“Put away that suspicious look of yours. I kindly helped you complete your mission without harming the hostage. Even if you’re not grateful, the least you can show is some basic respect. Is suspicion your new way of saying thanks?”
Yu Zhaozhao pulled out a martyr’s certificate from her pocket—actually from her space—and opened it.
“And this—these are my parents’ martyr certificates. They were both soldiers and died during a mission. As their orphan, and one who’s about to be sent to the countryside, my background is absolutely aboveboard. Feel free to investigate!”
“No, you’ve misunderstood. I didn’t mean to doubt you.”
Jiang Jizhou felt a headache coming on.
Items like that weren’t easy to obtain even on the outside. Yet this young girl not only claimed she could produce them, she even carried them around—wasn’t it normal for him to feel a bit suspicious?
But before he could even say much, she had already launched into a long speech.
“You’d better not have. Alright, my task is done—what about what you promised me?”
Yu Zhaozhao had already been running around all morning and was exhausted. She had thought she could rest after boarding the train, but she hadn’t expected conditions to be this bad.
Chickens, ducks, geese, and dogs everywhere. People smoking, wearing slippers, and bragging loudly.
Forget resting—even finding a moment of peace was difficult.
“It’s all prepared. Xiao Liu, take her there.”
Jiang Jizhou gestured to the young train attendant behind him—the “puppy-like” one.
“Alright, comrade, please follow me.”
Yu Zhaozhao didn’t spare Jiang Jizhou another glance as she followed Xiao Liu.
The compartment given to Yu Zhaozhao as a reward was actually Jiang Jizhou’s. As a regiment commander, he was entitled to a two-person compartment—but now, she had it all to herself.
“Comrade, this is your dinner. You can rest here for now. I still have duties to attend to. If you need anything, come find me.”
Xiao Liu handed her two aluminum lunch boxes.
“Alright, thank you, Comrade Liu.”
Yu Zhaozhao hadn’t expected him to be so thoughtful. She had just been regretting not buying a meal earlier.
“It’s nothing—you helped us a lot today.”
With a smile, Xiao Liu left.
Yu Zhaozhao looked around the compartment, quite satisfied.
But she couldn’t rest yet—she still needed to retrieve her luggage.
As she walked back, she heard an argument before even reaching her seat.
Curious by nature, she quickened her pace, afraid of missing the excitement.
What she didn’t expect was that the center of the dispute was her seat.
“Comrade Yu will be back soon. You can’t touch her things.”
“Hmph, mind your own business. She’s not here—so what if I touch it?”
The speaker was Chen Zhaodi, who sat across from Yu Zhaozhao. They had boarded at the same station, and she had seen Yu Zhaozhao put sponge cakes into her bag.
She had never tasted sponge cake before. At home, such treats always went to her younger brother. So the moment she saw it, she had made up her mind—when Yu Zhaozhao ate it, she would ask for a piece.
Girls from better families were usually thin-skinned. As long as she used the excuse of mutual support among educated youths, played pitiful, and acted a little miserable, Yu Zhaozhao surely wouldn’t have the face to refuse her.
But unexpectedly, Yu Zhaozhao hadn’t opened her bag at all since boarding. Just now, she had even gone off wandering for quite a while. The bag with the sponge cakes was right by her seat.
From across, Chen Zhaodi could reach it just by crouching down.
Soon, the train entered a tunnel, and the entire carriage went dark. She thought she could secretly open the bag and take one piece without anyone noticing.
But Liu Ying, who had been watching the luggage, proved to be very responsible—she immediately grabbed Chen Zhaodi’s wrist.
“Comrade, taking something without asking is stealing. What you’re doing is wrong!” Liu Ying said angrily. She had never seen someone so shameless.
At first, she had tried to be considerate and didn’t expose her outright, only holding her wrist as a warning. As long as she withdrew her hand, the matter could be dropped.
But instead, this woman accused her of squeezing her wrist red and demanded compensation. Truly shameless.
“Don’t make it sound so ugly. When did I steal anything? This bag is under the table—it’s in the way of my feet. What’s wrong with me moving it aside? Do you really need to meddle?”
“You—”
With her honest nature, how could Liu Ying possibly win against someone like Chen Zhaodi?
Her face turned red with anger, but she had no way to respond.
“Oh? My bag is bothering you?”
Yu Zhaozhao stepped out slowly from the crowd. Seeing Liu Ying being bullied into silence, she suddenly remembered who this girl was.
She was one of the educated youths sent to the countryside with the original owner.
Not just her—Chen Zhaodi, the shameless one, and the onlookers nearby—Li Jun, Wang Fangfang, Zhao Ruicheng—they were all assigned to the same production team.
During the original owner’s first winter in the countryside, she had only a tattered quilt. In the harsh northern winter, that kind of bedding could freeze someone to death.
She didn’t die—but she fell ill, lying alone in her room without money for medicine and without anyone to care for her.
Because of her poverty, the other female educated youths in the same room looked down on her and rarely spoke to her. When she got sick, they avoided her out of fear of infection—how could they possibly help her?
Only Liu Ying couldn’t bear it. Seeing her too weak to even get off the kang, she brought her meals at mealtime and sometimes even fed her warm water.
But just when the original owner recovered and wanted to repay her kindness, Liu Ying was assaulted by a local thug.
She didn’t make a scene—she went alone to the commune to report it.
But in the deep northern winter, the snow was thick. Step by step, she trudged along until she slipped and fell down a slope.
There were no passersby. No one came to save her.
Liu Ying froze to death.
The original owner’s later descent into darkness was partly because of this. After all, Liu Ying was the only warmth she had ever received in the countryside.
Yu Zhaozhao felt a pang of emotion.
It seemed this girl, like herself, was just another cannon fodder in this story.
Since they were both cannon fodder, they should help each other.
It would also repay Liu Ying’s kindness to the original owner.
With that thought, Yu Zhaozhao’s gaze toward Chen Zhaodi became even sharper.
Chen Zhaodi felt a bit guilty under that stare.
But she reassured herself—Yu Zhaozhao hadn’t actually seen her touch the bag. As long as she denied it, there was nothing Yu Zhaozhao could do.
With that in mind, Chen Zhaodi straightened her back a little more.