NOVPUBXu Qingfan arrived at Lin Wanning’s front door, where the once-small Little White had grown into an imposing large white dog.
Round eyes, a round nose, a delicate vixen face—the purebred Chinese Garden Earth Dog was just as marketable as any foreign breed.
"Chu chu chu~ Come here, Big White!" Excited upon seeing Xu Qingfan, the big white dog pushed off its hind legs and stood up, lunging toward him.
"Eh, good dog!" Xu Qingfan patted its head, then sensing an odd smell, he brought his hand to his nose to sniff. It was probably the rain from yesterday, a strong dog smell, "Damn stinky dog, get lost, don’t touch me!"
The dog: ???
Pushed away, a look of confusion emerged in Big White’s eyes, but a few seconds later, it bounded back even more excitedly than before.
"Brother Fan!"
Turning around, Xu Qingfan saw the little owner had come out.
"Wanning, how many days has it been since your dog had a bath? It smells so strong." Xu Qingfan asked after washing his hands clean at the sink.
"Not at all, Little White broke free from its leash and ran out yesterday, and didn’t come back until it started raining, then dad punished it by making it stand in the rain!" Lin Wanning also smelled the dog odor and stepped back with distaste, staying away from the largest radius of Big White’s activity.
"That deserves a punishment, to let it know about society’s perils, lest it be caught and end up in a dog meat restaurant!" In their area, dog meat was quite popular, selling for over thirty yuan per half kilogram, pricier than beef—catching a four or fifty-kilogram dog like Little White would mean a thousand yuan’s profit.
"Mm, let’s go inside and talk, Brother Qing Fan!" Lin Wanning took Xu Qingfan’s damp palm without disgust and pulled him into the house.
"Wow~ Ningning is doing homework, huh!" Xu Qingfan noted the open books and exercise booklets on the dining table with a smile.
"Hehe, the graduation exams are coming up, duck, I can’t score much lower than Brother Fan!" Lin Wanning linked her arm with his, her eyes curved into crescent moons as she tilted her head to look at him.
Xu Qingfan patted the girl’s head, praising her, "Ningning is great, the graduation exam is just a district-wide standard test, without those tough, hair-pulling questions added by schools, our scores shouldn’t be much different."
"As long as I’m within twenty points of Brother Fan, I’ll be satisfied!"
The elementary to middle school graduation exam covered four subjects: language, mathematics, English, and natural science, with a total perfect score of 350. Lin Wanning’s scores hovered around 320 in the previous tests.
"Then I’ll just score a few points less next time, and Ningning can achieve her goal."
"No need, I want to rely on my own efforts!" Lin Wanning pouted, giving him a reproachful look.
"Alright, alright, I’m just joking. Let’s hurry up and get changed. Aren’t your uncle and aunt home?" Xu Qingfan crouched to check the girl’s homework and, finding it all correct, nodded in satisfaction.
"Mom and dad went back to the factory. Just wait for me, Brother Qing Fan, I’ll go change!"
"Okay, I’ll wait for you downstairs." He sat in the spot where Lin Wanning had been working on homework, helping to tidy up the books and stationery on the table.
Xu Qingfan suddenly recalled that Lin Qiaoshan’s garment factory would implode this year due to the financial crisis. On one side was the devaluation of foreign exchange, turning previously profitable orders into losses after converting to Huaxia currency; on the other, many buyers extended their payment cycles, eventually dragging the garment factory into quicksand.
That was what Xu Qingfan had been busy with recently, finding a suitable reason to persuade Zhang Chunxue to sell her foreign stocks.
He certainly didn’t have the expertise to write an academic paper predicting the outbreak of the subprime mortgage crisis.
However, knowing that the 2008 financial crisis would explode due to real estate, he was able to find the evidence to prove the risks.
After dealing with January’s cold snap, Xu Qingfan had been self-studying and gathering relevant financial information from various channels. He managed to persuade Zhang Chunxue to sell the stocks at a high price just before the Lehman Brothers Building was about to collapse in April.
After all this, Xu Qingfan also managed to participate in the last midterm exam of the semester, achieving a perfect score.
He felt like he was just as described in Li Bai’s "Knight-Errant," disappearing into anonymity after handling affairs.
As for the Lin Wanning family’s garment factory, the long string of zeros in the girl’s bank account was more than enough to buy seven or eight garment factories of the same scale, ready to give Lin Qiaoshan and Wen Wanqing a huge surprise when the moment came!
"Brother Fan, does it look good on me?" After changing into a blue and white striped dress, Lin Wanning stood at the top of the stairs, holding up her skirt and asking him.
"It looks good, our Wanning looks good in anything."
"Heehee~ Then I’ll wear this, just wait a moment longer, Brother Fan, I’ll change my hair clip!" The girl ran upstairs giggling again.
"Okay!" Lin Wanning hurried back down to his side, with a yellow hair tie making a cute little bump on her head, knowing Xu Qingfan liked it.
Six years had passed, and the girl still had the same hairstyle she wore back in kindergarten.
Xu Qingfan’s eyes lit up; he couldn’t help but admit Lin Wanning was growing up to resemble the character Xiao Liuhua more and more—if she ever put on the high school uniform and a red plaid skirt, it would be like a real-life carbon copy.
[Chuunibyou seems to have come out in either 2012 or 2013, just when everyone was in high school too!] He recalled, thinking the girl would still be as silly and cute as she was now after high school, Xu Qingfan couldn’t help but smile faintly.
"What are you smiling at, Brother Fan?" Lin Wanning brought her face close, trying to observe carefully.
"Laughing because you asked me why my QQ level hasn’t changed even after I’ve shared so many posts!"
