Time flew like an arrow, and another week passed in the blink of an eye. Just as Tao Fengche was contemplating how to cause trouble for Sui Yuesheng, the latter received a phone call during a meeting.

Every Monday morning was the time for Tao Corporation’s routine meeting, where senior executives from various departments gathered to report on the progress of the previous week’s work and to make plans for the next phase.

Both Tao Zhixing and Sui Yuesheng were people with clear principles and boundaries, tolerating no mistakes or deviations. The executives of Tao Corporation were already accustomed to setting their phones to silent mode before the meeting and handing them over to their secretaries. Unless it was a matter of utmost urgency, they were not to be disturbed.

However, even if something did come up, under the CEO’s death glare, few secretaries dared to bring the phone into the room. Most of the time, issues were dealt with after the meeting.

This time was no different.

Just as the manager of the finance department was presenting a PPT, the door to the meeting room suddenly opened. Assistant Zhou stood at the door, holding a vibrating phone, looking at Sui Yuesheng.

The latter instinctively frowned. Assistant Zhou quickly walked over to him, bent down, and whispered, “It’s… Young Master Tao’s homeroom teacher.”

If it had been anyone else calling, he wouldn’t have dared to disturb Sui Yuesheng during a meeting even if he had ten times the courage. But his boss had explicitly said that any matter concerning Young Master Tao, no matter what he was doing, should be reported to him immediately.

Sui Yuesheng glanced at the phone screen, raised his hand to make a pause gesture, indicating the presenter to stop. Then he took the phone and walked out.

The door closed behind him, and the meeting room was immediately filled with low murmurs.

“What’s up with President Sui?”

Someone boldly speculated, “For a call that could make President Sui leave a meeting, it must be from the mayor or a city council member, right?”

Someone else worried, “But I heard the health department is planning some big moves lately?”

“Health department?!”

“Does it have anything to do with our company’s production line?”

The group exchanged information anxiously, but still couldn’t figure it out, so they waited eagerly for Sui Yuesheng to return and clarify.

Carrying the weight of the executives’ expectations, Sui Yuesheng hurried back to his office. He motioned for Assistant Zhou to close the door, took a deep breath, and answered the call.

Before he could speak, the person on the other end introduced themselves first, “Hello, Mr. Sui. I’m Feng Hui, Tao Fengche’s homeroom teacher.”

It was a very young female voice. Sui Yuesheng had already investigated her, knowing she was a recently graduated beta teacher from a teacher training college, filling in as a temporary homeroom teacher. Hence, he was not surprised by her young-sounding voice.

He responded calmly, “Hello, Teacher Feng.”

Feng Hui didn’t engage in pleasantries and went straight to the point, “I apologize for contacting you at this time. I hope I’m not disturbing your work. May I ask, are you usually very busy with work Mr. Sui?”

Sui Yuesheng: “?”

What was this about? He was puzzled, not understanding why she was asking this. After thinking for a while, he deflected, “It’s manageable. Is there something you need from me today, Teacher Feng?”

Surely, she wasn’t calling just to chat?

Feng Hui sighed deeply, her tone carrying a hint of reproach, “It’s like this, Mr. Sui. This morning, while checking the homework, I found that Tao Fengche’s dictation homework for the entire week was not signed by a parent. Following usual practice, I had the students whose homework was unsatisfactory stand for half a class period. But Tao Fengche has always been a good student, and this has never happened before.”

“Because of this, I called him to the office after class to ask about it.” Feng Hui coughed lightly, her tone growing more reproachful. “He told me that his guardian was too busy with work to sign it. After he returned to class, I checked the home-school contact booklet and saw that the guardian’s phone number had been changed from Mr. Tao’s to yours, so I thought I’d call to inquire.”

“Making money is indeed not easy, and the larger the company, the harder it gets. But no matter how busy one is, as a parent, one cannot neglect the child. Although it’s only the second year of high school, this year is still very crucial for them…”

Sui Yuesheng: “?”

He was utterly bewildered. From the moment Feng Hui started speaking, he couldn’t understand what she was talking about.

Signature? What signature? Tao Fengche had never mentioned needing a signature!

He wanted to interrupt to clarify this matter, but Feng Hui didn’t give him the chance, continuing her persistent monologue. Sui Yuesheng couldn’t find an opportunity to interject.

“Next semester, they will start applying to schools. Although this time it’s just a dictation homework, what if it’s the monthly exam, mid-term, or final exam results, or a parent-teacher meeting notice? Or even something more significant…”

“To improve a child’s grades, we can’t rely solely on the school. Parents also need to pay more attention, so we can work together…”

Sui Yuesheng: “…”

His well-cultivated manners prevented him from interrupting Feng Hui, but his eyebrows were tightly knit, and he was on the verge of collapsing.

