It is so dark in the attic!
Long Jinjin huddled in a corner, hugging herself tightly.
Teardrops the size of beans slid down the corners of her tightly closed eyes, and her small face was deathly pale.
She was still clutching the broken pieces of the antique bowl tightly in her hand, sobbing softly.
Mom and Dad, Jinjin knows she was wrong. She will never dare to enter Dad’s study without permission again.
Just as Jinjin finished muttering to herself, the broken bowl pieces she held in her hand emitted a burst of golden light.
The next moment, everything went black before her eyes, and she fainted.
…
“Mother, I beg you to spend a bit more money to get a couple of doses of medicine for Jinjin. She will definitely get better! Mother, I’m begging you!” Liu Duchuan pleaded tearfully to her mother-in-law.
“Liu, it’s not that I’m being stingy, but look at how long this little hussy has been sick! If we take out more silver from the family to buy her medicine, how is this whole family supposed to survive?” Her mother-in-law, Wang, scolded her coldly and harshly.
“Exactly, isn’t she just a money-losing asset? If she dies, she dies. Is she worth spending silver to save? Let me tell you, sister-in-law, since she won’t wake up anyway, you might as well just throw her away. You and the second brother can just have another fat baby boy instead!” Sister-in-law Xu said with a thin-skinned, sarcastic sneer, mocking Liu Duchuan.
As soon as Jinjin regained consciousness, these harsh and vicious dialogues were the first things she heard.
Could it be that Mom was watching a short drama?
Mom always loved watching these argumentative short dramas. The people in them were all very bad. Mom used to watch them while playing with her, and she had heard them before.
It seemed that after she fainted, Mom and Dad had carried her out of the attic?
“Mom, I want to eat chicken drumsticks!”
Jinjin murmured coquettishly as she opened her eyes, only to be stunned by everything she saw before her.
Inside the dim room, the walls were pitch-black and the roof was pitch-black—this was not their bright home at all.
She hurriedly scrambled up, turned her head to look, and saw three women standing on the floor of the room. She herself was on a bed, and the quilt covering her had patches on it.
“Who are you? Why did you capture me? Where are my mom and dad?” As she spoke, she tried to get down from the other side of the bed and escape toward the door.
Jinjin’s first instinct was that she had been caught by human traffickers, and she had to escape quickly to find her mom and dad.
Right, she also needed to find Uncle Police to report the crime and catch these human traffickers.
The three women on the floor were startled by her sudden movement of scrambling up. Hearing her rambling words, one of the youngest women instantly burst into tears, pattering down her face.
“Jinjin, my good baby, you’ve finally woken up. You scared Mother to death!”
Liu Duchuan rushed over, tightly wrapped her arms around Jinjin, and began to cry.
Jinjin tried to struggle, but she couldn’t move.
Mother?
What kind of strange title was this? Would human traffickers call themselves “Mother”?
Suddenly, a thought flashed in her mind from those short dramas her mom used to watch—children in ancient times seemed to call their mothers “Mother”.
“Did I time-travel?” Jinjin whispered to herself.
[Congratulations to the host for triggering the transmigration keyword, activating the artifact system. I am System Liuliu. Yes, you have transfixed!]
Jinjin froze, instinctively looking left and right. “Where are you talking?”
[Host, I am speaking in your mind. Don’t speak out loud; talk to me in your heart, or others will think your fever has made you stupid!]
“Jinjin, what’s wrong with you? Who are you talking to?” The woman holding her released her, looking at her anxiously and asking.
Reminded by Liuliu, Jinjin didn’t dare say anything more. She blinked her big eyes and obediently shook her head at the woman.
“You scared Mother to death! I thought your fever had scrambled your brains. As long as you’re fine!”
The woman let her go, turned around, knelt on the ground, and kowtowed excitedly toward Wang to thank her.
“Thank you, Mother, thank you for the fifty wen you spent on Jinjin earlier. When Jingao comes back, I’ll have him go hunting a few more times, and he will definitely earn the fifty wen back for you.”
Wang gave Jinjin a cold, disdainful glance on the bed and turned away, completely ignoring Liu Duchuan, who was kneeling on the ground kowtowing to her.
