It felt as though her entire being was submerged in water, making it impossible to breathe. Nothing seemed to cover her body, yet a stiflingly hot wind blew slowly into the room, parched and dry. Mai Zi wanted to get up and find something to fan herself with, but this dream was too deep and far too real.
In the dream, the girl was also named Mai Zi. She was born in Dajing Village, a place that had once been more prosperous than the surrounding villages because of its namesake well—but that was only during times of peace.
Shortly after Mai Zi was born, her father was drafted into military service and died in battle less than six months later. Mai Zi’s Mother died of illness that same year, leaving only Mai Zi behind. She had survived under the care of Mai Zi’s Grandmother.
The villagers all said Mai Zi was “hard-fated” to have survived; after all, it was common for children to die young in this era. After six or seven years, Mai Zi’s Grandmother passed away as well.
Since there were no longer any male heirs in the household, the Village Head reclaimed Mai Zi’s family land.
All she had left was the plot where her courtyard stood and a dilapidated thatched shack. She had struggled to survive like this for four years.
Then came a great drought, followed by famine and the onset of war. Mai Zi had fled with a small bag of beans, following the villagers for a month before dying on the road of her flight from the famine.
Mai Zi strained her eyes open. Her body felt too heavy to move. Last night’s wind had been stifling and hot, yet there was still no sign of rain.
She closed her eyes and saw a space enclosed by walls on all four sides. It was about the size of her rented room back on Blue Star—eight square meters. Her consciousness drifted inside. This was an interdimensional space, perfectly square and completely empty.
Her heart surged with a mix of disbelief and a lingering sense of loss.
As a child raised under the socialist education of Blue Star society, being thrust into this village of an unknown era made her want to go back, even with this interdimensional space. She longed to drink ice-cold cola and eat fried chicken.
On Blue Star, Mai Zi was named Chen Mai. She had also been an orphan, but with the government’s help, she had attended high school and worked as a general laborer at a government-supported greenhouse base.
Her accident happened during the base’s renovation. A piece of flying metal had pierced her spleen. The base was far from the hospital, and in the end, resuscitation efforts failed.
The dream ended; she had truly transmigrated!
She was in ancient times, in the middle of a famine. Chen Mai’s heart pounded. No, she was Mai Zi now. She looked at her hands: they were covered in grime, had hangnails, and bore a familiar mole. She felt a slight sense of comfort. The familiarity of this body told her that Blue Star was the dream.
However, the memories were so fresh that she found it hard to distinguish between the two versions of Mai Zi—which one was truly her?
Mai Zi struggled to roll over and get up. She had to hurry and harvest the beans she had planted. Since it wasn’t raining, they would only wither in the ground anyway; it was better to harvest them early to have more to eat.
The roof of the shack had grown even thinner after being eroded by last night’s strong winds. The entire room contained only a bed frame and a large stack of firewood, with an ash pit in the center.
In her memories, this was where she boiled water and cooked. Beside it sat a small bag of beans, weighing about four or five catties. In the adjoining side room, there were a few small bundles of fresh green branches.
The beans in the bag had been saved by the original Mai Zi in the spring. Back then, there were many wild vegetables to eat, so many beans were left over. Every year, as long as one survived the winter, it meant another year of life…
A single person’s rations weren’t much, but the young Mai Zi had been clever. She only planted beans on her plot, stored them all, and gathered as much firewood as possible so she could live to be a year older.
There were malicious people in the village, so she kept her firewood and food in the room where she slept as much as possible, leaving only unburnable green wood in the side room.
Mai Zi scooped a large handful of beans from the bag, threw them into a small stone mortar, crushed them with a wooden stick, and poured them into a clay pot.
She scooped a bowl of water from a nearby wooden bucket—just enough to cover the beans—and found two pieces of flint under the bed. It took several tries before she managed to start a fire.
Mai Zi placed the clay pot over the fire. When the beans were nearly dry from boiling, she took a small piece of yellowish salt brick and gave the mixture a quick dab. She began to eat ravenously straight from the pot. As the bean gruel slowly slid down her esophagus, that frantic, gnawing hunger finally began to fade.
Her stomach had already adapted to the hardness of the beans. The texture was rough against her throat and carried a faint, barely perceptible saltiness. Only after finishing did Mai Zi’s stomach feel somewhat settled.
In the past, she would have used half water and half beans, but since they would be fleeing the famine in a few months, she naturally stopped skimping on food. Her physical health was the priority.
There was a small bowl of beans left. Mai Zi placed it into her interdimensional space, a faint idea forming in her mind.
There was no gravity in this space; was it possible there was no time either? That would mean things would come out exactly as they were put in.
If so, she could cook the beans and then store them in the space, making her journey during the famine much easier.
Mai Zi experimented a few more times and discovered that she could store anything in the space as long as she was touching it.
Furthermore, with herself as the center, objects from the space could be manifested anywhere within five meters of her body. If used correctly in this world, it could be a life-saving tool.
Mai Zi harvested all the beans from the field and packed them into the cloth bag.
It was already noon, and the sun was baking the shack mercilessly.
She nimbly spread the green branches from the small room out in the courtyard to dry.
She had just finished a thorough search of the house, from the floorboards to the walls, hoping to find something valuable to trade for grain in town.
Hard work paid off; she found a small piece of iron wedged into a crack in the bed frame.
A normal person wouldn’t be able to get it out, but she had her interdimensional space. Putting it into the space and then taking it out was effortless.
Though there were no valuables in the house, she now had an additional tool—a piece of iron that was soon to become a blade.
