Chapter 346: Wei Xiao Pang

Er Mao has changed cars now; it's no longer that inconspicuous vehicle from before. Previously, Er Mao drove just for his own convenience, but now he often has to carry his wife and kids when driving, so safety performance is demanded much higher. After all, with that financial means, not buying a better car would be unjustifiable.

Zheng Tan saw many children's items in the car, and there was a milky smell.

Er Mao was in a good mood, talking about his daughter Er Yuan all along the way; no matter how Er Mao praised her as adorable and lovable, Zheng Tan, not having seen her himself, offered no comment.

After arriving at the lakeside villa area, Zheng Tan did not stay in the car following Er Mao to the old lady's place, but went instead to Feng Bai Jin's.

As Zheng Tan just approached the house, he heard Feng Bai Jin roaring.

"If you bite my data cable again, I'll throw your tiger toy away! Do you understand? I'll throw it away completely!!"

Feng Bai Jin only had classes in the morning today, but he skipped them all; his current arrangement for the morning classes is to definitely skip the first two periods and optionally skip the last two, depending on when he wakes up. According to Chu Hua Da Xue's rules, freshmen and sophomores have morning exercises, but Feng Bai Jin basically doesn't attend—from elementary to high school one had to do morning exercises, and now in college still do exercises? Exercise your balls! If points are to be deducted, deduct them; whatever.

Today Feng Bai Jin slept all morning; he stayed up too late playing games last night and couldn't get up, but when he finally did, he found the data cable left on his computer desk had been bitten again. He had originally wanted to download a few songs onto his MP3, but now it seems he can only go buy a new one.

As for the "tiger toy" Feng Bai Jin mentioned, Zheng Tan also knows it. When he first rescued the tiny Hu Zi from the demolition alley, he placed that fluffy tiger toy beside Hu Zi; later Hu Zi directly took it as his own toy, dragging it to his nest when moving, and sometimes hugging it while sleeping, just like when he was little—this habit hasn't changed even as he grew up.

Li Shen, who works as a nanny, takes that toy out to wash every so often, then hangs it on the balcony to dry; whenever this happens, Hu Zi squats on the balcony guarding it, and after a while he glances at the clothes rack on the balcony, afraid it will be thrown away.

The house door was open; Zheng Tan didn't climb through the window but walked straight in. Li Shen was mopping the floor. Seeing Zheng Tan, she said nothing and continued mopping. Zheng Tan was already a regular here, so it wasn't surprising.

On the second floor, in Feng Bai Jin's room, when Zheng Tan passed by he saw Hu Zi lying in his own nest, his two front paws tightly clutching the tiger toy, not letting Feng Bai Jin take it away.

Feng Bai Jin tugged at the tiger toy's head, then snorted, released his grip, and Hu Zi hurriedly shifted the toy back into his nest.

"This time I'll let it slide, but next time, even if I don't throw away your toy, I'll tear it apart! Look what you hug while sleeping! Know what tearing apart means?!"

Zheng Tan has heard similar remarks many times; each starts with "If you do X again, I'll..." and after a while turns into "This time I'll let it slide, next time..."

Hu Zi indeed has a few scars on his body, but judging by his appearance, his spirits are still good; he should recover soon. Not going out isn't because he can't, but because whenever he gets injured, the three people in the house watch him and won't let him go out.

Zheng Tan glanced at Feng Bai Jin's open computer; the screen showed a game.

When Feng Bai Jin has nothing to do, he stays home making games; unlike commercial production, he does it purely out of interest. The two games Zheng Tan knows Feng Bai Jin has made are "Maomao Lian Lian Kan"; this type of game isn't particularly novel—there are too many match‑and‑clear games. The download numbers for the version Er Mao made are not small; one reason is that each cartoon cat head in the game is cute, and when cleared they have different animation effects and various cat meows, while one of the prototypes is actually Hu Zi; when not cleared the cat heads remain cute, but when cleared they look as if they've been badly beaten, with the same sound as Hu Zi's meow.

The second game is called "Mao Zha Lao Shu"; frankly it's not that novel either—the early part of catching mice is similar to some small action games, but what many people like is the later segment where, after catching a mouse, you take it to scare people, for example placing it on the host's bedhead, blanket, drawer, schoolbag, etc. Such antics are fun in a game, but in real life they're absolutely a dirty trick, and Feng Bai Jin knows this from personal experience.

Feng Bai Jin incorporated his own personal experiences into the game, but those who play it won't think about the developer's bloody tears behind it.

Actually Zheng Tan is quite looking forward to Feng Bai Jin's future games; these current ones are merely his own practice attempts, many things aren't perfected, so who knows what will happen later—it looks like Feng Bai Jin might delve deeper into this direction.

When going downstairs to leave, Li Shen sat on the first‑floor sofa drinking tea and watching TV, with a red woven bracelet on the wrist holding her tea cup—a simple red cord braid.

Li Shen is probably also in her benming year; Zheng Tan had never seen her wear one before.

After leaving Feng Bai Jin's place, Zheng Tan went to have a look at the old lady's side, crouched nearby waiting for Er Mao; he didn't want to go into the old lady's house, because each time he saw her he felt weird inside, unable to describe the feeling, so it was better not to meet.

When they arrived, Er Mao had said they would go together to Wei Leng's for dinner in the afternoon, and he had already called Jiao Ba, so Zheng Tan didn't go back either; he waited for Er Mao to come out from the old lady's place and then rode with him.

Speaking of which, Wei Leng's son is also one year old; his first‑birthday banquet and Er Mao's daughter's hundred‑day celebration are relatively close together; Zheng Tan hasn't visited Wei Leng's home many times, but each time he goes he notices how much Wei Xiao Pangzi has changed.

