82: Chapter 82 The Hardcore Head Teacher Urges Children to Have Babies Online

That "Oh?" hung in the living room for a full three seconds.

Li Li sat on the sofa, his back straight. His brain was running at high speed, cycling through various damage control plans: explaining, apologizing, faking a stutter, or just dropping dead on the spot. Every single one was ruthlessly shot down by logic.

It was a reflex to call her "Mom." No one could smooth that over.

Jiang Rumu, in her wheelchair, wished she could curl into a ball. Her plastered leg didn't move an inch, and her whole demeanor radiated a strong signal of "I don't know this man."

Director Wu Xiaomei stood in the entryway.

That "Oh?" with the question mark was retracted.

She switched the shopping bag to her other hand to make room to change her shoes.

Then, she spoke again.

"Oh."

The fourth tone. Crisp and decisive.

It shifted from an interrogative sentence to a declarative one. The extra question mark was plucked off by this middle-aged woman and tossed into the trash.

The temperature in the living room instantly warmed up by ten degrees.

Director Wu Xiaomei put on gray cotton slippers and carried the shopping bag across the living room. As she passed the sofa, her footsteps paused.

"I watched the livestream."

Five words, steady and calm, pinning the awkwardness that was still swirling in the air firmly to the ground.

Li Li's back shifted from straight to slightly leaning forward; this was his instinctive posture when receiving critical information.

"From beginning to end, I didn't miss a single part. The desert segment, the palace segment—I saw it all."

She placed the shopping bag on the dining table and turned around.

"Thank you for taking care of Mumu."

There was no empty politeness. A mother watching her daughter emerge from a hail of bullets under someone's protection—the "thank you" she spoke was heavy with weight.

Li Li stood up.

"You're too kind, Ma'am."

"Not at all."

Director Wu Xiaomei was already unpacking the shopping bag, pulling out plastic containers one by one.

"Stay for dinner tonight."

The word "must" was omitted, but the sentence structure, unique to a Dean of Students, told Li Li that this wasn't an invitation; it was a notification.

"Then I'll help—"

"No need. Sit."

Director Wu Xiaomei carried two large bags of groceries into the kitchen, leaving the door slightly ajar. The faucet began to splash, and the steady sound of a knife hitting a cutting board echoed.

It was smooth and practiced.

In the living room, only the two of them remained.

Silence.

That eerie silence of, "We just fought our way back from the Middle East battlefield, but the mother-in-law is stir-frying next door, and we don't know what to say."

Li Li sat on the sofa.

Jiang Rumu sat in her wheelchair.

The two faced each other.

Three seconds. Five seconds.

On the battlefield, he could judge in three seconds and formulate a plan in seven.

But at this moment, facing a woman leaning on the wheelchair armrest, chin supported by one hand, head tilted as she watched him, his CPU usage spiked to 98 percent.

Because the way Jiang Rumu was looking at him wasn't right.

It was smiling.

Teasing.

Carrying the schadenfreude of, "You just called my mother 'Mom,' and I witnessed the whole thing."

And there was a hint of coyness hidden beneath her eyelashes.

The base of Li Li's neck burned.

He stood up abruptly.

"Can you go out onto your balcony? I'll take a look—"

"Look at what?"

"Check the lighting."

"Lighting?"

"Yes, the layout faces south, and the lighting area directly affects residential comfort. It's an occupational hazard for an architect—"

"You're looking for an excuse to run away."

Li Li's feet were nailed to the spot.

Jiang Rumu tilted her head, chin resting on the back of her hand.

Her voice was extremely low, low enough that it couldn't be heard in the kitchen.

"Coward."

The three words were light as a feather.

Li Li felt his soles go numb.

He stood for two seconds.

Then slowly walked back. Sat down.

"You win."

Jiang Rumu's eyes curved, and she didn't pursue the attack. She picked up her phone, swiped a few times, and changed the subject.

The two chatted aimlessly, commenting on a couple of hot search topics, but tacitly skipped the Company "Twin Stars" news.

