Chapter 0003 Crisis

Because of Chen Yan, Ruyi lived in constant fear for half a month.

But everything was calm and peaceful, as if the day the news was reported was just a nightmare in the girl's wild imagination.

Occasionally, you might run into Chen Yan in the office, corridor, or stairwell. He's either arm in arm with his cronies or walking leisurely alone. The common thread is that he doesn't look at you directly, as if Ruyi is invisible.

Ruyi guessed that this person might have intermittent mental illness, and that he just happened to be having an episode that day, and she was unlucky enough to run into him.

The more she thought about it, the more reasonable it seemed. The worries that had been weighing on her mind gradually dissipated, and she breathed a sigh of relief, focusing wholeheartedly on her new academic life and interpersonal interactions.

After three weeks of military training, Ruyi and her roommates gradually became familiar with each other.

Hao Jing, Hao Jing's roommate, attended the middle school next to Chen Yan's Experimental Middle School. Chen Yan and Cheng Jue came from wealthy families and were outstanding in appearance. They were popular figures on campus and quite famous in the Lancheng Middle School Tieba forum. As the forum administrator, Hao Jing knew a lot of gossip about Chen Yan and would talk endlessly about it during their late-night chats in the dormitory.

"His family background is unfathomable. His grandfather was once the commander of a military region and moved to Lancheng to retire. His father is Chen Weiren, the richest man in Lancheng. We don't know about the others, but what's scary is that we don't know them."

"Experimental High School is a national key high school, and there are too many rich and beautiful girls studying there. Just from the online forum, there are no fewer than ten pretty girls who have confessed their love to him in public, but he doesn't like any of them! When he's in a bad mood, he even directly curses and tells ugly girls to get lost! He has broken the hearts of countless girls."

"His temper is awful, and his grades are even worse. Class 14 is almost entirely filled with students admitted through connections; it's an open secret at No. 1 High School. If it weren't for Chen Weiren donating money to the school to build a gymnasium, how could Chen Yan, with his terrible grades, have possibly gotten into No. 1 High School?"

"It seems like he's never been in a relationship before. The only one he's really close to is Chen Yaqian from Class 5..."

"Chen Yaqian is also very impressive. She is beautiful and academically excellent. Although her family background is not as good as Chen Yan's, it is still very wealthy. She can also dance and play the piano. During the junior high school arts festival, she captivated a lot of male classmates."

"Pretty? It's alright, but I don't think it's as pretty as Ruyi."

Ruyi showed little interest in the topic of Chen Yan, her attention was diverted to reviewing what she had learned during the day, and she occasionally chimed in with a few words to show her participation. Suddenly she was called on, but she only heard the second half of it, which seemed to be a compliment, so she humbly shook her head.

No, I don't think so.

"Oh my god, do you have to be so modest? Don't you ever look in the mirror?" the girl in the upper bunk teased.

"Go ahead and take a picture." Ruyi was puzzled.

"So, who do you think is prettier, you or Chen Yaqian?"

Ah, who is Chen Yaqian? Ruyi was confused, but she didn't intend to reveal that she had been slacking off, so she said seriously, "I think our main task at this stage is to study, and appearance should not be the focus of attention."

Hao Jing said, "Baby, you're too Versailles-like. I've decided to break off our friendship for five minutes..."

Ruyi smiled slightly upon hearing this. She was speaking from the heart. A few days ago, a boy from Class 12 confessed his feelings to her. When she asked him why, the straightforward and cheerful boy was embarrassed by the question and frankly said that he thought she was pretty.

"But I think liking someone's appearance is superficial. Thank you for liking me, but I don't need it."

The boy asked her what kind of girl she liked, and Ruyi cleverly replied, "Perhaps I can answer that question after the college entrance exam."

What kind of boy does she like? Actually, Ruyi herself doesn't know, she only has a vague idea: he must be a good person, responsible, and have decent looks and family background...

As she pondered, Chen Yan's face flashed through her mind, and she couldn't help but shiver. In any case, it couldn't be him.

*

The days flew by amidst the teachers' enthusiastic chatter and the girls' laughter, and soon the first monthly break arrived.

On weekdays, she only gets half a day off, and monthly holidays are the real weekends. Ruyi lives in the northern industrial suburbs of Lancheng, which is across most of the city from the southeastern urban area where No. 1 Middle School is located. Unlike Hao Jing, who lives near No. 7 Middle School, she can't go home every week.

She finally got her monthly break, so she packed her things the night before. The next afternoon, as soon as school was over, she carried her textbooks and homework straight to the bus stop, eager to get home.

He Caiyu prepared a sumptuous meal, and Ruyi and her mother finally had a lively meal together at 8:30 pm.

The next day, Ruyi got up early, washed up quickly, ate the egg buns her aunt had left for her in the rice cooker steamer, and rushed to the vegetable market 700 meters away from home.

