Chapter 72

Chu Yue thought about it for a long time and made sure that she remembered it correctly. When Chu Lidi came back at noon, she mentioned this matter to him.

Chu Yue's physical age is less than ten years old, but her soul is already over sixty. In modern times, she is a lonely person. She has been married and divorced three times and gave birth to two children in her life. However, in the end, both children stopped talking to her because they thought she was embarrassing.

She lives alone in a small house in the downtown area of the capital. The house is not her own but rented. She lives on the child's support and the pension from the state every day. Although Chu Yue's life is poor, it is acceptable. After all, she does not have to go out to work, nor does she have to rely on picking up waste to make a living like other poor old ladies.

But Chu Yue was quite dissatisfied with such a life. She thought that she came from a prominent family. Her first two husbands were one a high-ranking official and the other a wealthy businessman. She had been an official's wife and also a wealthy wife. If she hadn't been so unlucky and met the wrong person, how could she have fallen to this point.

Chu Yue blamed the heavens and the earth, but not herself. She didn't even realize it, but she was just like those mean old ladies in the news, the ones who insisted young people give up their seats on the bus, and if they didn't, she'd yell at them. And if someone squeezed her while she was shopping for groceries, she'd make a scene and make it known to everyone, as if someone had stabbed her.

Modern Chu Yue was completely defeated. She never thought she could start over again, but God was so kind to her that he actually let her return to her childhood. This time, she would never repeat the same mistakes. She would not only shape her own life to be perfect, but also help her family. She wanted to see, if everyone in her family became successful, would anyone dare to point fingers and call them ungrateful wolves who had usurped their power?

At the beginning, Chu Yue forgot how children behaved and almost got caught. Later, she looked at her brother's behavior and imitated him, slowly figuring out the tricks. For example, now, she ran out skipping and jumping, walked to the gate to welcome her father, Chu Lidi, home.

Chu Lidi was originally a man who favored boys over girls. After all, he was raised by Old Madam Gao, and backward ideas took root in his mind. However, since he knew that his daughter was a genius, Chu Lidi's attitude towards Chu Yue has become better and better. When he saw her running out, he even took out a piece of candy from his pocket and said, "Yueyue, eat it."

"Thank you, Dad~"

After receiving Chu Lidi's briefcase, the two of them returned home. Chu Yue's mother also worked and was extremely busy, rarely coming home for lunch. It was always Old Lady Gao who cooked, and sometimes Chu Yue. Ever since she was six, Old Lady Gao had treated her like a servant, constantly making her do chores. If all the children in the neighborhood hadn't gone to school, Chu Lidi was afraid the neighbors would gossip about his child if she didn't go, and she might not even have the chance to go to school.

There were no separate bathrooms or kitchens in the tube-shaped building. Each household had a stove at the door. After cooking, Mrs. Gao turned off the gas stove and turned around with the dishes. Seeing Chu Yue's mouth moving, she yelled in the corridor, "You bought her candy again! What's the point of a girl eating so much candy! The more she eats, the dumber she becomes!"

Although she said so, Mrs. Gao did not make any other moves. She turned back to the house angrily and put the dishes on the table. She told the two of them, "Eat quickly, Chu Yue. After eating, go back and continue doing your homework. Don't always bother your father."

Chu Lidi, "Mom, it's okay, Yueyue talks to me, I don't mind it."

Seeing him contradict her, Old Lady Gao suddenly became unhappy. However, Chu Yue had indeed become much more likable recently. Before, she always kept her head down, didn't like to talk, and when she did, she would say something offensive and always rolled her eyes at people. No one in the entire building liked her. But now, she smiled at everyone she met and was more polite than the adults. Plus, she had the reputation of being a genius, so Old Lady Gao had become more respected in front of the neighbors. Others said she was from the countryside and petty, so you generous people in the city, why don't you give birth to a genius?

When she disliked Chu Yue, Mrs. Gao thought that Chu Yue was a money-losing commodity born by her mother, but when she needed Chu Yue, Mrs. Gao thought that it was because of her good genes that she inherited them from Chu Yue.