“Look at what sister-in-law is saying. Isn’t it only right that the money second brother gets from hunting is handed over to the family? The family hasn’t split up yet; how can you offset the fifty wen your Jinjin spent on seeing a doctor and taking medicine?”
“This fifty wen is public money, not your family’s alone. How many fewer pounds of meat will our Haohao have to eat because of this? A money-losing asset is a money-losing asset. Who knows what use there is in keeping her around?”
After speaking with a sharp and sarcastic tone, Xu glared fiercely at Jinjin, who was sitting on the kang looking at them in a daze, and turned to follow Wang outside.
Jinjin was in a daze because she was actually talking to Liuliu in her mind.
“Liuliu, how did I get here? Will I never be able to see my mom and dad again?”
Thinking about how sad her mom and dad would be when they found out she was gone, Jinjin grew anxious and hurriedly asked Liuliu.
[Host, do you remember the antique bowl fragments you were holding earlier?]
[That is actually a system artifact. You broke the antique bowl, the fragments scratched your palm, and your blood stained the fragments, opening a spacetime tunnel.]
[It just so happened that the you in this world fell so ill that your soul left your body. By a twist of fate, your souls were swapped, and I am the artifact spirit of the antique bowl. The moment the fragment touched your blood, I was bound to your soul!]
Jinjin listened in a daze.
“Liuliu, do you mean the Jinjin here also went into my body and took over my mom and dad?”
Jinjin understood the most crucial part, and her nose suddenly felt sore.
[Yes, host!]
Jinjin immediately burst into tears. “Can we swap back? Wuwu, I want my mom and dad! I’ll be very careful from now on and never break things at home again, wuwu!”
Today, Mom and Dad were not home. Out of a sudden surge of curiosity, she had sneaked into her dad’s study to explore.
Seeing a bowl painted with dragons on the table that looked exceptionally pretty, she wanted to pick it up to take a look, but she lost her grip, and it dropped to the floor and shattered into pieces.
Just as she picked up a fragment, her mom and dad came back.
They were extremely furious, saying she had broken an ancestral bowl, and punished her by sending her to the attic to reflect on her actions.
[Host, Liuliu doesn’t know if we can swap back. No one knows how the spacetime tunnel will open next time. Liuliu suggests you live well on behalf of your past-life self for now; when we find an opportunity later, we will definitely be able to go back.]
Liuliu hurriedly comforted her.
Jinjin silently lowered her little head and shed tears. How could things turn out like this?
As for the screeching and yelling of Wang and Xu, she didn’t hear a single word.
Turns out, she had transmigrated to ancient times just like the older sisters in the short dramas her mom watched.
Except she had transmigrated into her own past life and bound herself to the artifact spirit of the antique bowl she had broken. He would live in her mind from now on.
It was all too complicated. Wuwu, Jinjin wanted to go home.
Seeing Jinjin silently lowering her head and crying, Liu Duchuan thought that the harsh words her mother-in-law and sister-in-law had just uttered had broken the child’s heart, and she immediately started shedding tears again.
Her daughter was only six years old; how could her mother-in-law and sister-in-law say such vicious things in front of a child?
Sitting on the edge of the bed, she choked up as she pulled her daughter’s small hand to comfort her. “Jinjin, don’t be sad. Who says girls are money-losing assets? In your parents’ hearts, you are our little precious treasure, and our Jinjin is the best!”
Seeing how kind her past-life mother was, Jinjin wiped away a tear with her sleeve, bravely raised her head, and said with red eyes, “Jinjin knows, thank you, Mother!”
Just at that moment, noisy commotion rang out from outside, accompanied by Wang’s scolding.
“Liu, did you die inside that room? Why are you still staying with that money-losing asset? Your husband is crippled, why don’t you hurry up and come out to take a look?”
Panic flashed across Liu Duchuan’s face. She hurriedly let go of Jinjin’s hand, wiped away her tears, and said, “Jinjin, cover yourself well with the quilt and lie down. Be careful not to catch a draft. Mother is going to see what’s wrong!”
With that, Liu Duchuan hurried outside.