Song Jin had come through the apocalypse.
This meant she was different from ordinary infants—she was born with awareness, able to see and understand everything around her.
She naturally knew some of the things Niu Tielan avoided discussing.
But only some.
Niu Tielan was truly a person of ironclad discretion, and also a mother who doted on her child beyond measure. Even faced with a months-old infant who "understood nothing," she never spoke of those messy matters. All day it was "Jinjin, Jinjin," and at one point she had nearly registered Song Jin's name as Niu Jinjin.
For this, Song Jin had Town Mayor Lin to thank. Had he not sincerely praised the name as auspicious back then, Niu Tielan genuinely would have thought it a perfectly good name.
Town Mayor Lin hadn't actually been that old at the time, but he looked remarkably aged. Even as a child he'd had the face of someone much older, and having just gone through the autumn harvest, he was tanned a deep, dark brown, looking rather uneducated. Yet he praised the name Niu Jinjin with such genuine sincerity.
Niu Tielan immediately decided to find someone to change the name—and the surname along with it, though she was quite satisfied with her own new surname.
Niu—cattle—was a protected and precious species, carrying strength and status.
Tie—iron—was hard and versatile.
Lan—orchid—was like herself, hidden behind the iron.
But no matter how satisfied she was, Niu Tielan knew her own name wasn't pleasant by conventional standards. She didn't mind for herself, but when it came to her own daughter, that was another matter.
Niu Tielan delayed registering her daughter's name, and the next day brought three-year-old Song Jin to Wenyuan Academy, grabbing hold of the person who looked the most cultured—and who indeed was the most cultured, being the former headmaster of Wenyuan Academy.
He was an old man with a bad temper. To Niu Tielan's face he smiled kindly and amiably, but behind her back he loved to pinch Song Jin's cheeks and flick her forehead, right up until the day he left.
Song Jin remembered it clearly: this damned old man had pinched her thirty-nine times in total and flicked her fifty-seven times. He was no good thing at all.
But to his credit, he gave her a rather pleasant-sounding name. And later, upon learning that the mother and daughter had moved from elsewhere and had no connections locally, he used his influence to help them put down roots smoothly in Linxi Town. His merits and faults could be said to cancel out.
The days that followed were ordinary and unremarkable.
Niu Tielan's public identity was that of a widow, and Song Jin was her posthumous child.
Her husband had been an ordinary son of a wealthy family in Qiannan. He'd gone out to study and been killed by bandits on the road. With only a weak woman left in the household, unable to fend off her husband's clansmen, she'd been driven out with some family wealth. Passing through Linxi Town, she'd found the water and soil agreeable and decided to settle there.
She'd sought out Town Mayor Lin, who had just taken office, and used all her savings to purchase twenty-eight mu of fertile farmland, successfully establishing residency in Linxi Town. Later, she gained a foothold through her skill in incense-making, gradually expanding the family estate.
To outsiders, everything about Niu Tielan was perfectly reasonable. Even her excessive beauty was concealed by her frail, delicate bearing. But to Song Jin, the inconsistencies were far too numerous.
First, there was her "biological father."
When her mother burned incense for this man, she was calmer than when she sneezed. And every time, she burned incense for two people at once—clearly there was a story there. But from what Song Jin knew, her mother and father had been childhood sweethearts whose relationship had always been harmonious, with no third parties involved. Niu Tielan's behavior made no sense at all.
Moreover, it wasn't so much that she'd been expelled by the Song family as that she'd left willingly—even eagerly—taking the belongings she'd long since packed, calmly leading the not-yet-three-year-old Song Jin out of the prefectural city and coming to Linxi Town to re-establish herself as head of a female household.
Given Niu Tielan's normal life trajectory and her frail, sickly constitution, she should never have traveled far or enjoyed going out. So she certainly shouldn't have handled the entire relocation with such ease—ease that suggested she had walked this path before.
Her mother had a great secret she was keeping.
Coincidentally, Song Jin was a very curious person.
But in this life, she spent her days with cats and dogs, and had learned from them: be curious about all new things, but maintain patience.
She'd waited all these years, and finally the matter of her mother was beginning to show traces. Song Jin had to stretch out her claws and give it a scratch, pulling at that thread to see what came loose.
At this thought, Song Jin's phoenix eyes lifted slightly, and she dashed toward Panlong Mountain.
Under the cover of night, she moved like a leopard through the forest, weaving between grass and trees with a soft rustle, like a ghostly shadow, impossible to track.
Song Jin had been an Ability User in her past life. Thanks to her powerful abilities, she'd been taken in by the base for training from birth. Her life had been nothing but training upon training. Even without her abilities, her survival skills were unmatched by most—and crossing into another time and space changed nothing.
Not to mention, this era did have abilities. Only, without the Mutated Energy Crystals scattered everywhere, the abilities here were pitifully weak, and only a rare few possessed them. They were called Internal Power.
Song Jin went into the mountains every day, partly to train her agility and partly to search for animals and plants with energy that could help enhance her supernatural ability. Over the years, the fact that she had taken down the nearby bandit stronghold was the best proof of her efforts.
It was also because of that stronghold that she had noticed something strange in this area.
