When Qin Laidi woke up, she found herself lying on a kang bed. By the window stood a paint-chipped cabinet, and hanging on it was a rusty tiger-head lock… Wasn’t this her old home?
More precisely, it was her maternal home deep in the mountains.
After following the army, she rarely returned. The last time had been thirty years ago—she rushed back only to see her strong-willed grandmother, Qin Guihua, lying lifeless on this very kang.
Qin Guihua had originally been a refugee. During the Republican era, she fled famine from Jiaodong Province to Shilan Province. When they set out, there were over twenty people in the family, but by the time they reached the remote mountain village of Wulidun, only a young girl remained—Qin Guihua.
At that time, little Guihua was starving, barely clinging to life. By chance, a kind Qin family took her in. In those days, few households had enough to eat, yet she was well-fed and rosy-cheeked. The Qin family truly raised her as their own daughter.
Within a few years, she grew up alongside the Qin family’s only son as childhood sweethearts. One saved the trouble of finding a bride, the other didn’t need to marry out. The family simply decided they should get married.
Unfortunately, happiness didn’t last long. In the second year after giving birth to a chubby baby boy, her husband and in-laws died one after another from illness. At seventeen, Qin Guihua became a famous young widow in Wulidun—one known for her sharp tongue that could scold the entire village without defeat.
After her son and daughter-in-law also died, Qin Guihua, now an “old widow,” stubbornly raised four granddaughters. Not only that, she found them all excellent marriages—among the best in the village.
Qin Laidi remembered: her eldest sister Qin Ailan married a worker at the county steel factory; her second sister Qin Youdi married into a family whose father-in-law was a production team leader in the neighboring brigade. As for herself, she too had “married up” into an extraordinary family.
Her husband was Zhao Qingsong. Even before marriage, he was already a company-level officer, able to take her along with the army and provide state rations. The only flaw was that he had been divorced once before and had a son and a daughter.
At first, she was unwilling. But as her grandmother said, such a tall and handsome military officer was coveted by many officials’ daughters. For a poor rural girl from a three-generation peasant family with no parents and nothing to eat, being able to marry him was already like ancestral graves smoking with good fortune—what more could she ask for?
But the truth was, being a stepmother was not easy.
Her stepson was already five years old and could remember things. In his heart, he only longed for his biological mother and her family. If she took good care of him, it was expected; if she didn’t, it meant she had ulterior motives. Later, even the two-year-old stepdaughter felt that her real mother was better—gentle, never scolding, and occasionally making new clothes or buying half a jin of milk candies.
People often said that children not born to you could never truly be of one heart with you. Qin Laidi also wanted to have a child of her own, but Zhao Qingsong said at first that Haiyang and Haiyan were still young. They couldn’t let them feel that gaining a stepmother meant losing their father. They would wait two years until the children accepted her.
Two years later, when the children started elementary school and became more sensible, Zhao Qingsong said he was too busy with work and could barely return home once every six months. They would wait until he got promoted.
That wait lasted many more years. They tried and tried, but never succeeded… By the time Zhao Qingsong retired and the stepchildren graduated from college, she was already an old woman. What was the point of thinking about it anymore?
Better to support the stepchildren, help them marry, and raise grandchildren. Wasn’t that how most women spent their lives?
Ironically, just after the grandchildren were grown, her husband Zhao Qingsong suffered a stroke. She took care of him tirelessly for five years, feeding him and cleaning him, but in the end, he still passed away. As soon as their father died, the stepson immediately turned hostile, brought his biological mother back home, and drove Qin Laidi—the stepmother—out.
Even more ironic, this “good marriage” had been obtained by their Qin family through coercion.
Because of her grandmother’s fierceness and her own inherited “little chili pepper” temperament, no families with unmarried sons in the surrounding villages dared to propose marriage. No matter how pretty she was, few dared to pick such a thorny rose. In rural areas, girls usually began marriage talks at sixteen or seventeen. By eighteen, with no one asking, she was already considered a leftover woman, and the villagers mocked her for being unable to marry.
The turning point came in the summer when she was eighteen. While washing clothes by the dam pond, she slipped and fell in. Fortunately, she was rescued by a passing soldier.
That rescue changed everything.
When her grandmother heard that the one who saved her was the most promising son of the Zhao family—the third son who served as an officer in the army—she immediately went to the Zhao family to make a scene. She claimed her granddaughter’s reputation had been ruined and demanded accountability. If he refused to marry, she would risk her life and cause trouble at his unit.
For the sake of their son’s future, the Zhao family had no choice but to agree. Coincidentally, Zhao Qingsong had been divorced for two years and had returned home this time to find a new wife.
To secure this hard-won “victory,” her grandmother dragged both her and Zhao Qingsong to the commune that very afternoon to register their marriage. The next day, she sent Qin Laidi off to follow the army. The speed of it all left the entire village stunned.
