Rebirth: Saving the Lovely Girl from the Start

"Muxue, I’m telling you, this isn’t as easy as you think," Xue Rui said earnestly.

He’d learned his lesson the hard way; there was no need to crash and burn over the same thing twice.

Besides, what kind of pretty girl pedals a tricycle? ’Honestly, this girl...’ The moment no one was watching, her curious nature took over, and she just did whatever she pleased.

"If you can ride it, why can’t I?" Gu Muxue grumbled. ’I’ll show Xue Rui I can ride it today, no matter what,’ she thought.

"Fine," Xue Rui said through gritted teeth. Risking a crash, he squatted down in the cargo bed.

Of course, his main job was to act as a counterweight for Gu Muxue, keeping her from steering them into a ditch.

Gu Muxue pumped the pedals a few times, finding it difficult to get started. She finally just stood up to push them down.

Xue Rui’s heart was in his throat as he sat in the back. When the left wheel tipped up, he leaned left. When the right wheel lifted, he leaned right.

Before long, they reached the turn at the village entrance, and Xue Rui had a bad feeling.

The unpleasant memory came rushing back. Xue Rui remembered the day he and his dad had crashed.

Xue Rui shouted desperately, "Muxue, the brakes! Hit the brakes!"

"It’s too late! Jump!" Xue Rui yelled.

You have to admit, sometimes a person’s sixth sense is right on the money.

Sure enough, the right wheel lifted off the ground. Gu Muxue noticed something was wrong and quickly leaped off.

Xue Rui vaulted out of the cargo bed. In truth, he’d been ready to bail the whole time.

He stumbled upon landing but scrambled forward a few steps to catch Gu Muxue, letting out a sharp sigh of relief.

Watching the tricycle plunge headfirst into the wheat field, Xue Rui felt a great weight lift from his shoulders. The other shoe had finally dropped.

Fortunately, neither of them were injured.

"Xiaorui, I’m sorry," Gu Muxue said with a pout, knowing she’d messed up.

’This girl just refuses to back down,’ Xue Rui thought. ’She always has to try the very things I tell her not to.’

Normally, he could use this trait to his advantage, using reverse psychology to get her to do all sorts of things. But unfortunately, Gu Muxue was too smart for that trick to work...

"Great parking job. Saves me the trouble of carrying the fireworks over," Xue Rui said before hopping into the wheat field and heading toward the tricycle, which had slid quite a distance.

Gu Muxue felt a secret thrill in her heart, hearing Xue Rui comfort her in his own roundabout way. But when she saw him nonchalantly trampling through the wheat, she frowned. "Xiaorui, why are you ruining the crops?"

Gu Muxue jumped down after him. But instead of following his path, she moved gingerly through the gaps between the wheat stalks, terrified of damaging the wheat the farmer had worked so hard to plant.

’This girl doesn’t know anything,’ Xue Rui thought. ’Since when is winter wheat afraid of being trampled?’

Watching Gu Muxue tiptoe through the snow looked like watching a little snow sprite dancing gracefully. It was such a beautiful sight that he decided not to say anything.

When Gu Muxue reached his side, Xue Rui said, "Muxue, winter wheat isn’t afraid of being stepped on."

Gu Muxue’s beautiful eyes narrowed instantly. In a dangerous tone, she said, "You knew and you didn’t tell me? You did that on purpose, didn’t you?"

"Ahem. Let’s light the fireworks."

Xue Rui arranged the fireworks he bought in the snowy wheat field, took out a lighter, and lit the fuse.

As a point of light shot dozens of meters into the sky, the firework burst, its brilliant colors washing over their faces.

Gu Muxue tilted her head back to admire the fireworks blooming in the sky, but she found they weren’t pretty at all. From this angle, she couldn’t make out their shapes; they were just big, scattered blobs of light. The explosions made her ears ring, and fallout from the blasts kept landing on her face.

Her gaze drifted down. ’This isn’t what I imagined fireworks would be like...’

"This is what fireworks look like up close. I went late, so these large ones were all they had left." Xue Rui placed a pair of earmuffs over Gu Muxue’s head and held his arm over her, shielding her so the fallout wouldn’t get in her eyes.

"Then wasn’t it a waste to set them off?" Gu Muxue said with a smile, snuggling closer into Xue Rui’s arms as if she were afraid of being hit by the falling debris.

She glanced at Xue Rui. ’Actually,’ she thought, ’this is pretty nice too.’

"It’s not a waste. The beautiful fireworks you enjoy are always ones that other people set off. If we don’t light any, what will other people watch? Setting off fireworks is something you do for each other to enjoy," Xue Rui said with a laugh.

Besides, setting off fireworks was like a signal. Once one person got the ball rolling, others would join in. You didn’t have to wait until midnight.

Gu Muxue smiled. She understood the logic, but she just wanted to hear Xue Rui explain it to her again.

Sure enough, before Xue Rui’s fireworks were finished, people in the village started to set off their own.

......

Meanwhile, Xue Yao and Xie Jianfeng were standing at the village entrance, a pile of fireworks in front of them.

"I don’t know what my brother is thinking, insisting on running off to another village to set off fireworks. He said he’d light some for me, and I should light some here for him," Xue Yao said, rubbing her hands together. She used an incense stick to light a row of firework tubes, then hastily covered her ears and scrambled away.

She thought her brother’s plan was great. From the village entrance, she had a perfect view of the fireworks Xue Rui set off. Now that she’d enjoyed her own private show, it was her turn to put one on for him.

