Shen Yichen thought for a while longer and heaved a deep sigh, "I understand. If you can't tell me, I won't force you... What do I need to do to let Shen Hui stay at home if she needs my cooperation?"
Si Chengyou answered very quickly, "You just need to find an excuse to let me periodically observe Shen Hui's condition. The experts' suggestion is to have me be Shen Hui's political ideology teacher and give her two classes a week, to continuously record her condition."
Shen Yichen was truly a bit surprised to hear this. For someone of Si Chengyou's status to personally teach Shen Hui political ideology, this was really... an unexpected windfall.
He had to think of a way to earn more from this. This was Shen Yichen's rule for survival.
But before that, there was still one thing he had to confirm.
"Chief Si, what I'm about to say next might offend you, but as the parent of the children in this family, this is a question I must ask."
Si Chengyou's body shook. Here it comes.
"Please go ahead."
"It seems Shen Yue has your contact details. May I ask what's going on and hope you can explain."
Shen Yichen didn't immediately mention the message he saw, about liking and whatnot. He decided to take this step-by-step.
First ask about how the two of them added each other in the first place. Who took the initiative! Who was the real beast!
At this moment, Shen Yue who was drinking yogurt suddenly felt an itch in her nose and let out a loud yogurt-sprayed sneeze.
Shen Jize beside her immediately jumped up in surprise. He squeezed next to Shen Yue to examine her and said in astonishment, "Recently I've seen some literature about burps and farts after drinking milk. I didn't know sprayed milk sneezes were a thing too!"
Shen Yue wiped her mouth with a tissue and looked at her Fourth Brother. "Bro, I know why Eldest Brother confiscated your books. You're reading things humans shouldn't. And I was drinking yogurt just now so technically that was a yogurt spray sneeze."
Only then did Shen Jize react. He belatedly worried about Shen Yue, "You didn't choke, did you?"
"I already choked."
"Then that's good."
Shen Jize went back to reading his novel while Shen Yue continued watching her revenge TV drama.
On the other side, in the study.
Just like Shen Yue said, when facing unusual situations Si Chengyou could think of hundreds and thousands of ways to respond.
Si Chengyou believed he was just an ordinary person with many weaknesses. To avoid exposing these weaknesses, through years of struggle he had honed his skills at spouting nonsense and putting on an act.
When he heard Shen Yichen's question, the first thing Si Chengyou did was admit his mistake. "I'm sorry, this is my fault. I actually realized when I first met Shen Hui that she was related to my mission objective. To avoid making wrong judgements, I chose to understand some of Shen Hui's circumstances through Shen Yue.
I should have informed you Shen, but after I understood the situation that day, I received an urgent mission and left in a hurry, so I didn't get the chance to inform you. If this has caused you any trouble, I sincerely apologize."
Through his earlier probing, Si Chengyou had already confirmed that Shen Yichen didn't know about the time travel. That meant even if Shen Yichen had read all their chat history, Shen Yue must have processed and deleted the parts related to Shen Hui.
This inference wasn't entirely accurate, so just now Si Chengyou had set another trap in his words.
The trap was Shen Hui.
If Shen Yichen had read all his chat history with Shen Yue, then when responding to his explanation just now Shen Yichen would have pointed out the problem. Just like earlier.
But if Shen Yichen had only read part of the records and didn't read until the end, then he wouldn't have any objections to this explanation.
In fact, Shen Yichen's reaction was the second scenario.
At this point, Si Chengyou could already confirm which part of the chat records Shen Yichen had seen. It was his and Shen Yue's most recent chat, about the discussion of the orange cat.
And once he inferred the truth, Si Chengyou could grasp the initiative.
While Si Chengyou was thinking this through, he could also clearly feel that after gaining another layer of memories, his application of certain skills had also become more adept.
If this had happened previously, it would have taken him longer to deduce this truth.
After hearing Si Chengyou's explanation, Shen Yichen already felt that it was a misunderstanding. In fact, from the first time he met Si Chengyou, he knew Si Chengyou was a principled person who knew when to advance and when to retreat. He was unlikely to do anything to Shen Yichen's underaged younger sister.
It was just that yesterday, when he suddenly saw Si Chengyou say "I like you" and the object was Shen Yue, he was frightened and jumped to conclusions.
When it came to his younger siblings, he would always be much more impulsive compared to normal. But after chatting with Si Chengyou for a while, he had also calmed down now.
Shen Yichen drank a sip of the tea in front of him and decided not to beat around the bush anymore. "To be honest, yesterday I accidentally saw Chief Si's chat with Shen Yue and it seemed to mention something about liking. This point really concerns me. She's only 15 years old and I'm afraid she's ignorant about relationships and could be deceived.
If Chief Si knows the details, could you tell me about it?"
Not interrogating Si Chengyou over why he would say "I like you" to a 15-year-old girl was the last shred of face he could maintain!
Si Chengyou had already deduced the truth earlier so he wasn't nervous now either. He chuckled and said, "It seems Shen Yue really likes orange cats, but she seemed to think I don't like them. She sent an emoji pack, meaning something like people who don't like orange cats have no taste."
"The 'like' Shen saw wasn't aimed at Shen Yue herself, but rather at orange cats. There's no need to worry."
With Si Chengyou's prompt, Shen Yichen belatedly recalled the background of that emoji pack.
An orange pig.
Si Chengyou's voice sounded again at this time. "Miss Shen helped me a lot this time so I'm thinking of giving her an orange cat as thanks. I wonder if the Shen family allows cats?"
Shen Yichen nodded. "Of course."
At this point, Shen Yichen had been successfully smoothed over and even started to climb further up the pole.
"Chief Si, I have one more impolite request."
"Please go ahead."
"When you teach political ideology to Miss Hui, could you bring Miss Yue along as well?"
Si Chengyou smiled gently. "Of course, no problem."
