Chapter 4: The Familiar Scene (Part 2)

  "Mom..." Looking at the figure busily working in the kitchen, although compared to his own memories, the figure before him seemed slightly younger, and the crow's feet around his eyes had faded a lot. But this figure couldn't be wrong. He only called out once, and Lin Hongfei, leaning against the doorframe, burst into tears.

  After that incident, Duan Yuzhen, who was a teacher at Municipal No. 1 Middle School, originally had the ability to teach and could have been evaluated as an excellent teacher, but because of her family's influence, she remained an ordinary teacher for her whole life, never being considered advanced or excellent, even though in Lin Hongfei's impression, his mother's high school graduating class always had the highest college entrance rate in the city.

  "Ah," upon hearing Lin Hongfei's voice, Duan Yuzhen turned her head and saw that her son had tears streaming down his face. She was shocked and quickly walked over to him, concern etched on her face as she gently touched his forehead, anxiously asking, "Son, what's wrong? Are you uncomfortable somewhere?"

  Outside, Pei Guangrong's shouting had not been taken seriously by Duan Yuzhen before. Her son came home because of work-related issues, not because he was ill or uncomfortable. But at this moment, Lin Hongfei's performance really scared Duan Yuzhen: Could it be that her son was really sick? Otherwise, why did his face look so bad?

  "No, mom, I'm fine," Lin Hongfei shook his head vigorously, "I'm just hungry."

  "Really nothing's wrong?" The feeling transmitted through her hand made Duan Yuzhen also feel that Lin Hongfei should be fine, but she still had some doubts in her heart: If nothing's wrong, why are you crying? A mother's sensitivity to her son made Duan Yuzhen instinctively feel that something was off with her son today.

  "It's really nothing." Lin Hongfei coughed twice to cover up, pointing to the dish that Duan Yuzhen was stir-frying in the kitchen, "Mom, it's just that your pepper stir-fry is too overwhelming."

  Duan Yuzhen's cooking skills are not bad, especially the stir-fried chili and meat is a must-have dish. Lin Hongfei and his son love to use this dish to go with their rice. The spicy chili and meat enter the mouth, and instantly sweat breaks out on the forehead, feeling that it's refreshing! However, the only drawback of this dish is that when stir-frying, the pungent smell wafts throughout the house, even if there is an exhaust fan. In the past, when Lin Hongfei cooked this dish himself, he was often choked by the fumes and his nose and eyes would water together. Did he get choked again today?

  "It's really nothing," Lin Hongfei coughed twice, indicating that he was indeed choked by Duan Yuzhen's chili peppers. "I took a nap earlier and felt starving, so I came to see what delicious food you've made, Mom."

  So. A satisfied smile appeared on Duan Yuzhen's face: as a mother and wife, there was nothing more delightful than her husband and son liking the dishes she cooked with her own hands even more.

  "Alright, mom, I'm leaving. This smell in the kitchen is unbearable." Lin Hongfei hastily said and pushed his way out of the kitchen, afraid that his mother would discover something.

  Lin Hongfei's gaze fell unintentionally on the calendar outside the kitchen, and he was suddenly shocked!

  In this era, every household liked to buy a calendar. Ordinary people bought one that was the same size as "Xinhua Dictionary", 64K, while rich families preferred to buy a large 32K desktop calendar with a thermometer on the side. Lin Hongfei's family also had one, placed on the table outside the kitchen. Lin Hongfei's gaze inadvertently swept over the calendar and suddenly froze: May 26, 1991.

  Was it really May 26, 1991?

  If it's really 1991, then everything I'm facing now has an explanation: Heaven gave me a chance to start all over again!

  Is it that the heavens have given me another chance to start anew? Although I don't know how to interpret everything that has happened to me, now it seems that no matter what, it's not a bad thing.

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  The hot water splashed against Lin Hongfei's body, but he wasn't taking a bath. Instead, he was examining his own hands, which didn't belong to a middle-aged man in his forties. They were the hands of a young man in his early twenties - slender and agile. The only difference between these hands and those of the boys and girls in their ivory towers was that they had a layer of calluses.

  To put it simply, this is a pair of hands that are exactly the same as those in Lin Hongfei's memories when he was over twenty years old.

  Staring blankly at these hands, could it be that this isn't a dream and I've really returned to when I was 22 years old? Maybe it's a dream, but why does this dream feel so real?

