Chapter 49: See You Again, Duoli

Cyno hasn't been able to come over during this period.

This is Kantisi's reply after she tried to contact Cyno.

This Grand Discipline Officer went to the depths of the Great Crimson Sand Sea to pursue a criminal, and even his subordinate Discipline Officers can't get in touch with him.

There's nothing we can do about it.

We can only wait for him to return from the desert before we can ask him to seal the Archon residue inside Ke Lai's body.

Over the next few days.

Luo De brought Ke Lai, and before his ordered goods arrived, they restored the land that Ke Lai had destroyed.

Basically.

All the troublesome work is being done by Luo De.

Ke Lai only does relatively simple tasks like turning soil and cutting feed.

This isn't because Luo De pities Ke Lai and won't let her do heavy work.

It's simply that Luo De observed her performance on the first day.

One could say that.

She can't do any of that fine, troublesome work.

Her limbs aren't agile, which is an unsolvable problem.

However, there is one thing.

Ke Lai's strength is great, far greater than an adult's, so doing simple heavy work poses no problem.

This is the strengthening effect brought by the Archon residue potion.

This is basically the same principle as the strengthening effect of a Vision on the body.

The only difference is that one uses elemental energy to strengthen the body, while the other uses Archon power.

Aside from work,

In the past few days, after Ke Lai returned, she also has to do something else.

That is learning to read and write.

As a standard desert dweller, Ke Lai had never seen what books were like since childhood, and when she reached school age she was sent to a lab; to this day, let alone reading, she can't even write her own name.

Coincidentally, Luo De is also at the stage of improving his vocabulary, with a fixed time each evening to practice writing.

Seeing that Ke Lai also can't read,

He simply pulled Ke Lai along to study together.

That teaching plan, which had been drafted long ago but not yet implemented, was also taken out and used on Ke Lai.

Learning the Teyvat script is a tedious task.

At least, that's how it is for Luo De.

What he studies and teaches Ke Lai is the common language now used across the entire Teyvat continent.

This common language is not like Chinese, which evolved from pictographs, and it is also a letter-like script that is very cumbersome to write.

Such a cumbersome script also makes memorizing the Teyvat script equally cumbersome.

In traditional Teyvat education,

The part of learning characters basically relies on rote memorization and repeated copying.

This is also why Dixiya was initially surprised that Luo De could recognize characters but couldn't write them.

That's because the process of learning characters necessarily involves a lot of practice.

Of course.

I already said it's traditional teaching.

Then Luo De definitely wouldn't teach Ke Lai using that method.

Normally,

After teaching Ke Lai the basic letters,

he will design some fun little games he often played in his previous life.

The simplest of these is to mix some literacy cards together, with correct and incorrect ones; Luo De pronounces a syllable, then has Ke Lai pick out the letter with the correct pronunciation from them.

Besides that,

there are also practices like character-combination exercises and repeatedly reading story excerpts taken from storybooks.

This relatively relaxed learning method, plus the reward of a milk candy after completing daily study,

has caused Ke Lai to burst forth with unparalleled enthusiasm for learning.

"Once the people for Duoli arrive, let's go order some children's reading material; if Sumeru doesn't have it, she should be able to get it from other countries."

Watching Ke Lai secretly competing with the literacy cards, Luo De secretly pondered.

Looking at Ke Lai's current state,

his teaching plans he set up are still fairly effective.

This also added considerable confidence to his originally uneasy heart.

To say he isn't worried about the effectiveness would definitely be lying.

To say he isn't worried about the effectiveness would definitely be lying.

Just as Luo De was thinking about what else he could use for teaching, Ke Lai's voice interrupted his train of thought.

"I'm done writing! Come look quickly, come look!!!"

Unlike the Ke Lai of a few days ago, who always had a gloomy expression,

Perhaps the temptation of the milk candy is too great.

Or perhaps the labor of the past few days has worn her out, leaving no time for random thoughts.

Although Ke Lai's bandages hadn't been removed yet, she seemed much sunnier overall, and the number of times she was startled awake by nightmares at night had also decreased a bit.

He took the practice book she handed over.

Luo De glanced at it casually, pointing out two mistakes: "Here and here, both are wrong."

Ah~~~

Ke Lai's expectant expression instantly collapsed.

If she got all the daily practice correct, she could earn an extra milk candy as a reward.

But she had never gotten them all right even once.

"You've only just started learning to read; it's completely normal."

"Doing this well now is already quite good."

Luo De encouraged: "Don't forget that at the beginning you couldn't get a single one right; keep pushing, and at your current pace, you might be able to get them all right in just a couple of days."

"Okay, fine."

Ke Lai, who had never been encouraged before, quickly bounced back from her dejection, gathered her spirits, and continued practicing her writing.

Two more days of uneventful life passed.

Dolly arrived on time with the goods.

Luo De originally thought she would have her subordinates deliver the goods.

But it turned out she personally led the team herself.

"What's wrong?"

"Seeing the generous Sir Sangge Mahabayi personally arrive, how come you don't seem very happy?"

Dolly was still her usual self, laughing and giggling, completely lacking any awareness that she was a wealthy tycoon.

While speaking,

Her eyes kept darting around.

"Oh dear."

"You can have these cages custom-made from me; they're definitely better quality than what the village blacksmith makes."

"Look, your hoe is almost worn out; I have a top-quality hoe made of refined iron here, guaranteed to last years without breaking. How about it? Want one? It's not expensive—just two thousand Mora."

"And this, this"

Dolly was notorious for never letting any opportunity right in front of her slip by.

In the blink of an eye, she found a huge pile of things in Luo De's place that could be ordered from her, even not letting go of the broom in the corner that Luo De had hardly used.

As for her enthusiasm,

Luo De's reply was always uniformly "Next time for sure."

Knowing he was just placating her.

Dolly wasn't angry either, and continued wandering around Luo De's house.

When she wandered into the study,

She had originally intended to criticize him a bit, but she saw Ke Lai practicing writing inside.

"Huh? You have a daughter?"

Dolly didn't go in to disturb Ke Lai, but instead teased her with interest.

"Picked up."

Luo De replied expressionlessly.

"Picked up?"

Dolly tilted her head, examined Ke Lai closely, paying extra attention to the bandages on her body and the wounds visible.

"Scale plague?"

Dolly's smile suddenly faded, her brows slightly furrowed, and her tone became much more serious than before.

"Hmm."

Luo De nodded, then immediately began to play the victim, saying: "This child suffers from scale plague and has also been injected with poison; just the medicine expenses for treating the illness require huge amounts of Mora each day. Relying on me alone, I can barely afford this huge medical expense. Sir Sangge Mahabayi, everyone says you are benevolent and kind, the most generous merchant in Sumeru. Looking at how pitiful this child is, I don't know if you could sponsor a sum of medical expenses so I can continue treating this child's ailments."

Dolly, who had originally been sympathizing with Ke Lai, suddenly had her expression turn grim.

This was the second time.

This clueless jerk—this is his second time opening his mouth to ask Sir Sangge Mahabayi for Mora!

(End of chapter)