The Life of a Son-in-Law in a Courtyard House

Lao Wu has started a new book, a story about a courtyard house. It's not as violent; he just wants to make everyone feel comfortable.

Don't use your brain when reading; your brain is for storing information.

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I doubt anyone born after 20 would have started reading novels about courtyard houses before they were even five. If someone did, I can only admire them from the bottom of my heart.

……

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"Have you heard?"

"What?"

Yang Biao listened to the gossiping of several women outside, his mind foggy.

"The Chu family has taken in a son-in-law who moved in with them?"

"Really? Wasn't he said to be an adopted son?"

"Who knows? Some say it was in response to national policy and to help the neighborhood alleviate its burden that they brought back this young man."

"I think they probably brought back a boy to prevent the family from having no children, since they only have two daughters."

"His auntie, do you think they'll have enough to eat if they bring home a young man at this time?"

"Yes, things are so difficult now, I guess their family won't even be able to afford tree bark in the future."

"Aunt Jia, what do you think?"

"Pah! I think it's doubtful that anyone in their family will starve to death!"

Yang Biao tried hard to open his eyes, but his head was spinning.

But my eyelids felt like they weighed a ton.

I can't open my eyes no matter what I do.

His eyelids twitched a few times.

My stomach felt like it was on fire.

There was also a little girl's voice in her ear, clearly with a Beijing accent: "Sister, his eyelids twitched a few times, is he about to wake up?"

Another pleasant-sounding voice, belonging to a woman from Beijing, came through: "Possibly. You'd better hurry up and cook a bowl of dumpling soup. If you don't take good care of him, you can expect Mom to come back and give us a piece of her mind."

The little girl replied, "Well, really, these days refined grains are so rare, I haven't had dumpling soup in ages."

The sound faded into the distance; the little girl had probably gone to the kitchen.

Yang Biao could sense that the older woman had sat down next to him.

It seemed to be watching me, and then, as it left, it let out a sigh: "Sigh..."

Yang Biao's consciousness was gradually returning, and finally, just as he was about to open his eyes...

An electronic voice came from my mind: "Congratulations to the 37-year-old single host for transmigrating to the courtyard house at No. 95 Nanluoguxiang. Try your best to survive. The system will be activated after ten days of survival."

Yang Biao was still trying to hold on in his mind, but the system only gave him a newbie gift pack.

That's a super-strength pill; taking it gives you the strength of three pillars.

And then nothing happened, nothing at all, nothing...

Dog system, tell me the situation.

That's so perfunctory...

As a writer who enjoys reading Big Tomato novels for many years, yes, Yang Biao is a writer who lost his job and came here in 2025.

He didn't even dare to call himself an author, only a writer, and wrote two flops.

One book is "My Journey Through the 60s: Starting with Eight Calabash Brothers," and the other is "Starting from Sesame Alley in 1947."

Two period novels only earned him enough for cigarettes and meals; he was still 999,000 yuan short of the annual income of a top-tier writer.

Yang Biao was no stranger to time travel.

But please explain your current situation clearly.

This is all so confusing.

Yang Biao was just thinking about his experiences in this body when he suddenly felt a headache coming on, and a flood of memories came rushing back.

Yang Biao's body is named Yang Dalin, a native of western Shandong, and it is now late autumn of the 60s.

Shortly after the autumn harvest, he and his grandmother, who depended on him for survival, went out to escape famine.

His parents died early, and he has lived with his grandmother since he was five years old.

Grandma and he finally made it into a relief station outside Beijing.

Yang Dalin took care of his grandmother for three days while going hungry. Unfortunately, his grandmother gave most of her food to Yang Dalin along the way, which damaged her health. She managed to stay alive for three days after arriving in Beijing, but she did not survive.

It was an auntie from Jiaodaokou Street who worked in logistics and helped cook there. She saw that he was filial and sensible, felt sorry for him, and asked for his consent before deciding to take him home.

Because that aunt had lost her husband and only had two daughters.

Without a man in the house, it's inevitable that they'll be bullied.

At that time, the preference for sons over daughters was very strong among the people. If there was no man in the family, it was very likely that the family would be wiped out and looked down upon, because there was no man in the family to carry on the family line.

In daily life, if other families have some conflicts, and your family doesn't have a man, you're bound to be the one being bullied.

Yang Dalin attended junior high school but did not graduate. Although he was already sixteen years old, he was only in the first semester of the second year of junior high school. There was no way around it; people in rural areas start school late, and his studies were just average. He was still considered to be educated.

Unfortunately, the game started badly, with the whole family being sacrificed at the beginning, and the system only leaving behind a super pill, leaving him to survive for ten days.

The system will only activate after ten days of survival. Staying in bed all day without moving might work, but eating less will reduce energy expenditure.

But this is someone else's house, how could I possibly lie in bed for ten days?

Yang Dalin was taken home after his grandmother's funeral was hastily arranged at the relief station and with his consent.

On the way, an aunt named Qi Yulan said that if he could get along with her eldest daughter, he would become her son-in-law; if not, he would become her godson.

Aunt Yulan is quite open-minded.

Who knew that Yang Dalin would faint in the middle of the night after arriving at Qi Yulan's house.

Until Yang Biao from the future traveled through time.

When I woke up, I heard a group of middle-aged women outside chattering away.

Yang Dalin realized that he had arrived at the center of the interstellar journey, at No. 95 Nanluoguxiang.

I clearly heard someone call out "Third Auntie" just now. I guess that's Yan Laokou's wife.

Some people call her Aunt Jia, which is Jia Zhangshi, isn't it?

Everyone is familiar with the characters in the Siheyuan (courtyard house) story; regular readers who frequent Tomato (a popular Chinese online forum) will know them all.

Moral blackmail against Yi Zhonghai, the "Heavenly Venerable One".

The Heavenly Venerable and the Deaf Old Lady Pretending to Be Deaf and Dumb.

He Yuzhu, the invincible simp.

The extremely stingy Heavenly Venerable Yan Bugui.

The incompetent and furious Heavenly Venerable Liu Haizhong.

The Heavenly Venerable Jia Zhangshi, who was causing a ruckus and summoning souls.

The Flourishing Age White Lotus Celestial Venerable Qin Huairu.

The Undying Heavenly Venerable Jia Banggeng from the novel "Zhu Xian".

Women love the Heavenly Venerable Xu Damao.

Wait a minute, some people say this place is a concentration camp for beasts, while others say it's a wholesale market for idiots in the "Love in the Courtyard" area.

Everyone has their own understanding, but Yang Dalin was quite indifferent to the matter of time travel.

I've read at least eight thousand, if not ten thousand, time-travel novels.

What's there to get excited about? In my previous life, I was a complete loser who lived a terrible life. I should thank all the great gods for allowing me to travel back in time and start over.

Anyway, I had no more worries after the pandemic in my previous life.

It's not bad to be able to start over here. The key is that this body is only sixteen, which means I'm twenty-one years younger. What's there to be dissatisfied about?

It was just a bit of a mishap; it happened to be the second year of the three-year catastrophe.

However, this is the capital city, a place supplied by the whole country. It's certain that we won't have enough to eat, but we'll probably not starve to death. It should be much better than our hometown.

My hometown has been suffering from drought for more than two years now.

Many people couldn't hold on any longer. If Yang Dalin hadn't been carrying some pears from the village to eat on the way, he probably wouldn't have made it this far.