Mai Zi lifted the bag of beans to test its weight; it was about twenty catties. However, even with frugal eating, this was far from enough. Mai Zi sighed softly.
She still needed to go to the village entrance to fetch water. In a while, the water level would drop significantly, so she should get as much as she could now.
Mai Zi took inventory of her belongings.
Inside a wooden box were several pieces of paper. For Mai Zi, a high school graduate, she could only half-guess from the script that they were her identity and household registration documents.
There was a set of patched-together coarse cloth clothes and a quilt covered in various patches. (This was a quilt Mai Zi’s Grandmother had made by sewing together the leftover clothes of Mai Zi’s parents and stuffing them with dried reeds.)
There was a dried straw mat on the wooden boards, a pile of plant ash, two baskets, several lengths of rope, a fragment of a salt brick, and a pair of straw sandals.
There were also the cloth shoes left by Mai Zi’s Mother, a wooden bucket for water, the water itself, a dried gourd ladle, thin kindling, the clay pot, and the iron piece.
It wasn’t much, but these items had sustained Mai Zi’s life for nine years.
Mai Zi spread the quilt over the firewood to air out in the sun. She stuffed everything else into her space in one go, then grabbed the wooden bucket and headed out to fetch water.
The bitter summer days tormented the people of Dajing Village, pressing down on them until they could barely breathe. Most villagers were huddled in their houses to stay cool; only two or three older women were at the well fetching water.
“Mai girl, why haven’t you been out these past few days? I was thinking of coming over to check on you.”
Zhang Shi, Li Dahe’s Wife, was stout and thick-waisted, fanning herself with a large leaf. she shouted with a wide grin, then turned to whisper to the two sisters-in-law beside her.
Mai Zi recalled this woman. Zhang Shi had four sons and one young daughter.
In these times, life was hard and families had little money to spare. Zhang Shi wanted a daughter-in-law for free without having to provide food to raise her, waiting only for Mai Zi to grow up so she could take her back to her third son’s house.
What was infuriating was that Zhang Shi would come over to chat for no reason, only to sneakily snatch a few handfuls of beans.
When the young Mai Zi discovered it, she would only cry in secret; without evidence, no one would believe her.
As Mai Zi approached, Zhang Shi continued to herself, “Mai girl, you should be getting married in a couple of years. Life is hard for you with no one to help out. If you ask me, in two years, it’d be better if you came to my house. I can at least spare a bite of food for you.”
Mai Zi found these words grating. Zhang Shi’s calculations were loud and clear.
“Alright, Auntie. It’s getting hotter and hotter, and I’ve run out of beans at home. Can I come over and borrow some these next few days? I’ll pay you back as soon as the harvest is in.”
Mai Zi looked at Zhang Shi as she spoke, her bulging eyes looking terrifyingly large on her thin face.
“Borrow grain! Mai girl, I’m telling you, if you’re really out of food, just endure until this season passes and come to my house to eat at the end of the year.” Zhang Shi’s voice spiked with a sharp, shrill tone at the mention of borrowing grain, before softening slightly.
“Then Auntie, I can come over in the next day or two,” Mai Zi said quickly, staring intently at Zhang Shi.
Zhang Shi’s heart skipped a beat. It wasn’t autumn yet, and there was no work to be done.
Who said anything about taking this money-loser home to eat right now? If she thinks she can enter my Li family gates and eat for free, she’s dreaming! Zhang Shi was already cursing inwardly, and the look on her face turned sour.
A sturdy auntie nearby laughed awkwardly. “Mai girl, your Auntie Zhang is just joking. Your tribal auntie is the one in charge of the household, so it’s not our place to say!”
“Come, fetch your water. We’ve finished ours. These days are hard, and few families are doing well. We have to head back and tidy up.”
When Little Zhang Shi heard this, she was outraged. If one more person came to the table, how much less food would be in her own bowl? She had to have a proper word with her mother when she got back!
Zhang Shi was definitely going to get a scolding. Let her act all high and mighty! She pushed the others along to leave quickly.
Finally gone. Mai Zi knew that whenever grain was mentioned, few people would stick around. Sigh, this god-forsaken weather is ruining everyone!
Mai Zi tied the rope to the wooden bucket and slowly pulled the water up. Seeing that no one was around, she quickly emptied it into her space.
Sigh, without any containers for water, this was the only way. Fortunately, there was no gravity in the space. After only one bucket, the well water began to turn a murky yellow.
Once she had stored four and a half buckets and saw the water was full of yellow mud, Mai Zi stopped. She planned to come once every day at noon; this water would be enough for her journey during the famine, and she might even have a surplus.
Mai Zi carried the water and wobbled back toward her shack. She would wait until tomorrow noon to fetch more. At noon, there were few people and the water was clear; the sun was so vicious that very few people could make it out to the well.
When Zhang Shi returned to the house, her eyes followed Little Zhang Shi. Seeing her sneak off to the main room, Zhang Shi slammed the door hard.
“What are you going crazy for!” Zhang Shi’s man, Li Danian, had been dozing in the stifling heat when the sudden loud noise startled him.
Compounded by the oppressive weather that made everyone irritable, he grabbed a wooden stick and threw it at her. Zhang Shi let out a muffled groan and stayed silent, her fleshy face full of resentment.
That old hag would be lecturing her again soon, and she’d have to endure her looks. She knew that niece-in-law was no good—sending them to fetch water in the middle of the afternoon, who was she trying to torture?
That day, the house of Li Dahe echoed with the sounds of a domestic squabble. However, Mai Zi didn’t care at all. In a month’s time, this village would be facing much worse than this.