“No—!”
Ye Jin jolted awake from a nightmare, only to find the sharp surgical knife already hovering near the tip of her nose.
Doctor Liu stared at her in shock. Ye Jin was never supposed to wake up. He quickly pinned her shoulders down and shouted at the woman beside him, “I haven’t even started the operation and she’s already awake. How much anesthetic did you give her?”
“Let me go! I don’t want to become blind! I’m not donating my cornea anymore!”
Ye Jin forcefully shoved Doctor Liu’s hand away and sat up from the crude operating table made of wooden planks.
The yellowed blanket, the mottled walls, the stench of rot and mildew in the air. Elder Sister Zhang Duo lay on another table nearby, dressed in a wrinkled hospital gown, her face covered in blood. Even so, a smile still lingered at the corners of her lips.
Ye Jin stared at everything before her. It did not take long for her to realize what had happened.
She had been reborn.
Reborn in 1985.
She would never forget the wrinkled old face in front of her, even if it turned to ashes.
It was him.
It was this man who had removed her first cornea at the village clinic with its poor medical conditions and highly unprofessional methods, creating the tragedy that ruined her entire life.
After that operation, Zhang Duo’s eyesight returned to normal, while Ye Jin lost one of her corneas. Due to inadequate sterilization after surgery, her eye became infected and began to rot. Not only did she become half blind, she also became the infamous ugly woman everyone talked about.
And that was only the beginning of her miserable fate.
Not long afterward, while washing clothes by the river, she was pushed into the water and rescued by Han Wenqing, Er Laizi from the Neighboring Village.
Although Han Wenqing had saved her life, he was shameless beyond belief. While she was unconscious, he hugged and kissed her. Her Stepmother, Wang Fengqin, then arrived with a group of people under the pretense of rescuing her, but in reality they destroyed her reputation.
She refused to marry him, but her Stepmother and Stepsister took turns persuading her. Even her father, who was working in another city, tacitly approved after hearing the news.
“You’ve already lost one eye and your reputation is ruined. If you don’t marry him, who else can you marry?”
Those had been her father’s exact words.
The villagers pointed at her and called her a loose woman. Wherever she went, people gossiped behind her back and accused her of being immoral.
She had merely been pushed into the river while washing clothes. Because of her damaged eye, she could not clearly see who had done it when she looked back.
What crime had she committed?
Why did she have to endure such insults and humiliation?
Wang Fengqin and her father forced her to marry Han Wenqing. After the marriage, they treated each other with icy indifference.
Han Wenqing did not want to touch her, and she wanted nothing to do with him either. Ignoring the rumors and gossip, she took advantage of the opportunities brought by the Reform and Opening era and became a small independent business owner, something others looked down upon. Quietly, she earned a fortune.
Then one day, Zhang Duo fell and injured herself. Problems appeared in her remaining eye, and they actually began plotting to take Ye Jin’s other cornea as well.
Naturally, she refused. She did not want to become completely blind.
But that vicious mother and daughter threatened her with information about her younger sister, who had been kidnapped and sold away when she was only eight years old.
Her father had also lost all reason and urged her to donate her remaining cornea.
She completely lost faith in her family.
Her greatest obsession in life was finding her younger sister and taking good care of the grandmother who had loved and cherished her.
She fled in the middle of the night, only to be intercepted by Han Wenqing. After catching her, he locked her inside a woodshed.
Soon afterward, Wang Fengqin and Zhang Duo arrived. Furious that she had tried to escape, Zhang Duo even demanded that no anesthetic be used during the surgery. They tied Ye Jin tightly to the operating table and carved out her cornea while she was fully conscious.
An infection developed after the operation. Her right cornea ulcerated and oozed pus. Eventually, the cornea in her left eye also began to rot.
Han Wenqing locked her in the woodshed, ignoring all her crying and struggling while he ran to Zhang Duo’s bedside to shower her with care and concern.
