Transmigration: Flirted with My Childhood Sweetheart
Chapter 172 - 171: Men Should Not Be Spoiled; They Must Be Managed When Necessary

Chapter 172: Chapter 171: Men Should Not Be Spoiled; They Must Be Managed When Necessary

Zhou Xu looked at Lin Nianhe’s serene eyes, tugged at the corner of his mouth, and said softly, "Sister Lin, it’s not that I want to deceive you, it’s just that before Brother Cheng left, he said... well, you just take it easy, no news from him is good news, really!"

Lin Nianhe let out a soft sigh, "Then if he does call you, even if you can’t tell me the details, at least let me know."

Though she said this, Lin Nianhe decided she would later jot this down in her notebook to settle accounts with Su Yuncheng later on.

For whatever reason, deceiving her was not okay.

Men can’t be spoiled; they need to be managed when necessary.

"Okay, okay," Zhou Xu immediately nodded, but then thought of Su Yuncheng’s nature and said, "But Sister Lin, don’t get your hopes up too much. When Brother Cheng is on a mission, unless it’s absolutely necessary, he won’t make calls."

"Mhm, I understand. Safety comes first."

"Hezi, the team leader is telling you to answer the phone."

From a distance, Wen Lan called out.

Lin Nianhe’s eyes suddenly brightened. She responded and had just run a few steps when she suddenly stopped, turned her head back to Zhou Xu and said, "Brother Zhou, please keep an eye on them for me, don’t let them move the books back too quickly."

Zhou Xu was puzzled, "What happened?"

Lin Nianhe was in a hurry to answer the phone and could only say, "I’ll tell you when I get back, just help me delay a bit, and make sure nobody knows I’ve gone to answer the phone."

Zhou Xu, being an experienced scout, instantly speculated that there was trouble among the people moving the books.

He nodded solemnly, "Okay, I have a way."

"Mhm."

Lin Nianhe felt reassured and jogged all the way to the team headquarters.

The phone was still on the desk, and next to it, Li Dahe glanced at her and got up with his tobacco pipe to walk outside.

Lin Nianhe smiled at him and quickly answered the phone as soon as he left, "Hello, this is Lin Nianhe."

"Nianhe."

Su Yuncheng’s voice came through the phone, low and tender as always, seemingly with a hint of a smile.

"Brother Yuncheng," hearing his voice, Lin Nianhe breathed a sigh of relief, "Are you alright?"

"Nothing’s wrong, don’t worry." Su Yuncheng replied, "How about you? Did anyone go looking for you?"

"About that..." Lin Nianhe thought for a moment and then said, "Don’t be anxious when I tell you, Bai Bo really sent two guys to keep an eye on me."

"What have they done?" Su Yuncheng’s voice immediately tensed up.

Lin Nianhe counted on her fingers: "Well, they’ve been quite busy...chased by Zhao Zhuangshi for half the night, slapped in the face with a shovel by me, then they plowed the school’s private plots, tidied up the classroom, collected enough firewood for the school to last two months, today they went to town to pick up scraps of cloth for Principal Wu, and now they’re moving books."

Su Yuncheng: "..."

Lin Nianhe felt rather sentimental, "I must say, having two underlings is quite convenient."

Su Yuncheng took a while to find his voice again, "What exactly happened?"

"Actually, I really didn’t do much, it’s just that they weren’t very smart," Lin Nianhe said innocently, "Brother Yuncheng, don’t worry, Principal Wu and Uncle Team Leader are watching them, and Zhao Zhuangshi is working with them too. If I hadn’t deliberately let them be, they wouldn’t have even had a chance to go to the town to report to Bai Bo over the phone."

After thinking it over for a long while, Su Yuncheng could only let out a wry laugh, "Alright then, I’ll give Zhou Xu a call later to have him listen in on what those two say on the phone."

"I’ll tell Brother Zhou then; he just came to deliver a package."

"Okay." Su Yuncheng paused for a moment, then asked her, "Do you still have enough to eat?"

"Plenty," Lin Nianhe replied, "You be careful out there."

"Alright, then I’ll call you at this time in five days. If there’s anything you need to do, just tell Zhou Xu."

"Mm!"

After hanging up the phone, Lin Nianhe remembered that she had forgotten to ask why he lied to her.

She would have to wait five more days.

At the entrance to the village, Zhou Xu handed out cigarettes to the men one by one after they moved the packages down from the tractor.

A group of men gathered to smoke, which could be controlled in terms of duration without raising suspicion.

Zhou Xu casually chatted with them, all the while scanning the two unfamiliar faces with his peripheral vision.

Being a postman had its advantages; he recognized almost all the locals who lived within a radius of ten miles.

Looking at those who came to move the books—Li Xiaohai and Li Xiaoshan, the team leader’s sons; Wang Dong, an educated youth; Zhao Zhuangshi, a former village tyrant who had been suppressed.

Only two were left, one with white hair and the other short in stature. If there were real problems, it had to be one of these two.

Zhou Xu nonchalantly asked, "I haven’t seen the two of you before. Are you new sons-in-law of the Ten Miles Team?"

"No, we’re with the Victory Team. Our family is so poor that we can’t afford food, and Principal Wu said to let us work here and provide our meals."

Cao Shijian answered this question.

These past few days, he and Wu Genmao were repeatedly asked the same question, and Wu Genmao even reminded him repeatedly; he had memorized it so well that even in his sleep, he wouldn’t make a mistake.

"Oh, I was wondering why your faces looked unfamiliar. I rarely go to the Victory Team." Zhou Xu laughed it off casually, but his mind had already gone through all the people from the Victory Team—none matched.

Thus, these two either left before he transferred or they simply weren’t from the Victory Team at all.

In one question, Zhou Xu had confirmed the identities of the two men before him—spies of Bai Bo.

He took a few more glances to imprint their features firmly in his mind.

Just as he was about to probe further, Lin Nianhe came over.

"What are you all doing? Hurry up and move them back. We need to finish before dinner or we won’t make it in time for the literacy class." She spoke with an easy tone, smiling ebulliently as if in high spirits.

"Alright, alright, we’re coming."

"Brother Zhou, don’t bother, we’ve got this."

"That’s fine, I’ll head off first... Ah, I still have to go back, I left my bike at your school."

"Then you can go on slowly, we’ll go ahead."

Watching the people moving books walk away, Lin Nianhe finally said, "It was Brother Yuncheng’s call, he’s fine."

Zhou Xu awkwardly tugged at the corner of his mouth.

As expected, Brother Cheng’s current actions couldn’t be predicted using past assumptions.

Lin Nianhe went on, "You saw those two men, the one with the white hair and the short one, didn’t you?"

"Mm," Zhou Xu nodded and whispered, "They’re Bai Bo’s sent, right?"

"Is it that obvious?" Lin Nianhe chuckled softly and nodded, "They go to the post office every evening to make calls and report to Bai Bo. Brother Yuncheng said you should try to listen in and find out what they’re talking about."

"Okay, got it." Zhou Xu made a mental note and then asked uncertainly, "The same time every evening?"

"It’s been like that the past few days. They leave around 5:30 pm, which should catch the post office right before it closes. Though they probably won’t go today, they’re helping to fetch some fabric in town so they probably already made the call," said Lin Nianhe.

Zhou Xu was somewhat confused, "With such a fixed schedule, aren’t they afraid you’ll catch on?"

Lin Nianhe stopped and looked at him with a complicated expression, "Once you listen to their calls for a few days, perhaps you’ll understand."

Zhou Xu grew more puzzled, "Do you know what they’re saying on the calls?"

Lin Nianhe: "With some thought, you could probably guess."