The 1960s: The Story of a Country Girl's Journey to the City

Are you familiar with Li Jinbao and Li Yinbao? They seem to be related to your family.

Wang Xiao then asked, hoping to get more information from Bao Ya.

"Not really. He's my aunt's nephew. Didn't you come here last time just as we were dividing up the family property?"

Fang Mingda thought about the scene at the time, and realized that their relationship was bad, extremely bad.

"Finding them won't be difficult for you. Aren't they always out and about? Just find a secluded spot, put a sack over their heads, drag them away, lock them up, and interrogate them. Look, there's a small path from the cemetery that leads directly to their village."

Wang Xiao glanced at her. Was this something a girl would say? It sounded like she did it all the time.

"His disappearance would alert the enemy."

"Uh...it seems so. Hmm, how about we find someone to fight them and take them to the police station?"

Bao Ya thought it was a great idea; it's perfectly normal for a good-for-nothing to end up in the police station.

Wang Xiao and Fang Mingda exchanged a glance, thinking that it seemed to make sense.

"However, I'm warning you, if they want to come to the Beishan Brigade to investigate you, be prepared. They are very xenophobic, and you probably won't get any information out of them."

"In that brigade's situation, as you described, is the commune not taking any action?"

Bao Ya tilted her head and thought for a moment before continuing, "It's not that we don't care, it's that we can't. It seems like there's a high-ranking officer in the Li family in the army, and the commune leaders can't afford to offend him. Some cadres in the commune have a good relationship with the Li family. Don't take the people you arrest to the commune police station."

As a high-ranking officer in the military, Xu Mingda secretly memorized this information. Could it be that this was the reason why the spies from both sides were able to coordinate?

After chatting with them for a while, as the sun began to set, Bao Ya went home. She was still processing this huge piece of gossip; the spies she'd only ever seen on TV were actually so close to her. And what about the Nanshan Brigade?

Thinking about the information she had gathered for them today, Bao Ya's heart pounded. A person who had been pretending to be lame for more than ten years, a closed-off village—the answer was already obvious.

Bao Ya tossed and turned all night, unable to sleep, thinking about what happened that afternoon. She had only given Xiao Hu Zi one piece of candy today, just so the children wouldn't pay special attention to it. Everyone was the same; the other children probably wouldn't care much about what that child was saying.

Since returning from the mountain that day, Bao Ya hasn't gone up the mountain again. She has to admit, she's a bit of a coward.

When it comes to being pragmatic, she's second to none. Knowing there's danger and still rushing off—that's just crazy.

Now, every time I see that mountain, I feel like it's a gate, with terrifying wild beasts lurking behind it, ready to run out and devour people at any moment.

Bao Ya was staying at home, but her mind was far from idle. She was daydreaming all day long, mainly because she was too bored. In this era, there were no cell phones, tablets, computers, or televisions, and even the brigade headquarters barely had any newspapers. It was so boring.

Bao Ya felt desperate about her current situation. Everyone else was a transmigrator, so why was she so miserable? Others were either kings with superpowers from the apocalypse or martial arts masters and industry elites from the modern world. The identities she was given in transmigration were either switched at birth or wealthy heiresses who were good at everything from building a career to attracting men.

But she herself is just an ordinary woman. In her past life, she was a good-for-nothing who sponged off her parents, and in this life, she has no ambitions.

I still don't understand why I transmigrated here, or what I'm here for. The more I think about it, the more frustrated I get.

And that fiancé, it's been a while since I've seen him. Shouldn't he make his presence known to me more often? It seems that arranged marriages are still lacking something.

Jiang Yuan, Bao Ya's fiancé, is painting the walls of his new house. He keeps sneezing. Could it be that he caught a cold?

These days, Jiang Yuan has been extremely busy furnishing the new house. Seeing the Lin family building a house, he felt dissatisfied with everything about his own. The house was getting old, so he wondered if the roof tiles needed to be replaced, the walls needed to be repainted, and the yard needed to be tidied up. He got right to work on it.

Jiang Yuan starts working on his house whenever he has free time. He's getting married soon, so of course he wants to make his future wife happy.

Once he had made up his mind, he went to the transport team to find his second brother, bought some roof tiles, and asked someone to help replace all the old roof tiles. He also bought paint to repaint all the walls.

I also repainted all the furniture in the house that I wasn't planning to replace. After working on it for half a month, I'm finally satisfied.

As Bao Ya drifted into her own thoughts, it was already the end of August, and the weather gradually turned cooler.

Perhaps because the weather was getting cooler, Bao Ya felt like she was going to rot at home, so she called Simao to go for a walk in the mountains. Although she was a good-for-nothing, she valued her life very much; after all, it was better to live a miserable life than to die.

While wandering around the mountain, she unexpectedly discovered smartweed among a clump of wild grass. Yes, she knows how to make wine.

Before my father became wealthy in my past life, my grandmother often made her own rice wine to sell in town to supplement the family income. It was made using traditional methods, and everyone who bought it said it tasted great. Later, when I thought of my grandmother, I would also make some rice wine to drink.

Bao Ya called to Simao and asked him to pick all the smartweed around them, and also to pick the verbena, as both of them could be used to make yeast.

They picked a whole basketful of grass, and when Grandma Su saw the siblings carrying the basket of pig feed home, she couldn't resist picking some herself.

Other families have children this age who work in the fields every day to earn work points. Even though our family isn't short of money, we can't let them do this useless thing every day.

When Bao Ya mentioned using grain to make yeast, Old Lady Su pulled out her feather duster.

This child doesn't work and yet wants to waste food; we can't keep him.

I was just getting off work and saw the chaos at home, so I didn't think much of it.

"Mom, that's enough. A couple of slaps to vent your anger is enough."

As Su Daqiang entered the room, he asked Old Lady Su with a hint of schadenfreude in his voice, "What's going on?"

"That's right, Mother, Baoya is getting married soon, why are you still arguing with him?"

Lin Laosan looked disapproving and stepped forward to shield his daughter behind him. Su Ruyi also quickly stepped forward to stop Su Laotai and took the feather duster from her hand.

Seeing the two of them like this, Grandma Su pursed her lips. "Now you know how to care for your daughter. Why didn't you do this earlier?" She ignored them and went back to the kitchen to start the fire.

"Bao Ya, what's wrong with your grandma?" Lin Lao San asked Lin Bao Ya quietly.

Su Daqiang sat on a bench, smoking welding fumes, while also keeping an eye on what was happening here.

"I picked some smartweed to make some yeast for you to brew wine later."

"Then let's do it."

Lin Laosan didn't even think about it; he would support whatever his daughter wanted to do, and there was no need to consider anything else.

"Cough cough cough." Su Daqiang coughed from the welding fumes. No wonder he got beaten up. Could he really make that kind of yeast so easily? It would definitely ruin the grain. Except for ruining the grain, my mother is basically not angry.

"Bao Ya, when did you learn how to make yeast? I've never heard of it before."

Su Daqiang slowly asked Bao Ya, "There's no one in this village who knows how to brew wine. Who's been fooling you again?"

"I've heard my fourth uncle say before that smartweed can be used to make yeast. I saw it on the mountain today, so I picked a lot to make yeast."