When Lin Wenbo returned home with Gong Lixin, Lin Mao was just about to enter the Gong family’s residence. Gong father, Gong Xiangyi and Song Haoran had long been waiting in the living room.
"Old Lin, have you been well recently?" Gong father went to the door, greeting the other respectfully. Gong Xiangyi and Song Haoran quickly followed behind him and greeted the other as well, not daring to be disrespectful.
If Gong Yuanhang was a general on the battlefield, then Lin Mao was a general in the business world and his means were superb. In politics, in the military, in the business world and even in the underworld, they were all interconnected and each circle influenced by each other.
"Very well, I missed you." Lin Mao laughed. His strong spirit could be seen even when his hair had turned gray.
"Grandfather, please come in." Gong Xiangyi smiled, quickly adopting the image of a virtuous Mary Sue offering her help.
"Alright." Lin Mao nodded and smiled; his mood improved at the sight of his grandson. He extended his hand so he could lean on his grandson for support. Originally he was dissatisfied with Gong Xiangyi’s decision to cancel the wedding and he was slightly disappointed with his own grandson because of this matter. Thus, Lin Mao pretended not to see her ladylike behavior. Gong Xiangyi knew the importance of Lin Mao’s connections and decided to let her prejudice slide.
"Is that Lixin? I haven’t seen you in a long time and look how you have grown." Lin Mao asked with a smile after seeing a boy with a unique temperament and steady eyebrows standing next to his grandson.
"Lin grandfather is well!" Gong Lixin snuck a peek at Lin Mao as he bowed. [1]
Elderly people always took special care of children, especially children like Gong Lixin who were well-rounded. Just by seeing the pair of crystal-clear eyes, Lin Mao had seen through the child’s pure nature and nodded, his love and praise given without much effort. [2]
Gong Xiangyi saw Lin Mao’s attitude towards Gong Lixin’s amiable greeting. Gong Xiangyi who had been his granddaughter-in-law for a year knew very well how difficult it was to please the man. In the past, she had spent a lot of energy to forge a good relationship with Lin Mao, and she had barely been able to make him like her a little. Gong Xiangyi found it unfair how Gong Lixin was able to gain Lin Mao’s appreciation so easily.
Gong Xiangyi gritted her teeth as she secretly cursed Gong Lixin. She knew how the boy used his soft, pretty face hidden behind a facade of obedience to get others to throw themselves into danger for him. In her past life, others had died for the boy. She couldn’t let the boy do the same thing again.
Gong Xiangyi could not wait for her father to speak any longer. “Grandfather, shall we go to the study room to talk?" With the full support of the Lin family, the Gong family’s strength would increase dramatically.
Upon hearing her words, the servants who had just placed the dishes and tableware had to clean the table up.
Gong Xiangyi worried about what they were about to going to discuss.
"Ah, sure." Lin Mao didn’t mind delaying dinner. Thus, following Gong Yuanhang’s lead, they stepped into the study.
Gong Lixin knew that eating by himself was a very rude behavior. He watched the group of people disappear up the stairs and around the corner. He suppressed his hunger before taking his heavy bag and headed to his room so he could change clothes. Picking a set of casual clothes to wear, he opened his bag and checked its contents.
There were five glass bottles, each containing 500 Bugu Dan, for a grand total of 2500 Bugu Dan. This would be enough for the Gong family for more than 20 years. If all the Bugu Dans were finished before then, he could always collect the herbs and refine more Bugu Dan. With this amount of medicine, his mind was at peace. He was prepared to give a bottle to each person before going to bed tonight, so that he wouldn’t forget about it. During the apocalypse, if hunger could be avoided then a person’s chances of survival would increase greatly.
Gong Lixin nodded with satisfaction after placing the five bottles on his computer desk. He headed downstairs to watch TV. Watching TV had become his favorite hobby since he had come to this modern society which had such advanced technology.
On the soft and comfortable sofa, Gong Lixin used the remote control to search for the channel he loved to watch while listening to the conversation in the study. [3]
Time flew, and with the apocalypse approaching, he didn’t dare to slack off; whether it be eating, walking, sleeping, learning and training, he utilized every minute and every second to cultivate ’Reverse Spirits.’ His cultivation had already broken through the second level. With this. he would still be able to hear people talking even if they were a few kilometers away. Thus, he didn’t even need to force himself to hear what they were talking about in the study.
Entering the study, Gong Xiangyi got straight to the point. As soon as Lin Mao took a seat, she once again talked about the coming apocalypse. She even used her spatial power as proof for Lin Mao.
Seeing more than a dozen bags of rice suddenly appearing in the study room, Lin Mao was amazed but still remained calm. He has been in the business world for his entire life. He had experienced large ups and downs, moved left and right, there was no wind nor wave he hadn’t seen. He had experienced all sorts of things. Because of all that he had experienced, it was naturally impossible for him to believe Gong Xiangyi with only this show of power as the only evidence. In his heart, there were thousands of possibilities which he had thought about. Lin Mao stayed silent, not promising anything just yet.
Seeing how Lin Mao stayed silent, Gong Xiangyi hung her head down for a moment as she thought about how to convince him. A thought popped into her mind, and she slowly opened her mouth to speak. "Grandfather, my prophecy is true. If you don’t believe me, then I can predict one more event. After I say it, I hope that you will carefully consider about cooperating with our Gong family."
"Oh? What prophecy?" Lin Mao looked at Gong Xiangyi, his curiosity difficult to hide. After all, seeing is believing. He couldn’t trust everything he heard. If Gong Xiangyi’s prophecy really did come true, then he would support the Gong family.
