TYAM Chapter 91

Sorry for the uber late update, I was down with a nasty cold. It’s been raining everyday here, and I’m the stupid idiot who keep forgetting bringing an umbrella…

The parents’ sports event shared a track with the kids. The first few races had more participants than allowed, creating a lively and bustling scene, with many children enthusiastically cheering on the side.  

As the 100-meter, 400-meter, and 800-meter races wrapped up, the number of parents dwindled. By the time the 5-kilometer race was announced, the crowd scattered like the tide, even the spectators retreating far away, fearing they’d be mistaken as participants by the referees.  

Only three people had signed up for this event across the entire school.  

The three runners stood in their assigned positions, surrounded by dozens of onlookers.  

One of the mothers was clearly a professional, dressed in proper running gear, executing her pre-race stretches with smooth precision.  

The other, a short man in brand-new sweatpants, had a face full of regret upon realizing only three people were competing.  

Meanwhile, Peng Xingwang was full of excitement, waving a small red flag with all his might.  

“Big Brother!! You’re the best!! Go for it!!!”  

Ji Linqiu stood beside him, calmly eating a mango-flavored popsicle, unfazed.  

“Ready—Three, two, bang!”  

As the starting gun fired, the three runners sprang forward, one after another.  

At first, Peng Xingwang was confident, but after watching for a bit, he grew anxious. “Brother Linqiu! Why are they running so slow? I could outrun Brother Wang right now!!”  

This kid was just as competitive as his older brother. Ji Linqiu casually grabbed a small red flag and waved it alongside him, glancing at the runners in the distance. “It’s five kilometers, you know? Even on an 800-meter track, they have to run six or seven laps.”  

Peng Xingwang froze, realizing it made sense, but when he saw the short man sprinting at full speed in the lead, he still felt uneasy.  

Jiang Wang was jogging leisurely in the middle. As he passed them on the first lap, he glanced over.  

Ji Linqiu smiled, waving his little flag as if to say, “Have fun.” Meanwhile, Peng Xingwang had turned bright red, as if he were using all his energy just watching, wishing he could run in his brother’s place.  

Jiang Wang found this amusing and actually stopped halfway through the lap. “What’s wrong?”  

“Don’t stop!!” Peng Xingwang clutched his head. “Who stops in the middle of a race? Keep going!!”  

“You really want me to win first place that badly?”  

“Of course!!” Peng Xingwang suddenly gathered his courage and shouted loudly for all to hear: “My big brother is the best in the world!!”  

Jiang Wang raised an eyebrow, clearly pleased. He stretched out his hands. “I forgot to high-five just now. Give me one before I run.”  

Peng Xingwang was about to have a breakdown seeing him standing still while the others gained a whole lap.  

Tao Yingqi silently shook her head.  

Boss Jiang, this is some next-level avoidance strategy…  

Ji Linqiu and Peng Xingwang smacked his hands with force, and Jiang Wang turned and resumed running with ease.  

Perhaps sensing Peng Xingwang’s urgency, Ji Linqiu suddenly cupped his hands around his mouth and called out:  

“Jiang Wang!”  

“If you don’t win first place, you have to wear a skirt and dance at the office tomorrow!!”  

The crowd gasped—no need to go that far!  

With his back to them, Jiang Wang made an “OK” sign and suddenly picked up speed.  

It was like a slow-moving sedan suddenly merging onto the highway and flooring the gas pedal.  

In just three minutes, he overtook both competitors from last place to first, and his speed only increased.  

The short man, who had been in the lead, was running hard when a gust of wind whooshed past him. The next moment, Jiang Wang had already left him far behind.  

This… this guy had no sportsmanship!  

Who sprints full speed in a 5-kilometer race? Damn it!!!  

Once Jiang Wang went wild, it was as if all restraints were broken. Under the bright sun, he ran freely, every step as if carried by the wind.  

Ji Linqiu watched him with a knowing smile, like seeing a big wolfdog finally let off its leash to run wild.  

