While the teacher was saying those words, Chen Chu had already sent Chen Xiayu away. He told the little girl to go to the classroom and see what the other children were doing, and that he would go find her after he finished talking to the teacher.

Chen Xiayu was very well-behaved and didn't ask any questions. She just glanced back at him and then ran back to the classroom.

But her gaze remained fixed on Chen Chu. While he stood at the classroom door talking to the teacher, she sat by the window, quietly watching the adults outside through the glass.

She didn't play with building blocks or flip through picture books. She just sat there, her two short legs dangling over the edge of the chair, her eyes fixed on Chen Chu's back.

Following Chen Chu's gaze, the teacher glanced at Chen Xia Yu in the classroom, a slight smile playing on her lips. Her tone was professionally gentle and kind: "Xia Yu's father, please don't misunderstand what I'm saying. Xia Yu is a very intelligent child, so intelligent that sometimes even we teachers are surprised. But she does need some guidance in social skills. When other children are playing together, she usually chooses to stay by herself. We've tried inviting her to join the games many times, but she always shakes her head."

Chen Chu withdrew his gaze from the classroom, turned to look at the teacher, smiled, and said in a relaxed and natural tone, "I understand. It's okay. I'll help her make more friends. This girl is just slow to warm up, just like me."

The teacher nodded, seemingly wanting to add something, but after thinking about it, she didn't say anything.

No parent likes to hear bad things about their child...

Chen Chu turned and walked towards the classroom.

Enter the classroom.

Chen Xiaoyu was still sitting on that little chair. Seeing him enter, she immediately slid off the chair, toddled over to him with her short legs, tilted her head back, stretched out her two little arms, and precisely expressed her need in one word: "Hug!"

Chen Chu looked down at the little one, paused for a moment, then bent down and picked her up.

She immediately wrapped her arms around his neck and buried her head in the crook of his neck.

"You're not just sitting here waiting for Daddy to finish talking so you can hug me, are you? I just hugged you, and you want another one. Honestly, our little girl is so adorable."

He spoke in a relaxed, teasing tone, but his grip on Chen Xiayu didn't loosen; instead, it tightened. He could feel it; the little one was holding his neck tighter than usual, her face buried in his neck, her breath shallow and warm, as if drawing some sense of security from him.

As Chen Chu gently patted her back, he mentally reviewed what the teacher had just told him: no friends, unwilling to socialize, and always alone.

This girl is very perceptive. She probably sensed that the teacher was talking about her. Although she might not understand the specific content, she definitely realized that the topic was related to her.

When a child senses that they are being discussed by adults, their first reaction is often not curiosity, but unease, especially when the two parties in the discussion are their teacher and their father.

He mentally organized his thoughts, then spoke in an exceptionally cheerful tone: "Because our daughter is so outstanding, the teacher specially kept her father behind so that she could give us a proper compliment."

"Do you know what your teacher praised you for? The teacher said that Chen Xiayu from your class has made great progress in drawing and arithmetic. When she first came to kindergarten, she was even afraid to talk to the teacher, but now she can not only talk to the teacher, but also chat with other children. This progress is the greatest in the whole class."

Chen Xiayu's little face moved slightly in the crook of his neck, but she didn't look up. However, the arm around his neck loosened a little.

After a while, a muffled sound came from beside his neck. The voice was very soft, with a hint of caution and seriousness in its childish tone, as if it had mustered up its courage to ask the question.

"Will Daddy be happy that my daughter has friends?"

Chen Chu paused for a moment. He lowered his head and met Chen Xiayu's timid eyes, which were large and bright, reflecting his own image.

He was silent for a moment, and the first thought that came to his mind was not gratitude, but surprise. This little girl actually spoke so logically in one go.

The question, "Will Daddy be happy if Nannan has friends?" contains a cause-and-effect relationship: the premise is whether she has friends or not, and the conclusion is whether Daddy will be happy. It's rare in his memory for her to utter such a logical and complete long sentence.

He didn't let the surprise linger on his face for long, but suppressed it and replaced it with a serious, thoughtful expression.

He stood there holding Chen Xiayu for several seconds, as if he were seriously considering a very important question, and then he nodded earnestly.

"I would be very happy," he said, his tone unusually serious, as if making a promise. "But even if my daughter doesn't have any friends, I would still be very happy."

