On My Way - Chapter 29

Chapter 29 - Ren Dongxue, Director Ren, I Know You

The project at Jiaolong Village was running far more systematically than I had anticipated.

I would wake up at six every day to run and have breakfast, arrive at the office by nine to start signing various documents and calculating work progress, then report back to Zhao Yu. In the afternoon, I would walk around the construction site to check on the progress of each section.

I even had days off.

I would go exploring on the grasslands with Harina. They were Sinicized pastoralists who raised cattle and sheep and farmed, but they still retained some purely ecological habits.

For example, they still rode horses and hunted, though they used modified air guns that could only take down field mice or rabbits.

Harina would take me to drink the most authentic salty milk tea, show me the largest horse farm, and let me see the newborn foals. At the beginning of early summer, the deep blue lake, surrounded by endless swaying flowers on the grassland, looked like an oil painting that existed only in dreams.

Harina would ride her horse, her dozen large dogs following her with impressive flair, as she rounded up the scattered flocks of sheep into one place.

It was strange; in the internet cafe, she was nothing more than a beauty with garish fashion. But when she was on horseback, she was breathtakingly beautiful.

However, she didn't enjoy these tasks. The big dogs needed her to cook cornmeal meat broth to feed them, and the sheep required her to clean out their pungent, muddy pens. The grassland was beautiful, but the countless mosquitoes, dense as clouds, could make one stomp with rage.

She would sigh and say, "I wanted to go to the city to work, but my grandparents are getting old. If I leave, what will happen to them? I’m stuck guarding this crappy internet cafe! This crappy internet cafe!"

As she said this, she would furiously pluck the heads off the chives, as if the chives were her sworn enemies.

Her grandmother couldn't understand her and just kept insisting that I drink more tea.

I am not a person one would ever call warm-hearted, but for some reason, I always felt a sense of tenderness toward Harina.

I asked, "So, what about the future? Have you thought about it?"

"What else can I do? When I'm of age, I'll marry Qinglong. Anyway, he’s out driving his truck all day, and I can still live in my own house."

I looked at her face, beautiful as a blooming flower, and sighed.

She was the prettiest girl I had ever seen. If she had been born into a family that could afford to send her to study art, she might have even become a wildly popular star.

But the reality was that her beauty could only bloom in this tiny village, and then wither away in the household of a truck driver.

I said, "As long as you've thought it through."

After a pause, I added, "If—and I mean if—one day you want to go to school... I’ll cover your tuition."

She froze for a moment and said, "What could I even study? I dropped out after seventh grade."

I said, "There are many options. Adult self-study programs in electromechanical maintenance, petrochemicals, and the like aren't difficult."

She clearly hadn't considered these things and just looked at me with great surprise: "Aren't those things men study?"

I was caught between laughter and tears, saying, "I studied civil engineering, didn't I?"

She didn't speak again, just lowered her head and kept picking the chives. Suddenly, she asked, "Is your partner very impressive?"

"Why do you ask?"

She thought for a moment and said, "He looks like he has a lot of money... like someone from a TV show."

Cheng Xia certainly did look like that.

In the world of adults, everyone has their own hardships. Among the people I know, most possess a certain slack, weary air.

But Cheng Xia was always clean and fresh, with tight, youthful skin. Even when he stayed up late, his eyes remained bright and clear, as if he were constantly lit by a dozen beauty lamps, radiating spirit.

"It’s not just that he has money..."

He came from a good family, received the best education, and had a stable safety net every step of the way. Even when he experienced hardships, they still allowed him to maintain that childlike spirit.

However, I didn't want to explain all that to Harina.

"Qinglong is quite good, too; he’s handsome and always spends money on me... but I feel like your partner is particularly sophisticated," Harina sighed wistfully. "I’m not coveting your partner; I just think he looks like... very much like someone from a story."

I understood.

He really did look like the prince whom the heroine of a story finally wins after overcoming thousands of trials and tribulations.

But my dear girl, that is a scam.

A grand, centuries-old scam concocted for women in all those fairy tales: if you are beautiful, kind, obedient, and strong, you will get your prince.

A prince is not a doll prepared just for you; he will argue, he will make a scene, he will go crazy, and at any moment, he might bare his fangs at you from behind.

——

After Cheng Xia went back, we were constantly fighting.

I monitored him to ensure he saw a doctor; he was compliant about taking his medicine and visiting a psychiatrist once a week.

The results fluctuated.

When things were "good," he would be relaxed and cheerful in video calls, telling me to set my mind at ease and focus on work, promising to visit me whenever he had time off.

The "bad" moments, however, could be triggered at any time.

If I missed a phone call for a moment, he could go crazy and call forty-some times in a row.

