Chapter 81

The Little Princess was in a very bad mood.

Anyone, upon waking up beautifully ready to start a happy day, only to be tangled with some filthy, grotesque thing, would be in a bad mood.

The pink princess bed, her clean little face, her smooth strands of hair… all ruined!

Almost instantly, the Little Princess exploded, thrashing wildly to attack Zhu Ming.

Point deductions, point deductions, all the way into the negative!

However, what fault was there really in an old father who just wanted some playful, childlike parent-child bonding?

Zhu Ming swept the shrieking Little Princess into her arms and planted a bunch of smacking kisses all over her face. The shrieks slowly subsided. The Little Princess’s eyes gradually went blank. She raised trembling hands and wiped her face. Pulling them back to look, the wet, grimy marks left her silent.

Zhu Ming wiped her mouth, satisfied. “Good baby, Daddy loves you.”

Little Princess: “…………”

Her eyes rolled back, and she fainted on the bed.

Thus, Zhu Ming was deducted another twenty points.

Zhu Ming stood up, stretching her limbs as she revealed a smile.

Mm, it seemed the rules for deciding scores weren’t as rigid as they appeared on the surface. At least before the Little Princess fainted, none of her actions had led to a point deduction.

This meant the rules were inflexible. As long as one cloaked things in an outer shell of positivity and loving care for the child, there was considerable room to maneuver inside.

Zhu Ming was in a good mood as she shared this discovery with Yin Yu.

Regardless, they were still cooperating now.

.

The Little Princess only stayed unconscious for a short while before waking up, and upon waking, she started throwing a tantrum.

Because of Zhu Ming’s morning assault, she was exceptionally angry and dissatisfied. Not only did she demand Zhu Ming play games with her, she also demanded Zhu Ming constantly run errands outside to buy things for her, trying to exhaust her to death.

Unfortunately, she didn’t know Zhu Ming had excellent stamina. Running errands was exactly what Zhu Ming wanted.

Rather than pretending to deal with the Little Princess in the room, it was better to go outside and get some fresh air.

The more fresh air Zhu Ming got, the more relaxed she felt. She looked utterly unhurried and content, seeming somewhat similar to Yin Yu now. Thanks to Zhu Ming, the Little Princess focused all her attention on one person today, making things much easier for Yin Yu.

However, the more relaxed Zhu Ming looked, the more resentful the Little Princess became. She absolutely, absolutely, absolutely had to find a way to deal with her!

The Little Princess slumped darkly onto the sofa, crossing her two little arms, racking her brain for how to torment Zhu Ming.

Play games? No, this bastard “Dad” was stronger and louder than her. If it came to making a racket, who was tormenting whom was unclear.

Make her cook? Forget it. Don’t make things hard for her own tongue.

Tell stories? Already used that trick, eliminated!

The Little Princess strained her mind, thinking and thinking and thinking, until she finally came up with a brand-new, unused trick.

She quickly jumped off the sofa, went pitter-patter back to her room, and began rummaging under her little desk.

Zhu Ming peeled an apple while leaning against the door frame, keeping an eye out, afraid this little ancestor might cause trouble in some place she couldn’t see.

Very soon, the Little Princess pulled out what she needed: textbooks, a practice workbook, an eraser, and a pen.

“Hey, come here, do homework with me!”

She sat down at her desk and haughtily lifted her chin to command: “You’re responsible for after-school tutoring. Teach me how to solve the problems.”

Zhu Ming raised an eyebrow and took a crunchy bite of her apple. What angle was this? Still, she leaned over and dragged a chair next to the Little Princess.

The Little Princess stared resentfully at the apple in Zhu Ming’s mouth.

Zhu Ming wore a face full of loving care. “Children shouldn’t eat too many cold apples, it’s bad for the stomach. But don’t worry, Daddy will warm it up for you!”

Saying this, she chewed a few times, opened her mouth, and used her tongue to push out a pixelated mess.

Heavens, she must be the best father in the world, so caring and warm!

However, the Little Princess did not appreciate it. Not only did she not appreciate it, she almost threw up on her.

Zhu Ming said regretfully, “Seems like baby doesn’t like apples. Then Daddy will just have to eat it himself.”

Little Princess: “…” Her gaze was extremely venomous, grinding her teeth as she stared at the person. Hold it in, hold it in. Hmph, let’s see who can’t hold back when the time comes; it’ll definitely be this unlucky player.

Slap.

The Little Princess opened the practice workbook and pointed to a problem she had gotten wrong. “Hurry up and explain it to me.”

A good father like Zhu Ming naturally wouldn’t be afraid of tutoring an elementary schooler. So acting as if she owned the place, she began explaining. After explaining, she had the Little Princess do it again. Wrong. Explain again. Do again. Still wrong…

What the meowing hell, are you a pig brain?! What part of this can’t you understand or learn…!

After several rounds, just as Zhu Ming was about to impatiently slam the table, she saw the proud smile curling at the corner of the Little Princess’s lips and suddenly understood.

Oh wow, this little ancestor was doing it on purpose!

She must be trying to deliberately provoke her anger, to make her slip up and get points deducted. What a cunning and treacherous dear daughter. Truly impossible to guard against.

Realizing this, the impatience in Zhu Ming’s heart deflated with a whoosh. A smile as gentle as a spring breeze blossomed on her face.

“Good baby, Daddy has discovered that your foundation is extremely, massively, and particularly poor. This isn’t good, not good at all. So Daddy has decided to solidify your foundation first.”

The Little Princess blinked her big, watery eyes. “But I don’t want to build a foundation.”

“No can do.” Zhu Ming spoke in a sickly-sweet, nauseating tone. “When parents love their children, they plan for their future. Precisely because Daddy and Mommy truly love you, we must consider your future. Even if it temporarily goes against your wishes, even if it upsets you for a while, even if the pain on you aches in Daddy’s heart, we can’t go soft!”

