Rebirth 04: Starting from Taking an Unconventional Approach

Chapter 164 In the Dark

When Han Fei stepped into the large conference room on the third floor of the publishing house, the room was filled with low voices of conversation and laughter. He knew that Yuan Fan's arrival had made him late, and it was too late to mingle with his colleagues, eat cake, tell jokes, and banter with each other. People often express their farewells to those they admire through such social means. But thankfully, he still managed to arrive on time to deliver his gift.

Han Fei scanned the conference room. Zhou Ming and the others' luggage had already been packed and placed on the table where the gifts were displayed. Lin Feng reached out and took down the A4 sheets of paper pinned to the wall. The papers listed the progress of various technical tasks, and now each item was crossed out in red, indicating that all tasks had been completed.

"I'm sorry for the trouble I've caused you these past two weeks."

At this moment, everyone's attention was focused on Han Fei.

"President Han," Zhou Ming said, giving a simple smile, "Don't be so polite, this is our mission."

"A task that you finish and leave immediately is called a mission," Han Fei said. "If you stay for a cup of tea after you finish, then we're friends."

A burst of giggles filled the air. Han Fei noticed Lin Feng giving Zhou Ming a questioning smile.

"To be honest, we were quite worried when we first arrived," Lin Feng said. "The headquarters has supported quite a few SP companies before, but they basically took the policy and ran away, or they shut down after a while. But you guys are really dedicated to your work, and for that reason alone, this trip was worthwhile."

"So, when you go back this time, is there anything you need our cooperation with?" Han Fei asked.

"Not yet," Zhou Ming said. "President Fang said that once headquarters has a clear plan, she will personally communicate with you. The rest of us will be responsible for the work."

"I want to give myself a few gifts," Raymond Lam said. "Although it's a bit like dividing an inheritance, first of all... a USB drive."

He took a small USB drive out of his bag: "I'm going to give this to Wen Jie. I want to say that Wen Jie is really promising. His technical foundation isn't top-notch, but he has something that many programmers don't have, and that is an understanding of the business. He's not the kind of person who finishes writing code and then forgets about it. He thinks about why this function needs to be done, what kind of design would make users willing to use it, and how to recover quickly if problems occur. This kind of thinking is invaluable to Qingniao."

"And then there's your one-sentence submission system," Wang Zhe said. "When Wen Jie told me about it, I thought that with his technical skills, this project wouldn't be finished in less than ten days or half a month. But he managed to get the core functions up and running in less than a week by himself. Although there are still many areas that can be optimized, that kind of drive reminded me of when I first entered the industry."

Han Fei noticed that Wen Jie's eyes were red.

"This USB drive contains some technical documents I've compiled over the years," Lin Feng said. "It includes case studies on database optimization, design principles for high-concurrency architectures, and reviews of common pitfalls. It's not some company secret; I wrote it myself. Keep it; it might be useful."

Han Fei gently nudged Wen Jie, then stepped forward. Lin Feng hugged him and handed him the USB drive. He then hugged Zhou Ming and Wang Zhe.

"Wen Jie, keep up the good work," Zhou Ming said. "At the next technical check-up, I hope to see you and your team discussing the architecture with us."

Everyone applauded, and Wen Jie's eyes gradually filled with tears.

"The next heirloom is this fountain pen," Lin Feng said. "This pen has been with me for... about five or six years. Coders don't actually use pens much, but I take this pen with me to meetings and on business trips, and I've taken notes on quite a few things. So I'm going to give this pen to the editorial department. You deal with words every day, so you need it more than I do. You can keep it; it's for when someone needs to revise a manuscript."

The editors turned around and laughed at him, and he laughed back.

"Finally, I'd like to give President Han and Ms. Zhang something special." Lin Feng took out a photo from his bag. "It's nothing valuable, just a group photo our team took a while ago. It has all three of our signatures on the back. It's a small token of our appreciation, and we hope you can keep it as a memento."

"Thank you, Engineer Lin," Zhang Ruiyi said with a smile.

Han Fei stepped forward and took the group photo. Applause rang out again.

"Thank you," Han Fei said, and hugged the members of the technical team one by one.

"The green hills remain unchanged, and the clear waters flow on forever. We'll meet again someday," Zhou Ming said.

