Wang Jiao broke down.
Wearing thin, soft embroidered shoes, she had walked for half a day.
More than ten li—her legs felt like they were filled with lead, her feet blistered and bleeding.
Above her, the blazing sun hung high in the sky, scorching and merciless.
Along the way, there wasn’t even a single tree by the roadside—no shade at all.
Exhausted, in pain, burned by the sun, and parched with thirst, Wang Jiao felt like her soul was drifting out of her body. She was on the verge of collapse.
Finally, they stopped to eat.
And the food they were given was this pig-and-dog-unfit wild vegetable bun.
Wang Jiao truly couldn’t take it anymore.
Her “delicateness” wasn’t just because of her status—it was also due to the timing of her rebirth.
She had been reborn on the evening of the third day after the entire Wuchang Marquis household was imprisoned.
Everything from those three days—the spoiled food, the slop, the insults and mockery from the jailers—belonged to her previous life.
She had already forgotten them.
Upon realizing she was reborn, she was overwhelmed with excitement and joy, even ignoring her rumbling hunger.
In her memory, the suffering in the Dali Temple prison was absent, and even the experience of fighting over half a piece of coarse black bread had faded.
Moreover, in her previous life, according to the Wang family’s stories, their exile hadn’t been that harsh.
From the old matriarch to Wang Zhi Li, no one ever mentioned eating inedible wild vegetable buns.
Instead, the outspoken and blunt Wang Zhi Yi often reminisced about the “delicacies” they had enjoyed during exile.
Braised pork, crucian carp soup, roasted rabbit, beggar’s chicken… even wild vegetables and fruits by the roadside were turned into delicious dishes.
Because of this, Wang Jiao had developed a completely mistaken understanding of exile.
To her, exile wasn’t something to fear.
Even Li Shi, a pregnant woman, had safely made it through and even nourished her unborn child well!
With that mindset, Wang Jiao had eagerly fought to come along.
“How could this happen?”
“It wasn’t like this in my past life!”
“Where’s the braised pork and beggar’s chicken Fourth Brother talked about?”
“…I’m so hungry! So thirsty! My head is spinning!”
Blow after blow hit her, and her mental state began to collapse.
She squeezed her eyes shut, wishing she could just fall asleep forever—but the surrounding noise only irritated her further—
“It’s so hard! I can’t bite it!”
“Mother, it scratches my throat—I can’t swallow it!”
Among the crowd, Wang Jiao wasn’t the only one “courting death.” There were also several young children.
Their soft little faces had grown thinner, sweat and tears mixing with dirt and grass, making them look pitiful and miserable.
They were young and had always been pampered.
In prison and on the road, their parents and siblings had tried their best to take care of them.
So comparatively, they had suffered less.
And thus, they were even less able to accept the black, hard, unpalatable wild vegetable buns.
“Officer, could you give us some white flour cakes instead? We don’t ask for hu cakes—just plain steamed buns would do!”
“If not, could we at least have some hot tea or water? The children are young, their throats are delicate—they really can’t swallow this!”
Several parents, heartbroken at their children’s suffering—and unable to eat the coarse food themselves—used the children as an excuse to plead with Zhang Sanlang and the officers.
A passing guard saw the bun Wang Jiao had thrown away and heard the crying and pleas. He curled his lips.
“This is all you get. Eat it or don’t!”
Another guard sneered.
“Tsk, still haven’t accepted reality? Still think you’re noble young masters and ladies?”
“Complaining about the food? Hmph, guess you’re not hungry enough!”
As he spoke, he walked over, intending to pick up the buns thrown on the ground by Wang Jiao and the others.
But a slender figure moved faster than him.
“Xiao Cui! Wh-what are you doing picking those up?”
Someone in the crowd recognized her—it was Liu Xiao Cui, a concubine servant of Wang Yong.
Xiao Cui—no, Liu Wuyang, whose soul had long since changed—carefully picked up the buns.
She gently brushed off the dirt and pebbles, took out a handkerchief, and wrapped them up.
“Coarse grain is still food.”
She said calmly.
She didn’t explicitly say “wasting food is wrong,” but her actions themselves condemned Wang Jiao’s behavior.
The guard who had approached flashed a hint of interest in his eyes.
Heh, rare.
In this “luxurious yet rotten” marquis household, there was actually a woman who spoke of cherishing food.
Of course, it could just be an act.
The guards, living at the bottom of society, had seen all kinds of deceit and ugliness.
They wouldn’t trust someone based on a single sentence or action.
There were too many people in this world who spoke sweetly but were rotten inside.
This Xiao Cui… they would wait and see.
The road of exile was long. Today was just the beginning—perhaps she wasn’t tired or in pain enough yet, which was why she dared to act obedient and clever.
The guard thought to himself and turned to leave.
Liu Wuyang finished wrapping the buns and carefully tucked them into her clothes. As she turned, she saw the guard.
She frowned slightly and called out, “Sir, please wait!”
The guard paused, turned back, and pointed at himself.
“You’re calling me?”
“Yes, sir. I beg your pardon, but may I ask—have you been feeling unusually fatigued lately? Blurry vision? Dry, itchy skin?”
From her earlier observation, Liu Wuyang suspected he might have wasting-thirst disease.
The symptoms she mentioned were typical signs.
The guard froze for a moment and blurted out, “How did you know?”
A flicker of satisfaction passed through Liu Wuyang’s eyes.
Good. Her judgment was correct.
He indeed had the illness.
“To inform you, sir, my grandfather was a physician.”
Fortunately, the original Xiao Cui was not a servant born in the marquis household.
She had been sold into the household at around ten years old due to her beauty.
Her grandfather really had been a doctor, though her father squandered everything and ended up selling his children.
With that as a cover, Liu Wuyang now had an explanation for her medical knowledge—so others wouldn’t suspect her.
She would use her medical skills to cooperate with the guards, improve her living conditions, and make the Wang family masters look up to her and depend on her…