I laughed and said, "Brother Ying, you're not playing games anymore?"
"What's the point of the Zengtian Method (spending all day playing around)?"
We had just reached the door when Ersha saw that I had led the group again, and he hurriedly followed, calling out to Zhao Bailian, "Come with me this time."
Upon hearing this, Zhao Bailian clung tightly to Jing Ke's back, as if he might lose him if he wasn't careful.
I shouted, "Kezi, this time it's not about causing trouble."
Ersha didn't care; he grabbed my car door and leaned back, waiting for me to open it. I said again, "Then Xiao Zhao shouldn't go." I figured the car wouldn't fit the three of them, including Wei Tiezhu.
To everyone's surprise, Zhao Bailian simply shook his head slightly and said firmly, "I have to go."
Wei Tiezhu noticed my hesitation and came over, saying, "Let's go together, we have a car too."
Only after he pointed it out did I notice a Cherokee parked next to my beat-up van. I chuckled and said, "Wow, you're something else, who's driving?"
Wei Tiezhu smiled sheepishly and said, "I can drive either, I have the license too."
I remembered that I had made a fake ID for him. He used a fake ID to get a real driver's license; I guess he's the only one like him in the whole country.
We split into two groups and got into our own cars, with me leading the way. On the way, I called my parents and asked them to make a list of the relatives and friends I would be inviting to my wedding banquet and fax it to Yucai. At the end, I told my mother, "You and Dad can think about the list first, no rush."
My dad snatched the phone and yelled, "What are you thinking? It's already written down! If we relied on you, it'd be too late!" It seems the two elders were urging me on, but they weren't idle either, which made me feel a little embarrassed. The elderly toil their whole lives for their children, only to find themselves unable to enjoy life in the end. Since I took over the bar, I've been sending money home quite a bit. I know the older generation of working-class people definitely don't have the inclination to go abroad, but traveling to places like Beijing, Shanghai, or Dalian is fine, right? If I can't get away, I'll hire a tour guide. But the two elders are used to being frugal, and besides, their son is getting married and they're incredibly excited, refusing to listen to anything I say and refusing to go anywhere. I didn't dare do that to Baozi's parents, not out of favoritism, but to truly surprise Baozi. I completely trust the old accountant, but Baozi's mother is someone who can't keep secrets; she'd inevitably give herself away. Anyway, there will be plenty of opportunities for a son-in-law to be filial to his mother-in-law later.
My dad was a factory worker, and he had a bad temper when he was young. Right now, he yelled at me in a loud voice, "You, hurry up and send the names of your cronies home, I'll print them all on your invitations!"
I quickly smiled apologetically and said, "Don't bother, Dad. Just send me the list, and I'll have someone write it down."
My dad, unusually, compromised and said, "Alright then."
"Hey, you've never used a fax machine before, have you? My second uncle downstairs's son runs a printing and fax shop, right? Just give him the paper with the list on it and ask him to help you with it."
Before I could finish speaking, the old man jumped up and said, "Alright, alright, who's whose son?"
I:"……"
When I was about 200 meters from Yucai School, I saw a cacophony of gongs, drums, and firecrackers going off inside. I was completely baffled. Was Song Dandan's book, "Postpartum Confinement," going to be booked here? The crowds and cars blocking our way had to get out of the car and squeeze through the crowd of people from my hometown. Along the way, everyone I knew said, "Congratulations, Director Xiao."
I was increasingly confused. I led Tiezhu and the others inside and saw a large group of people surrounded by another large group. The outer group held various weapons of different lengths, while further out, some carried weapons of all sizes. The two sides were in a standoff—the heroes had been surrounded by reporters. One of the men at the very back, almost freaked out, kept shouting, "Tell us one by one! Tell us one by one!" It was Zhang Qing.
Just then, Zhang Qing turned his head and saw me. He pointed at me and shouted, "You're interviewing him? That's our person in charge, the head of Yucai."
Upon hearing this, the dozens of reporters rushed towards me like sharks seeing blood, surrounding me with lightning speed. They poked sticks of varying lengths near my mouth, asking one after another, "Are you satisfied with the result this time? What are your thoughts?"
Seeing so many people rushing towards them, Wu Sangui became very wary and whispered, "What? They've taken it down? Do they know about our business of smashing people's property?" Hua Mulan leaned back to him and said, "They don't seem to have any hostility." Fatty and the others had been there for a long time and were used to the kind of death-defying interviewing style of modern media.
Of course I knew the reporters were asking about the competition in Singapore, but I honestly didn't know how to answer them. Judging by their excitement, it seemed to go beyond just winning a gold medal. Especially for a niche sport like Sanda, such intense attention almost suggested the athletes were taking performance-enhancing drugs en masse.
I glanced at Zhang Qing from afar, hoping to glean some useful information. But these newly rescued people completely ignored me, rushing back to their dormitories with their bags and bundles. Zhang Qing only gave me a gloating look before disappearing.
Facing a forest of microphones, I could only clear my throat and say solemnly, "We have done our best for today's result (not the achievement). Please rest assured, our country and people, we will certainly live up to your expectations and achieve even better results!" Then, no matter what the reporters asked, I just repeated the same thing over and over. The reporters didn't seem to have any complaints, except for one female reporter who muttered to herself as she packed up her microphones, "Could there be a better result than this?"
