"Woof..." Xiao Hei swung his big tongue around and turned his body.
After crouching down, Xiao Hei let Mengmeng climb onto his back, then crawled forward, swaying from side to side. Mengmeng did not slip off, and her delighted laughter rang out.
Seeing this, Zhang Han smiled faintly. His gaze was gentle. Wasn't this the kind of life he had always yearned for?
After watching for a while, Zhang Han began working.
Transplanting rice seedlings meant planting the seedlings in the paddy field.
Zhang Han had only crammed at the last minute when it came to farming crops. He knew the basic process, as well as the planting density for producing high-quality rice—roughly thirty centimeters by twenty centimeters.
So Zhang Han estimated the distances and planted the seedlings one by one.
Two hours later, the paddy field was filled with seedlings. The seller really had expertise in their field. After asking Zhang Han about the size of the plot, they had sent exactly the right amount—only four or five seedlings short of filling the entire field.
After finishing all this, it was already one in the afternoon.
Mengmeng was brimming with energy and was still running back and forth through the grass with Xiao Hei.
"Mengmeng, let's go have lunch first. We'll come back and play after we eat."
Zhang Han washed his feet clean with water from the paddy field. When he glanced at himself, he was instantly rendered speechless.
He had forgotten one more thing. He should have changed clothes before coming to do farm work. But after thinking about it, Zhang Han shook his head slightly. It seemed he didn't even have any clothes specifically for farm work.
"Daddy, um, what are we going to eat? Mengmeng isn't hungry yet."
Even though Mengmeng's head was covered in sweat, she still hadn't had enough of playing with Xiao Hei.
Xiao Hei really was an elite playmate. He romped around with Mengmeng, and whenever she fell, he would dart over to cushion her fall. Later, Mengmeng even began deliberately falling a couple of times, or falling again whenever she couldn't catch Xiao Hei.
Xiao Hei was completely bewildered by her antics, but he clearly loved playing with his little mistress.
"Come on. Daddy will take you to eat Western food."
After tidying up, Zhang Han walked over, picked Mengmeng up, and said with a smile.
"Western food? Hmm... All right, then. We'll come back and play after we eat, okay?" Mengmeng obediently nodded, then asked again.
"Mm-hmm. We'll come back and play after we eat." Zhang Han smiled and kissed Mengmeng's cheek.
"Ew, it's all saliva!" Mengmeng raised her little hand and gently scratched her cheek.
Actually, it was Mengmeng's sweat. After Zhang Han kissed her, the sweat stuck to her skin, making her feel itchy.
"Mengmeng is actually rejecting Daddy now. Daddy is so sad." Zhang Han pouted and put on a deliberately heartbroken expression.
"Mm-hmm, I'm not rejecting you. Mengmeng isn't rejecting you." Seeing this, Mengmeng hurriedly leaned over with her cherry-like little mouth and kissed Zhang Han's face several times. "Mwah, mwah, mwah! Mengmeng would never reject Daddy."
"Hahahaha..."
Zhang Han laughed heartily. Ever since he had gained the Little Princess, it felt as though a rising sun had appeared in the endless night, illuminating the entire world.
That darkness was like the loneliness, emptiness, and other negative emotions Zhang Han had endured for five hundred years. Mengmeng was the rising sun that softened his heart.
After a twenty-minute drive, they arrived at a Western restaurant in New Moon Bay called Bombana. The interior was luxuriously decorated, and even the servers were tall foreign women.
"Hello, sir. Welcome to Bombana. May I have a meal for two people?"
A beautiful waitress who came over spoke fluent English.
"What did you say? Do you speak Chinese?" Zhang Han asked.
His English was only at around an intermediate level. Zhang Han could understand if people spoke slowly or used simple sentences, but he had trouble understanding when everything was strung together and spoken quickly.
Just then, two local middle-aged men happened to walk past. After hearing Zhang Han, they looked at him with a trace of mockery.
"He's obviously from the mainland. This is an English-themed restaurant, and he walked in without even knowing the rules. Only mainlanders would do something like that." One of the crew-cut middle-aged men spoke to his companion in English.
"What an embarrassment." His companion muttered in English as well.
The two men assumed Zhang Han couldn't understand them and spoke without restraint. Even the beautiful waitress beside them heard everything clearly, though she merely smiled faintly.
Zhang Han hadn't understood, but the little one in his arms had!
Mengmeng looked furious. She pointed at the two men and shouted in a childish yet extremely fluent voice:
"You don't bark in front of the Ant deity!"
As soon as she finished speaking, the two men stiffened. Their faces reddened, and they hurried away.
Being overheard while speaking ill of someone to their face was certainly embarrassing. Moreover, locals like them believed that children who could speak English had received an elite education, so they regarded them with greater respect.
"What's wrong, Mengmeng?" Zhang Han asked with a faint smile.
"They're bad, bad people. They said bad things about Daddy..." Mengmeng angrily repeated what the two men had said to Zhang Han.
Zhang Han patted Mengmeng's head and said with a faint smile, "Mengmeng, no matter how highly they think of themselves, they're still just ants. Don't bother with them. Let's go eat. Mengmeng, you're amazing—your English is so good. We'll have to rely on you to order when we eat out."
