TN: A little early appearance for our...... ahem!

Gulp.

The young man’s Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed hard.

Was it because the noodles smelled too good?

No.

It was because Xia Xiaolan was too beautiful.

In a run-down county like this, how could there be someone so stunning?

Her skin was dazzlingly fair, her eyes glistening as if filled with water, a delicate pointed chin completing her features. She wore a perfectly proper blue jacket, yet the way her full chest stretched the fabric made it seem suddenly… improper. A strip of white gauze was wrapped around her forehead, faint blood seeping through, making her look all the more pitiful and irresistible.

Watching her eat noodles in small, neat bites made a man want nothing more than to turn into the noodles in her bowl.

Truth be told, everywhere they’d gone in the county that day, people had stared just like this. Liu Fen thought it was because the two of them were poorly dressed—but all those looks were really meant for Xia Xiaolan.

The noodle-stall auntie rapped her bowl sharply, finally snapping the young man back to his senses.

“Well? You eating noodles or not?”

Flustered, the young man handed over his large lunch tin.

“Of course! I smelled them from far away—couldn’t resist. Two bowls, please. Pack them up to go!”

A full Beijing accent.

So, not a local.

Xia Xiaolan frowned slightly. She’d noticed people sneaking glances at her all day, but none had been this blatant—especially not an outsider.

She still wasn’t used to this face. After living decades with an ordinary, even unattractive appearance, it was easy to forget just how beautiful she looked now. Buying a lock alone didn’t feel safe enough. After eating, she’d go buy a pair of scissors too.

The bone broth bubbled on the small stove, the noodles rolled thin and fine. The two bowls were ready in no time. The young man paid but lingered, turning back again and again as he left.

Even Liu Fen sensed something was off and hurried through her noodles.

For thirty cents, the noodles came in a huge bowl. Liu Fen drank the broth down to the last drop. People these days had little oil or fat in their diets—when food was available, they ate heartily. A woman could easily polish off a pound of steamed buns in one sitting.

Afterward, Xia Xiaolan dragged Liu Fen off to buy a blade.

She’d wanted a kitchen knife before—stainless steel, Shanghai-made, looked excellent. Five yuan a piece. President Xia had turned on her heel and walked away immediately. Good quality meant nothing when cash was tight. Thinking about it now, scissors would do.

The outsider returned to the truck carrying two lunch tins of noodles, still reluctant to leave. Some broth spilled as he climbed in.

In the driver’s seat sat a man with a crew cut, sharp features, handsome by any era’s standards.

“Look at you.” the driver scoffed.

“No backbone at all.” His companion bristled.

“Brother Cheng, I’ve never seen anyone that beautiful! If you had seen her, I guarantee you wouldn’t be able to walk away either.”

Beijing was full of women—young girls, married wives—but none compared to the one just now.

She wasn’t the tough, heroic type of beauty. Hers was soft, seductive—almost indecent. The kind that hooked men without trying.

“You remember what we agreed on.” Cheng said coolly.

“I’ll take you on this run and teach you what I can. Learn what you can. If you can’t, then go hide wherever you came from. Or stay in this county and chase skirts if that’s your plan.”

Chasing skirts was Beijing slang for fooling around with women.

Brother Cheng had a slightly dangerous air and a foul temper. The younger man immediately shut up. They slurped down the noodles and drove off.

Two legs couldn’t outrun four wheels. After just a couple of streets, they passed Xia Xiaolan and Liu Fen again.

“Brother Cheng—look!”

The young man was nearly bouncing in the passenger seat. Cheng lifted his eyelids and saw only a back view. A blue, patched-up jacket hanging loose, yet somehow accentuating the girl’s graceful figure. The skin behind her ear was shockingly white.

Pretty or not—weren’t women all just two eyes and one mouth?

Boring.

The young man sighed in regret.

“Forget it.” Cheng said.

“Guess, you’ve got no fate with her.”

He didn’t dwell on it. The truck soon left Anqing County. Shanghai was still two days away. Long-haul driving was exhausting—and dangerous. There was cargo robbery to worry about. Who had time to admire pretty women?

That bold-eyed outsider had served as a warning. Xia Xiaolan went back and bought a large pair of scissors.

They didn’t have a pot and couldn’t afford one, so she bought another enamel mug instead—now they had a matching pair. Those mugs could boil food, store things, and hold water. Incredibly versatile. She added two pairs of chopsticks.

From the original ninety-two yuan, only six remained.

Xia Xiaolan dared not spend it lightly. Wild duck eggs weren’t easy to find. The nests in Dahe Village had already been cleaned out. To keep earning from eggs, they’d have to go to other villages—and with just the two of them, that would only cover basic survival.

She wanted to start reselling chicken eggs. With twenty yuan of capital, she wouldn’t have to keep wading through reed marshes.

Dahe Village was already a two-hour walk from the county. There were villages even farther away.

Three hours to walk into town. Ten eggs sold for one yuan five mao. Six hours round-trip. If she bought eggs at one mao two fen each, people would still be willing to make the trip—until harvest season arrived.

Once farm work began, even half-grown kids would be in the fields. No one would have time to walk to town to sell eggs. Leave them sitting for half a month in the summer heat, and they’d rot.

That was the window Xia Xiaolan wanted to exploit.

Two or three fen profit per egg didn’t sound like much. But a hundred eggs a day meant two or three yuan.

Even accounting for rainy days, she could make over seventy yuan a month.

Not much?

In her previous life, an elderly client once told her that in the 1980s, he worked at a county guesthouse and earned thirty-six yuan a month. In 1983, the truly wealthy were early private traders—though they kept a low profile. Public salaries belonged to state workers. Intellectual labor was undervalued — teachers at elite high schools earned only a few dozen yuan a month, while oil and coal workers could make over a hundred.

The lowest income of all?

Farmers.

If Xia Xiaolan made seventy yuan a month, the Xia family would probably welcome her back like a living bodhisattva.

With no capital and no connections, she knew the first step to success would be the hardest.

Slow and steady.

They carried their things back to Dahe Village, another two-hour walk. After storing everything in the dilapidated house, the new iron lock brought immense peace of mind. Xia Xiaolan returned Old Wang’s flashlight at the cowshed, then felt an itch at her wound. Liu Fen urged her to visit the clinic.

Changing the dressing wasn’t expensive—mostly disinfecting the wound. The doctor had professional ethics, unlike the village gossipers. He examined it carefully.

“Don’t worry. It’s healing well. Shouldn’t leave a scar.”

Xia Xiaolan finally relaxed. “Thank you for your care.”

As they left the clinic, Liu Fen tugged on her sleeve.

“Isn’t that… your uncle?”

The Xia family home was at the village entrance. A short man was arguing fiercely with Old Madam Xia.

“Your Xia family is rotten to the core! You drove my sister and niece to their deaths! If you don’t hand them over, I’ll smash this whole place to pieces!”

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