"Brother Qin, there's no need for you to draw lots! Don't say I don't look out for you, brother—seeing how tall and strong you are, I'll arrange the best for you directly!"
Zhao Erhu gripped Qin An's wrist, a fake smile plastered on his face, but his eyes hid a sinister cruelty.
Qin An's heart sank. The man clearly intended to use his position to settle a personal grudge.
Before he could react, Zhao Erhu spun around and pointed at a destitute woman among the crowd of women, the one with twin girls.
"That woman has given birth before, and she even bore twins—that means her body's sturdy. Perfect for continuing your family line!"
The moment these words were spoken, the drill ground fell dead silent.
Everyone's gaze turned in unison toward the woman.
She wore a plain-colored ruqun washed so many times it had faded white. Though her face was sallow from poor food, she could not hide her gentle, refined bearing—only now, pointed at by Zhao Erhu, her body trembled like a candle flame in the wind.
The two little girls in her arms were so frightened they huddled into a ball.
"Yamen Runner Zhao, this... this isn't appropriate, is it?" a migrant muttered under his breath.
Everyone could see that the woman was the family of an exiled official, carrying two children—nothing but a burden.
Zhao Erhu glared: "Appropriate as can be! Qin An is young and strong—supporting three women is a piece of cake for him, isn't it?"
He deliberately emphasized the words "three women," the mockery in his tone utterly undisguised.
Everyone present knew full well that Qin An was already skin and bones, his pockets cleaner than his face. He could barely feed himself, let alone drag along a family.
Cowed by Zhao Erhu's tyranny, no one dared to argue further. They all looked at him with eyes full of sympathy.
Qin An clenched his fists, longing to land a punch on that ugly face.
Wasn't it just because on the way here, he'd stopped the man's designs on Chen Han?
And yet the man had nursed the grudge all this time.
He'd already been tormented the whole journey, going three days with nine missed meals, and still the man wouldn't let it go.
At this moment, the man clearly wanted to screw him over to death.
But with everyone watching, if he dared resist, he'd probably be slapped with the charge of "defying the imperial edict" on the spot.
After all, this was the Imperial Court's policy encouraging childbirth, and the man did indeed hold that small bit of authority.
The only one who could stop it, the Village Head, looked as if he were sleepwalking.
Clearly, he would never stick his neck out for an unrelated person like Qin An.
"I accept!" Qin An's Adam's apple bobbed as he squeezed out two words, his voice hoarse yet carrying a stubborn grit.
Such an old wife and young husband pairing was indeed somewhat humiliating, but having witnessed modern life, Qin An couldn't help but feel a trace of wild ambition stir in his heart.
He was unwilling to remain forever depressed and subordinate to others.
Besides, he was destined to be assigned someone anyway. A woman with such experience might suit him better than some rustic village woman.
Hearing this, the woman jerked her head up to look at him, a flicker of surprise flashing through her eyes, followed by deep disappointment.
The youth before her was so much younger than herself, so thin a gust of wind could blow him over—by any measure, he couldn't hold up a family.
She opened her mouth, wanting to say something.
But thinking of her own situation, she ultimately lowered her head and silently accepted this absurd arrangement.
...
After all the commotion, Qin An ultimately led the mother and her two daughters toward their dwelling, silent the whole way.
The Thatched Hut he'd been assigned was at the very edge of the village, its walls thin as paper, a corner of the roof missing, whistling mournfully whenever the wind blew.
"This... this is our home?" The two little girls clutched the door frame, their big eyes round as saucers.
Inside, apart from a wooden plank bed about to fall apart, there was only a wooden bucket, plus some clay pots—not even a decent table or chairs.
The woman leaned on the door frame, her face pale.
She came from an official's family. Though she'd been exiled, she'd never imagined she might one day live in such a dilapidated place.
"With conditions like these, can he really support us?"
Despair welled up in her heart instantly.
The two little girls, on the other hand, though a bit disappointed, quickly adapted. They looked at Qin An with curiosity and unease in their eyes.
How could Li Yuan not know what they were thinking? He was so embarrassed he didn't know what to say.
For a moment, the atmosphere froze.
"Father?" the younger daughter suddenly spoke, her voice crisp, "Are you our father now? Will you protect us?"
Qin An paused mid-motion and turned to look at her.
The little girl wore her hair in double buns, her face dirty, but her eyes shone like stars.
He thought of the family he'd had in his dreams of modern society, and his throat tightened.
Looking at her expectant expression, he ultimately couldn't bear to disappoint her. He nodded: "My name is Qin An. From now on... I'll protect you."
The younger daughter immediately cheered: "Yay, we finally have a daddy."
The elder daughter said nothing much, but her body involuntarily relaxed, relieved that they could finally have some stability.
Seeing her daughters' reactions, the woman's eyes reddened. She knew they'd suffered greatly during this time, desperate to find someone to rely on.
She also knew things had come to this and couldn't be changed. Choosing to accept fate's arrangement, she bent her knees in a curtsy: "This humble woman is Yang Yuyan. Greetings... greetings... Husband!"
Her voice was soft, her manner gentle, but between her brows was ever-locked a lingering sorrow that wouldn't disperse.
She then briefly introduced the three of them.
The elder daughter was named Cai Yan, the younger Cai Zhen, both nine years old this year.
Because women in this world married quite early, Yang Yuyan herself was actually not old at all—only twenty-five.
In modern society, this would be the prime of youth, but in this world, in a few more years she could be a grandmother.
After understanding the situation, Qin An then carefully sized them up.
Though Yang Yuyan's face bore the marks of hardship, one could tell she was a beauty, with a full figure—only she'd suffered no small amount during this time, making her look considerably haggard and aged.
