“Uh?”
Zi Yan was taken aback. Then, she grinned involuntarily and said, “Dad, wouldn’t six o’clock be too early?”
“Not at all.” Zhang Guangyou shook his head. “To be a martial artist, one must seize every second to practice. At first, I wanted to start at five o’clock, but this brat just wouldn’t agree.”
While talking, Zhang Guangyou threw Zhang Han a nasty look.
He originally wanted to teach Mengmeng how to use a broadsword, but his son stubbornly disagreed. Now, he could only teach her some simple martial arts. That was far from enough, wasn’t it?
Zhang Han could only give wry smiles at this moment.
His wife told him that she was not willing to let Mengmeng study martial arts at such a young age. She saw on TV that martial artists had to do the horse stance for hours on end every day. Zi Yan loved Mengmeng too much to let her suffer like that. She had mentioned it to Zhan Han a few times with a bit of resentment. Meanwhile, Zhang Han’s dad was a little upset about all his terms and requirements. So, Zhan Han felt that he had become a piggy in the middle!
“Then it’s settled. Granddaughter, let’s get up tomorrow morning to practice the basics.”
When Zhang Guangyou’s eyes fell on Mengmeng, a smile immediately climbed up his face.
He knew that he did not need to care about Zhang Han’s opinion. As to Zi Yan, an excellent daughter-in-law, she certainly would not oppose. But when it came to Mengmeng, he knew he had to coax her into this.
But his smiling face did not pay off.
“Hmph, I’m not doing it.”
Mengmeng directly turned him down.
“Ah? Why did you say no now? My girl, you’ve promised Grandpa,” Zhang Guangyou asked in bewilderment.
“I, um, I did promise you that. But I’ve changed my mind. I gotta sleep with PaPa and MaMa,” Mengmeng replied solemnly.
“Then let’s put this off until…”
Before Zhang Han could finish, Zhang Guangyou stared at him menacingly.
His eyes seemed to be saying, “You think you’ve all grown up and don’t have to listen to me?”
“Alright then.”
Zhang Han immediately shut up. But on second thought, he added, “Then let’s settle this based on what Mengmeng wants.”
“Yeah, yeah.” Zi Yan hurriedly echoed, “If Mengmeng wants to learn, we will definitely not reject, and we will even wake her up on time. But if that’s not what she wants now, then Dad, shall we talk about this when she is older?”
In her opinion, Mengmeng was unlikely to say yes. But to her surprise, Zhang Guangyou instantly burst out laughing.
“Hahaha, well, that’s it, you two adults can’t eat your words.”
“Grandpa, I won’t go.”
Mengmeng murmured, “I have to accompany PaPa and MaMa.”
“Huh? But your parents can accompany you too!”
Zhang Guangyou smiled and stretched out his right hand, unfolded his palm, and said, “Guess what is this?”
When Mengmeng saw it, she was dazed for a moment, then cried with joy, “Hey, a red flower that only a good kid can get!”
“We lost!”
Seeing this, Zi Yan’s heart sank, for she knew that Mengmeng was about to be persuaded.
“Grandpa went to Teacher Lu for a chat and asked for some red flowers to be rewarded to good kids.” With a serious look, Zhang Guangyou went on. “Mr. Lu said, Mengmeng can get one red flower every time she finishes a week of study with Grandpa. And when you have 15 red flowers, you can exchange for a trophy.”
Mengmeng’s eyes brightened even more.
Then, Zhang Guangyou moved on to the second temptation.
“Not only can you get red flowers by learning martial arts from Grandpa. Grandpa has also prepared ice creams, candies, potato chips, and all kinds of snacks for Mengmeng. Every day when you get your job done, you can have some.”
“Yeah, I love snacks!”
Mengmeng’s big, clear eyes glinted more brightly.
“Hahaha, then, at six o’clock tomorrow, Grandpa will be waiting for you.” Zhang Guangyou beamed and patted Mengmeng on her cute head.
“Um? Well, I’m not going.”
Mengmeng was a little torn, but she still refused Grandpa’s offer.
“What?”
Zhang Guangyou couldn’t believe his ears.
“How can she say no to that?”
