Soul Returns to Hong Kong: From Tailor Shop to Richest Woman

Around 10 p.m., the village houses finally quieted down as people who had visited relatives and friends for the New Year dispersed, leaving only the aroma of leftover tea and fruit peels in the first-floor hall.

Lin Qian and Lin Yue were arguing over the last piece of cake at the corner of the stairs on the second floor. Lin Ying ignored the two clowns, took a cup of hot tea, knocked on her parents' bedroom door, and repeated what she had told her grandfather to her parents.

Lin Lanying, who was knitting in a wicker chair, stopped knitting after hearing this: "Are you really telling Grandpa that you won't get married and only want children?"

"I said so."

"Didn't your grandfather use his cane to chase you out?" Lin Lanying stared wide-eyed. If it were Lin Qian who had spoken to the old man, he would have broken his legs.

He Dazhu, sitting on a small stool next to him, chimed in, "When has Dad ever hit anyone? Besides, Aying is a very capable person now..."

"Don't interrupt!"

He Dazhu picked up his teacup and remained silent.

Lin Ying looked at her parents and continued, "Mommy, I'm not going to have a baby and bring it home right now or tomorrow; I'm just making my thoughts clear in advance so that you won't keep nagging me to go on blind dates every day when you see other people's daughters getting married."

"Who's been nagging you every day?" Lin Lanying retorted.

"Not at the moment, but it's hard to say in the future. I'm twenty-one this year, and in two years you'll definitely be anxious," Lin Ying said.

Lin Lanying was momentarily speechless: "What about the child's father? You can't just grab anyone off the street, can you? What if he comes after you to take the child away, and also has his eye on your money?"

"That's why we need to be even more cautious and absolutely not relinquish the initiative."

Lin Lanying felt a headache coming on. In traditional thinking, a woman was always expected to have a home. She turned to her husband, who was pretending not to hear, and said, "Why aren't you saying anything? She's your daughter too! Are you just going to watch her act like this?"

He Dazhu thought for a moment and then said, "I think what Aying said makes sense."

"He Dazhu!" Lin Lanying said.

"Let me finish speaking first." He Dazhu moved aside, stool and all, to create some distance between himself and his wife.

He continued, "You do the math, how much money does Ah Ying have right now? Tens of millions of US dollars, we can't even count a fraction of that in our lifetime; she'll be starting companies and large factories in the future, and she'll be dealing with even more people."

"If she marries someone with too many conditions, those wealthy families have terrifyingly many rules, and the first and second wives will be fighting each other, definitely trying to control her and take away her power; is our Ah Ying someone who can be bullied?"

Lin Lanying remained silent; she had witnessed the true colors of the wealthy in Hong Kong.

“If we marry someone with poor conditions,” He Dazhu continued, “we’ll be on edge every day, worried that he’s after her money and wants to kill her for it! So let’s find someone similar to her? What does ‘similar’ mean? There’s no scale for this, so we can put it on and weigh it to know its weight.”

Lin Ying gave Lao Dou a thumbs up: "Lao Dou hit the nail on the head, that's it; my assets and future plans don't allow me to take the risk of my marriage being interfered with and my property being divided."

Lin Lanying: "Don't encourage him, he's prone to talking nonsense when he's praised."

He Dazhu said, "What I'm saying now makes a lot of sense, okay?"

"Okay, go on."

"What I mean is, whether Ying gets married or not won't affect her life. If she wants a child, she can have one. We're both healthy now and can help take care of it. If one isn't enough, we can have two," He Dazhu said.

Lin Ying: "Two?"

"Yeah, bringing one is the same as bringing two, so bringing one more is just adding another pair of chopsticks," He Dazhu continued.

"Old Dou, a child isn't a stool from a carpentry shop; you can't just make an extra one whenever you feel like it," Lin Ying said.

He Dazhu coughed and said, "That's just what I was saying."

Lin Lanying almost burst out laughing at the words of the father and daughter, but she managed to hold it back.

She asked, "Little sister, tell Mommy honestly, did you meet someone bad while you were studying away from home? Did you get hurt in love?"

"No!"