"Where’d he go?" Xie Jianfeng took the cigarette his daughter handed back and put it between his lips, taking a couple of drags. ’This definitely isn’t that simple,’ he thought.

He recalled the direction the earlier fireworks had come from. It seemed to be Gu Qingshan’s village.

A thought flashed through Xie Jianfeng’s mind: Xue Rui had probably arranged for his sister to set off fireworks here for Gu Muxue to see.

Xie Jianfeng nodded with a broad grin. "That’s my boy. He’s really got some tricks up his sleeve."

He was very supportive of Xue Rui’s pursuit of the Gu Family’s daughter. He turned around and hauled a few more large boxes out of the house, figuring he’d let his son and the Gu girl watch to their hearts’ content.

......

"Xiaorui, look! There are so many fireworks over there!" Gu Muxue’s eyes lit up as she pointed.

Of course Xue Rui knew who was setting them off. It was his backup plan. What if no one had followed his lead? That would have been embarrassing.

But he felt the display from Xue Yao’s direction was a little too intense. He was sure he hadn’t left her with that many fireworks.

Xue Rui’s phone buzzed in his pocket. He pulled it out and glanced at the screen, surprised to see a text from his dad.

The message was just three short words: Go for it!

"..."

’So Xie Jianfeng was playing wingman too?’ Xue Rui was speechless.

He put his phone away, plopped down in the snow, and admired the beautiful scene in the distance.

Gu Muxue smiled. Xue Rui had always been so unceremonious. She sat down beside him, her hand landing on his as she braced herself.

She subconsciously started to pull her hand away, but he flipped his over and clasped it.

The two of them sat there in silence, the occasional firework blooming in the reflection of Gu Muxue’s beautiful, almond-shaped eyes.

"The college entrance exams are almost here, right after the New Year. We’re all grown up now," Gu Muxue said wistfully. ’Time flies,’ she thought. The memory of Xue Rui scaring her with a caterpillar was still so vivid, and now, in the blink of an eye, they were almost adults.

’What’s there to be wistful about?’ Xue Rui thought. ’Aren’t you still the same bright, cheerful little girl?’

’Just getting older, not gaining any real experience.’

In his eyes, there wasn’t much difference between a college student and a high schooler. They were all just children in an ivory tower, filled with idealistic dreams and unrealistic fantasies about the world.

True growth only came after graduation, after you’d taken a few beatings from the real world.

But Xue Rui didn’t want this girl to grow up. Growing up came at too high a price.

But Gu Muxue’s starting point in life was far too high. She wasn’t grounded enough, and a vast gulf existed between her world and that of a commoner like him.

So, Xue Rui felt it was necessary for her to learn a thing or two—to understand what the world of ordinary people was like. Otherwise, how would she ever relate to her classmates in college?

They’d be talking about how good the malatang at the East Cafeteria is, and she’d be talking about the desserts at some fancy Western restaurant?

What student could afford that?

Her lack of basic life skills was another issue. She couldn’t very well bring a nanny with her to college and spend her whole life in the gilded cage Zhao Lizhen had built for her.

However, the most important thing right now was to finish watching this fireworks show.

Xue Rui gently squeezed Gu Muxue’s soft hand. "Muxue, I’m not going to get into Chang’an Jiaotong University. I guess I won’t be able to ask you for tutoring anymore."

He was saying it on purpose. ’What kind of tutoring does a college student need? They’re lucky if you don’t skip class.’

Gu Muxue’s heart sank when she heard this. She had noticed it too. Xue Rui had been studying incredibly hard, but some things just couldn’t be achieved with effort alone.

But she really wanted to be at the same school as Xue Rui.

"Hmph. Who wants to go to the same school as you," Gu Muxue retorted, her eyes welling with tears. She was trying her best to suppress her emotions, not wanting him to see anything was wrong. With a cold sniff, she turned her head away.

Xue Rui felt her little hand squeeze his tighter. ’This girl,’ he thought. ’She never says what she really means.’

Teenagers were like that. It was just a matter of not being in the same school, but they acted like it was a tragic, life-or-death farewell.

In reality, when you looked back on it years later, what did it even matter?

Especially for an "old man" like Xue Rui, who’d already been through college, he felt there was no need to make things so dramatic.

"Muxue, a lot of the time you don’t even see each other often even at the same school, because different majors have different class schedules. When one person is free, the other has class."

"Haven’t you heard the joke? The dorm matron wanted to break up with the security guard at the gate," Xue Rui said with a grin.

"Why?" Gu Muxue’s curiosity was piqued.

"Because the campus was too big," Xue Rui said with a perfectly straight face. "She couldn’t handle a long-distance relationship."

Hearing this, Gu Muxue let out a "PFFT" of laughter.

She thought about the universities she had toured. Some of them really were enormous—the kind where you’d be exhausted just walking everywhere.

’When you put it that way, maybe it isn’t such a big deal after all?’

"With our connection, I’ll definitely come visit you on the weekends," Xue Rui promised, full of conviction.

Gu Muxue blinked, letting the winter wind dry the tears from her eyes. A warmth spread through her chest, and the sadness that had just bloomed was instantly washed away.

Xue Rui had said "our connection." She really wanted to ask him just what kind of connection he meant.

"We..."

BOOM!

A sudden, loud explosion from a firework made Gu Muxue jump. As it bloomed in the sky, the entire village seemed to erupt with fireworks and firecrackers of all kinds. The deafening roar drowned out Gu Muxue’s voice, and with it, her curiosity.