Confronted by their concerns, Ye Jian felt embarrassed and covered her forehead with her hand. “It doesn’t hurt anymore. I must’ve been nervous because of the afternoon assessment and fainted after tripping over Ye Ying’s foot accidentally.”
“Child, what’s there to stress over an assessment? Ye Ying is so intelligent in her studies, just have her let you copy hers,” the villagers joked. For a girl to be parentless and now live with her aunt, their hearts were filled with pity for her.
Their impression of her now was kind, and they were not looking at her with disgust.
Ye Jian pouted slightly as she pretended to anxiously twirl her hair around her finger and murmured, “She handed her papers in very early; even if I had wanted to copy, I could not. I had to sit until the bell rang before I handed in my papers.”
After her words landed, the villagers could not help but laugh. The Jian lass was an honest person.
However, what they did not know was the Ye Jian this time around had already begun paving the way for her future.
“Uncles and aunties, I’ll be going home today to take a look. Please carry on with what you were busy with,” Ye Jian courteously said her thanks and revealed a shallow smile on her exquisite little face. “It has been a long time since I’ve been home, so I’m intending to clean it up a little.”
Only then did the villagers knew she was on her way to the house in the innermost part of the village. “That Old Man Gen should be there. He’s there with his dog, so before you enter, remember to give a shout.”
Of course, Ye Jian remembered. She also remembered that time when she was accused of being guilty, she ran there crying, but a big black dog rushed out and barked ferociously at her. If not for Old Man Gen appearing just in time, she would have been bitten by that black mesh.
Later, Old Man Gen told her that the black dog was not actually a dog, but a mastiff -a young Tibetan Mastiff.
Gazing through the dense peach blossom trees, Ye Jian saw her somewhat visible house in the distance among the sea of flowers. Her house was the same as how she remembered it to be.
The dark green tiles and clean white walls; just like when the house was still new.
It was still the season when the peach blossom trees were blooming. The spring breeze blew and the petals danced.
Ye Jian walked in the shower of petals and arrived outside the place she called home after coming out from the dense peach blossom trees.
“Grandpa Gen, Grandpa Gen.” A few steps before the peach blossom trees were behind her, Ye Jian shouted. The black mesh over at the side was the Tibetan mastiff. Shouting in advance would prevent the incident that happened before.
She was slow in her pace, but even before anyone had responded, she was already out of the dense peach blossom trees.
Her footsteps came to a halt when she saw four men eating noodles on the raised platform.
She quickly gave a slight bow before asking generously, “Is Grandpa Gen here?”
After just one glance, she gradually lowered her gaze from them.
Just from that one glance, she saw one of them raising his hands and swiftly grabbing something from beneath the wooden table… it was a gun.
From where she was, she took another glance. The four men were wearing footwears which ordinary people would never wear… military boots.
Their posture when sitting were upright, just like the way the poplar trees grow.
Also, they had very short hair, the only hairstyle allowed in the military.
These four people were from the military.
They were sitting in the front of her house, with smiles on their faces as they chatted casually. But because of her sudden appearance, the four became somewhat startled.
With a washed-off cloth around the waist, Old Man Gen walked out with a huge grin, “Come, come, some old altar sauerkraut. I know you lot…, yi, Jian lass?”
She was a member of the village. The four men hurriedly stood up and a man with a firm face from among them, who should be the leader of the other three men, laughed and smiled, “Little missy, don’t be afraid; we’re not bad people.”
They were not bad people, of course she knew that.
Besides, what kind of bad people had she not seen before?
Afraid? She was not even the slightest bit afraid.
