Conquering That Black Lotus 13

Chapter 13

“Sorry, the subscriber you dialed is currently powered off, please try again later. Sorry…”

The familiar female voice of the customer service rang out, and Wen Xinyi’s delicate eyebrows furrowed.

She dialed a second time and got the same result. The call wasn’t answered, and he didn’t respond to the video call either.

Logically, with Gu Tang being with Jiang Huaisheng, the housekeeper would definitely ensure they had sufficient power banks, so it was unlikely that his phone would be turned off due to a dead battery.

She didn’t make a third call, but took her phone and walked to the study, looking at her current husband, Jiang He: “Honey, I can’t get through to Gu Tang, can you call him and see if his phone is really off, or if he’s blocked me?”

Jiang He handed her his phone, turned on the speakerphone, and the reply was the same.

“Try calling Nanny Zhang’s phone?”

If he had blocked Wen Xinyi, he might have also blocked his stepfather.

“Sorry, the subscriber you dialed is currently powered off…”

Whether it was Jiang He’s call or Nanny Zhang’s, they all indicated that the phone was powered off.

Jiang He took back his phone and called the housekeeper. This time, the call went through smoothly.

“Mm… I’ll ask about Xiao Tang’s situation. Madam is very concerned about the child and worried that something might have happened to him… Okay, I understand.”

Jiang He said to Wen Xinyi: “The housekeeper said Gu Tang is fine. He just finished sweeping the grave yesterday and is now alone in the house. Everyone else is with Huaisheng at the hotel. He might be in a bad mood and turned off his phone.”

Wen Xinyi complained with a hint of anger: “Then I’ll call him again tomorrow. This child, he’s so old and still doesn’t understand things, not knowing that his family would worry about him.”

It seemed she just wanted an answer, and once she got it, she didn’t care so much.

“Mommy, Daddy, I’m going to Teacher Li’s house for my lesson.”

A handsome young boy with a fair face came out of the bedroom on the second floor carrying a violin, greeting his parents before going out.

Children from families like theirs couldn’t just play around with their friends even during summer vacation. Gu Tang’s younger brother, Jiang Cheng, was nine years old, a fourth-grade elementary school student. Usually, tutors would come to their home to teach him on weekends, and he also had to learn music, chess, calligraphy, and painting during winter and summer vacations.

The Teacher Li he mentioned was a violin master, someone Jiang He had found through his connections, and Wen Xinyi had put a lot of effort into securing as a teacher. A teacher of this level definitely wouldn’t come to their home to teach, so Jiang Cheng had to go there himself.

However, even for a distance of two kilometers, there was a dedicated driver to pick him up and drop him off.

Wen Xinyi smiled: “Go ahead, darling, listen to Teacher Li carefully. Mommy will pick you up this afternoon.”

She looked at her younger son’s departing back with admiring eyes. Her older son looked too much like that man, and as he grew older, his personality became more and more withdrawn and awkward, not at all as cheerful and lively as he was when he was little. He was a failure.

Her younger son was different. He was a treasure she had raised with great effort, a perfect creation.

Jiang He’s eyes were also gentle when he looked at his younger son, just as gentle as Gu Tang’s biological father had looked at his own child.

After Jiang Cheng left, Jiang He commented on Gu Tang’s action of turning off his phone: “Alright, Gu Tang has grown up, he’s in his rebellious phase. Talk to him nicely, show him some care, there’s no overnight feud between a mother and her biological son.”

As a stepfather, he didn’t take Gu Tang’s small act of resistance seriously.

To be precise, from the moment Wen Xinyi led Gu Tang into the Jiang family, he had never treated Gu Tang as an equal.

In the past, it was because Gu Tang was young, objectively young, only 8 years old. But now Gu Tang was 18, legally an adult with full civil capacity, and he still didn’t think Gu Tang had the ability to escape his control.

Children, thinking they had grown wings, might experience a delayed rebellious phase at this age.

If Gu Tang were the kind of cold-hearted and ungrateful person, Jiang He might be a bit wary, but he knew he wasn’t. Gu Tang was soft-hearted since childhood and valued family ties too much.

For him, Wen Xinyi’s existence was like the string behind a kite. The kite itself didn’t have the ability to break free from the string. No matter how high or far it flew, it would be bound by the puppet strings, bowing its head and swallowing its anger again and again.

Giving in had become a habit, which meant that Gu Tang had been completely tamed.

Besides, even without Wen Xinyi, wasn’t there still him and Wen Xinyi’s younger son? This child born from Wen Xinyi’s womb was Gu Tang’s half-brother, sharing the same blood as Gu Tang.