Occasionally, their gazes would meet and then quickly shift away, touching and bouncing off, more cautious than dismantling a fuse on the battlefield.

The activity in the kitchen became increasingly intense. The sizzling of the oil pan, the humming of the exhaust fan, the crisp sound of the spatula hitting the iron wok—the rhythm was ridiculously dense.

Jiang Rumu glanced at the time on her phone.

"My mother is the Dean of Students at Haidian Middle School."

"Dean of Students?"

"Yeah. The kind that manages the discipline of the whole school. The kind that makes students in the entire Haidian District go weak in the knees when they hear her name."

"Then weren't you miserable when you were little?"

"You guessed right. While others went to internet cafes after school, I went to the Dean's office to write self-criticisms."

"Wait, the Dean of Students' daughter, going to the Dean's office?"

"I threw a boy's schoolbag from the class next door to the top of the flagpole."

"..."

"He said I was short."

Li Li was silent for two seconds.

"Reasonable."

In less than fifty minutes, Director Wu Xiaomei brought out five dishes and one soup from the kitchen.

Twice-cooked pork, braised sea bass, broccoli with garlic, hot and sour shredded potatoes, tomato scrambled eggs, plus seaweed egg drop soup. A whole pot of white rice was steamed, steam rising from it.

Including washing, cutting, cooking, and plating. A woman who could manage both the Dean's office and the kitchen simultaneously—her time management skills had already broken the upper limits of human cognition.

The three of them sat at the table.

Li Li instinctively pushed the wheelchair closer to the dining table, adjusting the angle so Jiang Rumu's plastered leg could rest comfortably. The movement was completed in half a second, without hesitation.

Director Wu Xiaomei didn't say a word. But when she saw that operation, she nodded slightly.

Bonus points. It should be bonus points.

Dinner began.

The first two minutes were quiet. Only the sound of chopsticks hitting bowls.

Then Director Wu Xiaomei put down her chopsticks.

"Li Li."

Here it comes.

The interrogation phase.

"Ma'am."

"Those things in the livestream, are they all true?"

"True."

"Those explosions, those guns, the desert car chase—"

"All true."

Director Wu Xiaomei's chopsticks hovered over the hot and sour shredded potatoes, pausing for two seconds.

"You're an architect, how is your marksmanship so accurate?"

"Self-taught."

Jiang Rumu buried her head in her rice, rolling her eyes upward.

Self-taught, you self-taught AK47, watching tutorials on Bilibili, right?

"Arabic too, self-taught?"

"Yeah, my language talent is alright."

"What about combat?"

"That counts as half self-taught."

"What does half self-taught mean?"

"It means learning alone by watching videos, without an opponent to practice on."

Pfft.

Jiang Rumu almost spat out her rice, blocking it with the back of her hand, stifling two coughs.

Director Wu Xiaomei tapped her chopsticks against the edge of her bowl. The classic move of a Dean of Students, "Stop messing around, let's talk business."

"Li Li, I won't pursue the details anymore. You protected Mumu and brought her back; I acknowledge this favor."

She placed a piece of sea bass into Li Li's bowl.

"Where are you from? Who else is in your family?"

The standard elder interrogation template, incomplete without every item.

"From Chengdu."

Li Li paused for a beat.

"Grew up in an orphanage. No family."

Director Wu Xiaomei's hand holding the chopsticks hovered in mid-air.

The chopsticks were quiet for two seconds before settling steadily back onto the dish.

She lowered her head.

She didn't respond.

The living room air conditioner hummed for four or five seconds.

"Then where do you live now?"

Director Wu Xiaomei looked up again.

"Used to be in the Imperial Capital. Haven't decided yet."

The moment these words landed, Director Wu Xiaomei's eyelids flickered. It was the reaction of an examiner flipping to the standard answer.

"The Imperial Capital is good."

She picked up a piece of shredded potato, unhurried.

"Medical conditions are among the best in the country, not to mention educational resources."

