“You have incredible strength now. Give the person who bullied you a good beating!”
Shang Hong and Shen Meng walked back into the room. Shang Hong snapped her fingers, and everything instantly returned to normal.
Wang Cui’e stared at Shen Meng standing in front of her, then looked down at her own hands, completely bewildered.
Shen Meng was just about to raise her hand and slap Wang Cui’e when a woman suddenly rushed in through the doorway. She threw herself against Wang Cui’e with all her strength, knocking her aside, then stood protectively in front of Shen Meng.
Wang Cui’e was still dazed. Caught completely off guard, the sudden impact sent her stumbling several steps sideways. She staggered and swayed before finally losing her balance and dropping onto the ground.
This time, it wasn’t just Wang Cui’e who was stunned. Even Shen Meng was dumbfounded.
“This is Bai Jinxi, your mother in this world,” Shang Hong explained.
Shen Meng looked at the woman standing in front of her. She was about the same height as Shang Hong. Her clothes were even more worn-out, but they were very clean. There were no hair ornaments in her bun, yet her hair was neatly combed without a strand out of place.
“This is… my mother?”
The image of Bai Jinxi, her mother from the other world, along with all the painful memories of how Bai Jinxi had treated her, suddenly flashed through Shen Meng’s mind.
She shuddered and instinctively took two small steps backward, putting some distance between herself and Bai Jinxi.
“Wang Cui’e!” Bai Jinxi pointed at Wang Cui’e, who was still sitting on the ground in a daze. “How many times have I told you? Meng’er caught a chill last night. She drank ginger soup and is sweating it out. Don’t disturb her!”
Wang Cui’e finally came to her senses. She scrambled to her feet.
“Bai Jinxi! She’s already sixteen! She’s grown into a big girl, yet all she does every day is wait for someone to feed her! She doesn’t do a thing! Hurry up and send her to the back mountain to chop firewood! If we don’t have firewood, none of us will have lunch!”
“Wang Cui’e! What do you mean, my Meng’er does nothing but wait to be fed?! My daughter and I prepare all the meals for this entire family. We wash everyone’s clothes, clean the courtyard, feed the chickens, tend the vegetables, fetch water, clean out the manure pits. What chore in this household isn’t done by the two of us?!”
Bai Jinxi’s voice wasn’t loud, but every word was clear. She delivered several sentences without stumbling over a single word. Her gentle voice carried an undeniable force.
“After Fugui died, you people took over the house that belonged to our branch of the family. You took my dowry and drove the two of us, a widow and her daughter, into this broken woodshed. You dumped all the household chores on us. Your second branch has grown sons and daughters-in-law, all perfectly capable adults, yet they neither go out to sea with their father-in-law to fish nor help with the work at home. My Meng’er isn’t feeling well, and you still insist on making a child go chop firewood!”
“Wang Cui’e, don’t push people too far!”
“Bai Jinxi! Don’t make up lies and accuse me of things I didn’t do! The house belonging to your branch and your dowry were all confiscated and dealt with according to our parents’ decision! As for you living in the woodshed, that’s because your belly was useless! You married into the Shen family for all these years and couldn’t give birth to a son. You only had this one little girl. You brought this on yourself! I gave the Shen family three sons and a daughter. And as for you saying we took your house, Mother and Father saw that we didn’t have enough room and gave it to us to live in!”
“Then send your precious sons to chop the firewood! Don’t you have plenty of sons? Aren’t your sons so capable? Send them to chop the wood!”
Shen Meng had never expected Bai Jinxi, who looked so thin and frail, to hold her own so well in an argument.
To be honest, Shen Meng was a little touched seeing Bai Jinxi stand up for her.
But only a little.
For one thing, Bai Jinxi’s treatment of her had left a deep psychological scar. For another, the first person in her life who had ever protected her was that scumbag, Xu Jingchen—and he had just proven that he had been lying to her all along.
At this moment, Shen Meng was still in a state of despair. When it came to being loved and protected, her heart had become numb. She was almost immune to it.
“Bai Jinxi! My husband, my eldest son, and my third son have all gone out to sea with Old Master to fish. They sell the fish they catch for money, and that’s how you and that good-for-nothing daughter of yours get food and clothes! Get that through your head! Without our family, the two of you wouldn’t survive! If you want to stay in this household, then hurry up and chop the firewood and get the meal ready!”
The anger and grievances Shen Meng had accumulated in her previous world had nowhere to go.
“I’m not chopping it! And I’m not cooking!” Shen Meng said.
“You little brat! What did you say?! Say that again!”
Wang Cui’e pointed a finger at Shen Meng, the flesh on her face twisting with rage.
Shen Meng reached past Bai Jinxi’s shoulder, grabbed Wang Cui’e’s wrist, and gave it a slight twist.
