I could feel deep suffocation in my chest as the memories ended, with all my might I started coughing and spat out the water. At last I could breathe, thank god for giving me a second chance to live. I slowly looked up and saw a group of people staring at me with wonder. And that set of memories started merging as my own, I could feel deep in my gut that this body belongs to myself in some other world and life.
“Maa.. ma..”, a small girl rushed into my embrace, and started crying in my hands. That girl looked the same as me when I was younger, except she was a lot thinner. “You, broom star, don't even know how to catch a fish, and caused all this trouble. What the hell are you still doing in this wet set of clothes. Have you not shamed my family enough yet.” A thin tall woman who had more white hair than black started scolding me. She was the original owner’s mother-in-law. I took the child in my arms and got up from the ground and rushed home according to the memory. Before leaving I sincerely said “thank you” to those villagers who helped me save.
Even though this was my first time seeing all this, the road looked so familiar to me. I walked fastly to my room but I could see the villagers in the field staring since I was all wet and sticky. I entered the Ye family house and saw Father Ye coming back from the field, I rushed home at the fastest speed with the girl before he approached me. I locked the door in my room and started arranging my thoughts. So I had gone through the legendary transmigration which I had seen in those novels. I checked my entire body for looking for any golden finger such as space or anything, you know in the novels usually the transmigrators would have space or any golden finger. I didn't find any mole that could open a space. I tried concentrating for any space to be popped out or could transfer anything. What this is not fair, I don’t have space, I don’t know how to cook anything besides instant noodles, I have zero medical skills, my combat power matches a chicken and do not have any extraordinary skills. How am I going to survive?
Even though I was from an orphanage, there was never a need for me to cook. There were staff for that. I opted for computer science engineering for my college and I had a scholarship and K organisation supported my studies. I do know to sew and stitch but nearly all the girls in the village knew that. I don’t know how to make soap, rouge, coal, etc. Don’t know to hunt or recognise medical material in the mountains. Life is going to be hard. At least I got Hui Juan’s memory. But I am hundred percent sure that I can’t live my life as Hui Juan as a drum for everyone to beat. I changed my clothes and the child’s and decided to rest to my thoughts and fall asleep with the child. Not even before 10 minutes I heard someone knocking the door and shouting at me to get out, the child in my arms squeezed my dress in fear. I assured the child to sleep and continued my sleep. After some time they stopped knocking.
Sky grew dark when I opened my eyes. Now I could clearly feel hunger, I got up and moved towards the main house. I saw that the moon was bright and guessed the time to be near 4-5 am or above. I knew this because I usually wake up at this time to do my studies.There is only one kitchen in the Ye family, in the main house. It turns out the kitchen was locked. Madam Ye usually locks the kitchen as she doubts even her daughter-in-laws. Madam Ye is unreasonably stingy. I tried to open the kitchen lock but it is impossible without breaking the lock. I moved towards the vegetable garden in the family and picked a few tomatoes and radish. I washed them in well water and took them back to the room. I awakened the daughter and ate those vegetables with her. The vegetable garden in the family is usually maintained by Hui Juan, and there is nearly half acre vegetable garden. So it won’t be noticed as the missing few vegetables. Then I moved towards the goat in the family and started milking the goat. I knew from memory that goats give 4 or 5 cups of milk daily. So I milked 2 cup of milk and went towards the stove in the backside (used for boiling hot water) and lighted it with a flint stone from memory and boiled the milk. After boiling the milk, I also made a simple vegetable soup with no salt or spice and took it back to my courtyard. And fed it to the child and myself to the brim. I was surprised to find the child didn’t utter a word of complaint as she ate my so called vegetable soup. But for me it was truly a nightmare. But I forced myself to eat it because since, I didn’t feed the pig or animals last night I was sure to be starved today, and I could only steal from the vegetable garden at night.
The child stared at me and said “Ma will grandmother find we stole vegetables and milk”. Roulan remembered that once when grandma starved them, mother stole 2 eggs from the chicken coop and grandmother found this next day, and beat mother and herself. Juan could see the worry in the girl's eyes and remembered that incident. “It is alright baby, this time we won’t get caught”. The original owner was a good girl and would not break the punishment as long as it’s bearable. But I ain’t. In college and orphanage, no one had dared to fight with me because of my poisonous tongue. Even being an orphan and still not suffering much was because of my bold character. And this Ye family, let’s see what they can do.