Chen Xiayu blinked, seemingly not fully understanding the sentence.

Chen Chu extended his little finger, gently hooked it around her little finger, and shook it: "Because no matter whether you have friends or not, Nannan will always be Daddy's favorite little girl. That won't change."

He added, rubbing his thumb against her little cheek, his tone becoming relaxed and playful again: "You know that, right? Daddy used to stand up to your mother for you."

Chen Xiayu looked up, puzzled. She tilted her head and stared at Chen Chu for a while, then suddenly smiled—the kind of smile unique to children, as if they had finally understood something important—and nodded vigorously: "Mm!"

The day passed quickly...

……

After dinner, Wang Zihao went back to his room. He closed the door, flopped onto the bed, and stared blankly at the ceiling for a long time. The grievances and resentment he had suppressed all day began to slowly surge up from the depths of his chest in this moment when no one was watching him. It was like a charcoal fire that had been smoldering for a long time; it seemed to have gone out on the surface, but the red glow underneath was still burning hot.

He had already apologized. In front of the homeroom teacher, in front of Zhou Lin, in front of Chen Chu, every "I'm sorry" he said was genuine. He admitted that he shouldn't have cheated, and that he shouldn't have gotten into a conflict with his classmates. He truly wanted to change, and he truly didn't want to live like he used to.

But his classmates' voices were still buzzing in his ears: "Is admitting your mistake enough?" "Didn't you only admit it after you got caught?" "It's not admitting your mistake, it's just that you got caught."

The more he thought about it, the angrier he became, and the more wronged he felt.

Why won't these people let him go even after he's already apologized?

Does someone who has made a mistake once never deserve to be trusted?

He didn't want to think about it anymore.

He sat up in bed, walked to his desk, and pulled out a chair. The computer stood quietly on the table in front of him. Behind the transparent glass panel on the side of the case, the blue LED strip embedded in the graphics card was quietly lit, illuminating the gold-plated numbers on the card: RTX 5090. Chen Ziran's computer.

Chen Chu bought a computer for his own son. Wang Zihao stared at the line of numbers, and suddenly a crack appeared in the wall of "grievance" in his heart, pried open by another emotion.

Resentful.

On what grounds?

Wang Zihao's exam scores were on the surface better than Chen Ziran's, even though he fabricated those scores. In Wang Wenwu's mind, he was a student with decent grades.

Even so, Wang Wenwu never bought him anything worth more than five thousand yuan, rarely gave him gifts, let alone a top-of-the-line computer like this.

He looked away, no longer glancing at the line of numbers that made his heart ache, and reached out to press the power button.

Just then, there was a knock on the door.

Chen Chu's voice came from outside the door, his tone relaxed and casual, as if he were calling him downstairs for dinner: "Are you there?"

Wang Zihao's finger hovered above the power button, but he neither pressed it nor turned around.

He didn't answer. He figured that if he didn't make a sound, Chen Chu would assume he was asleep and leave. With that in mind, he pressed the power button.

Then he heard the sound of the doorknob turning. Chen Chu pushed the door open and came in.

Wang Zihao suddenly turned his head and saw Chen Chu standing at the door. His gaze swept around the room and finally landed on the loading game interface on the computer screen in front of him.

Chen Chu walked in with a smile, pulled up a chair and sat down next to him. "Playing games? Do your homework first."

Wang Zihao frowned, shifting his gaze from Chen Chu's face back to the computer screen: "I don't have any homework."

"Then I'll set it up for you."

Wang Zihao's fingers paused on the keyboard for a moment, then he turned his head and looked at Chen Chu with a "Are you kidding me?" look: "I don't want to."

"That's not up to you."

Chen Chu's tone remained relaxed, but he had already stood up from his chair.

He reached out, his movements natural yet irresistible, and pulled Wang Zihao up from the chair, as if he were pulling up a radish that hadn't been planted very deep.

Wang Zihao was dragged out of the room by him, and he stumbled a couple of times before regaining his balance.

He instinctively tried to back away, but Chen Chu's hand was already on his back, pushing him toward the living room.

The dining table in the living room, which is usually used for meals, has been cleared of clutter, and a neat stack of advanced test papers is placed in the center.

"Didn't you say you wanted to prove yourself?"

