76 Chapter 76

I will not become like you.

Panpan's treatment went relatively smoothly. After an acupuncture session in the afternoon, the doctor said that its hind limbs had begun to respond, and it might be able to stand up in a while.

After leaving the hospital, Shi Ziqian stood on the steps at the hospital entrance, holding Panpan's hand, without moving, his face showing a hint of fatigue.

These past few days, besides taking Panpan out of school for physical therapy every two days and cleaning up after it and the dormitory, I also have to deal with its extremely high energy levels. Right now, Panpan is dragging its little wheelchair around him incessantly, never stopping for a moment, hoping he will play with it. But he only made a stop gesture and said, "Panpan, don't move."

Panpan obediently slammed on the brakes and stopped, raising her head and staring at him with her round eyes.

Shi Ziqian stared at it for a while, sighed softly, bent down, and touched its forehead with his index finger.

Panpan tilted her head and rubbed her wet nose against his hand.

Shi Ziqian straightened up, took out a wet wipe and wiped his hands, then looked outside.

As dusk approached, a hazy yellow glow appeared on the distant horizon, revealing the desolation unique to autumn.

He took Panpan's hand and walked a few steps toward the roadside. The streetlights along the road suddenly lit up one by one. The residential area a little further away was now also dotted with lights.

At such times when the smoke from countless homes fills the air, one always feels inexplicably lonely. Shi Ziqian stared blankly at the autumn leaves by the roadside, bathed in the golden light of the street lamps, for a long while, until he heard Panpan call out beside his legs. He suddenly came back to his senses and muttered to himself, "Let's go, we should go back."

He stood by the roadside, ready to hail a taxi. It was rush hour, and several taxis had passed by, but none were available. After waiting a while longer, he still couldn't get a cab, but a familiar car stopped in front of him first.

The back window rolled down, revealing Shi Yuesheng's face: "What are you doing here at this hour instead of being at school?"

"I have some errands to run," Shi Ziqian said. "I'm getting ready to head back."

Shi Yuesheng's gaze fell on the oddly shaped black dog beside him, and after a couple of glances, he asked, "Is this the dog you keep?"

Shi Ziqian: "You knew I had a dog?"

“I know a lot more,” Shi Yuesheng said. “Get in the car, I’ll take you back to school.”

"No need, I'll take a taxi."

"It's on my way, hop on."

Shi Ziqian hesitated for a moment, then opened the car door and got in. Panpan was also lifted into the car by him and placed at his feet.

It was very alert in the unfamiliar environment. Although its head was nestled next to Shi Ziqian's legs, its ears were always perked up, and its eyes kept glancing at Shi Yuesheng.

Shi Yuesheng leaned back in his car seat, resting with his eyes closed. He didn't look at the dog, but asked, "Can you cure this dog?"

"It should be possible."

“That hospital wasn’t very good either, was it? If it doesn’t work out, let’s try a better one,” Shi Yuesheng said.

"It was treated at that hospital from the beginning, because the doctors there are more familiar with its condition."

Shi Yuesheng nodded and then asked, "Have you eaten?"

"have eaten."

After he got into the car, the driver raised the partition, and now the back seat was quiet, with only the father and son inside. Shi Ziqian wasn't used to being alone with Shi Yuesheng, so after responding to a couple of questions, he turned his head and looked out the window.

Actually, he hadn't eaten. Recently, he had been taking Panpan to physical therapy, and he had to rush back to the dormitory to pick her up after the last class, then take her back to the classroom after the therapy, so he could barely make it to his evening class. Therefore, dinner was always skipped.

"I haven't eaten yet," Shi Yuesheng said. "Have a meal with me."

Shi Ziqian was a little surprised and glanced at his watch: "I don't have that much time, I have to go back to my evening class."

“It won’t take you long. Just find a place to eat a bowl of noodles by the roadside. I had some wine at noon, and now I just want a bowl of sour soup noodles.” Shi Yuesheng looked over. “It’s rare to have just the two of us, father and son.”

Shi Ziqian thought for a moment, then remained silent, which was taken as tacit agreement.

This road is considered a main thoroughfare, with decent greenery along the way, but few shops and no prominent restaurants in sight. After turning a corner, a noodle shop appeared on the roadside, standing alone under a large tree, its bright red storefront giving it a simple and unassuming appearance.

Shi Yuesheng lowered the partition slightly, signaling to the driver, "Pull over for a bit, let's have a bowl of noodles."