After dealing with the reporters, I immediately went to settle accounts with the heroes. Entering the dormitory building, I found the group already freshened up, each one strutting around with boundless energy. They were all such familiar faces: Lu Junyi, Lin Chong, Fang La, Fang Zhenjiang, Cheng Fengshou, Duan Tianlang… Amidst the lively chatter, we hugged and shook hands. I almost kissed Hu Sanniang without thinking, but she punched me back. Not knowing who to talk to first, I grabbed Zhang Qing and yelled, “You come back and immediately betray me! What kind of older brothers are you?”
Zhang Qing laughed heartily and said, "Isn't this a good thing? What a great opportunity to show off!"
Why didn't you tell me you were coming back?
Dong Ping said, "Didn't we say we wanted to give you a surprise? We originally planned to show up suddenly on your wedding day, but we stayed in Singapore and had to deal with reporters from all over the world every day. They were all blond-haired, green-eyed guys, which was kind of creepy, so we came back."
Duan Jingzhu suddenly appeared from somewhere and said with dissatisfaction, "What's wrong with yellow hair? Haven't you seen so many people deliberately dye their hair yellow?"
I asked, "Seriously, how were your results this time?"
Fang Zhenjiang laughed and said, "If your grades are bad, how can so many people follow you? Where's Yuanyuan? Go and report to Xiaoqiang."
Wu Sangui and I asked in unison, "Who is Yuanyuan?"
Tong Yuan came out of the room, looking embarrassed, and handed me a small notebook, saying, "Take a look for yourself."
I was shocked when I saw it. A total of 118 countries participated in this Singapore Sanda competition, divided into 11 weight classes and one team event. The Chinese delegation swept all the gold medals. Up until my last phone call with Tong Yuan, just as Zhang Qing said, not a single bronze medal was left for foreigners. Later, due to the unforeseen circumstances of the group divisions, three silver medals and two bronze medals were lost (lost, not forfeited). In the history of the competition, it's hard to say whether this is a miracle or a disaster. A large group of foreigners went all the way to Singapore, only to see our five-star red flag raised every day, barely winning any medals, but eventually learning to hum the "March of the Volunteers."
This event has already caused a sensation internationally, with even countries not particularly interested in Sanda sending reporters to Singapore halfway through the competition. The International Sanda Association has drafted a series of restrictions to address the dominance of Chinese fighters, including: replacing small gloves with large ones, supposedly to slow down punches and reduce the visual strain on spectators; changing the time-based system to a 3-minute sudden-death format, increasing randomness and uncertainty, making matches between unequally matched fighters less monotonous and lengthy. The last proposal, which has received considerable criticism and seems unlikely to be adopted, is unprotected attacks. This proposal requires each fighter to shout out their attack method and target before attacking, such as: "I'm going to punch you in the head!" or "I'm going to kick you in the chest!"
The shock this competition brought to the world went far beyond this, which was discovered by a local Singaporean journalist by chance: all the athletes in the Chinese delegation came from the same school...
This was no longer just a simple gimmick; it took on a touch of mystery. Reportedly, once this discovery was announced, foreign media outlets, already showing great interest in the Chinese team, immediately launched a 24-hour manhunt and surveillance operation to verify it. When they finally raised the issue, team leader Tong Yuan casually remarked, "Yes, we're from the same school. What's wrong with talking about this?"
The world was in an uproar. Imagine, we all know Brazilian football is great, but what if we suddenly found out that from Dunga in the past to the later legendary Ronaldo and Carlos, and now Ronaldinho and Kaká, they all graduated from the same school? How would we feel?
Yucai School, with its own strength, fought against the world's top Sanda fighters and achieved a complete victory. Compared to us, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry seems to have lost its mystical charm.
Faced with those smiling faces, I felt a little dizzy. I didn't know if this counted as cheating; I'd forgotten to remind them to be discreet. But I quickly calmed down: it concerned national honor, and besides, our gold medals were earned through hard work, not by using freezing spells or time-stopping magic.
Zhang Qing tossed a gold medal into my hand: "Here, keep this as a souvenir."
I glanced down and saw Cao Xiaoxiang—Cao Chong—focused on fiddling with a bunch of things on his chest. I picked him up and kissed him twice, then solemnly hung the gold medal around his neck, saying, "Son, Dad is giving you this. I hope that when you grow up, you'll repay Dad for what you earned yourself!"
Cao Xiaoxiang frowned and said, "Dad, I don't want them anymore—" As he spoke, he pulled out a large pile of gold and silver tokens from around his neck, "I can't carry any more." It turned out that the heroes gave Xiaoxiang any tokens they took as toys.
Hu Sanniang stretched out her hand at me: "Don't give it to me, I just need to collect one more so I can make a gold bracelet."
I:"……"
It seems that trying so hard to reclaim the plaques was just a display of the bandits' competitive spirit; these guys had absolutely no sportsmanship or sense of honor.
Wu Sangui and Hua Mulan came up to me and asked, "Where did you get your son from?"