"Thank you," Han Fei said again, feeling that Zhou Ming had been hugging him for a little too long. Han Fei presented the gifts he had prepared to the three members of the technical team. They were three sample copies of the first issue of Bluebird Magazine, each with the autographs of several contracted authors on the title page, along with a line of handwritten words from Han Fei: "To teachers Zhou Ming, Lin Feng, and Wang Zhe: Technology has boundaries, but friendship is boundless. Bluebird's sky will always keep a window open for you. Han Fei."

At 9 PM, Wen Shuyan returned to the school parking lot from the gym. As usual, after finishing her rehearsal at school, she left her car in the parking lot and walked to the Huizhi Fitness Center near the school. She went there not because the equipment was different from the gym near her home, but because it was more crowded and less deserted.

She turned into the parking lot, went to her MINI Cooper, pressed the key, opened the door, and put her gym bag and supermarket bags inside. Before getting in, she habitually glanced at herself in the rearview mirror. She looked great, her friend remarked; not even thirty yet, she already owned her own house, her favorite car, and a stable job with a promising future. Her friend also asked if she was used to life in Shanghai, and if she'd never experienced relationship anxiety in her twenties. It was strange; their minds automatically connected these two questions.

Wen Shuyan glanced at the rearview mirror again. Her friend was right; she looked really good. She thought she saw a shadow flicker in the corner of the mirror—no, it was just a leaf falling. Just as she was about to get in the car, she suddenly remembered she should take a pack of tissues from the trunk first.

Wen Shuyan turned around and was so frightened that she almost screamed.

The man was standing right behind her. Terrified, she took a step back, one hand covering her mouth. She wanted to smile and apologize, not because she actually had anything to apologize for, but because the man seemed harmless. But she immediately realized she recognized him. He had not only accompanied another woman to her house before, but had also called her twice, trying to ask her out.

The first thought that flashed through her mind was that everyone at school would have left by now, and there was no one around.

"Chen Zhengyuan," the man said, "from NetEase. Your brother used to work in my department. We've met before. Teacher Wen should remember me, right?"

"What do you want?" Wen Shuyan asked, trying hard to control her voice and prevent it from trembling, because her intuition told her that she must not show any fear. "What do you want?"

Chen Zhengyuan gave a fake smile: "Teacher Wen, don't be nervous. It's quite a coincidence. I just came to the school to take care of some business. I just finished talking with Vice Principal Zhang in the school-enterprise cooperation office and was about to leave when I saw you as soon as I entered the parking lot. I thought you looked familiar, so I wanted to come over and say hello. I didn't expect to scare you."

Wen Shuyan remained silent. There seemed to be something in Chen Zhengyuan's voice. No, there seemed to be something behind his voice that she had never heard before; it was like a low-frequency, almost inaudible howl.

"Teacher Wen, I was really too presumptuous when I called you last time. Principal Zhang mentioned you to me, saying that your musical skills are among the highest of all the young teachers in the school. I happen to be planning a charity concert and need a professional advisor. I tend to get anxious when talking about work and didn't pay attention to my approach. I was too blunt on the phone, which made you misunderstand. I've reflected on it since then, and I really shouldn't have made the appointment so directly. I should have sent a formal email first to go through the proper process."

Wen Shuyan looked down at her hands and nodded.

"By the way, how's Wenjie doing lately?"

"That's fine," Wen Shuyan said, subconsciously taking a step back. She had read in a book that the social space between unfamiliar people is one to three and a half meters, and that people maintain this distance when circumstances permit.

"I heard from my former colleagues in the tech department that he's doing quite well at Qingniao. To be honest, I was a little reluctant to see him leave. The content management system he developed at NetEase was a great idea, but unfortunately, the company underwent a strategic shift and it couldn't be implemented. However, seeing him shine at Qingniao makes me happy for him. If possible, please give him my regards and ask him to come back and catch up with his old colleagues when he has time. We can still be friends."

"Um.

""

"I almost forgot to mention the important matter." Chen Zhengyuan's eyes lit up with a smile. "Principal Zhang and I just finalized something: there will be a launch meeting for an original music support program in a few days after the start of the semester. The school will recommend several young faculty members to participate in the preparation and implementation. Principal Zhang said you're one of the department's key talents, and he might specifically request you to attend. I'll also be there, since this is an important project between NetEase and the school. Don't pretend you don't know me when we meet."

