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Chapter 111: Chapter 107 Visiting Family (Part 1)
Li Hongjun picked up Shen Yunfang, took the basket from behind her and the large tote bag from her hand, and then pulled her into the car. They sped off towards the garrison.
"Tired?" While driving, Li Hongjun turned to look at the little girl from his family. She’d changed so much. A year had passed, and the little girl had grown prettier, looking fuller. From the side, her peach fuzz on her face was plump and adorable. He could hardly recognize her.
"Not really." She had slept well yesterday, so she didn’t feel tired from the day’s journey. Glancing at Li Hongjun, who kept looking her way, Shen Yunfang blushed a little. "What are you looking at? Focus on driving."
Instead of being annoyed at being scolded, Li Hongjun’s smile grew wider, reaching his ears. "You’ve bloomed in the year we haven’t seen each other." Not knowing how to compliment her looks directly, he expressed himself in a roundabout way.
Shen Yunfang touched her face, realizing that she was no longer a bean sprout, but a pretty girl. "Don’t talk nonsense, I was simply born beautiful." No woman doesn’t like to be beautiful. Even though Li Hongjun’s words weren’t an outright compliment on her beauty, they made her happy. She had even bought herself a bottle of skin cream in the provincial capital. Despite the hard work in the fields every day, she knew she needed to take care of herself.
Li Hongjun chuckled foolishly, and the two of them chatted, each sentence followed by another. Twenty minutes later, as they spotted the garrison, the feeling of strangeness between them vanished.
"This place is quite remote." The second half of the twenty-minute drive had been nearly devoid of people.
"It’s alright. There are weekly trips to the county. If you come here in the future and get bored, you can always visit the county." Li Hongjun hurriedly explained, worried that he might frighten Shen Yunfang and that she might not want to come with the troops again.
There were too few family members following the troops now; most thought the place too remote and would rather stay in the countryside than come here.
Shen Yunfang glared at him. She hadn’t said she wanted to live here, let alone considered marrying him.
Li Hongjun led her to the gatekeeper to fill out a form before taking her into the garrison, introducing her to the surroundings as they walked. He eventually brought her to his dormitory.
"This is my dormitory. You can stay here tonight; I’ll find another place to squeeze in." Li Hongjun put the basket and the large tote bag on the table and closed the bedroom door before pulling Shen Yunfang to sit on the bed.
"Must be tired, huh? Take a seat and rest; I’ll get you a cup of water." He took the thermos and poured hot water into his large mug, then brought it to her by the bed.
Upon entering the room, Shen Yunfang started to look around. The room was simple, with a single bed against the wall, a two-door cabinet next to it, a set of table and chairs under the window—it was simple and clean.
Accepting the mug Li Hongjun handed her, she took a couple of sips. Hmm, the water was a bit too hot.
"Wash your hands and face, warm up." Thinking that Yunfang had been on the road all day and must be freezing, Li Hongjun quickly poured hot water into the basin for her to wash her hands.
"There’s no need to fuss." Shen Yunfang felt a little embarrassed. "Don’t you have a guesthouse? I can just stay there."
It felt wrong to usurp Li Hongjun’s dormitory the moment she arrived—it wasn’t proper. Surely such a large camp would have a guesthouse. It couldn’t be that all visiting relatives were supposed to stay in the military camp, that would be chaos.
Li Hongjun didn’t say anything. Indeed, the camp had a guesthouse prepared for visiting relatives of the soldiers, even for free, but it was located on the outskirts of the camp, quite far from here. If Yunfang stayed there, they would only be able to see each other at night.
"There is one, but it’s in very poor condition. You’re better off staying here. It’s only for a few days anyway." Li Hongjun lied without batting an eye.
Since he had put it that way, Shen Yunfang didn’t insist any longer. Using the hot water he had poured, she washed her hands and face thoroughly, feeling refreshed. Then she went over to the table and took out the things she had brought for Li Hongjun.
