I would like to invite Miss Meng to marry into the Lu family and become my daughter-in-law.
"I would like to invite Miss Meng to marry into the Lu family and become my daughter-in-law."
When news of Yan Jisheng's suicide reached Nanlu, Meng Lanjian was interning at the Nuclear Research Institute.
The senior professors at the Nuclear Research Institute applauded and gave Yan Jisheng a good scolding for most of the afternoon, granting the institute's students and their descendants a short break. After the senior professors left one by one, everyone began to discuss the anecdotes of the former director of the Nuclear Research Institute who had defected to Beiluan twenty years ago, as well as the possibility of war between the north and the south.
Fifty years ago, the North and South were still united, with the federal government primarily composed of the Republican Party in the North and the Democratic Party in the South, creating a balance of power. However, due to corruption within the Northern Party, Zhou Changhua, one of the five deputy secretaries-general, was accused of accepting bribes exceeding 100 million. Before the prosecutor's office could investigate, Zhou Changhua fled to the Southern Party headquarters seeking political asylum. Although this was an internal matter for the Northern Party, Zhou Changhua's corruption was a disgrace to the entire federal government. The Southern Party imprisoned him in a political prison under the jurisdiction of the South, awaiting a handover by Southern Party representatives.
Seeing that the Southern Party had no one to protect them, Zhou Changhua revealed a shocking secret—
The Northern Party is researching nuclear weapons in the deserts of the North.
These words shocked everyone in the Southern Party.
It's important to understand that at the time, the Northern Party negotiated nuclear energy procurement with other countries, but the construction and technology for the nuclear power plants were all located in the South. The nuclear power plants had been in development for ten years, from planning to construction. The party responsible for procurement had secretly hoarded nuclear materials, attempting to develop nuclear weapons, which infuriated and enraged the Southern Party. However, the Southern Democrats, situated in a technologically advanced region with abundant educational resources, were no ordinary people. They detained the Northern Party personnel who came to hand over the supplies, demanding that the Northern Party immediately disclose the nuclear weapons development process and agree to allow Southern experts to jointly develop them.
The Northern Party's meticulously planned scheme, meticulously crafted over many years, failed. They refused to hand over their nuclear weapons program and fired the first shot at the South. Three months of war ensued, with over ten thousand casualties, before a ceasefire was declared. The party chairmen stepped down one after another. The North was replaced by a leader advocating for peace, while the South's new leader, a former member of the armed forces, was fierce and radical, and was the first to declare the South's independence, changing its administrative name to Nanlu. After failing to achieve peace, the North also went on to declare independence, changing its name to Beiluan.
For thirty years, the North and South were independent, and for thirty years, relations between the two places were tense. Thirty years later, Yan Jisheng, the director of the Nuclear Energy Research Institute of the Nuclear Engineering Institute of Nanlu University, under the guise of construction, had an unsuspecting construction team destroy the heavy water reactor one night, and then defected to Beiluan with the nuclear weapons program that Nanlu had been developing for thirty years.
This event once again altered the situation in both the North and the South.
Beiluan has fuel from forty years ago, but has been unable to break through the key technologies. Meanwhile, Nanlu, which owns a nuclear power plant, has been secretly researching nuclear weapons for thirty years and is now on the verge of development.
At this moment, Yan Jisheng's actions of destroying and defecting were undoubtedly a fatal blow to Nanlu.
After a year of negotiations, the North and South signed a nuclear peace treaty, agreeing to jointly suspend the development of nuclear weapons. The treaty is for a period of twenty years.
Now, we are about to celebrate the nineteenth anniversary of the signing of the Nuclear Peace Treaty.
Yan Jisheng's suicide at this time was undoubtedly a great relief to the old professors at the Nuclear Research Institute on the southern slope, whose hard work and dedication had been destroyed in an instant.
The crowd was discussing current affairs.
Meng Lanjian, however, showed little interest in the topic and huddled in a corner doing the homework her senior had given her.
My senior always gives her a bunch of math formulas that are already giving her a headache, and then makes her write code that's even more of a headache. This time, the variant used for verification, Lanjian, has been stuck for almost four days. Today is Friday, and if I don't hand in my assignment soon, my senior will be chasing me down.
Lan Jian calculated the time difference and sent a message to her senior, who was 15 hours away on the other side of the ocean during winter time, "Senior, SOS!"
The SOS input method automatically replaced it with an emoji. Lan Jian found the jarring red background and white text offensive and was about to delete it and start over when Zhong Shiqing, the current director of the Nuclear Energy Research Institute, called her to the twelfth floor.
Meng Lanjian is a second-year doctoral student at the School of Nuclear Engineering, Nanlu University, and is currently interning at the Nuclear Engineering Section 4, an affiliated unit of the Nuclear Research Institute. The Nuclear Engineering Section 4 is jointly managed by the government and Nanlu University; most of its administrative heads are former university professors, and its staff are mostly graduate students from Nanlu University. Meng Lanjian has two mentors at the Nuclear Research Institute: her primary mentor is Zhong Shiqing, the director who recruited her, and her secondary mentor is Xue Xiang, an optimistic, self-taught PhD and the institute's youngest associate professor.
The Fourth Nuclear Division was directly under Zhong Shiqing's jurisdiction, so he also had an office in the Fourth Nuclear Division. Lan Jian entered the elevator but found that all the buttons were not working. She pressed the intercom to connect to the guard room, and the guard questioned her for a while before turning on the floor button for her.