Although the driver was surprised, he didn't say anything and quickly brought the car to a steady stop.

The noodle shop has a small storefront and only four sets of tables and chairs inside, but thankfully the environment is fairly clean. Perhaps because of its prime location with heavy traffic but few pedestrians, business is slow, and at this moment there isn't a single customer.

A black and white Rolls-Royce pulled up in front of the small shop, its gleaming gold Spirit of Ecstasy making the shop appear even more shabby. The door opened, and a middle-aged man in a suit stepped out and strode into the shop without hesitation. He glanced at the menu hanging above the counter and asked the owner, "Can you make sour soup noodles?"

"It can be done." There was only one owner in the shop, a man who wasn't very old. He looked him up and down for a moment, clearly wondering why he would come to eat here dressed like that.

Shi Yuesheng didn't pay much attention to his gaze and happily said, "Give me a bowl."

Behind him, Shi Ziqian, dressed in a school uniform, followed him in. He left Panpan in the car and got out empty-handed.

"Would you like a bowl too?" Shi Yuesheng asked him.

Shi Ziqian responded, "Okay."

"Okay. Boss, two bowls of sour soup noodles."

The owner went into the kitchen to cook noodles. Shi Yuesheng strolled around the shop, found a seat, and gestured to Shi Ziqian, "Sit down."

"How about it? You've rarely eaten in a small shop like this before, haven't you?" Shi Yuesheng said.

“That’s you, not me,” Shi Ziqian said calmly.

“It’s been many years since I last came here.” Shi Yuesheng said with a look of emotion. “But I ate a lot when I was young. In the first few years of my business, I was so focused on my business that I often didn’t have time to eat. Sometimes I would get so hungry on the way to business meetings that my stomach would hurt. I would be so happy to see a small shop like this. I would always go in and eat a bowl of noodles for a few minutes before continuing on my way.”

At this point, he turned to look at Shi Ziqian, a smile appearing on his face, "Starting from scratch is not easy. We had a very tough time back then. Can you young people today endure that kind of hardship?"

Shi Ziqian didn't seem inclined to respond, and Shi Yuesheng didn't press the matter. His gaze, which had been fixed on Shi Ziqian's face, seemed to drift away, looking somewhere else entirely. After a while, a hint of nostalgia appeared in Shi Yuesheng's eyes: "Although I was tired back then, I seemed to never feel fatigue. Every day was filled with fighting spirit and hope. Looking back now, that period of my life was actually the best. And..." He paused, "Your mother was still by my side back then. To be honest, she didn't have a good life with me either; instead, she endured a lot of hardship with me."

Shi Ziqian, who had been expressionless, twitched his brow and his voice turned cold: "Don't tell me these things, I don't want to hear them."

Shi Yuesheng smiled and said, "I know you've always blamed me, haven't you? It's only right that you blame me; I'm not a good father. Now that I think about it, no matter how big my business became, I failed miserably in both my family and my relationships."

Shi Ziqian remained silent. During the brief silence, the shopkeeper brought out the noodles and placed them in front of the two of them.

Don't let the small size of this shop fool you; the owner's skills seem quite impressive, and even a simple bowl of noodles looks very appealing. Shi Yuesheng took a bite with his chopsticks and sincerely remarked, "It tastes good."

The owner simply said, "You can get more if you're still hungry," and then went to sit on the recliner by the door.

Shi Ziqian lowered his head and ate his noodles quietly. Shi Yuesheng looked at the noodles but didn't touch them. Instead, he said to himself, "Your mother can't cook, but sometimes when I come home from social events at night, she'll make me a bowl of sour soup noodles like this. It's probably the only thing she can make. Although the taste is just average, it makes me miss it."

There was no response.

Shi Ziqian sensed that Shi Yuesheng had probably drunk quite a bit at noon and wasn't fully sober yet, otherwise he wouldn't be talking so much. He didn't reply, and Shi Yuesheng didn't seem to mind, continuing to talk on his own.

"Actually, I don't know how we ended up like this. When your mother first came to live with me, I was just a poor kid. Your mother is so beautiful, yet she still fell for me. Unfortunately, we're both stubborn, and neither of us was willing to back down when things got tough. Later, although life got better and better, and my business became more and more successful, we argued more and more frequently. In the end, our personalities are just too similar. One time, in the heat of the argument, she brought up divorce, and I said, 'Fine, if you want a divorce, then let's get a divorce.' And that's how we got divorced, all in a daze."