Humans were such complex and contradictory creatures, it was difficult to break free from the bonds of blood ties throughout their lives. Perhaps a small number of people could, but this definitely didn’t include the sentimental Gu Tang.

Gu Tang, in Lishui Town, sneezed several times, his eyes slightly red.

The owner couldn’t help but laugh at him: “Are you so used to living outside that you can’t even handle slightly spicy food anymore?”

Lishui Town was a small town with beautiful scenery. The locals believed there was a lot of dampness in their bodies, so they loved to eat chili peppers.

Gu Tang could also eat spicy food when he was a child, but Wen Xinyi said eating too much spicy food wasn’t good for children’s health, so he always ate only slightly spicy food.

Later, after moving to City A, he was forced to eat the local salty and sweet food.

Even if there were chili peppers sold in City A’s supermarkets and vegetable markets, they were either bell peppers eaten as vegetables or completely non-spicy red peppers used as garnish.

Gu Tang wiped the chili oil from the corners of his mouth with a tissue: “No, it’s just right, I just accidentally ate a Sichuan peppercorn and choked.”

He felt like he was the Sichuan peppercorn in the fat intestine rice noodles, brown in color, inconspicuous, looking gentle and harmless, without any aggression.

But if you accidentally bit into it, the explosive numbness and spiciness would overwhelm you.

“Auntie, your rice noodles are still as delicious as before.” Gu Tang paid the bill. When he was a child, a bowl of fat intestine rice noodles cost two yuan, and plain rice noodles only cost one yuan. Now, fat intestine rice noodles had risen to twelve yuan.

Although the small shop hadn’t changed, and the person making the rice noodles hadn’t changed, something had still changed, and it changed very quickly.

The originally peaceful and slow-paced town was now much more materialistic. While eating, the diners around him were talking about houses, cars, money, and their children’s marriage and education.

Balding and potbellied middle-aged men discussed how much dowry the woman’s family asked for their sons, how difficult it was for them, as parents of sons, to find a wife. When talking about schools, they used the same tone to say that teachers nowadays had no ethics, only wanting money, forcing students to take extra classes and buy supplementary materials. Doctors also had no medical ethics, going to the hospital was just a money pit.

However, the diners discussing these topics might also be the same black-hearted drivers and dishonest vendors complained about by others, as if everyone was obsessed with money, using all means just for money.

While talking, someone even lit a cigarette in the breakfast shop. There was a sign advocating against smoking, but the paper had been stained yellow and black by the cooking fumes. The men started smoking, and others took it for granted.

The smell of smoke drifted over, and Gu Tang suddenly felt nauseous. The previously delicious fat intestine rice noodles seemed to surge into his throat, and he felt like vomiting.

His impression of the town was still stuck in the past, but if he removed the filter of childhood, it wasn’t so beautiful either.

Gu Tang returned home, twisted open a bottle of chilled snow mountain mineral water, and only after finishing the whole bottle did the discomfort subside.

He looked at himself in the mirror with a blank expression, his face seemingly slightly distorted.

Gu Tang took out a small bottle from his pocket, poured out the colorful Skittles, picked out an unmarked one, and chewed it expressionlessly.

He wasn’t eating candy, but antidepressants, the kind with milder side effects.

However, Gu Tang rarely took them, most of the time he ate ordinary candy. This strange-tasting candy had layers of flavor, slightly bitter at first, then sour, and finally sweet, which could effectively distract him.

He started taking the medication in his senior year of high school, which was also when he met the doctor he had communicated with before.

He didn’t intend to smoke because smoking was harmful to his health, and the candy he ate was sugar-free.

Mainly because the pressure from school and family was too great in high school, and Gu Tang felt a bit uncomfortable. Now, the most difficult college entrance exam was over, and he had achieved a good result.

But occasionally, when stimulated, he would still take one to relieve his symptoms.

Gu Tang originally planned to cook lunch himself, but he gave up. He went to a nearby large supermarket, bought some snacks and ordinary purified water, then glanced at the shelves at the checkout counter and swept a row of small boxes into his shopping cart.

He only turned on his phone when he was paying at the self-checkout machine. Gu Tang ignored the missed calls and first sent a few messages to Jiang Huaisheng.

[Nudge]
[Photo]
[Come over after you finish eating, tell the housekeeper to deliver lunch to the courtyard gate, I’m not going out today]

Jiang Huaisheng, who was drinking pear soup, glanced at the message, his phone screen vibrated, then he opened the photo.

It was a photo of a shopping cart and a supermarket receipt.

Condoms * 10

The young master’s calves subconsciously twitched. His “beast” comment this morning was just a casual remark, he didn’t really want to die in bed!