No matter how shameless Mrs. Gao was, she couldn't slap herself in the face immediately, so she glanced at the father and daughter at the dinner table. In the end, she said nothing, picked up half a bowl of food, walked into the house, and fed her eldest grandson.

Chu Yue and Chu Lidi chatted casually. Chu Lidi was only a few years old, not even thirty, while Chu Yue had more than sixty years of life experience. If she wanted to achieve her goal, she didn't need to say it directly, just hint at it step by step. She first mentioned Chu Liqiang, and then mentioned his wife Zhang Fengjuan. Chu Yue said to Chu Lidi in a very naive tone: "Auntie always said how beautiful her hometown was, with beautiful mountains and clear waters, but I have never seen what real mountains look like. I dreamed about Auntie yesterday. It was a vague dream, and I just remember that the scenery was very beautiful."

Chu Lidi: "Don't call me Auntie. She and my eldest brother have been divorced for several years. No matter how you look at it, she has nothing to do with us now."

Chu Yue nodded quickly, "I know, I'm just curious. Oh, by the way, Dad, do you know where Auntie's hometown is?"

Chu Lidi ate while thinking, "I think it's called... Qingzhu Village?"

Chu Yue: "Qingzhu Village, it sounds very meaningful. Unlike our place, the Central Village, New Village, and New Village, the names don't have any meaning at all."

Chu Lidi listened for a long time, and finally, he asked, "Yueyue, are you tired of staying at home and want to go out and play?"

Chu Yue sat up straight when she heard it. She looked at Chu Lidi in surprise and asked, "Is it okay?"

Seeing her reaction so strong, and her eyes full of admiration, Chu Lidi felt a sense of satisfaction in his heart. His ears softened and he relaxed: "It's not impossible, but now you need a letter of introduction to go out. Otherwise, we can just walk around the capital. There are also beautiful scenery in Hebei. I'll ask the people at work later..."

Before he could finish his words, Chu Yue interrupted him directly, "Dad, just say you're going to visit relatives. Although Auntie is no longer our family, Chu Shao is still here, and he's still my brother. The scenery here in the capital is not interesting at all. Going to the south is more fun. Dad, you just got promoted this year and your salary has increased so much, so take me with you~"

Chu Lidi was a little hesitant. Qingzhu Village was in City X, which was such a long way away, and they couldn't really go to visit Chu Shao. His mother had asked him to put an advertisement in the newspaper to sever ties with the other members of the Chu family. The name listed was not just Chu Xinghua, but also Chu Liqiang. Although Chu Shao's name was not in the newspaper, he was Chu Liqiang's son, and an only child. He couldn't go back on his word and meet Chu Shao.

Chu immediately explained his hesitation. Chu Yue laughed when she heard it. "Dad, you're so silly. We're just going there to have some fun and have a look. Who said we really have to go see Chu Shao? City X is so big, we can just stay near Qingzhu Village, right? We can see the beautiful scenery, and it can also provide me with more material. When I come back, I will write an essay. This time, maybe I can win a national award!"

It was this last sentence that really moved Chu Lidi. Chu Yue won the certificate of honor, and he also gained face in the unit. Even the leader came to ask him how he had such a smart daughter.

Traveling isn't popular these days, but that's just for ordinary people. The truly powerful also like to go out and relax. For example, many leaders go to Taihu Lake, claiming to be recuperating, but in reality, they're just traveling. Chu Lidi is Chu Xinghua's son, so naturally, he's heard about all this.

Chu Lidi had wanted to try it for a long time, and Chu Yue was a great contributor to his family. The reason why he was able to be promoted so quickly was because Chu Yue came to the unit to play and saw a mistake in the factory. She told Chu Lidi, and Chu Lidi told the leader. In this way, he was promoted from a first-level clerk to a second-level clerk. If he was promoted again, he would also be a leader.

Feeling that Chu Yue was the lucky star of his family, Chu Lidi thought for a moment and nodded, "Okay, when summer vacation comes, Dad will take you out to play for two days. We will go by train. Yueyue, are you happy to be able to take the train?"