  Lin Hongfei is also quite pitiful. Although he too came from the era of the great internet explosion, for Lin Hongfei, who arranges his daily time in minutes, while enjoying the joy brought by being a successful person, he also lost the leisure and entertainment of an ordinary person. The two genres of "crossing over" and "rebirth", which almost every Chinese has heard to the point of numbness, for Lin Hongfei, from start to finish, he had never come into contact with online literature. When others were holding computers and reading about crossing over and rebirth, Lin Hongfei was flipping through thick books or thinking about design ideas in front of the computer. Rebirth, a cliché that has been written to death but still has countless readers who can't get enough, is an extremely unimaginable thing for Lin Hongfei.

  Up to now, Lin Hongfei still can't fully accept the fact that he has been reborn. After taking a bath, Lin Hongfei lay in bed for a long time before falling asleep. In a daze, the electric light that had been left on suddenly went out.

  The light is out?!

  Lin Hongfei, who had been dazed and still hadn't fallen asleep, suddenly opened his eyes.

  Is he dead?

  Lin Hongfei remembered that on the evening when Pei Guangrong came to find his father, a daring but utterly ignorant thief of electrical knowledge glanced at a large transformer near his home... The transformer was a valuable thing, and stealing one could sell for a lot of money... This transformer was specially supplied to the North District Military Division's family courtyard area. The daring but extremely unlucky thief was discovered by the emergency power maintenance personnel from the power bureau half an hour later, but at that time, the thief had already turned into a charred piece of charcoal.

  It's different from other places, although the power is out and many people are scolding, but in the military compound, it's not chaotic. On the contrary, you can still hear the excited screams of children who have succeeded in their mischief and the screams of little girls who have been frightened. However, overall, this sudden power outage has added a bit of fun to the vast courtyard.

  Lin Hongfei walked out of the military district's residential compound, and on his way, he ran into several officers hurrying back from outside. They were all dressed in neat uniforms and didn't smell of alcohol, so it was unclear what they had been doing outside. Judging by their hasty appearance, it was likely that they had been called back home due to a power outage and summoned by their families. As he walked, he occasionally heard the sound of pagers beeping "beep beep beep..."

  Pagers, this thing is really long out of sight, a stock deeply buried in Lin Hongfei's memory suddenly emerged in his mind. In the early 1990s, digital signal mobile phones had not yet appeared on the mainland of China, and analog signal mobile phones were basically used by big bosses. It seemed that there were only a few thousand analog mobile phones in the entire Beiguan City, and except for those wealthy bosses, state-owned enterprise leaders, municipal government leaders, and some "official second-generation" people who had one each, the price of tens of thousands of yuan was not affordable for ordinary people.

  At this time, it is the most difficult time for the military of the Republic. The one million layoffs in 1985 and the development strategy of "economic development as the main focus" forced the army to take the road of self-reliance, even the strange phenomenon of the army doing business appeared, which cannot be imagined in other powerful military countries. Now, the officers of the Republic's military, not to mention battalion-level and above officers having cars, even beepers are only allocated to a small number of main leaders.

  The cicada-like "beep beep beep..." suddenly made Lin Hongfei realize that his mood had inexplicably improved a lot.

  "Swan flying, swan flying, wait for me..." Just as I was saying this, a familiar voice came from behind, accompanied by the sound of rapid footsteps, and the person was getting closer and closer.

  Turning around, looking at the little guy who had already appeared in front of him, Lin Hongfei smiled and punched the little guy's shoulder heavily. "Good kid, how can you always appear wherever I go? You're like a ghost, always lurking around."

  "Get out!" The newcomer gave Lin Hongfei a kick without any courtesy, "A dog's mouth can't produce ivory, I'm in a good mood and came to chat with you for a bit... by the way, what's going on? I heard that the unit where you're interning is quite troublesome. Do you want me to help you out?"

  This kid's name is An Lele, also from the military district family courtyard. His old man, An Baoshan, was a lieutenant colonel and head of a department in the logistics department, responsible for the vehicle dispatch and maintenance of the entire military district. It can be said that it is a lucrative department. He is slightly older than Lin Weiguo, but he cannot be described as young and promising. However, this kid's old man is absolutely an eight-sided and clever person, always smiling when seeing anyone, making Lin Hongfei suspect that his face might crack from smiling one day.