Midnight Bookstore

Translated by XephiZ

Edited by Aelryinth

The man’s second daughter was seventeen years old, while his son was sixteen years old.

In other words, after the man gave his second daughter away, he immediately had another child with his wife, despite the guilt and sorrow he was feeling from the loss of his child.

He was lying about his worry of paying the fine for having more than one child.

He just wanted to have a son. His first child was a daughter, and his second child was a daughter, too. He decisively gave the second daughter away and proceeded to have another child.

The man did not even know the address of the family he had given his daughter to, implying that he had decided not to contact his second daughter ever again.

Luckily, his next child was a son. Otherwise, he would have given away his third daughter and his fourth daughter too…

But now their son had leukemia, so they were desperately trying to find a suitable donor. After learning that their first daughter was not suitable to be the donor, they remembered they had another daughter they had given away.

They started looking for her to save their son’s life. They contacted the media and even put up posters to search for her.

If someone wanted to move others, they had to move themselves first. Humans were such complicated beings.

They might have felt guilty over the years after giving their daughter away, but they never regretted it. Otherwise, they would have looked for her long ago. It would be easier to find her in the first few years after giving her away.

If you were really troubled by something you did, it would constantly be on your mind, until you finally did something to relieve it.

The middle-aged man had come up with many excuses. Even he started to believe his own lies after repeating them a hundred times.

He believed he still loved and missed his second daughter. He had only given her away since he was left with no other choice. It was a touching story, like The Orphan of Zhao.

{TL Note: The Orphan of Zhao is a Chinese play from the era of the Yuan Dynasty.}

They did not realize that the daughter they had given away was already seventeen. She was currently in high school with her own circle of friends, similar to other girls her age.

It was very likely that her adoptive parents never told her she was adopted. She might think that her adoptive parents were her biological parents.

She was living a peaceful life, but she would be struck by a bolt from the blue!

-Kid, let me tell you something you should be happy about; we’ve found your biological parents!-

-Kid, let me tell you something exciting; your parents aren’t actually your biological parents!-

-Kid, let me tell you something you should rejoice about; you have a sister and a brother!-

-Kid, let me tell you something great, you can actually save your brother’s life!-

-Are you surprised?-

-Are you shocked?-

-Are you touched?-

“Boss, what’s wrong?” Bai Yingying asked when she saw Zhou Ze daydreaming at the entrance.

“There’s one thing that keeps sending a chill down my spine whenever I think about it,” Zhou Ze said.

“That serious? Boss, you’ve even been to Hell, what is it that can give you such a fright?” Bai Yingying glanced at Zhou Ze curiously.

“Well, many jobs and occupations require you to get a license before you are eligible to apply for them. Like a driver’s license, it proves that you can handle the wheels, and you are familiar with the rules. You even have to go through a practical test just to prove it. If they gave a driving license to a person that was not skillful enough or didn’t have the right attitude, they would be held responsible for the safety of the pedestrians and the other drivers on the road.”

“So?” Bai Yingying asked.

“But you don’t need a license to be someone’s parent.”

——

When Zhou Ze woke up the next morning, he automatically went to the restaurant next door for breakfast, but realized it was closed.

Zhou Ze was worried if Xu Qinglang was disheartened by the shock he had received last night. Zhou Ze did not really care if the man was disheartened, but he really needed his juice.

Xu Qinglang quickly picked up when Zhou Ze gave him a call. It turned out that he had gone to receive his prize money. He even said he would be buying some gifts before coming back.

Left with no choice, Zhou Ze ordered some food by delivery. Luckily, he still had some plum juice in the bookstore.

The door was closed, but it was not locked. It was obvious that Zhou Ze was getting lazier. He had already accommodated himself to the circumstances.

Surprisingly, when he opened the drawer at the counter, he discovered a huge stack of joss money inside.

Zhou Ze thought Bai Yingying had purposely bought him some joss paper as a prank, but he realized Bai Yingying was not that childish.

He flicked the joss money. It was real.

-Isn’t it funny…-

It was rare to see people flicking the notes or inspecting them under the sun at the stores or the market, since it was more convenient to make payments on the phone now.

Nevertheless, the joss money was real.

Zhou Ze pondered for a while. It must be his payment after sending the official to Hell yesterday. The man was once one of the Nine Ministers of the Qing Dynasty. It went without saying that he must be quite wealthy, thus his descendants would have burned lots of joss paper for him.

Zhou Ze bet a few wallets would be dropped in front of the bookstore if he burned the joss money. He was confident he would get at least five thousand yuan from them.

