The tractor rumbled along for over forty minutes before finally arriving at Shangxi Production Brigade.
It pulled up onto the open ground in front of the brigade office.
The group practically tumbled out — their legs were so wobbly from the bumpy ride that they could barely stand.
The dirt road was full of potholes and uneven — forget a tractor, even a Mercedes or Land Rover would have people carsick!
Old Zhao, the tractor driver, was amused by their state and laughed heartily as he helped unload their luggage.
Su Yun crouched down for a moment to recover, then stood up and helped Liu Huan get down from the side of the tractor, away from anyone watching.
The female lead, Tao Yining, was already crouched by a tree, throwing up. Li Jianjun’s face was pale too — he was clutching his luggage and barely holding back his nausea.
Su Yun was sure she saw his cheeks puff out and then go flat again — she suspected he’d swallowed it back down…
That thought made her feel even more queasy…
Just then, two men walked out of the adjacent building. They looked fairly old, dressed in dark cotton clothes and pants with straw sandals. Their clothes were patched in several places, and their pant legs were casually rolled up.
The older man, about fifty or so, approached first:
“Welcome, comrades! Welcome to Shangxi Production Brigade!”
“I’m the brigade leader, Zhou Zhengguo. This beside me is the brigade accountant, Wang Lei.”
“You’ve just arrived — I heard you’ve been traveling for days. Take two days to rest. You’ll start work the day after tomorrow!”
“For now, let me take you to the educated youth point to get settled.”
The accountant, Wang Lei, added:
“After you’ve settled in, come find me to collect your educated youth subsidies — from this month until next July: eight yuan in living expenses and 32 jin of grain rations per month. Come pick them up yourselves.”
They looked like they wanted to say more, but seeing how exhausted the young people were, they decided to let them rest first. There was plenty of time ahead — no rush for a few more words!
They grabbed their things and followed the brigade leader forward. The educated youth point was right next to the brigade office — just a few steps away.
Su Yun sized it up and concluded: this house looked pretty good — at least much better than most of the earthen houses they’d passed along the way.
It was a green-brick, tile-roofed house, just like the brigade office. The courtyard gate was open, but no one was inside — the other educated youth were probably out working in the fields.
“I have some business to attend to — I’ll be going now. There’s a head person at the youth point — I’ve already sent for him. Wait here a moment; he’ll come and arrange things for you.”
Zhou Zhengguo seemed in a hurry — he’d seen someone signaling him from a distance, probably meaning another fight had broken out in the fields.
The brigade leader hurried off, clearly very busy.
The few of them exchanged glances, set their luggage down by their feet, and waited in the yard since no one had come to let them in.
“I wonder how many older educated youth are here, and what they’re like,” Liu Huan said with some concern.
An Qin comforted her: “We’re here now, so we’ll make do. Let’s just do what we need to do. If they’re hard to get along with, we’ll keep our distance.”
Tao Yining, on the other hand, was more worried about the living arrangements: “There seem to be quite a few rooms here. I wonder how they’ll be assigned.”
The two men didn’t speak, but they furrowed their brows worriedly. They were probably both dreading the prospect of shared bunk beds.
Only Su Yun, who knew the plot inside out, wasn’t worried at all.
She was the female lead in a period novel, after all!
She’d even brought her family’s mini-supermarket with her and could give herself special treatment anytime.
How could she not have a private place to stay?
In the plot, this educated youth point and the adjacent brigade office had both originally belonged to a landlord’s estate.
Later, they were vacated, and just around the time the new policy came down requiring each brigade to accept educated youth, the building was split in two. One half became the brigade office.
The brigade leader and the accountant both worked in that office, and a few rooms were used as brigade storage — for seeds, grain, and farming tools.
The other half was the educated youth point.
The youth point had two rows of buildings. The front row had three large rooms — originally used as storehouses. The middle one had been partitioned off into a kitchen and a wood shed.
In the other two rooms, the brigade leader had built large kangs (brick beds), turning them into two communal bunk rooms — each sleeping five people — one for the male educated youth and one for the female.
Out back, there was another row of small rooms — eight in total. They had once been servants’ quarters for the landlord’s family, each only about ten square meters or so.
Each room had a small kang, though a bit worn. When the brigade had built the kangs for the larger rooms, they’d fixed these up as well.
So, naturally, the female lead moved straight into a private room.
And Su Yun planned to get one too.
“Sorry — the fields are a bit far. Have you been waiting long?”
A voice came from behind them, and they all turned to look.
“Hello, I’m Zhao Jiayan. I came here as an educated youth last year, and now I’m the head of the youth point!”
Sure enough, the previous head had gotten married and moved out after just one year, and Zhao Jiayan had been voted in as the new head.
Zhao Jiayan didn’t seem surprised to see An Qin — his family had already written to him about it. He nodded to her in greeting.
“Where are we staying? How are the arrangements?” An Qin was tired from the journey and didn’t feel like making small talk in front of everyone, so she asked directly.
“There are communal kangs in the front, and private rooms in the back. You can have a room to yourself or share with someone. But in winter, heating the kang burns more firewood, so you’ll need to stock up more in advance.”
“You can take your pick — feel free to look around,” Zhao Jiayan explained patiently.
They all went to check out the communal rooms. In the female dormitory, there were already three sets of bedding on the kang. Liu Huan put hers down too.
“I’ll stay here for now. If it doesn’t work out, I can move later,” she said.
Her father had told her that to fit in quickly, she needed to interact with the locals. If the older educated youth were hard to get along with, she could always move to the back later.
“I’m used to having my own space — I’ll take a room out back.”
Su Yun said goodbye to Liu Huan and went to the back row with An Qin and Tao Yining.
Three of the rooms in the back row already had padlocks on the doors.
“This one is mine. Next door is another male educated youth. And the one on the far east is a female educated youth,” Zhao Jiayan said, pointing to two adjoining rooms on the west side and the easternmost one.
The rest were empty. An Qin chose the second-to-last room on the east side.
Su Yun picked the room next to An Qin’s. The female lead went straight for the room next to Zhao Jiayan’s. Gu Beihai was a step too late — with only two middle rooms left, flanked by women on both sides, he had no choice but to take the one next to Su Yun.
Su Yun couldn’t help but exclaim inwardly!
When she’d read the book, she hadn’t understood why the modern female lead was so fixated on the male lead — she knew he had a fiancée and struggled with it internally, but still ended up secretly dating him.
The moment she saw Zhao Jiayan in person, she understood — he was fair-skinned, refined, and bore a striking resemblance to a modern-day idol she knew.
From her covert observation, Su Yun noticed that the female lead’s eyes lit up the instant she saw him. Now she’d even moved right next door.
So this was a doppelgänger story! The female lead must have been a die-hard fan of that idol!
Wait a minute!
Suddenly, Su Yun remembered — that idol’s surname was also Zhao! (Author made this up — no real-life basis!) And he looked so similar — could he be related?
Su Yun gasped! Can’t have the idol, so marry his grandfather and become his grandmother? Wait — if the female lead inserts herself into the timeline, the original kids might not be born — then the idol might never even exist!
Were those soap-opera plots about breaking up and marrying the other person’s uncle or father, becoming their aunt or stepmother, actually real?!
The female lead really knew how to play the game. Su Yun shook her head, her worldview shattered, and walked into her own room.