Pause.

"Job opportunities are also plentiful. Architects find work easily in the Imperial Capital."

Another pause.

"And—"

She glanced at her daughter. Then at Li Li.

"If you have children in the future, I'm in the Imperial Capital, and I can help raise them."

Clack.

Li Li's chopsticks hit the edge of his bowl.

Jiang Rumu's face burned from her neck to her hairline, even more thoroughly than the time she was snapped by 46 million people on the plane.

"Mom!"

"What's wrong? I'm stating objective facts."

"What children! Whose children!"

"Yours. You're already twenty-six. The girl next door, Teacher Wu's daughter, was twenty-four when—"

"I'm not the same as her!"

"How are you different?"

"I, I—"

Jiang Rumu stalled.

She picked up her bowl and buried her head in the white rice, shoveling it in. She chewed every grain extremely seriously, feeling for the first time that white rice was the most delicious thing in the world.

Li Li also lowered his head to eat.

Two people who hadn't changed expression in a hail of bullets were utterly routed by three sentences from a Dean of Students.

Their appetite, however, increased. Two bowls of rice were finished, and Li Li reached for the rice scoop. Jiang Rumu also reached out.

Their hands bumped at the edge of the pot. They retracted simultaneously. And continued to shovel rice into their bowls.

Director Wu Xiaomei watched this scene while holding her soup bowl, tapping her chopsticks silently against the edge of the dish twice. Her face was very relaxed, a kind of satisfied ease.

The meal neared its end.

Director Wu Xiaomei put down her chopsticks and took a sip of the seaweed egg drop soup.

"By the way, those three days you were out of contact, where did you actually go?"

Jiang Rumu hadn't swallowed the rice in her mouth yet, and reflexively started to speak.

"We went to—"

"Ma'am."

Li Li steadily took over the conversation.

"Regarding that, we signed a non-disclosure agreement. It involves some sensitive content, so it's not convenient to disclose it."

The script was seamless. The experience on the aircraft carrier did indeed have confidentiality clauses; it wasn't a lie.

Director Wu Xiaomei put down the soup bowl.

First looked at Li Li.

Then turned to look at her daughter.

"Mumu."

"Hm?"

"You didn't tell him?"

Jiang Rumu was stunned for a moment.

Then shook her head.

Li Li rotated his left wrist.

"Tell me what?"

Jiang Rumu put down her chopsticks and rubbed the edge of the bowl with her thumb.

"My mother's security clearance is not low."

"What security clearance does a Dean of Students need?"

"It's not because of being a Dean of Students."

She looked up.

"It's because of my dad."

The living room was quiet for a moment. The wind from the air conditioner vent swept across the dining table, causing the steam from the seaweed egg drop soup to tilt in a different direction.

"My dad is named General Jiang Zhan."

"Commander of the Imperial Capital Garrison District."

"Lieutenant General."

Li Li's wrist-rotating motion froze.

Imperial Capital Garrison District. Commander. Lieutenant General.

He recognized all three words separately, but put together, the woman sitting across from him—wearing pajamas, munching on hot and sour shredded potatoes, with a plaster-cast leg resting on the wheelchair pedal—her father was in charge of the entire military defense of the Imperial Capital.

He slowly turned his head to look at Director Wu Xiaomei.

Director Wu Xiaomei was drinking soup, holding the bowl steadily.

The Lieutenant General's wife.

The wife of the Commander of the Imperial Capital Garrison District.

And him.

Five minutes ago, he had called this woman "Mom."

Li Li gently placed his chopsticks on the edge of his bowl; there was still half a small bowl of rice left, a few white grains sticking to the side of the bowl, quiet and still.

Opposite him, Director Wu Xiaomei put down the soup bowl and pulled out a tissue to wipe her mouth.

She looked at Li Li's completely frozen appearance.

"Eat more. You're too thin."

Li Li looked at the remaining white rice in the bowl, his Adam's apple bobbing.

Eat more.

Eat well so you're ready for the road, right?