The elder sister Cai Yan stood quietly, her eyes showing a maturity beyond her years.
The younger sister Cai Zhen was much livelier, already curiously examining the furnishings in the room.
Qin An nodded, said no more, picked up the broken broom from the corner, and began sweeping: "You sit for now. I'll tidy up."
When it was just him before, it didn't matter, but now that new people had come into the home, he really couldn't stand the sight of it.
The cobweb-covered corners, the accumulated dust, and the unknown bugs under the bed—he cleaned them all out one by one.
Yang Yuyan wanted to help, but she couldn't even hold the broom steady. Clumsily, she knocked over a clay pot and immediately flushed red.
Cai Yan hurried forward, wanting to help wipe the table, but got a splinter in her hand. The pain made her eyes redden, yet she didn't dare make a sound.
Cai Zhen wanted to help add firewood, but nearly set her own skirt ablaze.
Qin An saw it all but said nothing.
After bustling until mealtime, he scooped out some coarse rice into a clay pot, added a full pot of water, and cooked it into a porridge so thin it could reflect a person's silhouette.
The already meager rations were instantly consumed in no small amount.
"Fill your stomachs first." Qin An set the clay pot on the ground and scooped out every grain of rice with a broken bowl.
Yang Yuyan looked at the nearly transparent porridge, then at Qin An's cracked lips. She wanted to say something, but ultimately took it and first divided it between her two daughters.
As evening fell, Qin An carried back a bundle of dry branches and lit a fire to heat water for the mother and her daughters.
Amid the swirling steam, Yang Yuyan took her daughters to wash in the inner room, low voices drifting out.
Qin An, meanwhile, stayed outside and hastily wiped himself down with cold water.
Fortunately, though autumn was approaching, it wasn't that cold yet, so it did no harm.
In the inner room, Yang Yuyan looked at her two daughters' delicate faces revealed after washing, and her eyes grew hot.
She too had washed away the grime, revealing her originally fair skin—only her complexion was poor.
"He... isn't a bad-hearted person after all." She stroked her daughters' heads, feeling slightly more at ease, yet still full of fear for the future.
She'd noticed earlier—with just Qin An's rations, they wouldn't last many days.
After nightfall, the Thatched Hut was shrouded in darkness, only the dying embers in the stove casting a faint glow.
Qin An gave the wooden plank bed to the mother and her daughters, and spread a layer of dry grass on the ground for himself as a makeshift bed.
The bed boards creaked, and Yang Yuyan couldn't fall asleep no matter what.
The two daughters squeezed inside, clearly exhausted.
She lay with her eyes open, looking at the hole in the roof. Moonlight leaked through it, falling on the thin figure on the ground.
Qin An wasn't asleep either. He was thinking about how to survive.
"Zhao Erhu definitely won't let me off. Next time rations are distributed, he'll probably pull something again. The things in the fields won't grow overnight. Maybe I should go up the mountain to look for things, but that's not a long-term solution after all..."
Countless thoughts flashed through his mind. He didn't know how long had passed before Qin An finally grew drowsy.
But just as he was drifting into a haze, the dry grass beside him rustled.
His eyes snapped open and he turned his head—Yang Yuyan had at some point climbed down from the bed and slipped into his straw mat, pressing against his back.
Sensing that Qin An was already awake, Yang Yuyan's body visibly tensed.
But after one glance at her two daughters on the bed, she still pressed closer without hesitation.
"Husband..." Yang Yuyan's voice trembled, carrying a tearful note, "I know you feel wronged, but... but I have no choice..."
She knew Qin An had been forced into this, knew that she and her two children were a burden, and that she was quite a bit older than him.
But she had no other choice. For her daughters' sake, she had to grasp this lifeline before her.
Though Qin An was somewhat poor, their brief time together had already shown her that he was a down-to-earth, hardworking, honest man.
With a man like this around, she and her two daughters at least had a tiny sliver of hope.
For this, she was willing to cast aside her dignity and go all in.
Qin An said nothing. At this moment, he was completely immersed in the soft sensation behind him.
From his modern memories, he already understood the ways of men and women, but this body was experiencing such intimate contact with a woman for the first time.
Seeing that Qin An gave no response for a long time, Yang Yuyan bit her lip and reached out a trembling hand...
Her movements were resolute, as if completing a ritual.
As a mature woman, once she'd made up her mind, she naturally wouldn't be as reserved as a young girl.
Qin An froze, blood rushing to his head in an instant. He abruptly flipped over, looking down at Yang Yuyan from above.
Moonlight outlined her full figure, her plain inner garment loose and slack, revealing fair skin.
The woman before him, though destitute, possessed the unique charm of a mature woman. The tear mole at the corner of her eye flickered in and out of sight under the moonlight, carrying a kind of broken beauty.
Such a beauty was something he'd never seen in over a decade, and now he could do with her as he pleased.
Qin An felt his whole body burn with heat, his reason devoured by instinct.
The dry grass rustled, masking the suppressed sounds of the two.
Yang Yuyan closed her eyes, actively guiding him, tears sliding down from the corners of her eyes.
For her own fate, and for this absurd night that was perhaps her only way out.
Qin An, in the chaos, felt a throbbing he'd never experienced before.
This world, it seemed, wasn't so cold after all.
And just as he felt a sense of relief, a cold mechanical voice suddenly sounded in his mind.
【Detected that the Host has completed the coming-of-age ceremony. Binding conditions met...】
【God of Slaughter System binding in progress... Binding successful!】
【Newbie Gift Pack has been issued. Open immediately?】