Nowadays, many people have never even touched the back seat of a bicycle. If someone has taken a train, it is definitely something they can brag about for the rest of their life. However, Chu Yue lived to the modern era and she had even taken a plane. She felt nothing inside, but seeing Chu Lidi's happy expression, she had to pretend a normal reaction.

"Happy! That's great! I can take the train!"

…

The small Qingshi Town will soon become bustling, but the bustle will belong to others. Chu Jiujiu and her friends are more concerned about their family's first business - mushroom sauce.

Logically speaking, Chu Shaocai is the one who will start from scratch and become rich through business in the future, but for some reason, he doesn't seem to have much business acumen now. The idea of selling mushroom sauce was originally proposed by Wen Xiuwei, and the person who upgraded and processed this idea was Chu Jiujiu. And when it came to actually selling it, it was the usually very low-key Han Shengyi who relied on his eloquence to get the salesperson to raise the price for them.

Han Shengyi is a gifted speaker with a face that everyone trusts. He spoke volumes about an ordinary bottle of mushroom sauce. He gave a bottle to the salesperson for her to try, and then explained that his family had been making this sauce for generations, but then the war broke out and family members went into the army, so the craft fell into disuse. Only recently, after much research, did they finally revive it. The poignancy of his words made one sigh with admiration; it was truly difficult.

He first played the favor card, and then the emotional card. It was only at this time that Wen Xiuwei realized that Han Shengyi's words were even less reliable than Chu Jiujiu's. After all, Chu Jiujiu's adaptation was based on facts, while he directly created a story of his own.

In other words, the salesperson didn't recognize them, otherwise they would have been kicked out long ago.

Han Shengyi didn't think it was a big deal. What he said was not entirely false. The recipe was indeed an heirloom in Wen Xiuwei's family, and someone in his family did join the army after the war broke out.

So, it still stands up to scrutiny.

…

After Chu Jiujiu and Chu Shao came back, they didn't care about the process, but only cared about the results.

Walking quickly to Han Shengyi and Wen Xiuwei, she found the baskets empty, knowing that all the pickles had been sold. Chu Jiujiu quickly asked, "How much did they sell for?"

Originally they expected more than ten yuan, but in fact, as long as there was about ten yuan, Chu Jiujiu would already feel that she had made a big profit. Wen Xiuwei pursed her lips and smiled as she glanced at Han Shengyi. Han Shengyi curled his lips and took out three whole bills and three lighter coins from his pocket.

Chu Jiujiu looked down at his palm for a second, then looked up in shock: "Twenty-five?! You're not going to sell Da Huang and Er Huang together, are you?"

Wen Xiuwei: "What are you talking about? This is all thanks to Shengyi. He bargains better than me. We promised the salesperson that if it sells well, we will sell it to them in the future, so we raised the price a little bit, 65 cents a bottle, and the last penny was just wiped away."

Chu Jiujiu looked at the money without saying anything. Chu Shao was also surprised. But after waiting for a while, he didn't hear Chu Jiujiu's voice anymore. He felt something was wrong, so he turned his head and asked her, "What are you thinking about?"

Chu Jiujiu: "I think..."

She raised her head in a daze and looked at the other three people: "I want to open a mushroom factory."

Han Shengyi: “…”

Wen Xiuwei: “…”

Chu Shao: “…”

Chu Jiujiu was not joking. She really wanted to open a mushroom factory, specializing in growing mushrooms, and then making mushroom sauce. Just think about it, in two days, they made nearly fifty cans, some of which they gave away and most of which they sold. In this way, they could still make twenty-five yuan. If they had a factory, the money would come in like a ton.

If this were a cartoon, Chu Jiujiu's eyes would be the slot machine's window. The pattern on the window would spin rapidly, and in the end, it would turn into the symbol of the US dollar.

…

There were so many complaints that Chu Shao didn't know where to start. In the end, he could only look at Chu Jiujiu silently and said to her, "Study hard."

Wen Xiuwei chuckled, "Jiujiu is quite ambitious, but Chu Shao is right, your current task is to study hard."

Feeling the disgust and indifference of these two people, Chu Jiujiu was stunned. She looked at the last person, the one who would never hit her.