Having said this, without waiting for the Little Princess to continue refusing, she dashed out of the house in a whirlwind sprint.

Charge, charge, charge! To the bookstore on the street, to buy a pile of practice workbooks for the Little Princess!

Little Princess: …Wait, what was that about love being a deep abyss or something? What does that even mean?

The Little Princess wanted to ask clearly, but seeing the stack of new workbooks Zhu Ming carried back, her fur practically bristled. “Why is there only one math book? The rest are all Chinese and English? And so many?”

With math, she could just randomly fill in numbers, easily filling up a whole book. But Chinese and English required tons of copying. So tiring!

Zhu Ming smiled slightly. “Because we can’t be biased in our subjects. We’ve already studied math for a long time today. It’s time to switch to humanities, to exercise the other side of your brain.”

The Little Princess frowned. “I refuse! This is abuse!”

Zhu Ming’s expression turned severe, and she said coldly, “A qualified father absolutely cannot only focus on his child’s basic needs, but must also pay attention to their psychology and studies. To think you hate studying so much at such a young age, what will become of your future? For your own good, your old man must be strict with you in education today. Strict teachers produce outstanding students. Finish writing all of these for me! No dinner until you’re done!”

This righteous, surface-level speech left the Little Princess dumbfounded. She had no doubt this bastard just wanted to torment her, but why, when she said it, did it sound like it was for her own good?

Zhu Ming looked up to the sky and sighed deeply, squeezing out two crocodile tears. “Hunger on the child’s body, pain in the father’s heart! To set an example for you, Daddy and Mommy will accompany you today and won’t eat either.”

Poor Little Princess, just a child after all, didn’t understand the hypocrisy and cunning of adults.

She just instinctively felt disgusted, so: “Jerk! I’m not playing with you!”

Riiip, riiip, riiip, riiip!

The Little Princess angrily tore up eight practice workbooks.

Zhu Ming smiled slightly and snapped her fingers. Yin Yu, without any hurry, walked in from the doorway carrying a cardboard box full of new workbooks.

“Good baby, listen to Daddy, okay? Otherwise, no dinner tonight.”

Little Princess: “…”

The iron-willed Little Princess starved a whole night and didn’t do a single workbook.

And Zhu Ming and Yin Yu, just for starving the Little Princess, were each deducted another ten points.

Over the day, having grasped the key to the assessment, both Zhu Ming and Yin Yu’s scores remained quite stable. Their faces were just almost frozen from forced smiling.

Settling accounts at night, they both passed. Although the scores weren’t too high, it was gratifying. It meant they were gradually seizing the initiative, and the next few days would be easier.

Ah, this crap world was full of false warmth.

…

The night passed calmly and peacefully, signifying safety as long as one passed.

Immediately following was the third day. Zhu Ming and Yin Yu discovered that things weren’t progressing as smoothly as anticipated.

The Little Princess was sick. Literally sick.

“Ding-a-ling, ding-a-ling! It’s 8 AM! Mom and Dad, rise and shine! The Little Princess should wake up too! Another happy day is about to begin!”

Early in the morning, Zhu Ming went to wake her up. Knocking and opening the door, she found the Little Princess still sleeping.

Given her habit of sleeping in, Zhu Ming didn’t sense anything amiss at first. It wasn’t until she got closer and swoosh yanked off the blanket that she noticed something was wrong.

The Little Princess was curled up in a ball on the bed, her face flushed red, shivering uncontrollably. Reaching out to touch, her forehead was burning hot, her body icy cold, but she wasn’t sweating.

Strange. How could this happen?

So early in the morning, before anything had even happened, Zhu Ming was first deducted ten points.

She quickly wrapped the Little Princess in the blanket, trying to pull her eyelids open. After struggling for a while without waking her, she had no choice but to discuss what to do with Yin Yu.

“So she just skipped one meal last night. It shouldn’t be related to that, right?” Zhu Ming muttered.

Thinking about it carefully, the Little Princess had it pretty rough. Only two days into the task, she’d already vomited, gotten injured, starved, and now had a fever… Heh, kids are so fragile.

“This should be the new assessment content.” Yin Yu analyzed. “Let’s go, take her to the hospital. Since we’re supposed to be unimaginably wonderful parents… then we can’t eat breakfast. Mm, and Daddy will have to carry his daughter down.”

As she said this, she also seemed to find it a bit absurd, too much like a performance. She couldn’t help it and laughed a little at the Little Princess’s serious illness.

Zhu Ming glanced at her but said nothing.

Although they both knew the Little Princess was an ordinary little girl on the surface, likely something strange inside, at least right now, she looked heartbreakingly pitiful.

To still be able to laugh at this… Yin Yu was definitely bad news!

The top priority was the Little Princess. If they didn’t do something soon, who knew how many more points they’d lose.

The unconscious Little Princess was easy to handle. Zhu Ming quickly dressed her in a few motions, then scooped her into her arms and rushed out.

Yin Yu’s actions were also very efficient. If you ignored her expression, you’d definitely think this was an anxious, worried, yet very attentive mother: she didn’t forget to put a soft hat on the Little Princess, protecting her little face snugly. At the same time, she grabbed the house mobile phone, keys, and identification cards.

Zhu Ming was already charging down the stairs with the Little Princess, rushing down the street, sprinting straight toward the Children’s Hospital hidden within the thick fog at the end of the street.

Why take the elevator? Why take a taxi?

It was already good enough that it wasn’t raining.

Anyway, in classic elementary school essays, parents always took their kids to the doctor on their own two feet. If it wasn’t raining, it was hailing. The more grueling, the more touching. Anyone taking a taxi was a total weirdo!