Wang Cui’e immediately grimaced in pain and dropped to her knees.
“I said, I’m not chopping it, and I’m not cooking!”
Wang Cui’e was in too much pain to speak.
Shen Meng then kicked her squarely in the chest.
The kick sent Wang Cui’e flying straight out the door and crashing into the courtyard.
Shen Meng’s heart jolted.
She had forgotten that she was now incredibly strong.
She hurried outside to check on Wang Cui’e, and Bai Jinxi quickly followed.
Wang Cui’e looked like she had taken quite a nasty fall, but fortunately, she was tough and sturdy. She wasn’t seriously hurt.
“Mother! How dare you hit my mother!”
The scream startled both Shen Meng and Bai Jinxi.
They turned around at the same time.
A young girl came screaming through the courtyard gate and charged toward Shen Meng, intending to hit her.
Shen Meng slapped her across the face.
The girl spun around two and a half times on the spot before crashing to the ground.
“Her name is Shen Baozhu. She’s fifteen years old this year, and she’s the younger daughter of your second aunt, Wang Cui’e,” Shang Hong said.
Shen Meng was startled again.
She lowered her voice and asked, “They can’t see you?”
“Only you can see me,” Shang Hong replied.
Shen Meng relaxed.
Shen Baozhu pushed herself up into a sitting position. At first, she seemed too stunned to react. But when she saw the scrapes on her hands and arms and felt the burning pain across her face, she suddenly burst into loud sobs.
“Get lost!” Shen Meng shouted.
With blood still trickling from the corner of her mouth, Wang Cui’e helped the wailing Shen Baozhu to her feet and fled the little courtyard as fast as she could.
“Meng’er.”
Bai Jinxi pulled Shen Meng over and carefully looked her up and down.
“You… you used to be so timid and gentle. I was always worried that you’d be bullied after you married. But after seeing you today, it seems your mother no longer needs to worry about you.”
Bai Jinxi wiped away a tear.
“You caught a chill last night. I’ll go make you some more ginger soup. You need to sweat it out properly.”
The kitchen was directly across from the woodshed. As soon as Bai Jinxi finished speaking, she hurried into the kitchen.
“I think she realized I’m not her daughter,” Shen Meng said, staring at the kitchen door.
“Let’s take it one step at a time,” Shang Hong said. “But you really need to be careful. You only have three lives here. Once you’ve used up all three, the game is over.”
“Game?” Shen Meng looked at Shang Hong in confusion. “Isn’t this a real world in a parallel space? It’s a game world?”
“This is indeed a real world in a parallel space, but for you, it’s a game,” Shang Hong explained. “You can experience an ultimate life in this game. And if you clear the entire game, there will be additional rewards.”
Shen Meng felt that Shang Hong still wasn’t telling her the whole truth.
But she had already arrived in this world. Since she was here, she might as well make the best of it. Living an ultimate life for a while didn’t sound too bad.
“From the looks of it, this game isn’t going to be one of those farming-and-getting-rich stories, is it?” Shen Meng guessed.
“As expected of someone who often reads novels and watches short dramas. You got it in one,” Shang Hong said. “You have a one-month beginner period in the game. During that period, you have unlimited extra lives, and I’ll provide you with free assistance. Each level has three missions, but the first level only has two missions because you’re still in the beginner period.”
“Let’s hear them.”
As she spoke, Shen Meng turned and walked back into the room.
“Chapter One: Resistance. First mission: Eat at the table.”
Shang Hong followed Shen Meng inside.
Shen Meng dragged her weakened body over to the wooden bed and sat down. She noticed a small bronze mirror lying flat on the wooden box beside the bed.
She casually picked it up and saw a somewhat familiar face staring back at her. It was pale and sickly.
“This Shen Meng not only has the same name as me, she even looks exactly like me.”
Shen Meng studied her reflection in the bronze mirror. It was obviously not as clear as a modern mirror, but she could still tell that the face staring back at her was her own.
Only, it was much younger and more delicate than she had been when she died. It was the face she had had around the age of fifteen or sixteen.
“She was originally you,” Shang Hong said. “Or rather, she is you from another parallel world.”
“Does every version of me in every world have to live such a miserable life? The heavens really have it out for me!”
Shen Meng gave a cold snort.
“She only has the same physical appearance as me. She’s not actually me. Even her own mother realized that.”
Shen Meng put down the bronze mirror and looked at Shang Hong.
“Even if we had the same soul, once we were reincarnated, or, to put it in more scientific terms, once the memories of one world were erased and we went to another parallel world, strictly speaking, we would no longer be the same person. A person is made up of their experiences and memories.”
Shang Hong was momentarily speechless at Shen Meng’s words.
When she had first met Shen Meng, she had also felt that this wasn’t the Shen Meng she knew from her memories.
It was someone completely unfamiliar.