Every cent Han Wenqing spent came from the savings Ye Jin had accumulated through years of small business ventures.
She had denied herself food and clothing to save money.
In the end, it all benefited that adulterous pair.
The two of them had already been involved with each other while she worked herself to exhaustion every day. They spent her money, used her corneas, and locked her away in a dark place where no one could hear her cries for help.
They all deserved to die!
When Zhang Duo came to mock her, ridiculing her with the phrase, “A blind person lighting a lamp is a waste of wax,” Ye Jin swallowed her humiliation and begged her to leave behind an oil lamp.
That night, enduring the agony in her eyes and fully prepared to die, she knocked over the oil lamp.
The sparks ignited the straw in the woodshed.
Flames quickly engulfed the building.
Being closest to the fire, she was soon burned to death.
When her soul left her body, she saw that adulterous pair burned beyond recognition.
She laughed wildly.
Then she saw a man dressed in black, wrapped in a quilt, rushing into the flames and carrying out her charred corpse.
His back was turned to her, so she could not see his face.
But she could clearly hear the suppressed roar of grief in his voice.
She had no idea who the tall, powerfully built man was.
Yet when he turned his head, she clearly saw the tears at the corner of his eye.
She looked at him deeply one last time.
Thick black eyebrows.
Bright, star-like eyes.
A tall nose bridge.
And a small red mole on his right ear.
Filled with resentment and a trace of gratitude, she never expected to be given another chance after dying such a miserable death.
The anesthetic had only recently been administered. Her entire body felt weak and numb. Walking barefoot on the ground felt like stepping on cotton.
Gathering all her strength, she charged toward the door.
The middle-aged woman temporarily serving as a nurse spread her arms to block her path. Ye Jin bent down and slipped beneath her arm.
Another middle-aged woman standing by the door immediately pressed herself against it, using her body to block the exit.
Ye Jin grabbed the IV bottle hanging beside Zhang Duo’s bed and smashed it onto the floor.
With a loud crash, glass shards and medicine splashed everywhere.
The woman screamed in fright, covering her face as she fled from the dangerous area.
Ye Jin had already reached the doorway when the corner of her eye caught sight of a cloud-shaped jade pendant hanging around Zhang Duo’s neck.
“That’s Mother’s jade pendant. Why is it on her?”
The thought had only just appeared in her mind when Wang Fengqin, who had been waiting outside, heard the commotion and rushed in with her two brothers.
“Doctor Liu, what’s going on?”
“Ye Jin! Why are you awake? Get back onto the operating table!”
After glancing at her blood-covered daughter, Wang Fengqin was terrified out of her mind.
Judging by the situation, her daughter’s perforated cornea had just been removed. Doctor Liu was still holding the surgical knife and was clearly preparing to remove that little wretch’s cornea next.
Who would have thought she would wake up and escape?
If she got away, Wang Fengqin’s daughter would go from having weak vision to becoming half blind.
Her whole life would be ruined!
The group rushed forward to grab Ye Jin.
Seeing that the doorway was no longer an option, Ye Jin abruptly changed direction and ran toward the open window.
Several sparse bars had been installed on the window frame as a theft deterrent. One of them had already been broken off.
Using both hands and feet, Ye Jin climbed onto the windowsill and squeezed through the gap.
“What are you standing there for? Hurry up and chase her!”
When Wang Fengqin’s two brothers saw Ye Jin escape, they hesitated.
If she ran back to the village and spread the story around, they would lose face.
But Wang Fengqin continued urging them.
“My Duo Duo is about to go blind. Why are you two uncles still hesitating?”
Wang Fengqin tried to squeeze through the window herself, but she was too fat. Half her body became stuck, leaving her unable to move forward or backward. Her two brothers stood nearby like wooden posts, staring blankly.
“Forget about me. Go after her!”
Wang Fengqin roared through the pain.
Only then did the two men snap out of it and sprint outside.