He neither understood what “dictation homework” was nor why a simple signature had escalated to this extent. He also didn’t understand why she was saying all this. If she were an employee of Tao Corporation, she would have been fired long ago for taking so long to get to the point.

Given that she was Tao Fengche’s homeroom teacher, Sui Yuesheng took numerous deep breaths, holding back his anger. Finally, Feng Hui’s lecture seemed to pause as she took a sip of water. He quickly spoke up, putting an end to this bewildering conversation.

“Okay, Teacher Feng, I understand. I’ll pay more attention in the future.”

Better to agree to everything first!

Sui Yuesheng quickly said, then hastily pressed the hang-up button and let out a long sigh.

This teacher was like Tang Seng from “Journey to the West”—once she started talking, there seemed to be no end. Never in his life had he encountered such a person. By comparison, the verbal battles in the meeting room were much more enjoyable.

He sighed, tossed the phone back to Assistant Zhou, and returned to the meeting room.

Seeing the group of middle-aged alpha executives, with their average age of at least forty-five and their thinning hair, Sui Yuesheng suddenly smiled.

The eager executives shivered at his smile, not daring to ask questions. They repressed their curiosity and took turns presenting. The usually stoic President Sui suddenly smiling…

It looked good, but it felt dangerously ominous, as if they might be executed on the spot in the next second.

The varied thoughts of the executives were set aside for the moment. After the meeting, Sui Yuesheng returned to his office, where Assistant Zhou had already brought lunch from the cafeteria. He ate a little and then resumed tackling the pile of documents on his desk.

When the clock pointed between “5” and “6,” there was still a small stack of documents left unfinished. Sui Yuesheng suddenly looked up, picked up the desk phone, and dialed an internal line to Assistant Zhou.

“I don’t have any social engagements tonight, do I?”

Assistant Zhou, who knew his schedule by heart, immediately responded, “No, you don’t.”

“Alright then, I’ll head out first. I’ll take the documents home to review and provide feedback tomorrow.”

“Understood, Mr. Sui.” Assistant Zhou nodded and promptly informed the driver to bring the car around, wisely refraining from asking why Sui Yuesheng was in such a hurry to go home today.

After all, working overtime was his norm.

Because Sui Yuesheng’s off-work time was extremely irregular, it was hard for him to make it back to the Tao family ancestral home before seven every evening. Moreover, he occasionally had social engagements, so he couldn’t let Tao Fengche, a high school student, wait hungry for him to come home and eat together. Therefore, Sui Yuesheng simply had Xu Song tell the kitchen not to wait for him, even on nights when he didn’t have engagements. As long as Tao Fengche was home, they should go ahead and eat; when he returned, he could just heat up the leftovers.

Xu Song obediently complied, but the kitchen staff would never dare let Sui Yuesheng eat leftovers. The head chef pondered over it and decided to cook dinner twice each evening. After all, the kitchen was staffed 24/7, so it wasn’t much trouble.

That day, contrary to his usual practice, Sui Yuesheng left work on time. However, on his way back, there was a massive traffic jam on the elevated highway due to a chain-reaction accident. Traffic was at a standstill, and even after an hour, he had barely moved five kilometers. Frustrated and uninterested in handling documents in the car, he leaned back and took a nap.

By the time he reached the Tao residence, it was past eight.

Sui Yuesheng quietly ate dinner alone in the dining room, and when he looked up, it was nearly nine. Over the past few days, he had roughly figured out Tao Fengche’s routine: on weekdays, Tao Fengche would usually finish his homework around nine, then go downstairs to exercise.

Originally, Sui Yuesheng intended to go straight to his study to work and then inform Tao Fengche to come up after finishing his homework. But he suddenly changed his mind and decided to go see Tao Fengche in person.

The Tao family highly valued personal privacy, and if someone was in a room, the door would almost always be closed. Sui Yuesheng stood in front of the door for a moment before finally raising his hand and knocking.

Two long knocks followed by one short, with a fixed interval, very rhythmic.

Sui Yuesheng felt a bit hopeful. This was a signal they had agreed upon in their childhood, and he hoped Tao Fengche would remember.

But the latter disappointed him.

Tao Fengche’s voice came clearly from behind the door, “Who is it?”

Sui Yuesheng felt a bit downcast, “It’s me,” he said.

After a silent five seconds, Tao Fengche finally spoke, “Come in.”

He didn’t use a subject and didn’t say “please.” Sui Yuesheng lightly raised an eyebrow, didn’t comment on it, and pressed the door handle to enter.

There were no surveillance cameras in Tao Fengche’s room, and Sui Yuesheng hadn’t developed X-ray vision, so he would never know that at the moment the three knocks sounded, Tao Fengche’s hand had tightened, causing the sharp pen tip to instantly tear through the draft paper.