In his previous life, Su Yizhou's childhood had been tightly gripped by his parents from the moment he entered kindergarten. Even when he was still an innocent and ignorant toddler, his parents showed an extraordinary level of attention and obsession with his academic performance.
They firmly believed that so-called good study habits must be instilled from a young age. Consequently, the young Su Yizhou was forced onto the arduous path of reciting Tang poetry, practicing calligraphy, and learning addition and subtraction. He rarely had any time that truly belonged to him.
Reborn into this lifetime, he still could not escape this hurdle. On this weekend afternoon, having just finished lunch and happily plotting which cartoon to "favor" for the afternoon, Su Yizhou was suddenly grabbed by Liu Shiran and pinned down in front of the study desk.
With a stern look on her face, she was determined to "crush" Su Yizhou, who spent all day watching cartoons, with some real intensity. If he failed to keep up with this intensity, he couldn't blame her for cutting down his daily television time.
Faced with this situation, Su Yizhou inwardly cursed his bad luck. In his previous life, he had been crushed to the point of suffocation by this very treatment. Reborn, he just wanted to say to Liu Shiran:
"I'm not pretending anymore. I'm laying my cards on the table—I am the God of Literature reincarnated!"
Recalling those past days, his parents' demands could simply be described as "terrifying." From elementary school all the way to high school, the only things in their eyes were studying, studying, and more studying!
Other high school peers, after boarding at school for five days, returned home yearning to completely relax their minds and bodies, treated like emperors by parents who let them enjoy some rare leisure time.
However, Su Yizhou alone was different. He would rather stay at school day and night than go home to face the extra study assignments assigned by his parents, having to handle both schoolwork and various extracurricular competition training classes.
Although the result was good—Su Yizhou did indeed achieve an outstanding score on the national college entrance examination and was admitted to a C9 university—having studied non-stop from childhood to adulthood, he had no idea what else he could do apart from studying. Once he reached university and his parents stopped keeping tabs on him, he completely let loose, turning into a shut-in who knew only how to stay hoarded in his dorm playing video games all day.
Liu Shiran's plan for today was to teach Su Yizhou addition and subtraction within fifty.
"Zhouzhou, listen carefully. You haven't forgotten the addition and subtraction within ten that I taught you before, have you? Today, Mommy is going to teach you how to do addition and subtraction within fifty."
...(ten thousand words omitted here)
The more Su Yizhou listened, the more impatient he became, naturally letting his head droop onto the study desk and resting it on his chin.
Thinking that his mind was once again wandering to play, Liu Shiran grew a bit angry. Without caring whether he understood or not, she directly asked him: "Tell me, what is 15 plus 23?"
"38."
"25 plus 20?"
"45."
"57 plus 45?"
"102."
Su Yizhou answered every single question with exceptional speed.
...
She hurriedly switched to three-digit addition and subtraction, and Su Yizhou still rattled off the answers fluently.
Huh?
Now it was Liu Shiran's turn to be dumbfounded. Wait a minute, did I ever teach you these?
Then she simply saw Su Yizhou jump off his chair, run toward the living room, toss out the sentence, "Too easy, silly Mommy, I'm going to watch cartoons," and strut away, leaving Liu Shiran in a disheveled mess all by herself in the room.
Could my son be a prodigy?
Recovering her senses, she hurriedly chased out of the room. Looking at Su Yizhou, who was just about to turn on the TV, she wanted to stop him, but figured that since he not only knew how to do it but had overfulfilled her task, what harm was there in watching a bit of TV? She turned around to go rest in her room, intending to have a good discussion with Su Jin in the evening.
"What? My son is a prodigy?" A sudden exclamation burst out at the dinner table. Su Jin looked at Su Yizhou in disbelief, while the party in question maintained a calm expression, thinking to himself: What a big deal, getting yourself scared like this? I'll be doing even bigger things in the future, you better make sure your heart can handle it.
"Sigh, I just did some addition and subtraction within 100. Mom taught me that before, it's just with a few more digits. Don't make such a fuss over nothing." If it were the Su Jin before his rebirth, he would never have dared to speak to Su Jin like this.
Looking at the calm Su Yizhou, Su Jin wondered whose genes he had actually inherited. Liu Shiran? Her math skills could at best be bragged about before Su Yizhou entered junior high school. Back in university, if it weren't for her poor math skills and constantly coming to him for tutoring, she wouldn't even have Su Yizhou now!
Could it be himself? In all fairness, his own math level in university was only barely passing. As a liberal arts student trapped in a science major, it probably wasn't his achievement either.
If not for looking at Su Yizhou's handsome face that was just like his own, Su Jin really would have suspected that the baby had been swapped at the hospital.
*Haha, my son possesses the bearing of a Great Emperor!*
When it came time to sleep at night, Su Jin wrapped his left arm around Liu Shiran's waist and asked her, "Honey, since Zhouzhou is so smart, should we still push him this hard? After all, he's still so young, and this is the time when he should be enjoying his childhood. Didn't we just worry before that he wouldn't be able to get into a good university in the future?"
"I don't want to push him this hard either. Which parents don't want their child to have a good life later on? But what you said makes sense; Zhouzhou is indeed too young right now. Sigh, let's loosen up a bit then. When he actually starts school, if his grades aren't up to par, we can teach him then," Liu Shiran said helplessly.
Looking at the several books placed on the bookshelf—*How to Be Good Parents*, *How to Cultivate a Child's Character*, *How to Establish a Child's Values*, and similar titles—Su Jin and Liu Shiran fell silent.
It seemed that she and Su Jin were rather failing at being parents for the very first time.
Back when Su Yizhou was just born, wasn't the wish Su Jin made outside the delivery room simply that safety and health were enough?
Thinking of this, Su Jin felt relieved.
In fact, Su Yizhou also knew how deep his parents' love was, and he had never harbored any resentment toward them. Which parents do not love their children?
Su Jin pulled Liu Shiran into his embrace and said softly, "Then from now on, let's just let Zhouzhou 'grow wildly' on his own. As long as his core values are straight, we shouldn't put so much pressure on him!"
Liu Shiran pressed against Su Jin's chest and softly agreed.
On the other side, Su Yizhou, who had already fallen fast asleep, had no idea how much his parents' educational philosophy had changed just because of the tiny tip of the iceberg he had inadvertently revealed.
The silent atmosphere was quickly broken. Su Jin's hands began to grow restless, slithering about like a loach.
The atmosphere gradually grew amorous.
"Honey, since Zhouzhou is so smart, look—we shouldn't waste such good genes, right?"
And then followed a segment unsuitable for children; if you don't like reading that, I'll skip it.