“I’ve worked so hard these days to try to get her to agree, but she still doesn’t want to take my lessons, does she?”
Suddenly, Zhang Guangyou was at end of his rope and started to scratch his head, not knowing what to say.
Zi Yan was stunned, then snickered.
“You may think our little girl is so gullible, but she isn’t!”
Zhang Han seemed to have guessed something.
Sure enough, Mengmeng explained seriously, “Grandpa, I’ll say yes if PaPa agrees so. But if PaPa doesn’t, I can’t. But PaPa just said that he didn’t approve.”
“So that’s what it is.”
Enlightenment suddenly dawned on Zhang Guangyou.
He looked at Zhang Han with a smile and remarked, “Zhang Han, let me ask you, will you let Mengmeng learn martial arts from me?”
Gurgling.
Zhang Han swallowed.
If he said no at this juncture, God knew what his fate would be.
“Ur, certainly will.” Zhang Han said, “Mengmeng, it’s actually good that you can learn some skills from Grandpa. Just don’t exert yourself too much.”
“Hmm, then I’ll go. Grandpa, you gotta give me the red flower first.”
Mengmeng stretched out her little hand and asked for the red flower in advance.
Seeing the clear eyes of the little princess, Zhang Guangyou couldn’t bring himself to reject her. He put the little red flower on Mengmeng’s palm directly and said with a smile, “Then, Grandpa will be waiting for you under that big tree tomorrow.”
“Okay.”
Mengmeng happily agreed. She no longer cared to look at Grandpa but directly dragged Zi Yan away to paste the little red flower on the blackboard.
Now half of the small blackboard was already covered by little red flowers. There were fifty flowers in total, which put a big smile on Mengmeng’s face.
Seeing this, Zhang Guangyou smiled and waved them goodbye. After that, he turned and left.
It was not until he walked out of the room that he mumbled something like “this brat”.
He was simply complaining that Zhang Han was too protective of Mengmeng.
Zhang Guangyou even felt that if he weren’t Zhang Han’s father, Zhang Han would not let him teach Mengmeng any martial arts at all.
For that reason, Zhang Guangyou pulled quite a lot of strings. First, he went to Ji Wushuang and asked him to introduce him to Lu Xiong. He talked to Lu Xiong for a long time and bought him drinks several times. After that, he went to Lu Guo for the red flowers.
Now that Mengmeng had agreed, Zhang Guangyou was also relieved.
He wasn’t much worried about Zhang Han and Zi Yan’s view on this. After all, they were his son and daughter-in-law. He was most concerned about Mengmeng’s attitude. If she did not agree, given Zhang Han’s temperament, he would have no chance to negotiate.
“MaMa, I have so many red flowers now.”
Mengmeng looked at the blackboard, and pride could be seen from her delicate face.
“Yeah, Mengmeng is really awesome.” Zi Yan praised.
“Well, now you have to get up early tomorrow, let’s go to bed early tonight. It is 8:30 now, how about we go to watch an episode of cartoon and then turn in?”
“Okay.”
Mengmeng nodded.
So the two went off to the movie hall, while Zhang Han went to prepare juice and snacks.
The family of three watched cartoons for a while, then went back to sleep as they had agreed.
At 5:45 the next day.
Ring, ring, ring…
The alarm clock rang.
Zi Yan opened her eyes in a daze.
“Huh… It’s almost time.”
“Why not let her sleep for a while? Anyway, Mengmeng is still on holiday. It’s okay to go after seven o’clock.” Zhang Han suggested.
“No, Dad will be waiting for her in a moment.” Zi Yan shook her head slightly. She sat up, eyes half-closed, still a little sleepy.
In fact, it was not “in a moment”. Zhang Guangyou was waiting there now.
Zhang Han patted his forehead. “My father is really determined this time!”
“I’ll wake Mengmeng up.”
Zi Yan got off the bed, came to the smaller bed nearby, and called softly, “Mengmeng, Mengmeng, it’s time to get up…”
It took two minutes to wake the little girl.
“Mengmeng, you should go and learn kung fu with Grandpa.”
