In the dark night, the sound of flesh slapping against a human face was grating to the ears.
The old woman delivering the blows was strong, but the person on the ground remained motionless, as if already dead.
The small, dark, and withered face was swelling up like a northeastern steamed bun, yet the person on the floor still didn’t stir.
The old man standing behind the old woman called out coldly to stop her: “Enough, that’s about right. Hurry up and search for the things. The village chief and the others might be here soon.”
Dawn was approaching. If they didn’t hurry, their efforts throughout the night would be in vain.
With the patriarch’s command, the two daughters-in-law immediately stepped forward to hold back their mother-in-law: “Mom, don’t rush to beat her to death. Let us find the house deed first. If we can’t find it, we’ll still need to question her.”
“Fine, we’ll spare this wretched girl for now,” the old woman reluctantly got up.
Still cursing under her breath, she took the lead in searching.
The short old man on the side instructed sinisterly, “After searching her, don’t forget to check the ancestral hall as well.”
Chen Laoda’s dilapidated earthen house had only three rooms: one served as the main hall, and the other two were bedrooms.
Chen Laoda and his wife occupied one room, while the other was divided into two parts—the front for Chen Ziming and the back for Liang Qiaoqiao.
Before entering the ancestral hall, Chen Laoer’s family had already ransacked Chen Laoda and his wife’s room, Chen Ziming’s room, and the makeshift kitchen outside.
They had taken everything they could carry back to their own home, leaving nothing behind.
Now, only Liang Qiaoqiao’s room and the main hall, which served as the ancestral hall, remained unsearched.
In the eyes of Chen Laoer’s family, there was no such notion that the ancestral hall of the deceased should not be disturbed.
They had even been responsible for the death of Chen Laoda’s wife.
They hadn’t feared her when she was alive, and they certainly weren’t afraid of her now that she was dead.
After all, the eldest branch of the family had died out, and only their second branch could carry on the Chen family line.
Thus, all the belongings of the eldest branch rightfully belonged to their family, and no one could say otherwise.
Leaving the three women to work outside, Chen Laoer—dressed in a patched gray cloth shirt, with graying hair and beard—turned and entered the inner room with his two sons.
“Search thoroughly! Since we didn’t find it in the other two rooms, focus on this wretched girl’s room! I refuse to believe a mere piece of paper can be hidden so well!”
Chen Laoer, with his fierce appearance, stood by the window, his venomous triangular eyes wide open as he directed his sons to rummage through every chest and cupboard.
His dear elder brother and sister-in-law were dead, and his only nephew had sacrificed his life. Now, the Chen family house should rightfully belong to him, Chen Laoer.
Liang Qiaoqiao was nothing but a wretched child bride taken in for Chen Ziming. How could she, of all people, deserve to keep occupying the Chen family house?
Chen Laoer snorted darkly: It was just this wretched girl’s tough luck that she hadn’t been beaten to death along with the old woman the night they seized the survivor benefits.
But it didn’t matter. Those who were meant to die would die eventually—it just meant beating her one more time.
In her dazed state, Liang Qiaoqiao faintly felt someone groping her and pinching her from time to time.
The pain made her want to curse.
Blind heavens! She had followed traffic rules and crossed at the green light—so why had she been hit by a car?
Hit me then, just kill me outright! Why make it so painful?!
“That wretched girl, just like that damned woman, knows how to hide things!” The old woman’s coarse, grating voice was extremely unpleasant to the ear when she cursed.
Liang Qiaoqiao couldn’t help cursing inwardly as well.
Damn it! Who’s so bored? Even a person who died in a car crash gets groped and pinched?
Who did she offend? She worked hard all her life without gaining anything good, and now she can’t even rest in peace after death?
Struggling to open her eyes, Liang Qiaoqiao was about to curse out loud when three large, dark faces appeared right in front of her.
Gah! Scared to death!
Who are these three wretched women?
Don’t they know even the dead can be scared awake?
Her face was badly swollen, the slight opening of her eyes barely noticeable.
The three women busy searching her didn’t notice at all that she had woken up.
Or perhaps no one cared whether she was conscious or unconscious.
Chen Laoer’s second daughter-in-law, who was best at currying favor with the elderly, asked the old woman, “Mom, could it be that this wretched girl didn’t keep it on her at all?”
How else to explain it? The three of them had searched every inch of the wretched girl’s body multiple times.
Apart from a few stray hairs, they hadn’t found anything else.
The old woman was also furious and slapped Liang Qiaoqiao’s face again: “Wretched skin! Just like that dead woman, always hiding anything good from our family!”
Liang Qiaoqiao rolled her eyes inwardly: Look at what kind of people you are! Who else should we guard against if not you?
She laboriously pushed open her swollen eyelids and stared unblinkingly at the three malicious, ugly faces before her.
She had suddenly realized that she’d been unlucky enough to be caught by the transmigration god and dumped in some unknown backwater.
This timing was far from good.
It was the 1970s—a historically impoverished era lacking clothes and food!
Damn it, she was about to endure hard times!
Liang Qiaoqiao glared at the three vicious women surrounding her.
In the original body’s remaining memories, these three were deeply detestable presences.
They were the wife and two wicked daughters-in-law of Chen Laoer, the ungrateful younger brother of her adoptive father, Chen Laoda.
Unlike the honest and hardworking Chen Laoda, the lazy and cunning Chen Laoer had always been crooked—his whole family was rotten to the core.
The original host had been beaten to death by this family, her soul scattered.
Liang Qiaoqiao, who died in a car crash in the modern era, had somehow drifted here with her soul.
By accident, she was sucked into this vacant body.
“!!!”
Just like that, inexplicably and not very happily, she had returned from the dead.
Having died and transmigrated to the 1970s, immediately facing a room full of villains in the ancestral hall, Liang Qiaoqiao felt utterly sour and bitter.
“Mom, is the thing hanging around this wretched girl’s neck valuable?” Chen Laoer’s eldest daughter-in-law asked, tugging at something she had just pulled from Liang Qiaoqiao’s collar.
Chen Laoer’s wife squinted at it and spat: “Pah, it’s just a broken stone picked up from who knows where. What value could it have?”
“Oh…” Her eldest daughter-in-law curled her lip, her expression full of disdain and disappointment.
Liang Qiaoqiao’s gaze shifted, landing on the shabby stone in their hands.
It was about the size of an adult thumb, dull and uneven on the surface—it really didn’t look valuable at all.
If not for the crooked character “Qiao” carved on it, which the original owner in her memories often took out to fondle,
Liang Qiaoqiao truly wouldn’t have recognized this as the original body’s most treasured personal belonging.
“If the wretched girl doesn’t have it on her, then let’s search elsewhere.” The old woman kicked Liang Qiaoqiao irritably and led the way to search the ancestral hall.