He Caiyu was originally a state-owned steel mill employee. After the steel mill was restructured, it became a private enterprise, and He's secure job was downgraded to a long-term contract. Unexpectedly, three years ago, the steel mill went bankrupt due to poor management, and He Caiyu lost her job in middle age. Fortunately, she was good at making pastries. With the compensation she received from the factory, she rented a small shop of about ten square meters in the market and sold handmade glutinous rice balls, dumplings, and other pasta. Although the business was not booming, it was enough to support her family and pay for Ruyi's education.

Ruyi arrived at Caiyu Noodle Shop before eight o'clock in the morning. He Caiyu smiled and saw off a regular customer. She gets up at three or four in the morning every day and has been busy for more than three hours now.

When Ruyi arrived, she seemed unhappy and waved her away.

"Go back, I can manage on my own. This place is a mess. Have you finished your homework?"

Ruyi found it strange. Why was she being chased away? She used to often come to the store to help out during holidays...

"This is the busiest time of day. The sooner we sell out, the sooner we can go home and rest."

She stood gracefully at the doorway, and when someone passed by and glanced into the shop, she smiled and greeted them—

"Grandma, are you buying glutinous rice balls? We have sesame, peanut, and red bean fillings."

"Uncle, would you like to see the dumplings? They're made with the best meat."

"Uncle, would you like to buy some wonton wrappers?"

...

He Caiyu was reluctant to come, but she had to admit that when she was there, the shop sold twice as fast as usual.

Ruyi soon found out why her aunt didn't want her to come.

It turns out that the shop ran into problems shortly after she started school.

While she was greeting customers, He Caiyu was chopping filling in the work area, preparing to make another batch of dumplings.

The market manager was a thin old man with hardly any hair left on his head, and he looked like a rat.

He glanced at Ruyi, his words laced with sarcasm, "Boss He, your niece is so beautiful, how can you bear to let her do such filthy work for you?"

He Caiyu smiled apologetically: "I didn't want her to come, but she insisted on coming, and I couldn't get rid of her no matter what I did. But thanks to her, business was pretty good today."

"Heh," the administrator said with a forced smile, "You won't be here much longer. I'm just here to remind you that you only have two weeks left. Have you found a new shop yet?"

He Caiyu's expression changed. She wiped her hands on her apron, ran a few steps to the administrator, hunched over slightly, and spoke humbly in front of the administrator who had a lewd appearance.

“Brother Liu, new shops are hard to find, and the rent is expensive. Look at my daughter Ruyi, she's still in school. Without a shop, how will we survive? Could you make an exception and let us wait until after the New Year…”

Before she could finish speaking, the manager rudely interrupted her, "I don't care what you drink! Figure it out yourself! I'm just a messenger. If the higher-ups want to take back the shop, they must have some use for them. Who do you think you are, trying to talk to me about leniency? If you're not out of here in two weeks, I'll be the one getting the short end of the stick! If I make leniency for you, who will make leniency for me?"

He Caiyu looked like she was about to cry. The middle-aged woman in her forties, who was strong and healthy, looked as helpless as a child in front of the skinny old man.

Ruyi walked over to her aunt and put her arm around her shoulder to comfort her. Looking into the administrator's eyes, she said calmly, "The contract was for five years back then, so there are still more than two years left, aren't there?"

"Moreover, the contract is very clear: even if Party A wants to take back the store for some reason, it must give six months' notice."

"How long have you been talking about this?"

The administrator glanced at her up and down with disdain. "What business is it of yours to talk to adults? You're a girl, so what if you go to a top high school? Getting married early is the proper thing to do!" His grandson was the same age as Ruyi, but he couldn't even get into a decent vocational high school. His family spent a lot of money begging and pleading to get him into a regular public technical school.

Ruyi knew that arguing with such a scoundrel was pointless. Besides, no matter how despicable he was, he was still the market administrator. He could wield power like a tiger and still make a bunch of powerless, lowly working people bow and scrape to him.

She ignored the manager, pulled He Caiyu into the store, whispered a few words of comfort, and then they went back to their respective duties.

The two of them cooked some dumplings in a small electric pot at the shop for lunch, had a quick meal, and then worked for half a day before finally returning home at four o'clock in the afternoon.

Their home was an old house of about 60 square meters, with a square layout, a small living room and kitchen, and two bedrooms. Although it was dilapidated, it was a testament to Ruyi and her aunt's life together, providing them with a roof over their heads in the rapidly developing city of Lancheng.

The house was originally a welfare housing unit for steel factory employees, granting them only the right to reside there, not ownership. After He Caiyu was laid off, she needed to pay half the market price of the house before she could obtain a property ownership certificate. At the time, the factory's compensation was insufficient to buy the house. It took He Caiyu more than two years of running her shop, and only a month before Ruyi's high school entrance exam, to save enough money to finally own the house.

Ruyi still remembers how radiant He Caiyu looked that day.

She sipped her wine, spread her right hand under the lamplight, and proudly said to Ruyi, "Look, with this shop and these hands, we can have anything, and we won't live worse than others!"

She had no children in her ten-year marriage with her uncle and suffered greatly from rumors. After being laid off, she felt lost. Fortunately, she had Ruyi, and she quickly cheered up, opened a pastry shop, and regained her confidence in life.

Now, this confidence is crumbling.