Han Shengyi picked up the empty backpack, smiled gently, and walked up to Chu Jiujiu. "Building a factory requires capital, and you need people to help you with the work. Right now, none of us are adults. Maybe when you grow up, you can realize this dream."

Chu Jiujiu was about to say that she would start saving money from now on, and the first thing she would do when she grew up would be to open a mushroom factory. However, Han Shengyi quickly changed the subject, "But who knows, you might want to open a mushroom factory with the money you earn from selling mushroom sauce. Then, if you come across valuable Chinese herbal medicines, you might even want to open a Chinese medicine factory. Living by the mountains, all you can think of are the things there. When you leave this village, you'll see more and more valuable things. By then, no one will know what kind of factory you'll want to open."

Chu Jiujiu blinked, feeling that Han Shengyi was right. This was just how she was. She wanted to do whatever she saw, just like the story Grandma Han told about the bear picking corn. He would pick one, then see a bigger one, and then he wanted to pick another, throwing the previous one away. But he would keep busy like this, not only exhausting himself, but in the end, he would only have one corn left in his hand.

Chu Jiujiu was a little confused. "So should I just keep waiting? Wait until I see something of the greatest value, and then open a factory?"

Han Shengyi was stunned for a moment, then laughed. "That's just what I said. You don't have to think too much. My father said that everyone has something they particularly want to do, and it's different from other things. So, this situation has a name: dream. He also said that if you don't know what your dream is, it means you haven't encountered it yet. Just wait, maybe one day you will encounter it."

Wen Xiuwei and Chu Shao were walking in the front, no one looked back, but they both pricked up their ears to listen to Han Shengyi and Chu Jiujiu reasoning. Wen Xiuwei was a little surprised, she didn't expect that Han Shengyi was young, but his words were so worldly-wise. Some adults didn't even understand these principles.

She didn't want to disturb them by making any noise, so she slowed down her pace and listened quietly.

Chu Jiujiu asked Han Shengyi: "Brother Shengyi, do you have a dream?"

Han Shengyi nodded naturally, "Yes."

Chu Jiujiu: "What is your dream?"

Curling the corners of his lips, Han Shengyi looked forward and said, "I want to be a big shot."

Chu Jiujiu listened expectantly. When she heard this, her eyelids drooped. "Brother Shengyi, your dream is a bit vulgar."

Han Shengyi chuckled, "It seems so. What about you? Besides running a factory, do you want to do something else?"

Chu Jiujiu was silent for a second and shook her head. "No, I don't know. I... I can't think of it."

The more she spoke, the more hesitant she became. Chu Jiujiu truly didn't know what she wanted to do in the future. Some people wanted to make a lot of money. Making money could excite Chu Jiujiu, but it wasn't that exciting. The reason she loved making money so much was because their current life wasn't affluent enough. True, they were one of the richest families in the countryside, but if they moved to the city, they wouldn't be enough.

Some people crave power, but Chu Jiujiu has no interest in bossing people around. As for dedicating her life to contributing to her country, she doesn't seem that noble. Granted, she wants to do good for her country and her people, but that doesn't mean she has to be a civil servant.

After thinking for a long time, Chu Jiujiu finally came up with a hobby that was completely unaffected by anything and came from her heart. That was listening to poetry and Fang Weiping's stories that had happened thousands and hundreds of years ago.

She likes history and the vivid power deposited in texts and oral traditions. In modern times, her mother took her to the museum. Other children only glanced at the exhibitions, but she could spend five or six minutes looking at a bronze artifact. She not only looked at the shape, but also the patterns, staring at the gaps and rust on it and carefully describing them. Her mother once asked her why she looked so carefully, and Chu Jiujiu's answer at the time was this.

"Mom, the bottle seems to be talking to me."

Her mother was very surprised. How could a bottle talk? Little Chu Jiujiu tilted her head. She couldn't explain it herself. The bottle stood quietly in the glass cabinet. It had no mouth and of course it couldn't speak. But the more Chu Jiujiu looked at it, the more she felt that it was telling her something, but she couldn't understand it.

However, even if she didn't understand, she could still feel the heavy and lingering charm, which made her feel her heart surge every time she thought of it.