Xue Baozhu’s face was deathly pale, her eyes red-rimmed and her voice choked with tears.
“Sister, I’m sorry. I’m really sorry… I didn’t mean to take your place. Dad, Mom, why don’t I go with you when you’re sent away? Please don’t make things difficult for Sister anymore…”
The moment Zhang Shufen heard this, her heart ached terribly. She hurried over, pulled Xue Baozhu tightly into her arms, and gently patted her back to comfort her.
“You silly child, what nonsense are you talking about? Do you have any idea what life in the countryside is like? You’d be exposed to the wind and rain, working the fields from dawn to dusk. You’ve never suffered a day in our family since you were little. How could we possibly let you follow us there and endure such hardship? Be good and listen to me. Changming will take good care of you. He promised me that he wouldn’t let you suffer.”
Wei Changming had been engaged to a daughter of the Xue family since childhood.
He was now Xue Baozhu’s boyfriend, and his family was fairly well-off. Clearly, Zhang Shufen had already arranged a secure future for Xue Baozhu.
Standing off to the side, Lin Xiaxia watched the touching display of motherly love and filial devotion with nothing but bitter irony. A mocking smile tugged at the corner of her lips.
“How touching.”
Her voice was calm and unhurried, yet those few words pierced straight through the warm and affectionate atmosphere.
“You’re about to be sent away yourselves, yet you still made sure to arrange everything perfectly for her, afraid she’d suffer even the slightest hardship. Then you turned around and openly brought me back from the countryside. You really planned everything well, didn’t you? You were just waiting for me to take her place and suffer alongside you. What kind of twisted logic is that?”
Memories of her previous life surged through her mind like a tidal wave.
During the dozen or so years she had lived with the Lin family, going hungry and wearing worn-out clothes had been normal. She was beaten and scolded at the slightest provocation. In the end, her adoptive parents had nearly sold her to a disgusting old man in exchange for a bride price.
If she hadn’t fought desperately and escaped, she might not have survived at all.
The Xue family’s belated acknowledgment of her, along with the so-called debt she owed them for giving her life, had already been repaid by all the suffering she had endured in her previous life.
In this life, Lin Xiaxia would live only for herself.
Xue Jianguo was left speechless by her words, but the rage burning in his chest only grew stronger. He pointed at Lin Xiaxia, his finger trembling with anger.
“You unfilial daughter! I’m your biological father! What I say goes! Who gave you the right to stand here and tell me what to do?”
“Oh?” Lin Xiaxia raised an eyebrow. There wasn’t the slightest trace of fear on her face. Instead, her expression carried a hint of provocation.
“Whether I have a say or not isn’t up to you. If you’re so capable, go tell the neighborhood office yourself. If you really have the ability, go ahead and cancel the countryside assignment that’s already been registered under my name.”
After saying that, she couldn’t even be bothered to look at their reactions. She turned around and headed toward the stairs.
She was scheduled to leave for the countryside the day after tomorrow. For the next two days, she would still have to stay with the Xue family.
She could endure it for that long.
“Xiaxia! Xiaxia, wait!” Seeing her leave, Zhang Shufen quickly released Xue Baozhu and chased after her for a few steps.
A moment later, the heavy slam of a door echoed through the house.
Back inside the small room that had been hastily cleared out for her, Lin Xiaxia finally felt as though an enormous weight had been lifted from her shoulders. Her tense back relaxed all at once.
She slowly made her way to the narrow wooden bed and lay down wearily.
The hard wooden boards dug painfully into her body. The mattress was only a thin layer, and a stale, musty smell lingered around it.
They claimed this room was for her, but it was really nothing more than a storage room. Several dusty wooden crates were still piled up in one corner.
Aside from the tiny bed that could barely fit one person, there wasn’t a single decent piece of furniture in the room.
The blue cloth bundle she had brought with her when she arrived yesterday still sat abandoned at the corner of the bed.
Closing her eyes, memories from her previous life—memories soaked in blood and tears—flooded back into her mind. Her chest tightened, and her nose stung with the urge to cry.
She still remembered how foolish she had been in her previous life.
A few empty words of motherly affection from Zhang Shufen had been enough to make her believe that they genuinely wanted to make up for everything she had suffered. Like a fool, she had followed them to the place where they were sent for labor.
Life there had been unbearably bitter.
