Madam He hobbled forward on her bound feet, running with snot and tears streaming down her face until she reached Luo Lingfeng.
“Captain, our family never said we weren’t going to work. It’s just—something happened at home! That damned girl is possessed, making a scene about splitting off and living on her own!”
Luo Lingfeng’s face turned icy cold.
“Possessed? That’s feudal superstition. For talk like that, you should be dragged to the threshing ground and criticized.”
Madam He shuddered in terror and immediately began slapping her own mouth.
“C-Captain, I misspoke! I’m punishing myself! Our Eleven just caught a chill, has a high fever, isn’t thinking straight—she’s babbling about splitting the family.”
“Then let her split,” Luo Lingfeng said flatly.
“When children grow up, parents can’t control them. Daughters grow up and marry out sooner or later. If He Shiyi wants to set up her own household, I approve. Now all of you—get to work. If you keep dawdling and skipping labor, I’ll hold a struggle session for your whole family tonight.”
His voice was stern, indifferent, without the slightest emotion.
He Zhu and He Yi, who had been chasing after He Shiyi, were both deeply afraid of Luo Lingfeng and stood watching from a distance.
Chen Juan pushed out her four-month pregnant belly and sidled up beside Luo Lingfeng, speaking in a coy, delicate tone.
“Captain, I’m pregnant. I can’t go out to work.”
Dark clouds instantly gathered on Luo Lingfeng’s face.
“Which woman in this village stopped working just because she was pregnant? Rural folks aren’t that delicate. If you don’t work, I’ll deduct your work points and grain.”
Chen Juan’s eyes filled with tears.
She muttered softly, “I don’t believe it. If your wife were pregnant, you’d never let her go work in the fields.”
Luo Lingfeng’s hearing was sharp.
He snapped angrily, “I’m not married yet. No need for your nonsense. Go work!”
Then he turned and saw He Zhu and He Yi still standing there dumbly, not moving.
His face turned black as charcoal.
“The work assignments are already given. Why are you still loitering here instead of getting to work?”
Everyone in the He family—except He Shiyi—was driven off to the fields by Luo Lingfeng.
He Shiyi paused, gathering her emotions.
Tears welled up instantly, shimmering in her eyes.
Her pitiful gaze passed through the blur of tears, staring straight at Luo Lingfeng.
Her lips trembled as if she wanted to speak, but she swallowed the words back down.
Luo Lingfeng’s heart clenched sharply.
He avoided her gaze.
“You don’t need to work today. Go wait at my place. I’ll make arrangements with the production team and come back.”
He said this in a cold, restrained tone, then turned and walked toward the fields.
That was exactly the sentence He Shiyi wanted to hear.
She carried half a sack of dried sweet potatoes and slung the shovel over her shoulder, walking with light steps and a smug heart.
Her face glowed with the joy of a first victory.
Luo Lingfeng’s house stood right beside the village road.
Using five years’ worth of military subsidies, he had built three rooms of blue-brick tile houses and two side rooms.
There was a surrounding wall, brick paving in the courtyard, flowers and plants growing in the open spaces, and even a hand-pumped water well.
In all of Nanfeng Village, his home was the brightest, cleanest, and most tasteful.
He Shiyi’s dog, Hunhun, took a liking to Luo Lingfeng’s house at first sight.
With two half-sacks of grain on his back, he lay down right at the front gate and refused to move.
“Woo-woo…”
When he saw He Shiyi, Hunhun grinned, nodded, wagged his butt, and swished his tail.
“Good taste. We’ll settle here. We’re not going anywhere else.”
He Shiyi sat down beside Hunhun with a plop, leaning her back against the two wooden doors as she planned her next steps.
Luo Lingfeng’s gate was only closed, not locked.
Yet He Shiyi didn’t have the courage to push it open.
She valued other people’s privacy and personal space deeply— just as she hoped her own privacy would be respected.
The He Shiyi of the twenty-first century had always gone her own way.
She had dreams, goals, and hoped to enjoy the freedom that came with financial independence.
No man tying her down.
A carefree, comfortable life.
She worried that once she stepped into Luo Lingfeng’s private space, it might bring unnecessary trouble or embarrassment.
What she wanted was a healthy, equal, mutually respectful relationship.
She circled around Luo Lingfeng’s house and noticed a small open plot of land outside the east wall.
Flat, spacious, and bathed in sunlight.
He Shiyi smiled.
【I’ll build a thatched shed right against his wall. Saves materials and effort.】
【And with Captain Luo as my neighbor, no one would dare bully me.】
Behind Luo Lingfeng’s house was a stack of firewood— logs, corn stalks, sorghum stalks, wheat straw, bamboo poles, rice straw.
He Shiyi got straight to work.
She dug four pits half a meter deep with her shovel and buried four thick wooden posts.
Hunhun ran back and forth, carrying bamboo poles and branches in his mouth, even helping gnaw mulberry bark to make rope.
All the work meant for men— the dog did it all.
He Shiyi saved herself a lot of effort.
Once the frame of the shed was finished, she “borrowed” the waterproof oilcloth Luo Lingfeng used to cover his firewood and spread it across the roof.
She tied bundles of rice straw with mulberry-bark rope and layered them over the oilcloth.
“Not bad, not bad! Hunhun, this is our home in the 1970s. Like it?”
“Woof! Woof!”
One woman and one dog stood cheering in front of the newly built shed.
“Feels like something’s missing… Hunhun, what’s missing?”
“Woof woof woof!”
Hunhun rolled happily around inside the shed.
“Ah! We’re missing a bed—and a table to eat at.”
Despite swearing not to invade Luo Lingfeng’s private space,
He Shiyi still pushed open his courtyard gate.
She searched the yard for materials to make a bed and table.
There was a grape trellis in the courtyard, and beneath it stood a bamboo bed Luo Lingfeng used to cool off at night.
“Helping others is the source of happiness! This bed is mine now.”
He Shiyi showed no courtesy at all.
She dragged Luo Lingfeng’s bamboo bed into the shed and claimed it as her own.
The shed was roomy enough— after placing the bed, there was still space for a table.
After a whole morning of work, both woman and dog were exhausted to the point of collapse.
They lay sprawled on the bamboo bed, cool breeze blowing through the gaps in the straw walls, sleeping deeply as if cut off from the world.
…
Luo Lingfeng was extremely busy, managing over two hundred people.
He had to lead labor with tools in hand and inspect the work of the commune members.
Only after finishing everything and blowing the end-of-work whistle did he hurry home.
The front gate was still closed.
It looked as if He Shiyi had never come.
【Where did she go? Didn’t I tell her to wait at my place?】
【Did she calm down and run back home?】
He searched inside and outside the house.
“This… what is this?!”
He stopped in front of the thatched shed He Shiyi had built.
His expression was torn between laughter and helplessness.
A few wooden poles mixed together with corn stalks, sorghum stalks, bamboo, and straw— the whole shed looked like it might collapse at any moment.
Its crooked, lopsided shape made him want to laugh.
【The girl’s learned independence. Not bad at all.】
A complicated emotion welled up in his chest.
He gently pulled open the straw-woven door and looked at He Shiyi sprawled on the bamboo bed inside, sleeping soundly.
He curved his lips indulgently and gave the pig-sleeping girl an approving smile.
Then he turned and went back into his own courtyard.