As soon as the elevator doors opened, a spacious conference hall covered with a red carpet came into view. Two tall and imposing army officers stood at the entrance of the conference hall, and Lan Jian immediately noticed their sidearms.
The solemn demeanor of the two men blocking the doorway, remaining silent and seemingly indifferent, made Lan Jian stop in his tracks and not rush forward.
Shortly after, a female officer in a suit and wearing a military insignia walked from the conference hall towards Lan Jian and searched her. After the search, the female officer led Lan Jian inside.
After passing through the corridor, there was a lounge. In addition to the big boss, a middle-aged man in a smart military uniform was also sitting in the room.
His features resembled those of someone Meng Lanjian knew.
Zhong Shiqing introduced the visitor to Lan Jian, who was Lu Jie, a major general in the Southern Army.
Seeing Meng Lanjian's alarmed expression, Lu Jie forced a smile onto his solemn and dignified face.
“Miss Meng, in previous years, I would talk to your uncle first, and then your uncle would talk to you through your parents. But this year your uncle said that you are ready to make your own decisions, so I will talk to you personally.”
Since the other party didn't get to the point, Lan Jian had no choice but to ask, "What important matter do you want to discuss with me?"
"This matter shouldn't have involved your parents, but as a soldier, I don't like beating around the bush. So I'd like to ask Miss Meng, can you make your own decisions about marriage?"
"What do you mean by that?!" Upon hearing the word "marriage," Lan Jian almost jumped up from her seat in excitement. "Since you don't like beating around the bush, please speak frankly."
In the quiet lounge where you could hear a pin drop, Lu Jie said firmly, "I would like to invite Miss Meng to marry into the Lu family and become my daughter-in-law."
Lan Jian thought she had misheard, but the other person's imposing expression dispelled her doubts.
"Miss Meng, once you marry into the Lu family, no matter what happens outside, the Lu family will ensure your safety. What do you say?"
At this moment, Meng Lanjian's mind was in a complete fog. She subconsciously asked, "It seems that a war between the North and the South is inevitable?"
Lu Jie looked up, his sharp, hawk-like eyes seizing the bewildered girl.
This female student from Beiluan had clear and bright eyes, and her temperament was pure and flawless. People often use "a blank sheet of paper" to describe such a person, but Lu Jie felt that the person in front of him was a deep pool, seemingly clear, but actually unfathomable.
“The North-South nuclear peace treaty will expire in a year. It was signed twenty years ago, and it’s still uncertain whether it’s valid now.” Lu Jie paused deliberately for a moment. “If you marry my son, the situation might change.”
Lan Jian fell silent for a moment.
The northern Luan region prioritizes economy and industry, while the southern Luan region emphasizes education and has a strong military. In the event of war, the north has money but no weapons, while the south has weapons but lacks logistical support. In recent years, there have been constant frictions of varying sizes between the north and south in various aspects, and both sides are currently filled with anxiety.
Meng Lanjian, a native of Beiluan, studied at the southern foot of the mountain, making his situation even more difficult than that of ordinary people.
However difficult it may be, she never imagined that such a sordid affair as an arranged marriage would fall upon her, Meng Lanjian.
Before she could gather her thoughts, Lu Jie pressed his advantage: "After all, you are not only a relative of the naval commander of the North... you are also Yan Jisheng's only niece. When you marry into the Lu family, you are not only marrying my son, but also marrying the entire Southern Mountain."
“I’m not that valuable.” Upon hearing the name “Yan Jisheng,” Lan Jian’s expression hardened. “I have absolutely no connection with Yan Jisheng.”
"Bei Luan has suppressed the news for three whole days. Outsiders don't know Yan Jisheng's last words. Are you still going to pretend to be stupid?"
Upon hearing this, Meng Lanjian suddenly looked up.
She stared at the imposing man before her and retorted with equal force, "Yes, Yan Jisheng is indeed my uncle, but he has neither given me life nor raised me. He is dead, so why should I atone for his sins?"
"Atoning? Miss Meng seems to underestimate your importance to both the North and the South." Lu Jie suddenly laughed. "With just a few words, you drove your own uncle to his death. After he jumped off the building, you saw his will asking you to inherit his mantle, yet you are still enjoying a peaceful life in the South. Meng Lanjian, this world doesn't allow you to have your way!"
"I'll only give you three days. Once you've thought it over, tell Dingyue that you two can go get your marriage certificate. Your name will naturally be added to the Lu family's household registration." At this point, Lu Jie still didn't reveal who "Dingyue" was. "With Miss Meng's intelligence, it shouldn't be hard for you to guess who my son is, right?"
Meng Lanjian knew perfectly well what was going on, but still insisted on asking, "What if I don't agree?"
“Miss Meng, you have no reason not to agree. You probably don’t know that your boyfriend is currently in a state of great anxiety about his military service. People on the border are living in constant fear, and the situation can change in an instant. Three days is the limit you can afford to endure.”
To live a life of compromise and ignominy.
For an army general to use such harsh words to an unarmed civilian on the enemy's shore... If it weren't for the war, Meng Lanjian wouldn't care who he was. From the moment she heard the first sentence about marrying him, she should have turned around and left.
But right now, there is an even more serious test looming ahead than thinking about marriage.
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