After self-study, Xiao Qi went back to her dormitory.
She was the only one in the dormitory today, which felt a little strange.
However, she neatly put away all the gifts, the camera for her friend Mier, the laptop for Wei Cheng, the tea set for Yunshu, and tidied up the dormitory again. It looked tidy and cozy.
She didn't go to bed too late either. She planned to sleep after lights out.
But when the lights went out, the mechanical sound next to her ear rang out empty.
"The host's positive attitude towards life has set a good example for the underage children around her and helped establish the right values and outlook on life. The host is awarded a medal of heartfelt thanks and a talent seed. This seed can only be applied to one academic subject. Further development requires the host's own efforts."
Xiao Qi saw an interface in front of her with a bean-like grayish-green thing added.
At this moment, seeing her daughter tidy up her things obediently and go to bed after finishing her homework, Ms. Liang shed tears of relief.
She knew her daughter was playful, and she spoiled her. After letting her daughter go out and play for a few days, she started to worry about her safety, but she was too busy to accompany her daughter.
She asked Jiajia to video call every day. Seeing her happy and energetic put her mind at ease, but it was not as reassuring as seeing her daughter safe in person.
After running around for a few days, she didn't seem tired at all, still very energetic and cheerful.
When Ms. Liang saw her daughter come back safe and sound, she finally felt relieved. She didn't expect there would be a pleasant surprise afterwards. She noticed her daughter had changed. Usually when she came back, she would just throw herself on the sofa and refused to do anything. But today, she tidied up her stuff, showed Ms. Liang that she had finished all her homework, and said, "Mom, I want to continue learning English. Please find me a good tutor. And I'm really bad at math, so I think I should make up for that too."
Ms. Liang was astonished. When did her naughty daughter become so well-behaved? It was like she had become a different person.
Ms. Liang felt she needed to have a good talk with her daughter.
However, every time she tried to be a caring mom to chat with her daughter, her evasive daughter found ways to avoid it. Maybe it was the generation gap.
So this time, Ms. Liang didn't put on a knowing motherly air when talking to her daughter. She just chatted with her daughter about what she had seen and heard these days.
As expected, her daughter was very excited to tell her all about her adventures in the past few days. She even enthusiastically took out her camera and showed her mother some videos.
Most of the videos were about that little girl Xiao Qi. Running, practicing calligraphy, studying, painting, and talking with groups of foreigners. Her life seemed full of colors. Even Ms Liang looked at those videos longingly.
She also reminisced about her own life. She didn't go to college. Her brother was the one who went to college. So was her ex-husband. If she had had the chance to go to college, wouldn't her life be different now? Maybe she wouldn't have become a businesswoman.
Now looking at her daughter, she felt her daughter could go to college and fulfill her dream, which was great.
Moreover, she clearly felt her daughter had changed after the trip, not just temporary excitement. It seemed like her whole temperament had been transformed.
This feeling made Ms. Liang want to cry with joy. In fact, Jiajia had been a good girl. It was after her divorce that Jiajia had become more and more naughty and indifferent. And now it looked like the daughter before the divorce was back.
She was very grateful to the little girl Xiao Qi in her heart. She wanted to do more for her.
Xiao Qi didn't know about this. Without the little tail Jiajia around, she did feel a bit unusual.
She checked the seed on the interface but didn't find anything special about it. Xiao Qi opened the English speech content, set a 20-minute timer, and lay in bed listening while falling asleep.
The next day was the last day of the holiday. Yunshu and the others should come back today.
With no roommates, the dormitory was especially quiet. Xiao Qi preferred the lively atmosphere when her roommates were around.
After getting up, she went through her routine - washed up briefly then started practicing calligraphy.
It was a bit cool in the morning already. Today was the Chinese Double Ninth Festival, a festival for mountain climbing. In her hometown Gumula Village, everyone would go up the mountains to work. And on this day, elderly above 60 years old could have dinner at the village canteen because the mountains were high.