"Really not?"

"Mommy, even though there are many boys in the science department and I see a lot of men every day, I don't have any feelings for them."

Lin Lanying pressed further, "So, out of all those male classmates, wasn't there a single suitable one?"

"no."

"How do you know it's not there if you didn't even look closely?"

Lin Ying sighed, "I went to school to study automation, not to choose a son-in-law."

"Reading books and judging people are not mutually exclusive."

"Mommy, you were just angry that I didn't want to get married, and now you're making me look at male classmates."

"Anger is anger, but as a mother, I still have to ask!" Lin Lanying said.

Lin Ying breathed a sigh of relief; she knew her grandfather wouldn't object, as he valued the family's interests and capabilities; she was just worried that her parents wouldn't accept it; especially Lin Lanying, a traditional Hong Kong woman who hoped her eldest daughter could have a stable family in the future.

"Mommy, don't worry, I won't make decisions lightly," Lin Ying said, looking at her mother.

Lin Lanying sighed, "Aying, I'm not worried about you getting scammed out of your money. I'm worried about how hard it will be for you to manage on your own later. You're already so busy with your studies, always staying up late. What will you do in the future, running a company and raising a child? How many hands will you have?"

"Aren't you all still here?" Lin Ying said. "You won't abandon me, will you?"

"Now you know to come to us?" Lin Lanying rolled her eyes at her.

"Old Dou just said it on his own initiative."

He Dazhu nodded: "Yes, yes, I said it! I'll take care of the child after we send him back to Hong Kong! I'll pick him up and drop him off at school every day, without fail!"

Lin Lanying then exposed his shortcomings: "You're in charge of picking him up and dropping him off? You even went to the wrong classroom for a parent-teacher conference when Ah Qian was in first grade, and sat in someone else's seat for half an hour!"

"That's all ancient history! Didn't I find the right person later?"

"Yeah, we only found it after the meeting ended. What's the use if everyone's gone!"

He Dazhu was speechless.

Lin Lanying looked at her daughter again: "If you don't want to get married and serve someone else, Mommy won't force you. If you want a child of your own, we'll help you raise it; but you can't hide anything from the family in the future."

"Sure," Lin Ying readily agreed.

He Dazhu added, "Yes, the man can't be just anyone; he should be healthy, smart, and as intelligent as you. And his looks absolutely can't be bad, otherwise he'll lower the average level of our family."

Lin Lanying said, "Do you think you're going back to the countryside to pick out breeding pigs?"

"No, I'm just thinking about my child's future genes, aren't I?"

Lin Ying covered her forehead: "Old Dou, this is really a long way off. Don't think about it so specifically yet. It's not even close to being settled."

Just then, a noise came from the bedroom door; Lin Qian and Lin Yue peeked out one after the other, having been eavesdropping for quite a while.

Lin Lanying shouted, "What are you two brats doing hiding there?!"

Lin Qian held up the empty plate high: "I'll ask Mommy if there's any cake left."

"No! Who told you to eat so many sweets?! Go back to sleep!"

Lin Qian turned around and ran downstairs, and Lin Yue followed suit.

After the matter was brought up, the whole family tacitly agreed not to mention it again.

On the sixth day of the Lunar New Year, Lin Ying began packing her luggage to return to her school in Beijing.

Lin Lanying checked the thick down jacket, wool scarf, and the imported humidifier she had bought last time, and then stuffed food into the gaps in the box.

On the afternoon of the seventh day of the Lunar New Year, the plane landed in Beijing on time.

February in Beijing was still very cold; Lin Ying was wearing a down jacket, and her hands were so frozen that they were numb from holding the lever. The first thing she did when she got back to the dormitory was to turn on the heater.

After the new semester started, Lin Ying realized that all she had accumulated in her previous life while bedridden was theoretical knowledge, which made mathematics and theoretical derivation much easier.

But once they entered the lab class, their true colors were revealed.

Even though it's the same circuit diagram, she can quickly calculate the voltage and current data for each node in her mind and predict the error range in advance; but when it comes to actually wiring and soldering the circuit board, she always runs into problems and rarely does it perfectly.