old Man Sun was alive. In addition, Old Lady Sun also came from a scholarly family, so there was no saying that "a woman's virtue lies in her lack of talent." All four children had attended private schools.

Sun Caiping is intelligent and stubborn, and she studies very hard, making her a deserving "talented woman" in the small mountain village.

"Is Auntie resting?" Sun Miao'er asked from outside.

Sun Caiping opened the door; her eyes were dark and swollen from several days of insomnia. "Come in."

She took it as Sun Miao'er coming to persuade her, and before Sun Miao'er could speak, she took the initiative and said, "Miao'er, your aunt is understanding, so don't worry."

Sun Miao'er laughed and said, "What are you thinking, Aunt? Let's not talk about those things. Right now, Xiaoman's handwriting is still not good. I remember that Aunt's small regular script is the best. I would like to ask Aunt to teach Xiaoman."

Sun Caiping now feels extremely guilty towards her family because of Jiang Yutao's matter. She has a thorn in her heart and feels that she cannot get over this hurdle unless she does something for the Sun family.

"Come, let me see." Hearing that Xiaoman wanted to ask her for advice, Sun Caiping finally felt a little better. She had also heard about Sun Yuanhu and Jin's plan to sell their son to pay off their debts, and she felt sorry for her sweet-talking and obedient little nephew.

Xiaoman spread the Xuan paper out on the table, looking every bit the studious girl.

Sun Miao'er helped grind the ink, and Sun Caiping picked up the brush and wrote a sentence on the paper: "Respect the elderly as you would your own parents, care for the young as you would your own children." "Let me copy it once for my aunt to see."

Xiaoman did as instructed, and solemnly copied the characters once.

Sun Caiping picked up the paper that Xiaoman had just written on; the ink was still wet and it smelled of ink. "Come on, take a look and see if there's any difference between this and what your aunt wrote."

"It's not as good as Auntie's handwriting." Xiaoman tilted her head, very dissatisfied with her own handwriting, and didn't want to look at it again.

Sun Caiping is a very patient person; otherwise, she wouldn't have forgiven Jiang Yutao so easily time and time again. Meeting Xiaoman brought out the gentle side of her personality.

Since she had no biological children, she treated her two nephews as her own.

“If you don’t even want to look at it yourself, how can you expect others to like your handwriting?” Sun Caiping said softly, pulling Xiaoman into her arms. “Come on, look at it carefully.”

Even though Xiaoman was unwilling, she still turned her head and stared at the few lines of text for a long time.

"My handwriting isn't as neat as my aunt's," Xiaoman said.

"Anything else?"

Xiaoman scratched his head and yawned, "The strokes are too rough, the horizontal lines are not level and the vertical lines are not straight."

Sun Caiping smiled knowingly, "Didn't you understand? Where there's a problem, we'll solve it from there. If we can't write straight, we'll practice writing straight characters first."

Sun Miao'er watched quietly from the side. Xiaoman found Sun Caiping's patient and persuasive approach very helpful, as she no longer had to endure the teacher's scolding as she did in the private school.

Xiaoman may seem carefree, but she is actually quite sensitive. On the other hand, Xiaoning has worked outside since childhood and knows how to deal with people.

The immediate problem was solved effortlessly.

Xiaoman practiced his calligraphy several times, but his eyelids kept drooping. He was so sleepy that Sun Miao'er told him to go to sleep first.

“Aunt, why don’t you stay home tomorrow and help Xiaoman with her reading and writing?” Sun Miao’er knew that Sun Caiping needed someone to keep her company to ease her distress.

Sun Caiping was taken aback and asked in return, "Me?"

She laughed self-deprecatingly, "How could I possibly be capable of teaching Xiaoman to write? I'd probably be misleading her!"

Sun Miao'er disagreed, "Aunt, Xiaoman is struggling at the private school. The teacher can't take care of so many students. If he doesn't do well, the teacher will scold him. I think it would be better for him to practice calligraphy with you at home for a few days first. Once he has a solid foundation, he can go to the private school."

“Reading and recognizing characters is not a problem for me.” Sun Caiping’s resistance gradually dissipated, and Xiaoman’s satisfied smile just now made her cold heart feel a long-lost warmth. “But I’m no good at writing articles.”

Sun Miao'er was delighted to hear that she had agreed, saying, "Don't worry, as long as Auntie is willing to take Xiaoman with her!"

This approach achieves two goals at once: it solves Xiaoman's problem and helps Dagu get out of her worries and distress as soon as possible.

The next day, the weather suddenly turned cold, without any warning.

The thick quilt and thin cotton clothes that Sun Miao'er bought finally came in handy. Fortunately, we were in the south, so it wasn't too cold.

As she busied herself in the courtyard, she heard the sound of children reciting their lessons coming from inside the house. Xiaoman was taking lessons at home with Sun Caiping, which was much easier than attending a private school, and she was gradually regaining her previous cheerfulness.

"Is it the Sun family?"

A young woman's voice suddenly came from outside the door.

Sun Miao'er peeked out and saw that the person who came was Wang Xueru.

Upon seeing Sun Miao'er, Wang Xueru excitedly ran forward, put her arm around her shoulder, and spun her around several times, calling out, "Miao'er! Miao'er!"

Sun Miao'er was surprised and delighted that Wang Xueru had come looking for her. After calming down, she took Wang Xueru's hand and asked, "Xueru, what brought you here?"

"Have you forgotten?" Wang Xueru was very curious about the countryside and wandered around the yard. Many of the things she had never seen at home were there. "When you left, I promised you that I would come to find you."

Wang Xueru walked around the courtyard. Today she was wearing a bright red pomegranate dress, which made her face even more beautiful. "Oh right, Brother Jingnian is here too, but he said he went to his aunt's first and will come to find us later."

Sun Miao'er nodded knowingly. She could roughly guess why Wei Jingnian had come; the Wei family's affairs must have been settled.

Sun Miao'er spent several hours every day working on the white raw yarn. After repeated experiments, she finalized the color, but she didn't expect Wang Xueru to come so soon, before the white raw yarn was even dried.

Because the white raw yarn is delicate and cannot be directly exposed to the sun, she specially chose an empty room to air dry it in the shade, and only took it out to dry for a short while each day when the sun was weakest.

"Go and see if the white yarn suits your taste," Sun Miao'er said.

Wang Xueru waved her hand, "No rush, I came a few days early on purpose, thinking of giving you a surprise! It just so happens that Brother Jingnian came over and said he had something to bring you, so I came along."

"Do you know what happened at home while I was away?" Wang Xueru suddenly said mysteriously.

"What's wrong?" Sun Miao'er listened attentively.

Wang Xueru asked, "Do you remember Xiaoju, the maid who served you that day?"

Sun Miao'er's memory was vague; she only remembered that she was a timid girl whom Aunt Qin had bought.

"She poisoned Ziqian's ginseng soup!" Wang Xueru was still somewhat shocked.