Chapter Thirty-Nine: This Time Was an Accident

“Hey, handsome, the news is out! Everyone’s saying you’re my boyfriend.”
Sun Miaomiao’s message made Zhong Di feel like coughing up blood. He clearly remembered that hardly anyone really knew who he was.
No… they only knew Sun Miaomiao. As for him, he might as well be Mr. X or Mr. Y. The point was simply that Sun Miaomiao was holding a boy’s arm, not who the boy actually was.
Zhong Di replied with a facepalm emoji and left it at that. These things only got messier the more you tried to explain.
Just as he was about to check other messages, Sun Miaomiao sent over a few photos.
In the pictures, she looked elegant—her posture, her outfit, everything was carefully chosen. The blue-and-white skirt in particular flattered her figure.
From the angle of the shot, he was nothing more than a background prop, his clothes pixelated out.
There was no point continuing this conversation tonight.
Zhong Di opened the next message, which was from Su Rou.
“I tried your eggs—they’re delicious! Looks like your double-yolked ones must be even better. I’ve heard your eggs are selling for a hundred per kilo now. I’ll offer you forty each for the double-yolked eggs. Can’t let you take a loss.”
Su Rou’s initiative to raise the price caught Zhong Di off guard, but he didn’t refuse.
He replied with an “OK” gesture, then resolutely opened up his chicken battle game.
After a period of soul-soothing, Zhong Di was fired up again—tonight, he was determined to place well.
Half an hour later, as if blessed by the gods, Zhong Di maneuvered quickly, dodging a wild burst of bullets and taking cover behind a rock.
His health was low—he used a medkit and some bandages.
“Hang in there, sixty-nine left,” he muttered.
Da-da-da!
A burst of gunfire rang out. Zhong Di saw that the guy who’d just tried to kill him was now fighting someone else.
Good opportunity—one of them went down. Sixty-eight left, just one more and he’d break his record.
That’s the advantage of solo mode—everyone’s an enemy.
The survivor was hastily bandaging himself, no medkit in sight.
He readied a grenade, thumb holding down the pin, mind calculating distance.
If he timed it right, the grenade would explode the moment it landed—an instant kill, a technique he’d learned from watching streams.
Just one more kill and he’d be sixty-seventh.
Thud, thud!

Outside, a sudden banging interrupted him. Was that the yellow weasel again?
A low whimper, then a bark—Yusheng was calling out.
Bang!
Crap, I didn’t throw the grenade!
Staring at the results screen, Zhong Di fell into self-doubt—he’d blown himself up. Did he really have no talent for this game?
No… this was just an accident!
Turning off his phone, Zhong Di rushed outside. He saw Zhong Yusheng barking toward the woods.
First, he checked his eggs. Sure enough, they were gone. Then he inspected the chicken coop and found no new traces around the reinforced fence.
Did the yellow weasel climb the wire mesh? Zhong Di searched carefully but found no animal fur or clues.
It seemed the thief had just grabbed the eggs and fled when Yusheng spotted them—a coward, really.
Back inside, Zhong Di had lost the urge to keep playing and went straight to bed.
The next morning, before the alarm even sounded, he was woken by Shao Hong’s noisy arrival—so early?
“Did you drink last night?”
Seeing Shao Hong’s bloodshot eyes, Zhong Di immediately understood—he’d definitely had a drink. People who drank often had fine red lines on their eyes.
“My heart still aches a bit. I had a little, not much.”
Shao Hong didn’t bother to hide it; it was just a drink, after all.
“Aren’t you worried your mom will be concerned?”
“She’s not here.”
“All right, let’s get to work then. Let’s gather the eggs first—someone’s coming for them soon.”
Seeing Shao Hong like this, Zhong Di knew he wouldn’t get over his pain so quickly. Wounds of the heart aren’t so easily set aside.
“All the eggs are pre-ordered?”
Looking at the lively hens, Shao Hong started collecting the eggs.
“Yeah, we have a contract.”
Zhong Di considered for a moment, then got to work filtering manure and carrying it out to fertilize the woodland.
“What are you doing? Shouldn’t the organic fertilizer go to the orchard, not the woods?”
Shao Hong might have scraped through graduation, but he wasn’t clueless about the basics.
“I’m planning to grow medicinal herbs under the trees. Our hens need to be fed herbs. First, we enrich the soil with manure. Our philosophy is green and healthy—we can’t use too much chemical fertilizer.”
That was Zhong Di’s plan. Better to let Shao Hong in on it now than keep dragging things along.
“I see. Let me handle it—I’ve finished collecting the eggs.”
Shao Hong took over willingly. In theory, growing medicinal plants under the trees was a great way to use the land efficiently.
After a while, the egg collector arrived. While Shao Hong delivered the eggs, Zhong Di took the chance to pick wild sand fairy leaves—he gathered sixteen, which was excellent.
Thanks to the steady supply of manure lately, the sand fairy leaves were slowly recovering, sending him messages of excitement.
“Zhong Di, how much do our eggs sell for per kilo?”
As soon as Zhong Di left the woods, Shao Hong scratched his head and asked.
“A hundred.”
Zhong Di answered lightly. At first, the price had excited him, but now he’d grown used to it.
“Oh… a hundred. So I wasn’t hearing things. Not bad.”
Shao Hong absentmindedly weeded the ground with Zhong Di, but the more he thought, the more something felt off.
“A hundred? That batch was twenty kilos, so two thousand yuan? That’s sixty thousand a month? Seven hundred and twenty thousand a year? Even with just ten percent, we’d get six or seven thousand just from eggs?”
Suddenly, it clicked for Shao Hong—how could a local egg sell for so much?
“Zhong Di, we’re really going to make a fortune!”
After running the numbers, Shao Hong was delighted—he barely noticed the weeds anymore.
“It’s not quite that much. Raising these hens is a hassle. We have to feed them herbs, and soon I’ll have to go buy more—our stock is out. Plus, the hens don’t lay as much in some seasons. All in all, the annual profit is just over three hundred thousand.”
“Don’t get too optimistic. We’re still figuring things out, which is why I want to grow herbs under the trees. This is our secret—no telling anyone.”
Striking while the iron was hot, Zhong Di quickly pulled Shao Hong into the plan.
“Three hundred thousand means I get over thirty thousand—plus there’s more. Zhong Di, I believe in you. I get it, business secrets. From now on, I’ll do whatever you say.”
Once he saw the potential earnings, Shao Hong was full of energy. Earning sixty or seventy thousand a year, maybe even more—
In just a few years, he could buy his family a bigger house, and his mother could finally enjoy life, joining the other ladies for square dancing and such.