It was clearly worth the effort. He had earned more than five thousand yuan from just half a night’s work. The only cost was the rides there and back, which were less than a hundred yuan in total.

Zhou Ze was not in a rush to burn the joss money, since it might come in handy when he needed to avoid trouble. It was more useful than actual money.

—

“Xu Le!” The voice arrived before the girl walked into the bookstore.

Zhou Ze raised his head and saw his sister-in-law walking in.

“Here you go.” His sister-in-law was carrying a backpack. She took out a stack of cash and placed it on Zhou Ze’s counter. “The money I owe you.”

Zhou Ze smiled, “You could just transfer the money to me.”

“No way, it feels better to pay you back with a stack of cash!” The girl smacked her lips.

His sister-in-law seemed to have a better impression of Zhou Ze after what happened last time, mainly because Xu Le was just too much of a coward and could not even handle his wife. It made sense that his sister-in-law was looking down on him.

However, Zhou Ze was treating his sister-in-law arrogantly, just like an elder would do. The girl had been treating him with more respect since then.

“Xu Le, your bookstore really isn’t doing well,” the girl declared, her hands in her pockets.

“Aren’t you going to school today?”

“It’s the weekend!” The girl twisted her lips, displeased. “But I’m going to a bar later. I told my sister I’d come to your bookstore to read some books and do my homework. Don’t you dare tell her the truth.”

-Your sister hasn’t contacted me for half a month.- Zhou Ze was a little lost. He initially thought everything was fine after Doctor Lin took the initiative to hug him after he spilled the beans, but it turned out that it was just a moment of courage.

She started to think more about it after she calmed down. It was likely that Doctor Lin was still struggling to find her way out of the loop.

Her legal husband that she never liked was dead, but the man she liked had reincarnated by claiming her legal husband’s body.

It was meant to be in her favor, yet there was a huge moral line she had to cross.

Luckily, Zhou Ze was not in a rush after his encounter with the faceless woman. The thought that she was not willing to sleep with him had stopped bothering him some time ago.

Perhaps it was because he had Bai Yingying sleeping with him lately, even though he could only see instead of ‘using’ her. It was better than nothing.

“You should avoid going to places like that,” Zhou Ze reminded her. “You can do whatever you want after you make it to university.”

“I got it, you sound just like my parents and my sister. You are a university graduate too, how did you end up like this?”

If one had to describe the way she spoke nicely, it would be frank and outspoken. Otherwise, it would be dim-witted.

Zhou Ze believed his sister-in-law might have played an important role in provoking the timid Xu Le, until he finally lost it and hired someone to kill him.

It seemed his sister-in-law was still unaware that her best friend had been exposed. Maybe the news was kept off-limits to the underaged.

——

“I’m back!” Xu Qinglang showed up with lots of stuff. “It’s so tiring. Strangely, I wasn’t able to find a cab. I’m not sure if I’m out of luck, or all cab drivers have gone to some annual meeting instead.”

Xu Qinglang placed the things down and wiped his sweat off.

Bai Yingying came over. Her eyes glittered when she saw the stuff on the ground.

Computer parts!

“I’ll place it in my restaurant. You can come over and play it whenever you want,” Xu Qinglang said.

“Sure!”

Xu Qinglang gave Bai Yingying a bag and tossed Zhou Ze a delicate lighter. “Here, everyone has their own gift!”

“What is this?”

The sister-in-law was not interested in the gifts. A plastic fan sticking out behind Xu Qinglang’s neck had caught her attention.

It was still winter. It was weird to see someone carrying a fan!

“A group of people was doing some promotion at the shopping mall. They forced me to take one,” Xu Qinglang explained.

The girl took the fan. It was just a normal fan with an advertisement printed on it. She laughed when she took a closer look at its contents.

“What are you laughing at?” Zhou Ze asked.

“It’s advertising Where Are We Going, Dad?,” the girl replied.

“How’s that funny? Are you amused so easily?” Xu Qinglang took the fan, and his eyes popped.

“It’s perfect! You can go with my brother-in-law.” The girl glanced at Xu Qinglang and Zhou Ze with a strange face.

“An advertisement for Where Are We Going, Dad?’” Zhou Ze repeated.

Xu Qinglang had a strange expression, too. He tossed the fan to Zhou Ze and said, “Take a look yourself.”

Zhou Ze caught the fan and glanced at it. He saw a hospital on it with the huge line, Where Are We Going, Dad?

There were two lines written in some cartoonish fonts under it: Bring your son with you for circumcision. Half price now!