Logically speaking, Si'an County was doing fairly well, but it wasn't wealthy enough to invite envy or robbery. The surrounding common folk weren't so destitute that they'd be driven to become mountain bandits.
So when the bandit incident broke out, Xiao Shi had come to Song Jin with a generous offer, hoping she'd investigate. Song Jin had nothing better to do anyway, so she took Huanghuang along for a stroll through the bandit den—and that stroll revealed something off.
Most of those men were vicious criminals wanted by the imperial court, but a small portion of them, judging by their words and demeanor, were no ordinary bandits. Moreover, their intelligence was far too sharp—the moment she and Huanghuang approached, they had already made moves.
Song Jin had no choice but to kill them all.
After all, if they didn't die, who knew how many more people would lose their lives later.
This matter was clearly not simple, and with all its tangled complexities, a village girl like her couldn't get involved. She left the rest to Magistrate Xiao. Whatever they had extracted from the interrogations, she didn't know.
But Song Jin had more or less made some guesses. If there was anything in this area worth scheming over with cunning plots, it could only be—
What lay before her eyes.
Song Jin had run and flown nearly the whole way, spending close to two shichen before reaching her destination. She stood at the mountaintop, pulled out her crude homemade telescope, and looked at the mountain foot beyond two ridges.
In this silent, deep mountain, under the dim night, faint firelight still flickered there. Looking closely, she could make out buildings hidden beneath the foliage. Scanning the perimeter, she spotted wild wolves and vicious dogs lying at the edges. And beyond the layers of defense, what they were protecting was a cave.
As time slowly passed, the quiet cave began to emit sounds. Amidst clattering noises and curses, the vine-woven fence at the cave entrance was pushed open, and a tall man in gray clothes stepped out first, followed by several gaunt men.
They were dressed in rags, carrying bamboo baskets on shoulder poles, swaying unsteadily behind him. The long poles bent under the weight, as if they might snap at any moment.
The gray-clad man looked at these laborers with disdain and barked, "Be careful, don't jostle the goods! If even a bit goes missing, your worthless lives won't be enough to make up for it."
The men nodded timidly, their withered faces etched with bitterness, walking even more carefully and cautiously. Only when they set the baskets down and before they could catch their breath, the man at the front was shoved hard, tumbling to the ground with a pained groan.
But no one paid him any attention.
The tall guard stood by the baskets, lifted the black cloth covering them. Firelight flickered across, and the baskets gleamed with silver, occasionally touched with threads of gold.
He chuckled. "Oh? The quality's much better this time?"
The gray-clad man smiled too. "Of course. It should be this quality from here on out. After digging for so long, we've finally hit the good stuff. The master will be pleased."
The guard said, "Naturally. It's all those useless fools' fault—they botched such a simple task and got us caught in the master's wrath. Now that we're seeing results, life will be a bit easier for everyone."
The gray-clad man said, "Enough. Get the goods moved down quickly, so nothing goes wrong."
The guard replied, "What could go wrong? This deep in the mountains, forget outsiders—even we couldn't get up here without a guide."
Not to mention all the fierce beasts around. Even if someone did come, they wouldn't be leaving.
The gray-clad man said, "True enough."
…
Song Jin sat among the tree branches, watching as they carefully hung the baskets on mule backs. The group, weapons in hand and vicious dogs on leashes, left the valley.
She put away her telescope and squinted in thought.
Those people were extremely cautious, with vicious dogs on both sides. The moment she got close, she'd be discovered, so she never risked it. After all, anything worth this much effort in the deep mountains was either gold or silver—or at the very least, copper or iron ore.
All of it was controlled by the government, the kind of stuff that got your entire clan executed.
Ordinary people wouldn't dare touch such things. Whoever was behind these men was either royalty or a great noble family. Song Jin, a small rural landowner, couldn't afford to get involved, nor did she want to. So even though she had a decent relationship with Magistrate Xiao and had discovered this place long ago, she'd never told anyone.
Magistrate Xiao was a good man, but you could know a person's face without knowing their heart—who could guarantee he wasn't mixed up in this? Serving the country and the people didn't conflict with wanting to make a bit of money.
Besides, even if he wasn't involved, could he afford to be? One misstep and not only would he be in trouble, but his family would suffer too.
That was how Song Jin had thought before. Now, thinking of the people she'd run into yesterday—
Each of them looked like they had significant backing, and they'd chosen this specific time and place. If they weren't here for this matter, she'd change her name to Niu Jinjin on the spot.
Song Jin sat in the tree pondering, watching as the firelight in the valley died out and darkness swallowed everything once more. She climbed down from the giant tree dozens of meters tall.
The moment her feet touched the ground, a round, chubby head popped out from behind the tree.
Huanghuang: "Meow~"
Song Jin pinched the tiger cub's ear. "Night owl, didn't I tell you not to run around?"
This was already the edge of Huanghuang's territory, bordering the territory of her older cub. She usually didn't come this way—she must have caught Song Jin's scent and followed it here.
Huanghuang couldn't understand what she was saying, and simply rolled around acting spoiled. "Roar~ mew."
What a clingy tiger she was.
Song Jin rubbed Huanghuang's belly, watching her roll around happily. Starlight flickered in her eyes, and the corners of her lips gradually curved upward.
Huanghuang paused, her tiger ears twitching. "Mew?"