After casually responding to the original host’s second brother with a few words, Xia Baozhu hurried back to her room to pack up.
She had more urgent matters to attend to now.
She had always heard Meng Shuting, the avid novel reader, rave about how awesome this Jinshouzhi was or how incredible that Jinshouzhi was, how magical this space was or how hilarious that system was.
But why hadn’t she felt anything at all!
She tapped her wrist, waved her palm, and knocked on her temples.
No response.
She called out in her mind: System? System? Space? Space? Hello? Hey? Anyone there?
No response.
She patted all eight major acupressure points on her body, even feeling the urge to slap the Yongquan acupoint on the soles of her feet.
But reason prevailed, and she gave up.
To send her through time travel without giving her a Jinshouzhi!
How ruthless! Time travel is one thing, but at least provide the supporting facilities! Truly fitting for a Paohui Nüpei in a Zhongmawen…
Her hotpot, her barbecue, her house, her car, her bank account balance—all had left her in such a dramatic way.
Ten minutes later, she grabbed her bathing basket and headed to the workers’ bathhouse.
She really wanted to collapse on the bed and sleep for hours, but after her “arduous journey” back to the Xia family home, she was covered in dust.
Washing herself clean would serve as a symbolic ritual for the start of her new life.
In these times, taking a bath every day was considered quite a luxury. Depending on their positions, the factory issued 4 to 8 free bath tickets per month.
If you exceeded the number of welfare tickets and had to pay out of pocket, each bath cost ten cents.
Her monthly salary was only twenty-six yuan. Ten cents might not sound like much, but if you spent ten cents every day on baths, that would add up to three yuan a month—a significant sum in this era.
There was no other way. Washing at home with a basin was both inconvenient and felt unsafe. After all, the Xia family home wasn’t truly her home. If she couldn’t cut expenses, she’d have to find ways to increase her income. But how could she enjoy tea and newspapers while also aiming for promotions and raises?
Speaking of which, the Xia family really had a lot of workers. In these times, having even one worker in a family was considered good, but the Xia family had five.
The highest earner in the family was her mother, Comrade Lin Chunlan, a sixth-grade fitter and the workshop foreman in the assembly workshop, with a monthly salary of a full seventy-six yuan.
Next was her father, Comrade Xia Yongwu, a master chef at the Heavy Machinery Factory’s second canteen. Although he wasn’t at the level of a head chef, his monthly salary was still forty-two yuan.
Combined, the two earned one hundred and eighteen yuan a month. After Lin Chunlan sent ten yuan to support the Lin family and Xia Yongwu sent twenty yuan to support the Xia family, eighty-eight yuan remained.
Thinking of this, Xia Baozhu twitched her lips. Her cheap father’s salary was literally cut in half after subsidizing his family.
What a level of filial piety and devotion!
Meanwhile, Lin Chunlan’s salary was sixty-six yuan after supporting her own family, yet she was still criticized by Grandmother Xia for contributing too little to the household.
Even so, the remaining eighty-eight yuan placed them in the high-income bracket. That’s why all the children in the family ate and drank at home, while their own earnings were saved—truly a case of being raised in affluence in this era.
As a result, her two sisters-in-law seemed to think they’d lose out if they had fewer children. One gave birth, then the other, back and forth, as if they were competing!
Her eldest sister-in-law had a son and a daughter, while her second sister-in-law had two daughters. And both of them were currently pregnant again.
After finishing her bath and returning home.
“Oh my, look at my little sister! Fresh out of the pot… I mean, fresh out of the bath, her little face is as dewy and radiant as a hibiscus flower!”
Xia Baozhu maintained her character persona by completely ignoring her second brother, carrying her bathing basket straight into the house.
Back in her room, she examined herself carefully in the mirror. The original owner’s appearance was eighty to ninety percent similar to her own—bright round eyes, smooth and soft facial contours, like newly sprouted willow branches in early spring, full of vitality yet not ostentatious.