The other two competitors originally had their own pace, but faced with such an absurd opponent, they instinctively sped up to keep up.  

A slightly awkward three-person race suddenly turned into an intense competition.  

The three parents were from different classes. Initially, only five or six kids were cheering with puffed cheeks, but soon, an entire crowd of children started shouting along, and the atmosphere exploded.  

“Class Three! Class Three! We are the best!!!”  

“Class Five is the strongest! Go, Big Xiang’s mom!!!”  

“Big Brother! Big Brother! The No.1 King of Experiments!!!”  

Ji Linqiu laughed uncontrollably. As Jiang Wang finished another lap and passed them again, he shamelessly held up both hands to form a heart.  

Jiang Wang, sweat dripping down his neck, grinned when he saw him and boldly raised both arms to make a giant heart in return.  

The entire class of kids took it as a sign of approval from their “Big Brother” and started screaming their lungs out, some even outright shrieking.  

Tao Yingqi, standing in the back, hadn’t noticed someone’s sneaky move in the front row and was genuinely puzzled.  

Why did it feel like the boss wasn’t just trying to steal someone’s heart but was also planning to kidnap the entire class of children?  

…It’s not impossible? 

The short man dropped out at the fourth lap, staggering off the track in exhaustion, but two gym teachers had been prepared and quickly supported him to a slow walk.  

The woman in second place managed to regain her rhythm but remained half a lap behind.  

Jiang Wang got so caught up in running that he lost track of the laps. Eventually, he noticed Peng Xingwang and another little girl standing on opposite sides of the track, holding a big red ribbon.  

Dozens of children, like a choir, yelled in unison: “Chaaaaaarge—”  

He took a deep breath and sprinted forward. As he crossed the finish line, paper confetti popped in celebration.  

“Yay!!!”  

“Big Brother is amazing!!!”  

Ji Linqiu, quick on his feet, grabbed Jiang Wang’s arm to keep him moving forward with the momentum, preventing a sudden stop.  

Jiang Wang instinctively looked back and saw Peng Xingwang and the others lifting the red ribbon again.  

The female parent soon crossed the line, triggering another round of confetti and cheers.  

“Oh, I forgot to explain,” Ji Linqiu said with a bright smile. “She won the women’s category, and you won the men’s. No conflicts.”  

Jiang Wang laughed.  

“So, I already won when that guy quit on the fourth lap?”  

“I was going to remind you, but you looked like you were having fun, so I didn’t.”

They walked together against the long wind towards the bright spring scenery. After more than half a minute, Jiang Wang finally put down the towel and carefully sniffed himself.  

“Do I smell sweaty? Should I stay away from you?”  

Ji Linqiu paused his breathing, suddenly feeling a little embarrassed.  

“You look… really good like this.”  

The man blinked.  

“You like the sporty type?”  

Ji Linqiu shook his head decisively.  

“I like the wild type.”  

“Got it,” Jiang Wang nodded. “I’ll start training in sanda tomorrow.”  

Ji Linqiu laughed and punched him lightly.  

The two of them walked around the second half of the track and saw a couple whispering to each other under the shade of a tree.  

Jiang Wang looked on enviously. “I want that too.”  

A bit further ahead, another couple walked hand in hand while a child beside them guzzled soda.  

Jiang Wang was envious again. “That looks nice too. I want that as well.”  

After just a few more steps, they saw a couple feeding each other water.  

Before Jiang Wang could say anything, Ji Linqiu directly lifted a bottle of mineral water in front of him.  

“Drink more, talk less.”  

Jiang Wang pouted and whined, “I even won the championship, and you still think I talk too much.”  

“Fine, fine,” Ji Linqiu humored him with a smile. “Mr. Jiang, you performed exceptionally well today. Tell me, what reward do you want?”  

“I want to see Teacher Ji dance in a skirt at the company — hey, don’t hit me! You were the one who brought it up first!!”  