"Even though we're divorced, I never really thought we'd really separate. I just felt we'd always been like this, arguing, just this time it was a bit more intense, and we'd make up eventually. But one day, your mother suddenly called me. I remember it was a morning. She usually doesn't answer my calls, so I was really happy to get her call that day. But on the other end of the line, she said: 'You think I can't find someone better than you after leaving you? Let me tell you, I've found a man a hundred times better than you!'"

“I was so angry I was shaking, I completely lost my mind, and all I could think about was finding a better woman to show her. Actually, back then, Xiaoyue's grandfather really admired me, and after he knew about my divorce, he had been trying to set me up with her mother. In a moment of impulsiveness, I just agreed…”

"It was only much later that I found out that your mother was just trying to spite me, and there was no one else in her life. But by then, it was too late... After finding out, she hated me so much that she didn't even want you anymore."

Shi Yuesheng picked up two strands of noodles with his chopsticks but didn't put them in his mouth. "Actually, Xiaoyue's mother was innocent too. It's just that her grandfather was too domineering, so she didn't have her own opinions and married me according to his arrangement. We didn't have much affection for each other, and we just drifted through life like that. The first few years were okay, but the more time went on, the more I missed your mother. Then, Zhu Qing appeared. She really looks like your mother. I made a mistake, and now not only your mother hates me, but Xiaoyue's mother, Xiaoyue, and Xiaole all hate me."

"One wrong step leads to another. How did I end up like this today?"

Shi Yuesheng was lost in thought, while Shi Ziqian, who had been silent and seemingly oblivious to whether he was listening, suddenly chuckled twice, his voice revealing undisguised sarcasm.

When Shi Yuesheng met his expression, the dazed look on his face gradually disappeared, and finally he couldn't help but frown: "I am your father, don't look at me like that, I don't like it."

"Was it really just an impulse?" Shi Ziqian had finished his noodles sometime earlier. He put down his chopsticks and looked at him. "Do you dare say that when you agreed to Shi Qiyue's grandfather's request, you didn't have any selfish motives? Did it really have nothing to do with the fact that his high position might bring you a lot of help?"

Shi Yuesheng's expression changed, but he didn't get angry in the end. He just looked down at the noodles in the bowl, his expression somewhat unpleasant.

After Shi Ziqian finished speaking, he didn't say anything more. The two of them sat facing the outside of the shop. He looked out quietly, and the boundless darkness in the distance had already merged into the horizon.

The father and son faced off in silence for a long time, until finally Shi Yuesheng lowered his head first. He rarely spoke so humbly, but he knew his son's temperament was even more stubborn than his own, and he didn't know if he inherited it from him or Zhu Sheng. "Ziqian, do you have to be so unforgiving to your father?" he sighed softly. "No matter what, a father still wants to maintain his image as a father in front of his children..."

“You’re right. Back then, besides love, I also had a burning ambition in my heart. Perhaps at the moment I made the decision, my determination to rise above others outweighed the weight of love in my heart. So now I deserve all of this, and there’s nothing to be sad or regretful about.” Shi Yuesheng put down his chopsticks, clearly not intending to eat anymore. As he stood up, he sighed softly, “The world of fame and fortune isn’t a good place. It can change a person in an instant, and those seemingly nonexistent possibilities are enough to tempt any young heart.”

He looked at Shi Ziqian: "You'll understand when you reach my position."

His tone was one of relief and certainty: "Perhaps by then, you will make the same choice as me."

Shi Ziqian's eyes flickered, and as he looked at him, a conversation he had with Zhan Xinyue not long ago came to mind. That day, Zhan Xinyue had encountered something and suddenly asked him a very strange question: "Do you think money, or wealth, can change a person?"

His answer at the time was "maybe," after all, he already knew far too many stories like that. But Zhan Xinyue said she didn't believe it.

He thought he knew Zhan Xinyue well; she was usually mild-mannered and rarely assertive. But the determination and subtle mockery in her eyes at that moment surprised him.

Perhaps she, like him, had seen some very unpleasant things.

Shi Ziqian suddenly laughed again.

Shi Yuesheng looked at him, confused, but then saw Shi Ziqian's sharp gaze fixed on him, his eyes revealing a faint mockery that Shi Yuesheng disliked the most: "I won't. I will never become like you."