"You should know about the earthquake and tsunami in R country. I predict that at 9:28 tonight, there will be a large-scale nuclear accident at five nuclear power plants in the country. 17 people will die this night and the area of nuclear pollution will be over 40000 km2, accounting for 1/10 of the country’s land area. The five nuclear power plants are..."
Gong Xiangyi frowned, trying to recall the names and locations of the five nuclear power plants. The disaster in R country had almost shaken the country’s foundation, and even spread to more than a dozen neighboring countries. The negative impact was very big. The world was competing to report the news at that time so it was difficult for Gong Xiangyi to forget the details.
It was also because of this large-scale nuclear pollution that all the new zombies in R country skipped the primary stage and evolved to the first level after the solar eclipse which signaled the beginning of the apocalypse. And since R country had not yet figured out how to deal with the zombies, they were massacred. The whole R country was occupied by high-level zombies and became a living hell.
Fortunately, the country was an island country and zombies could not cross the sea. Even if they came, they were limited to one or two emperor-level zombies or water zombies. They were taken care of by a joint force making them not a big threat. In order to collect higher-grade crystal nuclei, Gong Xiangyi and Lin Wenbo once killed an emperor zombie in the transitional sea from the beach nearest to R country. During that hunting trip, every conversation was about the tragedy of R country so the details were could be remembered vividly.
The atmosphere became heavier upon hearing another disaster-related prophecy. Since the beginning of 2012, large-scale disasters around the world had become more frequent. They didn’t pay attention to any of it in the past. They only took notice of it after Gong Xiangyi’s warnings. It turned out that the world really was breaking down and was slowly becoming completely unrecognizable.
Lin Mao looked at his wristwatch before saying: "It’s 9 o’clock, there’s 28 minutes left." Everyone heard this, their expressions becoming tighter.
"Grandfather, Uncle Gong, let’s go to the living room. If such a big accident does happen, it will be reported immediately on the news." Lin Wenbo frowned, his voice dark and hurt. He was feeling overwhelmed in the face of this series of bad news.
Gong father got up. "Alright. Old Lin, please go first." He raised his hand to invite Lin Mao to the living room to watch the news live. Lin Mao didn’t refuse and headed downstairs, his brisk pace slowing down.
In the living room, Gong Lixin had only listened to the beginning of their conversation. When Gong Xiangyi kept on talking about coming events, he lost interest. Instead, his attention was immediately attracted by the wonderful animations on the TV. This anime was a 3D production with a rare martial arts theme. The anime showed different aspects of the Jianghu and ancient times, and combined with the lifelike and realistic characters, one would be deeply immersed into the story the more they watched.
Gong Lixin didn’t want to stop watching. When everyone came downstairs, they found him sitting cross-legged, holding a big-mouthed monkey plushie while staring at the TV with a smile on his face, looking happy as he devoured the scenes with relish.
The boy’s face was charming, his posture was lazy and he was surrounded by a warm and happy atmosphere. When one looked at him, they would only feel that the world was stable and quiet for years to come.
When Gong Yuanhang and Lin Mao saw this, the heaviness in their hearts was alleviated. Song Haoran and Lin Wenbo both blinked, their thin lips didn’t show any signs of rising but the pain and pressure sitting at the bottom of their heart was taken away by the teenager’s bright smile.
Comparing what she remembered in her past life, she could sense how the people around her were polar opposites to what she remembered. She felt that Gong Lixin, who was at ease at this moment, was very eye-catching and she detested that sight.
Emotionlessly, she turned away without any explanation. She picked up the remote control and changed the channel to an international news station. Turning to face Lin Mao and the others, she changed to a gentle and virtuous expression as she said, "Grandfather, Dad, come sit down and wait. It’s almost time."
Gong Lixin frowned as he saw the channels being changed. His pink lips were slightly upturned, clearly showing his dissatisfaction. But when he heard Gong Xiangyi, he realised that Lin Mao and his father wanted to watch the news. His dissatisfied look instantly disappeared, and he stood up with his big-mouthed monkey to politely greet the two elders.
Touched by how polite Gong Lixin was, Lin Mao walked to Gong Lixin’s side and lovingly touched his head and smiled. "What’s with the urgency, there’s still more than 20 minutes. Let Xiaoxin finish watching his cartoon."
"Alright, change the channel back." In Gong father’s heart, he was secretly reluctant about concealing news about the coming apocalypse from his son. However, how could his son be so happy? Seeing his son’s joyous smile, he felt his mind and body easing, and the pressure he felt diminished.
Gong Xiangyi tightened her hands into fists but sat still in the same place. She stopped herself from revealing the hatred she held for Gong Lixin in her heart. Seeing that she didn’t respond, Song Haoran picked up the remote control and turned the channel back to the children’s cartoon channel. After Gong Yuanhang and Lin Mao settled down on the main sofa, while the other two men took Gong Lixin to sit with them.
Lin Wenbo and Gong Lixin were together quite often recently, thus he got used to accompanying him and sat down next to him without a thought or change in facial expression. His fiancée on the other hand, sat on the other side of Gong Lixin, surrounded by a gloomy atmosphere.
The two sitting beside Gong Lixin reached out to touch his soft hair but only to have their hands touch each other. Both men were slightly stunned but they laughed it off.
Twenty minutes was enough to finish watching an episode of anime. Gong Lixin held his big-mouthed monkey and concentrated on the TV screen. His eyes were bright and full of excitement that he didn’t pay attention to the "crash" incident above his head.
[1] When Gong Lixin says "Lin grandfather is well" he is being respectful, this is a typical greeting.
[2]Well-rounded here means that he’s an adorkable, obedient child.
[3] Editor’s note: Oh my, super hearing due to his cultivation!
T/N: Yay, Grandpa Lin~~~ (The doctor chick is still my fave side character)