As a kid, she could go to eat for free.
In Xiao Qi's family, it was just her grandma. Her grandma refused to go. She heard grandma used to be a young lady from a landowner's family. Anyway, grandma was particular about things sometimes. So Xiao Qi didn't have the chance to get a free meal there. But even if grandma went, Xiao Qi guessed she wouldn't be able to eat for free.
After finishing calligraphy practice, Xiao Qi went running. The dorm area and the tracks were empty. After running, Xiao Qi did stretches under the basketball hoop as taught by the coach.
After completing the whole routine, she went back to her dorm, took a shower, then went for meals.
After the meal, she still went to the new district racetrack to practice horse riding.
Today the horse riding coach Steven looked at Xiao Qi a little strangely.
That was because he had also watched the marathon race, mainly on Enhua's side. Without this university, it could be said to be a remote poor mountainous area, full of bumpy hills and no entertainment activities, surrounded by farmland and fish ponds.
Steven, who didn't use to watch TV much, now watched it as a pastime. As a middle-aged man, he had no interest in TV dramas. He mainly watched sports news or his stocks.
Then he saw his new student was actually the record breaker in this year's marathon, almost tying with that Kenyan black runner at the finish line.
It was simply against the heavens.
It's said that black people can run through the earth barefoot. But what was his seemingly delicate student here?
Moreover, she also won over 1 million prize money. Why did she look exactly the same today when he saw her, even more composed than this old man?
He remembered he had drunk for three days and attended parties for a whole week when he first won third place in an equestrian competition.
But she seemed to be no different from usual at all.
Well there seemed to be some difference - she appeared to practice harder and listen more attentively.
Although having lived abroad for a long time made him used to not prying into others’ business, for the girl in front him, Steven felt like taking her as his closed-door disciple, his last hope to accomplish something. He was still very curious - hmm - very concerned.
At dinner time, Steven finally couldn't help asking, "Su, did you participate in the marathon? I saw you on TV. You were awesome to break the record. Don't you want to do anything with the bonus you got?"
Today the Western chef was here. Xiao Qi was having steak, eye of round steak and beef tenderloin, plus a serving of salad, thick soup and toast.
Steven ate about the same amount as her, just without the toast.
Hearing the coach ask about it, Xiao Qi was a little embarrassed. She had actually seen the gloves when buying a handbag for her mother and happened to think of the coach.
When she just about finished eating, she asked the coach to wait for her for a bit. She went to her locker and took out a small box.
She handed it to Steven.
Steven opened the box curiously and saw a beautiful pair of leather gloves. The size happened to fit perfectly. Steven tried them on, feeling a little uneasy.
Actually when he came back from abroad, he took things impulsively without much thought. Many things he was used to didn't come with him. These days he had been handling the lunge lines with bare hands, although as an experienced horse riding coach he was used to it. But he did use to wear gloves before.
He didn’t expect Xiao Qi to give him a pair of gloves.
“Thank you.”
Hearing the coach sincerely thank her, Xiao Qi felt somewhat ill at ease. She actually just happened to think of the coach when buying things for her mother.
Steven was very touched in his heart. From his observation, he felt his student was not well off. She dressed very plainly. Her clothes and pants seemed to have been worn for many years. Men could dress like that with no problem, but she was a young girl. Young girls tended to care about looks.
What's more, she had a good appetite, and Steven felt that being able to eat well was a sign that one had experienced hunger before - only those who had suffered from starvation would be so devout towards food.
She was willing to work hard and didn't mind getting dirty.
After hanging out with Su several times, Steven completely broke his initial prejudice and grew very fond of this down-to-earth student.
He didn't expect that the first thing she did after receiving the prize money was to buy him a gift. This pair of gloves couldn't have been cheap.
"Su, I will definitely train you into the best equestrian rider. You will definitely succeed," Steven suddenly said passionately.
Xiao Qi: ...
Is there some kind of misunderstanding here?