“Hmm…”
Because she turned in early the previous evening, Mengmeng quickly perked up and went to brush her teeth with Zi Yan. Minutes later, they went downstairs and came to the thunder sun tree together.
“You’re two minutes late.” Zhang Guangyou stood there with his hands clasped behind his back and reminded, “Next time, you must be on time. Be punctual. You can be early but not late.”
Zhang Guangyou was teaching her what was the proper behavior.
Mengmeng didn’t really understand, but Zi Yan pursed her lips slightly.
“Hmph, we’ll be on time tomorrow.”
This was the first day. She thought that fifteen minutes was enough to wake Mengmeng up and prepare everything. Who would know that they were still late even though they tried to hurry?
“It’s good that you’ve dressed properly.”
Zhang Guangyou glanced at Mengmeng’s clothes.
She was wearing a white exercise suit. It looked perfectly clean.
Of course, it was brand new.
Zhang Guangyou looked at Zhang Han and Zi Yan and asked, “Why do you two wear exercise suits as well?”
“Huh? We, we want to practice with Mengmeng.” Zi Yan was taken aback for a moment.
“Haha, you want to have some free lessons by the way?”
Zhang Guangyou laughed and waved his hand at them, saying, “Stay out of this. Go back now, don’t interfere with my teaching Mengmeng martial arts.”
“Huh? They can’t. Grandpa, PaPa and MaMa have to be with me,” Mengmeng quickly added.
“I have already called some friends here to accompany you. Look, I’ve got them here.”
Zhang Guangyou pointed to the sky. When he looked up, his face darkened.
“Humph… hum… humph hum…”
Dahei’s grunts came.
“It already fell asleep after leaving my sight for just a minute?”
“Eh?”
Mengmeng was slightly surprised. “Big Heihei, Little Heihei, Tiny Tot, how did you climb up there? It’s too dangerous. Get down here!”
“Ow-woo!”
“Whoosh!”
Little Hei jumped down immediately. Tiny Tot fell directly on the lawn below with a grunt.
“Oh?”
Dahei shook its head, a little at a loss. It seemed that it had heard the call of the little host and wondered if it was a dream. It thought so and then went back to sleep.
But just when it rolled over to continue to sleep, from the corner of its eye it saw several people standing below.
“They’ve really come!”
“Whoa!”
“I’m coming!”
Dahei straightened up and jumped off the tree.
“Look, how high is this tree? It’s fifteen meters tall. Do you know why Dahei can jump right off?” Zhang Guangyou asked.
“No idea.” Mengmeng’s big eyes blinked.
“Because they’ve practiced martial arts. And when Mengmeng masters some martial arts, you can jump off the tree as well. How dashing that is! Well, Dahei and the other two will stay here with you.” Zhang Guangyou looked at Zhang Han and said, “You two…”
“Mengmeng, you stay here with Grandpa to learn martial arts, and PaPa and MaMa will go upstairs to make breakfast for you,” Zhang Han said, sort of amused.
“…”
In the end, Zhang Han and Zi Yan backed off.
Zhang Guangyou definitely did not want them here. With their presence, he wouldn’t have the mood to teach.
If Mengmeng got tired, Zhang Han would definitely take her back to rest, and Zi Yan would almost feel pained, too.
But how could he make Mengmeng work too hard?
Well, as the saying goes, it’s the first step that’s the most troublesome.
It was true.
To teach Mengmeng martial arts, Zhang Guangyou had resorted to all the means to get her to agree on this at the beginning.
“Haha…”
After musing for a moment, Zhang Guangyou looked at Mengmeng and abruptly began to laugh.
“Grandpa, when shall we start?”
Dahei, Little Hei, Tiny Tot all stood by Mengmeng’s side as they were told. That also made Mengmeng start to look forward to the lesson.
“Let’s get started. Today we are only learning the basics. Come on, Mengmeng, drink this bottle of water first.”
Zhang Guangyou took a small bottle of water from the small table on the side.
“I’m not thirsty, Grandpa. I just had some water.”
“The water Grandpa’s prepared for you is no regular water. We can only start our lesson after you drink it.”
“Okay.”
Mengmeng obediently drained the water in the bottle with a few gulps.
It tasted a bit cool and sweet.