She reached up and pinched her cheek. Well, her sensitive skin was still there—her face was practically a motion-sensor light.
However, the plumpness under her fingers wasn’t as pronounced anymore.
During the three-year famine, the grain and oil rations for state-owned factory workers had changed from 42 jin of fine grains per month to 32 jin of mixed grains, and cooking oil from 500 milliliters per month to 200 milliliters. At the most critical period, each household registration booklet was allotted only 400 milliliters of cooking oil per month.
Workers couldn’t muster the energy to labor without meat in their diets. To ensure production, major factories and mining units went to great lengths to solve the supplementary food supply issue, swapping resources everywhere.
Many state-owned factories even organized hunting teams from their security departments to go into the mountains. With so many units doing the same, conflicts and clashes became frequent, creating a chaotic mess.
The variety of dishes in factory canteens also shrank drastically. While grain supplies were guaranteed, getting white rice, flour, or meat relied on the black market.
At its peak, rice on the black market cost two to three yuan per jin, white flour two yuan per jin, and pork prices soared to ten yuan per jin. Even then, it was a matter of having money but no goods—not something you could buy just because you wanted to.
The Xia family had over a dozen members. Apart from the five with secure jobs, the rest couldn’t eat their fill on rations alone. Xia Chang’an, idle and unemployed, was practically a regular on the black market.
However, starting from the end of last year, the factory began to recover.
For the New Year, employee benefits included one jin of pork and a fish, signaling that the famine had largely passed on a broad scale.
According to Grandmother Xia, the village’s collective meat distribution this year had also changed from once a year to once every few months.
Lost in thought and hungry, Xia Baozhu lay down and began sorting through the events of the day.
For her, everything had been too sudden, as if her own soul had been drifting aimlessly. Only after taking a bath and catching her breath did she feel somewhat grounded.
Rewind a few hours earlier—she had directly transmigrated onto a jolting ox cart.
The wooden wheels of the ox cart creaked with a repetitive "squeak—squeak—squeak," while the old ox wore not a brass bell but a crude iron clapper, emitting a dull, clattering sound.
For a moment, she was utterly stunned. The pain in her rear felt all too real. She pinched her index finger with her thumb, hard—it hurt.
Panicked, she sat up and looked ahead. The dirt road seemed endless, with no green mountains or clear waters in sight, only dust swirling everywhere.
At the same time, a flood of memories surged into her mind, forcing her to face reality.
There was no time for her to remain dazed.
A kind-looking older woman leaned over and asked with concern, "Comrade Xia, you’re awake? How are you feeling now? Any better?"
As she spoke, she reached out to feel Xia Baozhu’s forehead. "Seems like the fever’s gone. Oh, you gave us such a fright!
In the future, if you’re not feeling well, don’t tough it out. Report it to the organization promptly. What would we do if something really happened to you? Regret would come too late!"
"That’s right, child. Why didn’t you say you were unwell? If something had happened to you, we’d all be held responsible when we got back!"
Xia Baozhu rummaged through her muddled mind before finally figuring out who these two people were.
The kind-looking woman who seemed familiar was the leader of this rural assistance team, Yang Wenxiu, deputy director of the Guangming Zhongjichang factory office.
The one speaking behind her was Wang Chunmei, the team leader of the workshop where the original owner worked. The statistical duties the original owner was responsible for included her team.
She smiled weakly, "I've caused you trouble. Thank you for taking care of me."
Not far away, someone who overheard this curled their lips and sneered sarcastically, "Xia Baozhu really knows how to bend and stretch. When she doesn't need someone, she's all cold and disdainful; when she needs care, it's 'thank you for your care.' Pah."
"Exactly. A toad sitting in the golden palace—just because she's pretty, she thinks she's something special."
"Who does she think she is, putting on airs all day and ignoring us? I don't think her in-laws treat her all that well either."