Chen Chu pressed him down into a chair at the dining table. All their conflicts stemmed from the child throwing a tantrum, but he didn't take these tantrums seriously at all. "The first step to prove it is to finish this test paper."

Wang Zihao was forced into a chair, tilting his head back to glare at Chen Chu, his voice filled with the annoyance and defiance of someone cornered: "I've changed my mind now, is that not allowed? Didn't you say you shouldn't force children to do things they don't like?"

Chen Chu laughed when he heard this.

He pushed the exam paper in front of him.

"Didn't you say to the teacher that you wanted to get a high score next time? You're a grown adult; don't you mean what you said in front of your homeroom teacher?"

"You..." Wang Zihao's face flushed red, partly because he was speechless, and partly because he had indeed made that promise. He glared at Chen Chu for a long while, then lowered his head and squeezed out a reluctant sentence through gritted teeth, "This is coercion. I'm going to sue you. I don't want to stay here anymore."

"You can't back out now."

Chen Chu returned his exact words to him.

The comment section in the bullet screen was like it had been fast-forwarded, with comments popping up one after another, so densely packed that it was almost impossible to read them all.

"Chen Chu doesn't need to waste his time on this kind of person. Some people are just incorrigible, and no matter how much effort you put in, it's all in vain."

"I'm not discriminating against anyone, I'm just stating the facts. Chen Chu's educational philosophy worked for Chen Ziran because Ziran is a good child. If you cherish a good child, he will grow stronger. If you hold a stone in your hands, it will still be a stone."

Zhao Shuilan looked at Chen Chu with dissatisfaction.

Whether it's a trial or a test, Chen Chu's educational approach is still too niche.

Most kids need to be pushed to a very high intensity level.

Praise-driven education only works on self-disciplined children; it's a complete waste of time for someone like Wang Zihao.

Wang Zihao lowered his head, his knuckles turning slightly white from gripping the pen so tightly.

He recognized most of the questions on the test paper; none of them were beyond the syllabus, but rather content that he should have listened to in class but had never paid attention to.

He wrote down each question one by one, skipping over those he didn't know and guessing on those he wasn't sure about.

Twenty minutes later, he pushed the test paper to Chen Chu with an expression that conveyed a sense of "I'll hand it in once I'm done" and a subtle challenge.

Chen Chu took the test paper and scanned it from top to bottom. The accuracy rate wasn't high; many questions weren't wrong because he got them wrong, but because he skipped them and just wrote down an answer randomly.

Chen Chu did not frown, sigh, or show any disappointment.

He placed the test paper on the table, ticked the last question with his pen, then looked up at Wang Zihao and said in a sincere and unpretentious tone, "Not bad, you finished the whole set of questions in less than half an hour. At least half of your class can't do that."

Wang Zihao was stunned for a moment. He had originally thought that Chen Chu would say that his writing was too bad, that he made too many mistakes, and that his attitude was not proper. He had already prepared three rebuttals in his mind, each of which started with "I didn't ask you to assign me homework."

But Chen Chu praised him.

He was praising an angle and speed that he hadn't anticipated at all.

He opened his mouth, but all the prepared rebuttal drafts suddenly became useless.

Before he could react, Chen Chu pulled a new test paper from the pile and pushed it in front of him: "Do this one too."

Wang Zihao gritted his teeth, lowered his head, picked up his pen, and continued writing.

This time he wrote a little slower than the previous one. He encountered a problem he thought he could solve, and scribbled on the scratch paper for a while, unable to figure it out. Not wanting to ask Chen Chu, he just bit his pen cap and pondered it in silence. About half an hour later, he handed over the second test paper. Chen Chu took it, checked the answer key, and saw a score of over seventy.

Wang Zihao leaned over to look at the score, his eyes widening in surprise, a look of utter astonishment crossing his face: "How could it be so high?"

"Of course, it's because you can do it."

Chen Chu flipped the test paper over and pointed to the last few questions he had answered correctly. "You skipped these questions on the first paper, but you did them on the second one, and you got them right. You already knew this knowledge; you just didn't realize it."

Chen Chu's words were very sincere...

Because this exam paper is much easier than the previous one...

Wang Zihao remained silent.

"Then I'll make another one and see."

Tap the screen to use advanced tools Tip: You can use left and right keyboard keys to browse between chapters.

You'll Also Like