Madam, Please Behave
Chapter 418: Do Me a Favor

Liu Xiazhi's tears wouldn’t stop falling.

She yanked her hand free from her father’s grip and kept wiping her face with both hands.

But that did little to stop the flood.

With her sobbing echoing through the hallway, other parents began looking their way.

Before long, the father and daughter were surrounded.

Liu Xiazhi noticed too.

At her age, being the center of attention like this was already embarrassing enough.

But emotions aren’t something you can just turn off. So to avoid being seen, she turned toward the wall, took a few steps, and leaned against it.

Then she let it all out in muffled cries.

“I’m so dumb, I’m so dumb… I’m just a big dummy…”

“…”

Liu Changqing glanced around at the parents nearby.

After standing there silently for a moment, he stepped toward his daughter and tugged on her sleeve.

He said gently,

“Dad doesn’t care about your grades.”

“But… but I do…”

Liu Xiazhi sobbed as she replied.

“I… I really tried hard… but… sob sob… why… why do I always do so bad…”

As she spoke, it looked like something straight out of a TV drama.

Liu Xiazhi, still crying, clenched her fists and pounded the wall.

But maybe she was afraid it would hurt, so she didn’t use much force. Each hit was soft and soundless.

The surrounding parents watched with interest.

Who doesn’t enjoy a bit of drama?

One parent even felt a sudden surge of admiration. Looking at Liu Xiazhi bawling her eyes out over her grades and then at their own kid—who bombed the test and was still smiling like an idiot—

The more they thought about it, the angrier they got.

They couldn’t hold it in anymore and smacked their kid on the butt.

“You’re still smiling? You’ve got the nerve to laugh?!”

“Ahhh! I’m sorry!”

Compared to Liu Changqing and his daughter’s emotional little scene, the drama unfolding nearby was much more attention-grabbing.

The other parents turned their heads at once.

Can’t beat a good old-fashioned scolding.

But Liu Changqing paid them no mind.

Right now, the only thing that mattered was how to comfort his daughter.

He pursed his lips and thought carefully. Then he went with a classic catch-all line.

“You just didn’t perform well this time. Try harder next time.”

“Liar… You always say that…”

“…”

Seeing she still wasn’t feeling any better, Liu Changqing tried a different approach.

“Xiazhi, you have to understand—everyone’s got different talents, and their strengths lie in different places. Like our great writer, Mr. Zhou Shuren once said, ‘No one is born a genius. Everyone has things they’re good at and things they’re not.’”

“Zhou… Zhou Shuren? Who’s that?”

“Doesn’t matter who he is. What matters is, he’s right. Your grades might not be great, but you have a talent for dance that others would kill for. That’s your strength, isn’t it?”

“But… I… I want to be a top student too… I want an award certificate… Shuyan’s family has a bunch of them…”

“Before we go home, let’s stop by and buy some paper. I’ll make you an award certificate myself. And not just that—I'll even fold you a big red flower to go with it!”

“R-Really?”

“Really.”

Hearing that, Liu Xiazhi slowly turned around.

Her red, puffy eyes looked up at her father.

Staring at his face—

She couldn’t hold it in anymore. She flung herself into his arms and cried out,

“Daddy!”

“Hey now.”

“Daddy, I love you the most!”

“I love you too.”

Xu Yisheng was walking alongside Feng Qian, with Feng Shuyan trotting beside him.

Noticing the commotion ahead, they both looked puzzled and approached curiously.

When Feng Qian saw Liu Changqing hugging Liu Xiazhi, he was stunned.

What the heck is Lao Liu up to now?

Even Xu Yisheng looked a bit confused.

But the father-daughter hug wasn’t what caught their attention the most—

It was the kid nearby, wailing like crazy.

Apparently, that parent had been holding in a lot of frustration. Maybe it was the kid’s terrible test score. Or maybe it was because the kid had just laughed out loud at the wrong time…

Whatever the reason, it was enough to push the parent over the edge.

The hand of “fatherly love” came down hard.

The child cried miserably, unable to escape since their arm was pinned.

And with all the other parents crowding around, there was no room to run.

It was honestly getting a bit out of hand.

One of the parents watching even tried to intervene.

“Alright, that’s enough. So what if the score’s bad? You can’t just beat the kid like this.”

“You don’t get it. He got zero! Because he copied someone else’s paper! I’m not mad about the score—I’m mad he couldn’t even cheat right. He even copied the other kid’s name!”

“What?! Okay yeah, that’s fair.”

“Aaahhh! Daddy, I won’t do it again! I won’t copy their name next time!”

The kid’s cries were absolutely pitiful.

Seeing this, Xu Yisheng, being a teacher, naturally stepped forward to stop it.

And Feng Qian, worried the parent might hurt her by accident, also jumped in to help separate them.

Meanwhile, the ones who had unintentionally started all the chaos—Liu Changqing and his daughter—

walked off hand in hand.

One tall, one short.

One older, one younger.

Heading toward the stairs at the other end of the hallway.

Their voices floated behind them.

“Daddy, next time we buy fish… can we not eat them? They’re so cute… I feel bad…”

“But braised fish is delicious.”

“It is… but…”

“And the fish soup’s not tasty?”

“It is tasty…”

“So do you still want to eat it?”

“……”

Holding her father’s hand, Liu Xiazhi fell into deep thought.

Then she turned to him, sniffled, and—

with a bright smile—nodded.

“I wanna eat it!”

Because he’d promised his daughter, Liu Changqing stopped by the school gate’s little store on the way home and bought the materials to make her a big red flower award.

He also swung by the market and picked up two crucian carp.

While they were there, the shop happened to be selling softshell turtles too.

Animal-loving Liu Xiazhi spotted one immediately and begged to take it home.

Seeing the fat, plump turtle, Liu Changqing didn’t think twice and bought it.

He figured—let her keep it for a bit.

Once she got bored, he’d cook it.

That was the plan.

So Liu Changqing walked home carrying the bags while his daughter held the plastic bag with the turtle.

Once inside, she swapped her shoes for slippers and ran straight for the bathroom, excited.

Watching her bounce away, Liu Changqing just smiled and didn’t say anything.

He changed into slippers too and headed for the bedroom.

But the moment he pushed the door open—

the smile that had just bloomed on his face disappeared in an instant.

Standing next to the crib was a black-haired woman.

And sitting beside the bed… were his mother-in-law and his wife.

The sound of the door opening caught their attention, and all three women turned to look.

Their gazes converged at the doorway.

Li Wanran’s eyes left the baby and landed on Liu Changqing.

Upon seeing his face, her eyes flickered with a complicated expression.

After hesitating a moment, she finally spoke.

“Liu Changqing… can you do me a favor?”