If I didn't mask my desire to hang up early during our evening video call, I would receive a barrage of long-winded essays from him the next day.

He was sick. His reliance on me wasn't love; it felt more like the madness of a drowning man trying to clutch at something.

But forcing myself to chat with him left me not knowing what to say. He wasn't a good conversationalist, and my life was quite monotonous day after day.

We wanted to keep talking, we wanted to touch, but the topics were gone. We could only sit there, feeling that exhaustion, with awkwardness and boredom spreading from within it.

I knew that even the grandest affection couldn't withstand such consumption, so I...

Started using my spare time to visit various villages to collect materials, take all sorts of photos, and then I asked him to give me a reading list so I could read architectural books frantically.

I demanded the same of him—to go out, take photos, read books, and experience more of the world.

This way, when we opened our video calls, we would have plenty of topics to discuss instead of sitting in awkward silence.

This was my way of loving him.

Clumsy, but earnest.

——

The next day, Qinglong came to my office.

We had signed our transport contract with his team. After learning that I was the person in charge of the construction site, the kid became much more respectful to me, calling me "Sister" at every turn.

This time, he slunk up to me, looking dejected, and whispered, "Sister, um, Director Zhao seems quite angry. Can you help us plead for mercy?"

After asking, I learned that this time, their transport of building materials had been late, delaying the construction.

And this was already the third time this month.

Zhao Yu had flown into a rage, pointing at their manager's nose and letting out a string of profanities: "Can you do the job or not! If you can't, get out! I don't raise deadbeat bosses here!"

"That’s not how it went at all. When we were transporting, several large trucks were parked right in the middle of the road, blocking us and refusing to move. We were stuck from morning until afternoon. What were we supposed to do?"

As soon as I heard that, I knew it wasn't just bad luck—it was pure, man-made sabotage.

For construction projects with large transport needs, many trucking teams want to snatch the job. If they can't get the contract, they use dirty tactics to drive away the team that won the bid.

Setting up roadblocks was nothing new.

In fact, to us, it made no difference which trucking team we used.

I suggested that if this team wasn't working out, we should just switch to another.

But Zhao Yu disagreed.

First, he had personally vetted Qinglong’s team, and they were the most cost-effective; replacing them would definitely cost more.

Second, the team manager had been crying in Zhao Yu’s office all afternoon. He had a spineless personality and was pushed around by everyone locally; he only gave us such a low price because he was truly struggling to make ends meet.

Zhao Yu was the type who couldn't stand seeing honest people being bullied.

There was no help for it; since the boss made a request, I had to see it through.

I accompanied the manager and went, in my capacity as the client, to the trucking team that had been causing the trouble.

It was in a county town fifty kilometers away, a fairly large yard where several rows of large trucks were parked.

As soon as I stepped out of the car, I heard dogs barking, and several giant dogs came running over.

My heart sank.

I recognized them; the leader was a Tibetan Mastiff, majestic and tall—it was clearly purebred. It didn't even bark; it just curled its lips and let out a low growl. Then, two German Shepherds approached me, their ears erect, their bodies massive, snarling as they neared.

A rough estimate told me these dogs alone were worth over a hundred thousand.

In my experience, anyone who kept so many vicious dogs was not a person to be trifled with.

A man walked out of the house, commanded the dogs to stop, and asked, "Who are you looking for?"

The manager nodded and bowed hurriedly, saying, "Brother Lang! Where's your dad? I'm Old Zhang from Weisheng, and this is Director Ren from the client company."

The man looked at me with a hostile expression. He was, in fact, very handsome—a bit like Aaron Kwok in his younger days—but his eyes were too fierce, carrying a gloomy, oppressive air.

"Oh!" He stuffed his hands into his pockets and laughed, "Just tell me whatever you need to say."

The manager gave me a distressed look.

That wouldn't work, of course. This kind of "second-generation rich" energy was too much; few of them could actually make decisions for their fathers.

And I was, at the very least, a client! How could I... Wait, why were those Tibetan Mastiffs baring their teeth again?

"Young man, I’m the person in charge of the Uleji Village project." I’ve always been someone who knows how to assess a situation, so I quickly offered a fawning smile. "I have some business matters to discuss with Director Teng. Could you please get in touch with him for me?"

The man sneered, but then he said something I never expected.

"Ren Dongxue, Director Ren, I know you."

Huh?

I had only been back in the country for a short time, and I had only worked on projects in the South. How could a second-generation rich kid from a transport company in a small Inner Mongolian county know me?

Before I could answer, the answer appeared: someone walked out of the office building behind the man.

This was truly an old acquaintance—a familiar face. I just didn't know if he could be counted as a friend.

"Director Ren, long time no see." The other party revealed a brilliant smile.