VIP Chapter 122: A Bigger Piece of the Pie

An old man and a young man walked slowly along the dirt road at the entrance to the village. The villagers working in the fields on either side all called out greetings to the old village chief, who waved back at them as though he were a commander reviewing his troops.

“That’s enough!” Yuan Desheng sighed, as if delivering a final summary. “I’ve been a village official all my life. This is enough! I don’t ask for merit, only that I make no mistakes.”

Ye Xiaoxuan smiled. “It’s not a perfect ending yet. This still isn’t the scene you truly want to see. You want them to come over and greet you, to pat their children on the head and tell them to call you Grandpa. It isn’t that you care about receiving gifts. You simply want everyone to visit you during the holidays!”

Yuan Desheng’s expression stiffened, and his face grew somewhat unnatural. “What does a little brat like you know?”

Ye Xiaoxuan laughed. He knew he had struck the old village chief where it hurt. No official, not even a village official, could truly despise political achievements.

Yuan Desheng had spent his whole life being a good-natured man, but that did not mean he had never wanted to be a good village chief. Precisely because he wanted so badly to leave behind a good reputation and serve as a capable official, he had been too timid to act decisively. He had accomplished nothing remarkable, but neither had he made any serious mistakes.

Now, everyone greeted him simply because he was the village chief, an elder, and a fellow villager. It was nothing more than the polite courtesy of country people meeting one another. What he most wanted to see was the kind of scene in which people revered him and were genuinely grateful for what he had done for the village.

Ye Xiaoxuan pointed at the battered road ahead, full of potholes and stretching beyond sight. “Uncle Yuan, whether you leave your name behind before the next election depends on this road!”

Yuan Desheng pulled a stern face. He wanted to put on an air of moral superiority and lecture the boy, but he also felt that trying to hide his thoughts from this young man would be foolish. With a sigh, he slapped Ye Xiaoxuan on the shoulder and asked, “How about taking over from me?”

Ye Xiaoxuan chuckled and shook his head. “Caiyi must have told you what I think. Do you believe I’m pretending to be above it all? I really have no interest! Forget village chief—even township mayor or city mayor wouldn’t tempt me. My ambitions don’t lie in officialdom!”

Yuan Desheng nodded. He looked down at the road as though he had made a momentous decision.

“Fine! I originally planned to leave these troubles for the next village chief, but since someone is willing to take the lead, I’ll do something worthwhile for the villagers this time! I’ll submit a report to the township office later. I’m sure we’ll hear back soon!”

Ye Xiaoxuan smiled. “Then the villagers will all thank you.”

Yuan Desheng shook his head. “If anyone deserves thanks, it’s you. You’ve driven me into this whether I liked it or not. If I don’t get something done before I step down, I’ll never be able to show my face in the village again! The township actually approved this project long ago. I was the one who kept delaying the report.”

Ye Xiaoxuan looked at him in surprise. “Why? If you hadn’t held it back, the road would have been built by now!”

Yuan Desheng snorted. “Not necessarily! Why do you think I wanted to leave it to my successor? When the village chief changes, the party secretary has to change too! If we try to get it done now, a huge sum of money will suddenly be coming in. Do you think someone like Chen Jiatang, who plucks every feather from every passing goose, would let that go? I’m afraid the road would never be completed, and he’d pocket every last penny!”

Ye Xiaoxuan nodded. That really was something that had to be taken into consideration. Chen Jiatang was not someone they could afford to underestimate. The villagers had struggled to raise that money. If it fell into his hands, who knew how much would be left?

“Why are you willing to do it now?” Ye Xiaoxuan asked, looking at Yuan Desheng. “He needs money even more now. Aren’t you worried about him anymore?”

Yuan Desheng smiled with a hint of malicious satisfaction. “He’s buried under trouble these days! His nephew’s affair dragged him into it so badly that he even lost his house. The township police are investigating evidence of his corruption, and even his patron, Chen Jiaying, is about to lose his position as township mayor. I hear someone sent directly from the county is going to replace him. That grasshopper Chen Jiatang won’t be hopping around for much longer!”

That was indeed good news. Ye Xiaoxuan was delighted to hear it. Once Chen Jiatang fell, the village economy would improve several times over. The only question was who would replace him. Hopefully, it would not be another ravenous parasite.

“Come on. I’ll show you.”

Yuan Desheng took Ye Xiaoxuan by the hand and led him into the fields. There was a stretch of raised earth there that had once been used as a small reservoir dam. Later, after new irrigation channels were built, it had been abandoned.

Standing atop the embankment, Yuan Desheng held a cigarette between the fingers of his right hand and pointed straight ahead with his left.

“Take a look. What do you see over there?”

Ye Xiaoxuan frowned. “The fields, obviously! What else would there be? Wheat and corn!”

Yuan Desheng flicked him on the head and scolded him sternly. “Look farther away! That’s Fairy Lake City!”

Ye Xiaoxuan rolled his eyes. “Of course. And beyond Fairy Lake City lies the provincial capital.”

Yuan Desheng smiled. “Exactly! And what’s behind that?”

Ye Xiaoxuan frowned and turned to glance behind him. “Behind it? You mean the capital?”

Yuan Desheng nodded. He pointed once toward Fairy Lake City, then turned and pointed toward the capital.

“These two places will be connected sooner or later! I’m talking about an expressway, not a provincial highway!”

Ye Xiaoxuan scratched his head. “And then? What does that have to do with us?”

Yuan Desheng angrily raised his hand as if to flick him on the head again, but Ye Xiaoxuan would not have it. He covered his head and shouted, “If you have something to say, just say it! Do you really think I’m your son?”

Unexpectedly, Yuan Desheng did not get angry. He merely snorted.

“If you can win over my daughter, I wouldn’t object even if you became my son.”

Ye Xiaoxuan was so furious that his nose nearly twisted sideways. He cursed at him. “Damn your wife! Of course you wouldn’t object—you’d get a son for free…”

His mouth remained open, but the rest of the abuse died on his lips. Even an idiot could understand what the old man meant. He wanted to marry his daughter off to him!

Ye Xiaoxuan could not make sense of it. The old man knew perfectly well that he already had a girlfriend, so why was he still trying to bring his daughter and him together?

With Yuan Caiyi’s appearance and character, she would not be settling even if she married the son of a township mayor. The son of a city mayor would hardly be beneath her either! Could the old man have taken a fancy to his battered car? Or perhaps to that orchard of his, which had nearly been sheared bald?

Yuan Desheng cursed him irritably. “I thought you were clever. Turns out you’re an idiot too! Can’t you see? If an expressway is built, this area of ours will be a route it must pass through!”

Ye Xiaoxuan nodded. “Yes. So what?”

Yuan Desheng glared at him. “Looking at the long term, the benefit is that your orchard and fishpond will be able to ship their produce out in the shortest possible time. Looking at the immediate future, once the expressway is built, the village road you took the lead in repairing will become the main transportation route for the construction project. The village can set up a toll booth for the construction vehicles, and you’ll receive the largest share of the proceeds!”

Good heavens!

Ye Xiaoxuan’s eyes widened. He truly had not thought that far ahead.

This was an even bigger slice of the pie, and the benefits it could bring were entirely tangible. But why was the old man being so generous to him?

Could it be that eighteen years ago, the old man had tossed a little iron boat into Great Fairy Lake?