Chapter 42

Bai Xinmei couldn’t break free of Song Jinping’s hold, but that didn’t stop her from stabbing him with words.
“Yes, not just liking. Admiration. Comrade Bai, I admire you. I am both a fool and a coward. I’ve never pursued a female comrade before, couldn’t see my own feelings clearly, and failed to tell you my intentions in time. I hesitated, and in choosing a partner, I lost the initiative. You and Wang Shuisheng are not married yet. I, Song Jinping, sincerely and fervently hope that you will reconsider me.”
Hearing the dissatisfaction and grievance in her words, Song Jinping didn’t lose his head or take it as a cruel rejection. Instead, he heard a sliver of hope.
He took her right hand and placed it over his chest, letting her feel his eager, pounding heartbeat. His eyes shone brightly, like a sky full of cold stars.
Perhaps his gaze was too focused, too burning. Bai Xinmei lowered her eyes; her lashes trembled like butterfly wings, her cheeks warming as she didn’t dare look at him.
He continued, tempting her gently. “My home is in Beijing. My parents are senior technical experts who studied abroad and now work at the nuclear weapons institute. They have the ability to help their daughter-in-law find a light, stable job. The college entrance examination is about to reopen, I’m confident I can get into university in one shot. After further study, I plan to devote myself to our country’s aerospace unit. My unit allows family members to come along. If you also want to attend university, I’ll help you review, accompany you in studying, and we’ll take the exams together…
As long as the way you treat me is even half the way I treat you, I have a hundred, a thousand ways to bring you to the city and let you live the life you once had. If you’re worried I won’t treat the child well, then we won’t have children in the future. Niuniu will be our only daughter, Meimei.”
This sincere confession stunned Bai Xinmei. She abruptly looked up at Song Jinping, who stood more than a head taller than her.
He… was telling her his future plans, and in every step of those plans, there was her.
She murmured softly, as if recalling something. “But before… you clearly looked down on me.”
Those first few times, his avoidance of her, she had remembered them all along. Song Jinping, too, recalled his own initial disdainful indifference.
So what if she was a widow? He liked widows. If he’d known he would like her this much, then the first time he saw her being harassed by Liu Tiangui, he should’ve stepped in to help.
Too bad there were no ifs.
Song Jinping was well aware of his earlier mistakes, but now was hardly the time to admit fault, so he refused to acknowledge it.
“No. I’ve always been emotionally cold by nature. That’s why you misunderstood.”
Bai Xinmei wasn’t stupid. This man smiled three parts of the time no matter who he spoke to, and yet he claimed to be emotionally cold?
The names Wang Shuisheng and Song Jinping circled back and forth in her mind for a long while.
In the end, she still resolutely pushed Song Jinping away. His words were heartfelt, but the system showed the task completion rate was only 80%, proof that Song Jinping had not yet fully fallen at her feet.
Maybe he liked her a little, but not enough.
If she agreed to him now, then with her own persona, spoiled, vain, faithless, the later stage of marriage would probably just become a process of wearing down whatever affection had been accumulated.
“I’m sorry, Comrade Song. I’m already engaged to Brother Shuisheng. You’ll find someone who truly loves you.
I know I’m not worthy of you. I still have things to do, so I’ll be going now. Otherwise, the villagers will start gossiping.”
Watching the hesitation and struggle flash across her face before she rejected him without mercy, Song Jinping’s tolerance hit its limit. After she left, he drove a fist into the tree trunk.
His expression dark and heavy. Meimei, I gave you the choice. Since you didn’t choose me, I’ll erase your other option, then you’ll have no choice but me.
At the same time, in the inpatient ward of a certain military region hospital.
A man lying in a hospital bed, his entire body wrapped in bandages, slowly opened his eyes.
The nurse making rounds cried out in delight and quickly called over the attending physician and head nurse.
“He’s awake!”
“Yuanzheng, you’re awake.”
“The patient’s condition has stabilized, but he still needs to remain hospitalized for observation.”
This man was none other than Qin Yuanzheng, who had already been declared a “martyr.”
Years ago, the organization had issued an ultra–top-secret special mission, extremely dangerous. Because of his wife’s background issues, Qin Yuanzheng, who had long been unable to advance in rank, saw it as a turning point in his military career.
If he could complete this mission, future promotions would no longer be affected by his wife’s background.
Of course, he had never blamed Meimei for hindering his career. Before marrying her, he had already foreseen this possibility.
But without promotion, once he reached a certain age he would have to transfer out of the army. All he knew was how to fight wars, after demobilization, how would he support Meimei? So he had to rise, even if it meant risking his life.
Clearly, he had gambled correctly.
This mission had taken a full three years, aimed at capturing enemy agents who had infiltrated from a certain country. These agents were involved in human trafficking, organ trading, and the theft of state secrets. During handoffs in overseas delta regions, there were even faint signs of other countries’ military forces.
On top of that, infiltration had also occurred within the military district itself, making the operation even more tightly guarded.
From the very beginning, it had been announced that all participants were already dead, communication up and down the chain was strictly single-line.
By the time the mission concluded, more than half of the soldiers and special police involved had sacrificed their lives, a heartbreaking outcome.
But it was one that had to be accepted. For the nation, for the people, their sacrifice was sacred and meaningful.
At the moment of final capture, the enemy fought back desperately, planting bombs in a house where children and women were being hidden. There was no time to call in a professional bomb disposal unit.