After resting for a while, the two of them reached peak teamwork during the group sports events.  

One event required parents to carry children on their backs to reach for balloons. After Jiang Wang finished his turn, Ji Linqiu went up next, his stamina surprisingly on par with Jiang Wang’s.  

Peng Xingwang, being carried by Linqiu for the first time, was a bit overwhelmed.  

“Snatch theirs!” Ji Linqiu’s sharp eyes locked in. “Reach out! Now!”  

“Look to the right! Yes! Take hers!!”  

“Get ready to jump, one, two—if you miss, go again!!”  

At that moment, the little boy on Linqiu’s back truly understood what “wild” meant.  

Wait a minute, wasn’t my Linqiu-gege always gentle and soft-spoken?  

—Who is this competitive demon bullying little girls in a game?!!  

That night, Jiang Wang uploaded all the photos Tao Yingqi had taken onto his personal homepage.  

The company was in an uproar.  

Look, look, look!! Who said the boss was clueless?!  

Isn’t he literally bringing Teacher Ji to a parent-child sports day? Boss, your methods are impressive!!  

And setting the album to public? This is a blatant family announcement!  

Everyone’s a gossip expert.  

[Three Years of Overtime, Five More Until a House]: Did you guys see today’s photos?  

[Frontline War Reporter]: Holy crap!! That picture of Teacher Ji carrying Xingwang — his gaze is so fierce! He suddenly looks so dominant!!  

[Java is the Best Language]: Do you guys remember the rumors when I first joined? That Boss Jiang… seemed to be the bottom?  

[Second-tier Spectator]: Hahaha! Even if Teacher Ji is dominant, Brother Jiang is still more dominant. I once saw him take Teacher Ji to play with guns!  

[Oh God, I’m so Poor]: Go check the boss’s album!!! He just uploaded thirty more photos!!  

[Frontline War Reporter]: ????? Is the boss really that happy today?? He never used to post anything!  

The next day, when Ji Linqiu arrived at the office, he saw several young women huddled around a computer, whispering.  

“What are you looking at?”  

Fu Er, beside them, suddenly pulled back. “N-nothing! I haven’t even finished my report, I gotta go!”  

The computer screen hadn’t been closed in time, revealing a page from Jiang Wang’s blog.  

The little secretary, seeing they were about to be exposed, whispered, “This is… Boss Jiang’s blog.”  

Ji Linqiu memorized the webpage number at a glance, exchanged a few casual words, and left for his office to look it up.  

He rarely browsed the internet, spending his free time reading books instead. It was only thanks to their reminder that he thought of checking Jiang Wang’s social media.  

The registration process was simple, and he could even search for Jiang Wang’s profile by real name.  

Jiang Wang had several albums, all set to public, showing no concern for others seeing them.  

The first fifty or sixty photos were all from the sports event, with a few candid shots so well-timed that Ji Linqiu couldn’t help but smile.  

As he scrolled further, every picture seemed to align with their life together.  

Taking Peng Xingwang to school, going on a spring outing to fly kites, moving houses…  

He stopped scrolling, his gaze fixed on the screen.  

Among the earlier photos, there were nearly a hundred images of old Hongcheng.  

Peng Jiahui’s living room, the playground at Hongshan Elementary School, the fried noodle stall at the old alley entrance, even the childlike chalk drawings on the stone pavement.  

It was like a child trying to capture every memory, yet the shooting technique and focus were unmistakably from an adult’s hand.  

At that moment, he realized he needed to return to Hongcheng.  

In Ji Linqiu’s memory, Xingwang had always been happy, sleeping soundly, carefree, and living a joyful life every day.  

But he had rarely considered what about the former Jiang Wang? That Jiang Wang, what his childhood looked like? 

He had always thought Jiang Wang was now calm and strong, standing high enough to pull anyone out of the abyss.  

No, some things were still unresolved. Some attachments remained at their starting point, like silent concerns buried in a quiet child’s heart.  

He had to go back to Hongcheng now.