The last time he came over, Zheng Tan still remembered that Wei Xiao Pang could only crawl awkwardly on the foam mat; now he can walk two steps.

Wei Xiao Pang is the nickname of Wei Leng's son; he was very fat at birth, and although he no longer looks like a solid lump of meat, he is still somewhat chubby compared with other kids his age.

When Zheng Tan and Er Mao arrived at Wei Leng's home, Wei Xiao Pang was holding onto the wall and walking; seeing Zheng Tan and Er Mao, he wasn't afraid but instead grinned happily, wanting to come this way, yet after taking just a couple of steps he collapsed.

The floor and the adjoining walls are covered with a layer of soft padding; all furniture with hard corners in the house is wrapped in padding so he won't get hurt from bumps, therefore Wei Xiao Pang falling to the ground won't suffer any injury.

He rolled over, Wei Xiao Pang didn't cry, still cheerfully crawling this way; this time he didn't walk but went straight to crawling, which is faster.

Er Mao scooped up the crawling little fatty and said, "Little fatty, hey. Come say 'second uncle' for me to hear. Say 'second—uncle—'"

The little fatty laughed happily, then directly sneezed in Er Mao's face, spraying Er Mao with saliva.

Er Mao wiped his face, thinking inwardly that his own daughter was still cute; the little fatty is a real troublemaker.

"Sister‑in‑law, is Wei Xiao Pang catching a chill?"

Wei Leng's wife took the child to have a look. "Nothing's wrong," she said, then put Wei Xiao Pang down.

Having regained freedom, Wei Xiao Pang crawled toward the sofa where Er Mao and Zheng Tan were sitting.

"Heard he can call dad and mom now?" Er Mao asked.

"Yeah, just not sure yet," Wei Leng's wife replied with a smile. In the same compound there's a child who could call at ten months old; Wei Leng didn't say anything, but whenever he sees that family showing off in front of him he gets annoyed, though this can't be rushed—different kids develop differently. After hearing Wei Xiao Pang speak last week, Wei Leng was so happy he didn't sleep until the middle of the night.

"Come, call Hei Ge," Wei Leng's wife said, lifting Wei Xiao Pang onto her lap and facing Zheng Tan's direction.

After learning that Zhuo Xiao Mao calls Zheng Tan Hei Ge, Wei Leng's wife, whenever she sees Zheng Tan, also has Wei Xiao Pang call Hei Ge—but before, the little fatty couldn't say it and never did.

Wei Xiao Pang looked at Zheng Tan, and after his mother prompted him a few times he uttered "ha ka," not pronounced clearly, but you could tell it was meant to be that.

And after Er Mao's joke, he had Wei Xiao Pang try calling "second uncle" again; the little fatty's response was a "pff!" which made Er Mao shout about unfair treatment.

Wei Leng came back relatively early in the afternoon, with no overtime; after arriving he first held Wei Xiao Pang and had him shout twice, then chatted with Er Mao on the side.

"Here!" Er Mao threw something to Wei Leng.

Wei Leng caught it and looked: a red woven bracelet, a simple thing, with no gold, silver, or jade.

"Aren't you in your benming year? I grabbed one from my great‑aunt's place for you; she has lots of these."

Hearing Er Mao's words, Zheng Tan thought about the bracelet on Li Shen's hand; the two woven bracelets look similar, but Wei Leng's should be the men's version—the knot on the cord differs from Li Shen's, and even without metal ornaments it looks sturdier.

Wei Leng originally didn't think much of it, but recalling what he'd heard from Ye Hao about the boss of Shi Wei, he put it on anyway. It's just a little trinket, not troublesome, merely for psychological comfort—wearing it is fine.

At first the two talked about Wei Xiao Pang's first‑birthday banquet and Er Yuan's hundred‑day celebration, then mentioning the master‑old man they both sighed. The old man's age is increasing; not long ago he even took a tumble by accident; although he looks healthy normally, his age is what it is, and several disciples have forced him to rest in bed for a period. This time Wei Leng and Er Mao also didn't think of having the old man travel a long distance to come over; he attended their wedding, but now the old man can only view pictures of the two little ones transmitted via computer; however Wei Leng thought, someday we could all go there together so the master‑disciple group could gather.

Now several fellow disciples have each become fathers; at Er Mao's wedding, the fellow disciples who attended said they'd find a time for everyone to gather at the old man's place. They've been apart these years, meeting infrequently and scattering often, and from now on each will be busier, so other plans are uncertain.

"I also know that after the new year I have some business over there, so I'll swing by on the way; his old man's spirits are quite good. But I'm thinking, once my Er Yuan gets a bit older I'll bring him along to show the old man; for now Er Yuan is still too small," Er Mao said.

"Hmm, then I'll bring Xiao Pang along too."

"Oh, the master's old man also said that if we go, we should bring Hei Tan along if possible, to play with Dashan."

"Really bring him?" Wei Leng glanced at Zheng Tan beside him, thought of Dashan's ferocious appearance, and decided it wasn't a good idea; when he'd gone on a year‑end business trip and stopped by to see the old man, he'd happened to see Dashan biting a rabbit, his face covered in blood.

Zheng Tan also pondered the Dashan mentioned by Er Mao and Wei Leng; he'd long heard of Dashan's great reputation, but had never seen him.

Zheng Tan was so deep in thought he didn't notice; by the time he realized, Wei Xiao Pang was leaning against the sofa edge standing, holding Zheng Tan's cat tail in his hand and bringing it to his mouth.

Zheng Tan: "……" Compared to that, the original Zhuo Xiao Mao really was a good kid. (To be continued…)