Fortunately, Qin Yuanzheng had once been a straight-A top student at the military academy.
He had the others leave first and stayed behind to cover the rear. The bomb was dismantled, but during the firefight, those left behind were badly outnumbered. Qin Yuanzheng was hit by three bullets, his left leg, his waist, and his head.
At the moment he fell, he thought there was no chance of survival. Staring into the void, he apologized to his Meimei. He hadn’t fulfilled his promise, but he had no shame before his conscience, no shame before his country and home.
Seeing him wake up, the doctor at his side couldn’t help sighing. “Deputy Regiment Commander Qin, you’re really blessed by your ancestors. A gunshot to the head, and it ended up grazing through the cheek near the lips from the side, just barely avoided a fatal wound. Sure, it’s a bit disfiguring… but you’re a grown man, who cares about looks? Scars are medals you carry for life. Yours is just worn right on your face.”
Faced with the military doctor’s teasing, Qin Yuanzheng tried to curl his lips into a smile, only to realize he couldn’t make much of an expression at all, probably an aftereffect of the bullet passing through.
He wondered if Meimei would accept him…
“Damn it, I really thought you were dead. Back then, if you hadn’t helped me… ah, forget it, no need to bring up the past. Who’d have thought you were off doing something this big, Deputy Regiment Commander Qin! Your promotion report has already been submitted. The transfer order should come down in a few days.”
Beside the bed stood a square-faced man with two bars and two stars on his shoulder. He gave Qin Yuanzheng’s shoulder a symbolic pat, joking with obvious relief.
This was Jiang Weimin, Qin Yuanzheng’s good brother, a graduate of the same military academy. If Li Zhaodi were here, she’d probably recognize him as the one who’d visited the Qin household before.
“Do I… have leave?” Qin Yuanzheng asked hoarsely, speech slow and labored from the facial wound that hadn’t fully healed yet. “After my body… recovers, I want to go back to Lotus Village. These past years, I’ve lived up to the country, lived up to the army… but I haven’t lived up to my wife…”
Hearing him mention his wife, a flicker of discomfort passed through Jiang Weimin’s eyes.
After Qin Yuanzheng had been declared “martyred,” he’d gone to the Qin home several times.
The last time, he’d heard that the overly beautiful sister-in-law seemed to be preparing to remarry.
As for whether she’d already married or not, he wasn’t sure, he’d only heard it from another soldier from Yuanzheng’s village.
That soldier was already a company commander now.
But Yuanzheng had just woken up; his emotions couldn’t take too much stimulation. Back then, when Yuanzheng had taken leave to rush home to marry his young wife, Jiang Weimin had been a witness. The depth of his brother’s feelings for that little sister-in-law went without saying.
This wasn’t the time to bring things up. Best not to let him know that the sister-in-law had most likely remarried.
But Qin Yuanzheng couldn’t stop thinking about his wife and home. Jiang Weimin tried several times to steer the conversation away, but failed. In the end, he spoke vaguely about Bai Xinmei’s situation.
“Your parents are in good health. Your wife’s doing fine too. Life’s been… been pretty good. Oh, right, she even gave you a daughter. You didn’t know, did you?”
Qin Yuanzheng’s eyes immediately lit up, his spirits lifting along with them.
He urged Jiang Weimin to tell him more about things at home…
Thousands of kilometers away from the military region hospital, in Lotus Village.
Ever since Bai Xinmei rejected Song Jinping that day, Song Jinping had acted as if nothing were wrong on the surface. No one could tell that he was in an extremely bad mood.
Xinmei thought he’d simply given up and didn’t pay him much mind.
Instead, she started getting headaches over her marriage with Wang Shuisheng.
Truthfully, she didn’t like Wang Shuisheng all that much. But blind dates were about suitability, still, his younger sister felt like a troublesome presence.
That day, she didn’t even know how it happened; in a daze, she’d agreed. She’d even felt a little regret afterward.
Then one fine afternoon, Wang Shuisheng rode his bicycle over to find her.
He’d brought big bags of gifts, his face full of guilt.
“Xinmei, I’m sorry, I…”
He hesitated and struggled over his words, but finally forced them out.
“I’m sorry, Xinmei. Our marriage… we won’t be going through with it.”
By that point, Xinmei didn’t need him to say anything more.
She was furious, not because Wang Shuisheng didn’t like her, but because this man actually dared to toy with her. In all her life, it had only ever been Bai Xinmei who looked down on men, no man had the right to play her!
Her face turned ashen as she said coldly, “No need to explain. You can get lost.”
“These things-”
“Leave them. That’s compensation I deserve. Now get lost.”
Xinmei was never the type to care about face at the expense of substance.
What puzzled her was how, out of nowhere, Wang Shuisheng had decided not to marry her.
Their argument drew the attention of another person, Song Jinping.
No, someone who had been waiting for a long time.
Arms crossed, he stood not far away, watching for quite a while, until he saw Xinmei’s livid face and heard her telling Wang Shuisheng to get lost.
He broke into the first genuine smile he’d had since being rejected, brilliant and radiant.
When Wang Shuisheng still tried to explain himself, Song Jinping stepped forward, righteous and indignant. “She told you to leave. Didn’t you hear her?”
Seeing that it was Song Jinping, Wang Shuisheng nearly lost control and lashed out. In the end, he restrained himself, his lips twitching.
He was really something, threatening him on one hand, then coming over here to play the gallant protector in front of Xinmei.