“What are you doing lately, sweetie?”

Mingmei’s bright face held a hint of resentment as she looked at the background image of her Boxed Lunch kid. She seemed to be lying in a full-immersion pod, having apparently emerged from the virtual space just to answer her video call.

“Studying,” Boxed Lunch said, a touch of melancholy in her voice. “Learning is a lifelong pursuit.”

Mingmei: !!!

“Sweetie, why are you so…”

“But speaking of which, Mom, I can’t even read yet. Why didn’t you teach me before?”

Faced with Boxed Lunch’s resentful gaze, Mingmei felt a moment of suffocation.

You might not be a salted fish, but your mom is!

Even though your mom is working overtime to make money, it’s all for the sake of the money. Who has the energy to grind and teach you to read on normal days?!

Mingmei almost blurted out, “Go ask your dad to teach you,” but Boxed Lunch immediately retorted, “Dad doesn’t teach me either. What kind of parents are you two?”

Mingmei: ?? m..oΓg

Kid, do you know it’s very wrong to try and pressure your mom and dad in reverse like this?

“Honey, if you can’t read, what are you studying right now?” Not wanting to discuss this topic with her child, Mingmei turned the conversation back to Boxed Lunch herself.

“Reading.”

Mingmei: …

“Why the sudden urge to learn to read? Did Grandpa Yan ask you to?” Mingmei hadn’t expected Yan Hui’s educational approach to be so proper, actually teaching the child to read! (Yan Hui: Do you have some kind of misunderstanding about me?)

“Grandpa didn’t ask me to! He just takes me fishing every day!”

Mentioning Yan Hui, Boxed Lunch pouted so much she could hang an oil bottle from her lips. But Mingmei didn’t fall for it and asked directly, “Oh? Just you? What about the others?”

Boxed Lunch: ??

At this point, Boxed Lunch’s accusatory aura faded a little. Mingmei understood everything with a glance.

The other three older brothers were no longer forced to go fishing, because Grandpa said they could all calm down and study. This infuriated Boxed Lunch, who insisted that she also needed time to study, that she could do it too.

Immediately, she was directly attacked by Grandpa: “You want to study? Can you even read?”

Although Boxed Lunch was young, she had already learned a lot through her “100,000 Whys” questioning method, but she really couldn’t read.

Which toddler can read at three or four years old?

Boxed Lunch was angry, and then her cousin Mei Xingan, who was only a few months older, backstabbed her!

Very good, Xingxing could read, and quite a bit at that _(：3」∠)_

So, to prove herself, Boxed Lunch now spent her afternoons in virtual space learning to read after fishing every day.

After hearing that all of this was Boxed Lunch’s own choice, Mingmei suddenly lost the desire to cuddle with her baby.

So much pressure at such a young age, it’s really unnecessary!

Why couldn’t her child think the other way around, proudly declaring to her older brothers that she didn’t need to study and could just play?

Mingmei couldn’t help but wonder, and even asked. But Boxed Lunch couldn’t raise the corners of her mouth anymore.

Because the other three said that after learning to read, they could play with even more things.

Mingmei: ??

Play with what kind of things?

“Sweetie, tell me, after you learn to read, what do you want to play with?” Looking at Boxed Lunch’s high spirits for learning, Mingmei felt that something was off.

Neither she nor her child’s father, nor even her child’s grandmother, were particularly ambitious people. This child’s hard work was strange.

“Fly a starship!”

Mingmei thought she had misheard: “Do what?”

“Fly a starship! Cousin Hanhan told me that I’m only one step away from flying my own starship, and that step is learning to read!”

In a moment of carelessness, Boxed Lunch had provided her mother with an important clue.

“Fly a starship? What do you need a starship for at such a young age?”

At this point, it was Boxed Lunch’s turn to refuse to answer. She covered her mouth, acting like she had a secret she wouldn’t share with Mingmei.

Mingmei felt even more hurt.

Her child had her own little secrets at just four years old?

That night, when Mu Chen returned, Mingmei repeated her conversation with Boxed Lunch to him and asked, “Our daughter has secrets at such a young age. What are we going to do in the future?”

“Secrets?” Mu Chen looked puzzled, wondering if he had missed something. “Wasn’t she just tricked into studying by Hanhan?”

“Ah? Not Grandpa?” Hearing that Hanhan was involved, Mingmei thought about it and still believed it was Yan Hui.

“Didn’t Hanhan tell our daughter that she could fly a starship if she learned to read?” Mu Chen raised an eyebrow. Seeing that Mingmei still hadn’t caught on, he reminded her, “Boxed Lunch herself said that she was learning to read in order to fly a starship. So her real goal is to fly a starship, and the idea that she needs to read to fly a starship came from Hanhan…”

“So, Boxed Lunch wants to fly a starship, and Hanhan knew this and told her she needed to learn to read. As for the secret, it probably involves how Hanhan is helping our daughter fly a starship to do something~”

Mu Chen smiled, his eyes full of amusement. As for what they were going to do with the starship, given their current situation, wasn’t it obvious enough?

“That’s ridiculous, a bunch of little kids…”

Mingmei frowned in disapproval. Seeing that Mingmei still hadn’t caught on, Mu Chen couldn’t help but put his arm around his wife, hugging her close and comforting her. “Don’t worry, Grandpa is there. He won’t let them mess around.”

Reminding her that there was also a “very reliable” adult involved, Mingmei finally went to find Yan Hui just as he was officially throwing the last troublesome kid who was bothering his fishing into virtual space to study by himself.

“Shh–”

Yan Hui responded to Mingmei’s sudden arrival by saying, “Don’t scare them away. We’ll talk later.”

Mingmei: …

Did her uncle really not know that there were no fish in this artificial lake?

“Speak,”

After lying on the folding chair and casting his empty line twice for his own satisfaction, Yan Hui was finally willing to pay attention to Mingmei. “I thought you would go straight to the villa to see the children.”

“I’m here to ask you about the next education plan.”

Hearing Mingmei ask this, Yan Hui turned over on the lounge chair and looked at Mingmei. “Why did you suddenly think of asking about this?”

“Do you know what those kids want to do?”

“I know. It’s just that this old man is unpopular. The fledglings are leaving the nest, they want to break out.”

Mingmei’s forehead was covered in black lines after hearing Yan Hui’s words.

This uncle, who always maintained the appearance of a man in his twenties, was calling himself an old man?

Why were leaving the nest and breaking out linked together?

“So you plan to indulge them, to help them along and send them to someone?”

“Ruan Ruan ah, he’s getting old and spends all his time in the lab. Instead of letting me, a retired old man, take care of the children, you might as well let Ruan Ruan take care of them. Otherwise, if he continues like this, your mother will complain about him being alone again during the New Year.”

“Mom is doing it for your own good.”

“So, you, as a daughter, should be more filial, share the burden for your mother, and let your Uncle Ruan Ruan worry less.”

Mingmei: …

Why did it seem like everything changed after going through her uncle’s mouth?