February 11, 1985. The twenty-second day of the twelfth lunar month.
On the ice outside a village in Northeast China lay a young woman. She was the village chief’s twenty-year-old “old girl,” who possessed the intelligence of only an eight-year-old and could not care for herself.
A Ye Zhifang from a later generation, sharing the same name, had transmigrated into the body of this silly village girl. She was woken by the cold; the mid-winter weather combined with the temperature on the ice reached nearly twenty degrees below zero.
Had she not woken up in this body, it likely would not have survived the day. By the time the villagers found her, she would have been nothing more than a cold corpse.
Upon waking, Ye Zhifang felt a pain in her head. She sat up and touched her scalp, finding a bump on the back of her head. It seemed the original owner had slipped and hit a hard snowbank, losing consciousness. Coincidentally, that was when she had transmigrated.
Ye Zhifang was filled with regret. She was supposed to graduate from university in six months. During the holiday, she had bought a swimming pass, only for a simple swim to end her life. She had just swum into the deep end when her leg suddenly cramped; it felt as if a force from the bottom of the pool had pulled her, and then she was here.
In the original owner’s memory, she had loving parents and two older brothers. However, her eldest sister-in-law was only close to her on the surface, frequently speaking ill of her behind her back. Even her four-year-old nephew had learned to be two-faced.
The reason the original owner had appeared on the ice outside the village was that her four-year-old nephew said he wanted to eat fish. Hearing that someone had cut holes in the ice to catch fish, the original owner followed her nephew out of the village.
They had left quite late that day, arriving at the ice at two in the afternoon.
At the time, other village children were nearby catching fish. The nephew quickly joined a group of kids to play, while the original owner seriously tried to catch fish. Eventually, she slipped and hit her head directly on a snowbank.
When the transmigrated Ye Zhifang woke up, no one was around. Even her four-year-old nephew was long gone.
Ye Zhifang thought for a long time and concluded there was only one possibility: her sister-in-law and nephew found her an eyesore and had used this opportunity to get rid of her.
Heaven has not forsaken me. The Ye Zhifang from the twenty-first century is here.
Since the original owner was a “fool,” she would continue to play the part. She would give them a taste of their own medicine and ensure those in the village and the family who looked down on her received their due punishment.
Ye Zhifang stood up. Her padded cotton shoes were soaked, and the legs of her large red cotton trousers were wet. Fortunately, the original owner’s family treated her extremely well; she wore the best fabric in the house, without a single patch.
At that moment, the village chief sat in his main hall, watching the sky grow dark. Usually, the old girl knew to come home by now. Why wasn’t she back yet?
“Xiao Yong, did your aunt go out with you this afternoon? Do you know where she went?”
The village chief finally asked anxiously, standing up to go outside and look for her. Aside from being a bit slow, his daughter had no other faults.
It was all because they had only hired a midwife for the birth. The baby had been in a breech position, nearly costing both mother and child their lives.
When the girl was born, her face was blue from lack of oxygen. The midwife had to smack her for a long time before she finally wailed. As she grew, they realized she was different—developmentally delayed and unable to do basic math. Her IQ ultimately stopped at that of an eight-year-old.
Even so, the village chief’s family doted on the youngest child. It was just another mouth to feed, and they could afford it.
Xiao Yong was the eldest grandson of the Ye family—Ye Zhifang’s four-year-old nephew.
Xiao Yong had returned home around three in the afternoon, completely putting his aunt out of his mind. Whether he truly forgot or not was one thing, but he had shown no concern whatsoever for her fall.
“Grandpa, Auntie did go out with me. We agreed to catch fish, but she wanted to do it herself. I finished playing with the other kids and came back first.”
Xiao Yong wasn’t lying. Just as the village chief was about to head out, a figure walked in. It was Ye Zhifang.
Her mother, who was in the kitchen, saw her daughter return. Wearing an apron, she rushed out, only to see her daughter’s trouser legs covered in ice and her shoes soaked. Her heart ached instantly.
“Xiaofang, where have you been? It’s already dark, why are you just getting back?”
Ye’s mother pulled her daughter toward the room. Ye Zhifang glanced at her nephew, Ye Yong, who was standing by the door. Ye Yong was startled by his aunt’s gaze.
Usually, his aunt’s eyes were vacant and silly; she would easily believe him even when he lied to her. But now, her gaze was like poison, as bone-chillingly cold as the mid-winter weather.
“Mom, Xiao Yong and I wanted to catch fish for the family, but the fish were too clever. We didn’t catch a single one,” Ye Zhifang said, acting spoiled with her mother.
Standing by the door, Xiao Yong began to doubt his own eyes. Had his aunt really looked at him like that?
While her mother was helping her change, she discovered the bump on the back of her daughter’s head. At her touch, Ye Zhifang cried out in pain.
“Mom, it hurts.”
Tears welled up in her mother’s eyes. Since childhood, her daughter had been more obedient and well-behaved than others, and she rarely fell ill. She had been raised with great care.
Though her IQ was low, she was one of the prettiest girls in the village. Her mother was willing to care for her for a lifetime.
At that moment, the eldest sister-in-law brought in a basin of hot water. Ye Zhifang lived with her parents, and the warmth of the rural earthen kang made her feel cozy.
“Xiaofang, honestly… if you wanted fish, you should have asked your brothers. Trying to catch them yourself—you’re lucky the fish didn’t catch you instead! If you hadn’t come back soon, Mom and Dad would’ve had the whole family out looking for you.”
The sister-in-law placed the basin on a chair with a hint of displeasure. Since marrying into the Ye family, her life was better than at her own home, but the best food and clothes always went to this sister-in-law, putting even her own son in second place.
Ye Zhifang looked up at her sister-in-law, who wore two braids. She was the same age as the oldest brother but looked closer to thirty.
“Sister-in-law, tomorrow is Minor New Year. I want to eat fish—lots and lots of fish.”
Ye’s mother gently wiped her daughter’s hands and face, even taking off her frozen socks and shoes to wash her feet herself. In this house, Ye Zhifang was treated like a young lady, which naturally made the sister-in-law jealous.
“That’s enough. Bring the food over. Tomorrow, I’ll have Zhiyuan and Zhiheng go catch fish.”
Ye’s mother truly spoiled her daughter. Whatever she wanted would surely appear before her the next day, a privilege not even the grandson enjoyed.
Ye’s mother felt she owed her daughter. If the family hadn’t been too poor to afford a hospital birth, her daughter wouldn’t have come into this world to suffer like this.