Ye family has 5 sons and 2 daughters. The first child was a girl named Ye Zhen who had been married to nou family, second was a son: Ye Dao and married mother Ye’s niece Ye Lian and they have 4 boys. Ye Lian has the highest prestige in daughter-in-laws and support of mother-in-law. Third was my husband Ye Qui and fourth was Ye Xue who married a beautiful girl from a very poor family, she has 1 girl and 1 boy. Both Ye Dao and Ye Xiu are hard workers who work in the fields unlike the 5th son Ye Zian who has wild ambitions but extremely lazy. He married a girl from a poor family in town, named Kong Hua but still with a bride price of 5 silvers. And the sixth child is the hope of the family who studies in town for whom everyone is waiting to pass the exam and to enjoy the blessing of being the official’s family. And last is a girl of 13 years named Ye Xialan who is the carbon copy of selfishness.
I lay on my bed while thinking how to live in this family without being treated as a slave. Sun raised and chicken started crowning, and there were movements started in the main house. Like usual I got up and walked towards the mountain to pick up any wild vegetables and pigweed, from my memory I knew all the spots in the mountain which they grew and left towards the mountains. The mountains here are relatively safe and most of the animals are herbivores, but still people don’t try their luck by entering deep mountains. But sometimes wild boar would come down from the mountains. As I walked into the mountains my fear was rising of encountering a wild boar or a snake. I don’t understand how those protagonist in the novels walked into mountains and brought back 3 hares and 4 chickens.
At last I came down from the mountain successfully without encountering anything strange and brought back food barely able to feed the pig and the poultry at home. At that time the sky brightened nicely and it was around 8 to 9 am. By the time I fed the pig, I saw my eldest sister-in-laws slowly come out of their sleeps and hurried to the kitchen to help my 3rd sister-in-law to cook. Hui Juan doesn't have permission to cook since Madam Ye believes she would steal food.By the time I fed all the animals in the house, the food for family members was also made. I woke my daughter and walked into the dining room with her. “There comes the princess after a full day’s rest. Oh we slaves would have come out to serve you, why did the madam take the pain to come out of room your own” , as soon as I stepped into the room I heard Madam Ye ridicule. “Mother, I was sick and burning all night, I and my daughter haven’t even drank water since yesterday. Still feeling tired I went up the mountain to pick pigweed. Mother we are truly hungry now”.
“Hungry, hungry, hungry always there is only food on mind, do you know anything beside that, no there is no food for both of you this morning”. I gritted my nails and calmed myself down, if she said this to me a day before, I would have scolded her eighteen generations. A 21 year old girl nearly died because of her and she still wouldn’t give her even rice porridge, I don’t know what this devil made up of. “No mother, I am hungry and I want food. Yesterday because of you urging me to catch fish, I nearly died. Till yesterday I thought that you punishing me was for my own good, but now..”. Madam Ye was enraged upon hearing me, “What are you spouting you bitch, you blaming me for yesterday’s drowning, it was because of your own karma that you drowned”.
“Oh really mother, you believe in karma, and you still could eat food and sleep at night knowing that your son whom you gave birth to is on the battlefield risking his life. My husband has sent 6 silver to the family every year for the last 5 year and we have not even written a letter to him once since you don’t want to spend 100 copper money. And you are still speaking about karma.” As I finished saying this the entire family stopped their activities and was staring at me. Time to take my acting skills to the next level, “So what now, from the 10th day I had married into this family, my husband was forced into the military, yet he still sent his savings into the family, while you people are treating his wife and daughter as slaves”, eeh eeh …. I started crying. Father Ye's face was black, he roared “enough”. “What I can’t speak the truth now, this family has four daughter-in-laws, other than me who else have ever been starved. I clean the house,wash the dishes and clothes of every courtyard, feed the animals and manage the half acre vegetable garden, and still not be allowed to eat food as the ladies in the house. Isn’t sister Fang (fourth child's wife) also came with no dowry, how is she treated and how am I treated?, isn’t eldest sister-in-law also came with 1 silver as dowry but still paid 4 silver as bride price, why am I the only one suffering? Eeh eeh ,..” and continued with my acting.
Eldest sister-in-law eyebrows twitched as she heard this, “How could you compare myself with you, I have given birth to 4 boys, not some scrawny girl.” What the hell, is she thinking that I am some sort of hen, to give birth for years if once I mated with a male, “Do you blame me not having 4 boys, wasn’t it the sister Lian who was particularly enthusiastic in pressuring mother to send my husband to war. If you want to blame my first child for being female, isn’t mother’s first child was also a girl. And the reason why my daughter is scrawny is because you and your kids ate all the food in the family not leaving us any.” Shit, my poisonous tongue is coming back to life.
The eldest sister-in-law started shivering in range, and the eldest brother was also so angry. You must know in future it is them who are going to be the clan leader of more than 40 families of Ye, and he had never been insulted like this. Clan head’s face was also unsightly, no women had ever shouted like this infront of his face, and insulted his grandsons, also thinking that she is from Hui family, his anger blasted.
“That is enough, we are taking you off. Divorce” said the father Ye.