Wen Shuyan's heart raced, and she no longer felt that the nights at the end of August were hot.

"It's getting late, you should head back now. The streetlights are too dim, be careful. See you next time." Chen Zhengyuan turned and left.

Wen Shuyan immediately got into the car, started the engine, and drove away.

As the car approached the Cuihu Tiandi residential complex, she suddenly felt someone watching her from the back seat. Looking in the rearview mirror, she saw a man's face. It wasn't Chen Zhengyuan's face, but a stranger's. She slammed on the brakes, the rubber tires screeching against the asphalt, followed by three angry honks from the car behind her. Looking in the rearview mirror, her chest heaving, she saw a young man in the car behind her, looking utterly terrified. Trembling, she continued driving, passing the entrance to the Cuihu Tiandi complex, and then made a U-turn at the intersection.

Wen Shuyan pulled the car over to the sidewalk, released the steering wheel, took out her phone, and dialed Han Fei's number. Besides her brother's number, Han Fei's was the only number Wen Shuyan could remember. She stared straight ahead, her finger on the dial button, and took a deep breath. No. She hesitated for a moment, then finally dismissed the idea.

"The fifth point is... twenty years of being mute," Sun Yue said, swirling her coffee cup. Han Fei thought the coffee cup was almost worn transparent by her. They were sitting in Han Fei's office at 9:30 p.m. Because Sun Yue had to liaise with both Ye Cao and Sun Jianguo, she seemed to have become the busiest person in the editorial department all of a sudden, and she finally managed to find time to report to Han Fei in the middle of the night.

"Sun Jianguo heard it while running the postal route," Sun Yue said. "It's about a village in Qingpu where there was a mute man who opened a blacksmith shop at the village entrance and worked as a blacksmith for twenty years."

"Twenty years?" Zhang Ruiyi said.

"Yes, for twenty years. He didn't charge for blacksmithing; whoever came to have farm tools made would just need a meal. The villagers all said he was stupid, wondering if he had something wrong with his head. Then one year there was a big flood, and the village bridge was washed away. The mute man carried stones for three days by himself and built a makeshift bridge over the river."

"and then?"

Sun Yue turned to the next page of the notebook on the table: "On the very night the bridge was completed, the mute man died. When the villagers were sorting through his belongings, they found a wooden box under his bed, filled with letters. The letters were written by a woman over twenty years."

The first letter was addressed to "Brother Mute," saying, "I'm leaving, don't wait for me." The last letter was also addressed to "Brother Mute," saying, "I have a terminal illness, I can't go back in this life. In the next life, I'll be your wife."

Han Fei and Zhang Ruiyi looked at each other and both took a breath.

"Who is this woman?" Han Fei asked.

Sun Jianguo said he had checked, but found nothing. Nobody in the village knew the mute man had ever had a lover, except for the old locust tree at the village entrance.

.

"The old locust tree?" Zhang Ruiyi asked. "How much of this story is true?"

Sun Yue thought for a moment: "The story of the mute building the bridge is true. Sun Jianguo said he saw the bridge with his own eyes. As for the letters, an old village secretary told me about them after the mute died. As for the contents of the letters, the old secretary said that the mute gestured for him to read them before he died. It's been passed down orally, so there might be some embellishment. But this story has been circulating in the village for more than ten years, and no one thinks it's fake."

Sun Jianguo said, "People in their area believe in this."

Han Fei nodded: "Let's do it. If this story is written down and illustrated, it will have a very strong emotional impact."

"Okay." Sun Yue put down her coffee cup, wrote it down in her notebook, and turned to the next page. "The sixth one, which is also the last one left on Sun Jianguo's side. It's a bit short, but I think it's very suitable for the resource library."

"Hmm, tell me about it," Han Fei said.

"When Sun Jianguo was running the postal route, he passed through a village. At the village entrance was a stone mill with a line of words carved on the millstone: 'Xiuying, wait for me to come back.' The villagers said that the words were carved by a young man sixty years ago. He was going to fight in the war, and before he left, he told Xiuying that he would come back to marry her after the war. Later, the war ended, but he didn't return. Xiuying waited for him for three years, and then married someone else."

Ten years later, a man with a leg ailment came to the village. He stood in front of the millstone all day and left after dark. The next day, someone found another line of text next to the original one on the millstone: "Xiuying, I'm back. How are you?"