"This is the wine I brewed. I’m not sure if it’s allowed here." Shen Yunfang took a small jar from the top of the basket. The journey had been too long to bring much, so she only brought two pounds. "And here’s some pickles I made. I find them tasty, so I brought you some."
Suddenly, Li Hongjun hugged her from behind, resting his head on her shoulder. Her muscles tensed in an instant. "Your coming to see me means more than anything you could bring." Li Hongjun murmured softly next to her ear.
The difference in height between them was quite significant. Although Shen Yunfang had grown taller over the past year, being bear-hugged by Li Hongjun made her feel like a child, with her whole body shrinking into his embrace.
"Let go quickly, if someone sees us, I won’t be able to show my face." Shen Yunfang’s face was a bit red as she wriggled in his arms. This guy had no shame, he was a soldier after all, and yet he started hugging and clinging as soon as they met.
"We’re inside the house, who could see us?" Li Hongjun would not let go and even had the gall to turn her around in his embrace, so they were face to face. "Stop squirming, I just missed you, what else do you think I could do?" Li Hongjun said with a laugh, watching the little person in his arms flush red.
Upon hearing his words, Shen Yunfang stopped struggling, though her pouted lips still showed her defiance.
Shen Yunfang looked up at him, her large, sparkling eyes making Li Hongjun feel dazed. "Fang, you are so beautiful," said Li Hongjun in a deep voice.
Shen Yunfang’s face turned beet red, this shameless man, flirting with her as soon as he arrived, "Let go, you’re supposed to be a soldier, you’re almost like a hoodlum."
Li Hongjun suddenly flashed a grin, "Wrong, a hoodlum would do this."
As soon as he finished speaking, he lowered his head and kissed the pouting lips.
Ever since he returned from his last family visit, he thought of her every night. He found it strange himself, the girl wasn’t even that pretty, and yet he couldn’t stop thinking about her.
It was only after listening to the half-crude jokes of his fellow soldiers that he realized he had become smitten, longing for a wife.
Although it was just a brush of lips, Shen Yunfang was only stunned for a moment before she leaned back as far as she could, "You lousy hoodlum, let me go right now."
It didn’t matter whether anyone could see or not, if men were truly obedient, pigs could climb trees.
As she pushed back, he drew in a sharp breath and muttered through gritted teeth, "Don’t move, don’t move at all, you’re really killing me here."
With that, his arms tightened and he lifted her entire body into his arms, then captured the little mouth he had been craving with a large, precise bite.
Defiant and refusing to let the filthy hoodlum succeed, Shen Yunfang struggled fiercely, shaking her head from side to side, trying to free her mouth to scold him.
As if encouraged by the resistance, Li Hongjun, carrying the person in his arms, stumbled toward the bed and pressed her beneath him, becoming even more unrestrained.
For a moment, the entire dormitory fell silent, and only the sound of heavy breathing could be heard.
"Company commander, has sister-in-law arrived? It’s dinner time, the political commissar asked you to bring her along for the fun," Quan Zhu started calling out loudly as soon as he reached the top of the stairs.
Thankfully, his shouting gave the two people on the bed a moment to react. Li Hongjun’s muscles tensed immediately and in the next moment, like lightning, he pulled a cotton blanket over his head and then with a flick, opened it up to cover the woman beneath it entirely.
He himself only managed to sit up in time, placing his long legs down beside the bed.
As Quan Zhu approached the window and looked in, what he saw was their company commander sitting in front of the bed as though he was just tucking someone in.
"Company commander, what’s wrong with sister-in-law? Is she sick? Should we go to the medical room and have her checked?" Quan Zhu, also a bachelor, then naively asked.
Li Hongjun coughed twice before responding, "It’s nothing, your sister-in-law is just tired from the car ride, she’ll be fine after lying down and resting for a while. You go eat first and tell the political commissar not to wait, I’ll come over to eat in a little while."
