Miss Nie and Xiao Juzi had always held completely different views regarding Zhang Xiaohua's identity.
Miss Nie felt that Zhang Xiaohua ought to be an otherworldly eccentric. Simply the way he sat upright atop Four Unlike, putting on that deliberately profound air, was enough to set one thinking deeply. Of course, that was also because Miss Nie knew and understood the habits of an animal like Four Unlike. To anyone else, he would merely seem like some lad riding a mule. Speaking of a lad, Miss Nie had another reason for hesitation: Zhang Xiaohua's age. Although Zhang Xiaohua had basically finished growing, his features differed little from several years ago. Only his face had lengthened slightly, shedding a youth's childishness and taking on a young man's vitality. The youthful air rushing toward one's face proclaimed in every way that the young man before her was in the prime of his rainy-season years. This left Miss Nie puzzled. How could an eccentric be so young?
Yet Miss Nie, who was quite skilled at judging people, had read something in Zhang Xiaohua's seemingly ordinary eyes during their few chance encounters—certain depths she had never seen before. That was the key reason she had kept calling Zhang Xiaohua an eccentric. But if asked what exactly those profound things were, she could not explain them either.
"Just a woman's sixth sense!"
That was what Miss Nie said.
Only you're a woman? I'm not a woman, then?
Xiao Juzi curled her lips, thinking this inwardly.
Indeed, in Xiao Juzi's eyes, what was strange about appearing out in the wilderness early in the morning? She had heard that the farmers outside the village rose with the sun and rested at sunset. For a young man from the countryside, getting up that early was all too easy.