Yes, everyone thought that by relying on this scheme, Qin Laidi had transformed from a sparrow into a phoenix. But only she knew what kind of life she truly lived.
Setting aside the stepchildren, even the Zhao family’s attitude alone was enough to exhaust her. Old Madam Zhao constantly called her a “shrew” and a “jinx,” saying that so many deaths in the Qin family were caused by her grandmother’s bad luck. She would blame her son’s lack of promotion on Qin Laidi as well. Everyday difficulties and humiliation were commonplace.
Her sisters-in-law all waited to see her fail, eager to watch this mountain pheasant revert to her original form.
And Zhao Qingsong?
At this thought, Qin Laidi let out a cold laugh and wiped the moisture from the corner of her eyes… Wait, something wasn’t right!
She looked at her own arms—slender, fair, and smooth, with the tightness and softness unique to a young girl. There wasn’t a trace of the roughness formed by years of housework.
Touching her face, though it wasn’t very fleshy, it had a natural baby fat. It felt full of collagen, as smooth as a freshly peeled egg, without a single blemish or wrinkle.
Even her long-troubled presbyopia was gone. She could clearly see tiny insects on the leaves outside the window!
Wait—why did her body feel wet, as if water was dripping down? She quickly flipped over and sat up. The world spun around her, and her drenched floral clothes came into view. Suddenly, a terrifying thought appeared in her mind—
Could it be… she had been reborn?
And reborn to the very day she fell into the water at eighteen!
She remembered this floral outfit clearly. She had begged for a long time before her grandmother agreed to remake it from her elder sister’s old clothes. She treasured it dearly and rarely wore it. The only time she wore it was the day she fell into the water.
If she had truly returned to that day, did that mean she wouldn’t have to marry Zhao Qingsong? Wouldn’t have to spend years as a widowed-style stepmother, wouldn’t be driven out of the house…
Her youthful eyes sparkled.
However, before she could celebrate for long, voices came from outside the door.
“Hey, Third Sister-in-law, did you really see Widow Qin go extort someone?”
“Oh, I saw it with my own eyes! Widow Qin plopped herself right in front of the young man, grabbed his leg, and kept saying her Laidi had no face to live anymore. If he didn’t marry her, she’d hang herself with a rope right in front of him today!”
“But I heard from Old Six’s family that she threatened to go to his workplace and make him lose his job…”
“Whatever the threat, it’s not something decent people would do. That poor Widow Qin must be crazy from poverty—doing something so shameless, I spit on it!”
“This isn’t just poverty. Maybe her little chili pepper is desperate to get married?” An old woman let out a malicious laugh, and the others joined in. Who didn’t know that she had been trying to marry for two years without success?
They knew several examples. The second son of the Li family from Qilitun had been her classmate and liked her back in school. But when he mentioned her to his family and they learned she was Qin’s granddaughter from Wulidun, and that her grandmother was the infamous shrew, they immediately forbade the match. The son made a fuss for half a month but eventually married another girl happily.
Then there was Xiao Zhang from the neighboring commune. Because of the distance, the matchmaker hadn’t mentioned she was Widow Qin’s granddaughter. The family was quite satisfied and even prepared to compare birth charts. But once someone spread the word about Widow Qin’s reputation, they ran faster than rabbits.
Later, there was Xiao Liu. Though his parents had died early and his family was poor, he didn’t care about the Qin family’s reputation. But just half a month before the wedding, on their way back from watching an outdoor movie, Qin Laidi beat him severely under the cover of night.
She didn’t hold back at all—she beat a strong young man into the county hospital for half a month. Naturally, the marriage fell through.
After several such incidents, her inability to marry became the village’s favorite gossip topic.
“No wonder Widow Qin had to extort someone. With that temper of hers, without tricks, she’d never get married.”
The crowd sighed and laughed. Qin Laidi wanted to go out and see, but whether from the shock of nearly drowning or long-term malnutrition, she didn’t even have the strength to get off the kang. Just moving slightly made her dizzy and see stars.
She absolutely could not end up with Zhao Qingsong again!
Biting her tongue until it bled, she finally dragged herself to the door. Just as she was about to open it, her vision went black…
When she woke again, it sounded like a meeting was being held in her courtyard. Amid the noisy chatter, she barely made out a sentence—
“Auntie, you’ve got it wrong! The one who agreed to marry your Laidi isn’t Qingsong—it’s his comrade!”
“Qingsong will become a regimental commander in the future. But your future grandson-in-law? I heard he’s already been discharged for half a year.”
“Fair and delicate-looking—doesn’t seem like he can do hard labor. How will he support your Laidi in the future? Poor thing…”
“Auntie, don’t you know? Your future grandson-in-law is lame!”