"Really?" Mengmeng immediately cheered up when she heard this. She felt that she finally had a really important use in front of Daddy.
"Of course. Mengmeng, you're the best." Zhang Han smiled and lightly pinched Mengmeng's little cheek.
This made the Little Princess giggle nonstop. In the end, with Mengmeng translating, Zhang Han successfully ordered a fairly sumptuous Western meal.
While eating, Zhang Han was already thinking things over. It seemed he would have to set aside some time recently to learn a few other languages.
English, German, French, Korean, Japanese, and all the rest—he would learn every one of them.
How could mere languages stump the illustrious Immortal Lord Hanyang?
After the meal, Zhang Han took Mengmeng back to New Moon Mountain.
Mengmeng continued playing with Xiao Hei in the grass, while Zhang Han began planting wheat and other crops.
The wheat was planted on a flat patch of land. He used tools to rake the soil back and forth twice, scattered the seeds, and covered them. Corn and soybeans, however, required furrows, with the seeds planted on the raised sections.
On New Moon Mountain, Zhang Han worked the fields while Mengmeng and Xiao Hei played nearby, filling this paradise beyond the mortal world with a warm atmosphere.
At Imperial Dynasty Entertainment, in Ziyan's office.
"Sis Yan." Zhou Fei walked in from outside and let out a sigh of relief. "That old witch did give you some consideration. Although the team filming the music video isn't very good, at least she arranged one for you, and the final refinements to the song are done too."
"Then let's go to the recording studio. We'll finish recording the song over the next few days and then shoot the music video." Ziyan rose to her feet.
"Sis Yan, no need to rush so much, right? You've been pretty tired these past few days. Why not rest this afternoon?" Zhou Fei raised her brows.
"No. We don't have that much time. I heard Xu Ruoyu has already started rushing her music video. Shooting the video still requires post-production and promotion, so we don't have much time. Besides, I want to finish everything quickly so I can spend some quality time with Mengmeng." Ziyan shook her head slightly.
"All right, then." Zhou Fei curled her lips, clearly agreeing. "It is time to spend some quality time with Mengmeng. Otherwise, that heartless little girl might get snatched away by Zhang Han. Look at today—when you wouldn't let Mengmeng go out, Zhang Han didn't even pay you any attention and just took her away. What are we going to do if this keeps up?"
"Hmph!" Ziyan led the way out. Along the way, she gave a soft snort and said irritably, "Tonight, I'm going to have a talk with him. He's about to take over as master in just a few days. Dream on!"
"Dream on! Hehe, tonight I'll kick him out for you!" Zhou Fei had always loved watching the commotion. After hearing Ziyan, she wore a gleeful smile.
Meanwhile, in a room on the twenty-second floor of a high-rise apartment building in the Huamei residential complex in New Moon Bay.
Xue Qian sat exhaustedly by the window. On the table beside him were more than a dozen bottles of Rio cocktails, six of them already empty. A trace of drunkenness colored Xue Qian's face.
"Old Xue, don't get worked up. Things have already come to this, so we can only think of another way. Now that all those endorsements and commercial performances have been canceled, you have time. You could release an album. Isn't music your dream?" The square-faced man beside him, nearly thirty years old, sighed softly.
Xue Qian did not answer. He stared blankly at the coast outside the window, took another large gulp of alcohol, and sighed.
Seeing him like this, the square-faced man sighed as well, feeling that Xue Qian had it hard.
Xue Qian was a popular first-tier male singer with countless fans. His representative songs included "Ugly," "Within a Few Miles," and "Animal World," all beloved by the public. Over the past two years, he had frequently appeared on variety shows and his popularity had exploded, earning him the title of the Prince of Variety Shows. But the past month had brought him a devastating blow.
He had broken up with his ex-girlfriend a year ago. They had separated for many reasons, but a month earlier, his ex-girlfriend had exposed several disputes from their relationship and private life.
Such disputes would have attracted no attention if they involved an ordinary couple. But he was a famous, immensely popular male star, and the information exposed was all unfavorable to him. In an instant, he was branded a "scumbag."
Within a month, every variety show, commercial performance, and endorsement had canceled their cooperation with him.
Seeing that Xue Qian could only drown his sorrows in alcohol, his manager, the square-faced man, said indignantly, "Old Xue, that woman has gone too far. What is she trying to achieve by stirring all this up? I really can't understand it. Does that mean everything she said was true? Those media outlets reported the story without distinguishing right from wrong. It's outrageous. Shouldn't we sue them?"
Xue Qian was stunned for a long while. After draining a bottle of alcohol, he sighed and said,
"There's no right or wrong in love!"
"Ah, Old Xue." The square-faced man gave a bitter laugh. "You're just too stubborn and weak in this regard. If it were me, how could I endure it for a month? I would have struck back long ago! Damn it, wouldn't it have been better for a boyfriend and girlfriend to break up peacefully? Why did that woman have to cut off contact completely?"
"All right, Li Fan. I won't keep sinking into depression. I'll release some information tonight. Also, the concert in Linhai City on the fifteenth will go ahead as scheduled. I'm going to perform several new songs. Li Fan, help me see whether any good songs have been submitted." Xue Qian rose and spoke calmly.
"What?" Li Fan was stunned at first, then overjoyed. He nodded repeatedly.
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