They lived in a crude straw shack where the wind blew through every crack. In winter, it was so cold that they had to curl into balls just to keep warm. In summer, it became as hot and suffocating as a steamer.
Before dawn even broke, she had to get up and work to earn labor points.
Harvesting rice, carrying buckets of manure, digging irrigation ditches—whenever there was heavy, exhausting work to be done, hadn’t she always been the one at the front?
Xue Jianguo and Zhang Shufen had long been accustomed to a comfortable life. They would complain of exhaustion after working for only a short while, and in the end, nearly all the work fell onto Lin Xiaxia’s shoulders.
Like an old ox, she had worked herself to the bone supporting them for eight long years.
Then the policies changed, and they were finally rehabilitated and allowed to return to the city.
Yet before leaving, they casually told her, “You’re already used to living in the countryside. Stay here for now.”
And just like that, they abandoned her there alone.
Afterward, she wrote countless letters to Beijing, asking when they would come back for her.
Every single letter disappeared without a response.
Years later, after years of overwork had ruined her health, she dragged her sick body through countless difficulties before finally making her way back to Beijing.
Only then did she learn the cruel truth.
The reason they had acknowledged her as their daughter back then had never been because of blood ties or parental love.
They had simply known they were about to be sent away and needed someone strong enough to work and take care of them.
What chilled her heart even more was discovering that they had already known Xue Baozhu wasn’t their biological daughter when Lin Xiaxia was only five years old.
They had even visited her adoptive parents’ home and seen her with their own eyes.
But back then, she had been painfully thin, like a scrawny bean sprout. They found her too rustic and frail and didn’t like what they saw. So they simply chose to leave things as they were and continued doting on Xue Baozhu—the beautiful daughter who made them look good.
Lin Xiaxia had learned all of this much later, when Xue Baozhu deliberately flaunted the truth in front of her.
At the time, Xue Baozhu had been wearing a fashionable dress, her arm linked with her well-to-do husband. With a condescending smile, she had said, “Sister, actually, Mom and Dad knew about it a long time ago. They just thought you weren’t as good as me.”
At the memory, Lin Xiaxia abruptly clenched her fists.
Her fingernails dug deep into her palms, sending a sharp stab of pain through her skin.
While she was still lost in thought, an emotionless mechanical voice suddenly sounded beside her ear.
[The Space-Time Shop has been activated. Your Beginner’s Gift Pack has arrived. Host, please claim it promptly.]
The sudden voice struck like a thunderclap out of nowhere.
Lin Xiaxia jolted violently and shot upright on the bed, every hair on her body standing on end.
She cautiously scanned the cramped storage room. Her gaze swept across the dusty wooden crates and the cobwebs in the corners. She even checked beneath the bed.
“Who? Who’s talking?”
Her voice trembled faintly despite her attempt to remain calm.
The room was completely silent.
The only sound she could hear was her own heart pounding like a drum.
As soon as she finished speaking, a palm-sized, translucent blue screen suddenly appeared before her without warning. A faint glow flowed around its edges as it hovered clearly in midair.
At the center of the screen was an eye-catching image of a bulging gift box tied with a red ribbon.
Lin Xiaxia’s eyes widened in shock.
Instinctively, she reached out to touch it, only for her fingertips to pass straight through the screen without touching anything.
While she was still stunned, the mechanical voice sounded again.
[Host, please claim your Beginner’s Gift Pack.]
“Is this… some kind of special space? Or a system?”
Lin Xiaxia murmured to herself, her heart pounding so hard it felt as though it might burst out of her chest.
During her previous life, when she had been bedridden with illness, she had often watched short videos to pass the time. She had also listened to her caregiver read plenty of online novels to her.
Didn’t those stories often have plots where someone was reborn and received some kind of miraculous cheat ability?
Could this be…
A special benefit she had received for being given a second chance at life?
An indescribable surge of excitement rose within her, quickly sweeping away her earlier fear.
Lin Xiaxia steadied herself and stared intently at the gift box displayed on the screen.
Taking a deep breath, she focused her mind and mentally tapped the icon, just as she used to tap the screen of her phone.
The instant her thought touched it, the gift box on the screen burst open.
Countless tiny specks of blue light scattered outward, twinkling like stars for several moments before fading away.
Then, several lines of text appeared on the screen.