Starting from 1950

The kitchen was filled with steam and the smell of firewood. Ruan Sumei wiped away her tears and continued speaking.

"Officer Wang just told me that you older kids who have no relatives to claim you will be sent out of Beijing tomorrow..."

She suddenly choked up, instinctively pretending to work to hide her emotions. She lifted the lid of the pot on the stove and glanced at it. The rising steam blurred the scars on her face. "Xinxue, don't be afraid. You can read and do accounting. Just say you're three years older, and maybe you can become a clerk... Xiaoyangzi, you..."

She looked at Su Yang's slender figure, opened her mouth, but didn't know what to say.

Su Yang was stunned on the spot.

These children who came from the Eight Great Hutongs had long anticipated their future.

They have now been in the reformatory for two months, during which time the military control commission has been calling on people from all walks of life to adopt these unfortunate children.

The younger boys had already been adopted by the people of Beijing, leaving only those over ten years old like Su Yang, whom no one wanted.

Although a boy who is only a teenager can become a labor force in the family after a few years, his personality is already set. Moreover, he comes from a complicated place like the Eight Great Hutongs. Many families are afraid that if they take him back, he will be difficult to teach and may even cause trouble.

However, there are quite a few families willing to raise girls, such as Wu Xinxue. In the past two months, more than a dozen families have inquired about her and wanted to take her away.

However, after Wang Cui and her colleagues investigated, they found that the motives of these people who adopted girls were not pure; most of them wanted to find a child bride.

Such a thing, which is practically human trafficking, is something that reformatories would never do.

As a result, Wu Xinxue and the other girls were left without a home, just like the boys.

These days, Wang Cui goes to the Military Control Commission almost every day to participate in meetings, which are about the whereabouts of these children.

It's definitely not feasible to place them in Beijing. These children come from the Eight Great Hutongs, and there's no guarantee they won't be recognized in the future. Gossip and rumors won't do them any good for their future lives.

Sending them to a distant place was to be expected.

"Aunt Mei, I don't want to leave." Wu Xinxue threw herself into Ruan Sumei's arms and sobbed.

"Good child..." Ruan Sumei patted her shoulder, crying as she gently comforted her.

The wind and snow outside intensified, rattling the wooden windowpanes, but it couldn't drown out the sobbing of the two women inside.

Su Yang sighed. He was also reluctant to start over in an unfamiliar environment, but these were things he couldn't control, so he could only accept his fate.

The two women cried for a while, then gradually calmed down and fell silent.

"Aunt Mei, did Director Wang say where we'll be sent tomorrow?" Su Yang broke the silence.

Ruan Sumei sighed and said, "The Northeast, Shenzhou!"

Upon hearing this, Su Yang breathed a sigh of relief.

Today, Shenzhou ranks among the top five in the country in terms of population and is known as the "Ruhr of the East." In terms of both economic level and industrial strength, Shenzhou is even stronger than Beijing.

This seems... much better than being sent to a remote rural area or grassland?

Ruan Sumei wiped her eyes and forced a smile. "Officer Wang said that many new factories have been built over there, and they're short-handed. You teenagers can go and learn a skill, become workers in the future—that's a proper way to make a living!"

"Workers..." Wu Xinxue raised her head, her face still wet with tears, but a glimmer of light appeared in her eyes.

Having grown up in the Eight Great Hutongs, she has witnessed too many tragic stories of people forced to sell their smiles at doorways, their lives filled with helplessness and despair.

Being a worker, earning a living through labor, is an excellent career path for these girls.

"But Aunt Mei, we..." Wu Xinxue hesitated, glancing at Su Yang before lowering her head again.

Her worry wasn't about going to Shenzhou, but about being separated from Ruan Sumei and Su Yang.

Now it seems that leaving Ruan Sumei was inevitable, but among the more than forty children in the reformatory, she only liked to play with Su Yang.

It wasn't just because Su Yang was the best-looking, but also because he wasn't as vulgar as the other boys. He spoke politely, had clean eyes, and resembled the down-on-his-luck teacher who used to teach her, yet he had more of a youthful spirit than those teachers.

For some reason, she wanted to be with him. If she was destined to be separated from Ruan Sumei, then at least she should be with Su Yang, right?

"Silly girl," Ruan Sumei seemed to see through her thoughts and gently patted the back of her hand, "You and Xiaoyangzi, as well as a few other girls of similar age in the courtyard, were arranged together by Officer Wang as much as possible, so that you can look after each other. She will inform the person who is in charge of you."

She paused, then lowered her voice, "Once you get there, you'll be unfamiliar with the place and the people, so you'll need to support each other even more..."

Her eyes were filled with worry as she looked at the two children. They were too eye-catching in appearance, and their personalities were not as rough as He Dazhuang's. She was afraid that they would be bullied if they went to a strange place.

Su Yang and Wu Xinxue exchanged a glance and nodded heavily, their hearts filled with mixed emotions.

"Alright, stop standing there." Ruan Sumei took a deep breath and forced herself to cheer up. "We're having dumplings for dinner! Cabbage and pork filling! And chicken soup too! Aunt Mei is making you a nice meal, consider it... a farewell dinner."

She turned to chop the meat, the knife hitting the cutting board with a dull thud that masked the sob in her voice.

Su Yang and Wu Xinxue didn't say anything more and took the initiative to help.

In the past two months, when the meals were occasionally improved, Ruan Sumei would call the two of them to work, and when the food was about to be cooked, she would secretly give them some extra oil.

Wu Xinxue opened the flour jar, scooped some flour into the basin, and began kneading the dough.

Su Yang went to the chicken coop, grabbed a chicken from inside, picked up a wood-chopping knife from beside the woodpile, and began to kill the chicken.

He felt that his strength had indeed increased.

With ease, Su Yang pinned the chicken to the edge of the bench, placed a bowl underneath to catch its blood, and, ignoring its struggles, swiftly brought down the knife.

"Cluck cluck~!" The rooster let out its final mournful cry.

"Player has gained 5 experience points!"

A string of faint characters floated before Su Yang's eyes and disappeared after two or three seconds.

"!!!"

Killing monsters gives you experience!

Su Yang's hand trembled, and with a "clatter," the woodcutter's knife fell to the ground.

"What's wrong?" Wu Xinxue and Ruan Sumei looked over at the same time.

"It's nothing, it just slipped out of my hand by accident," Su Yang quickly waved his hand.

Seeing the two of them busy with their own things again, Su Yang suppressed his excitement.

Try again!

He bled the rooster and threw it aside, then pulled another chicken out of the cage.

He then raised his knife and brought it down again.

"Player has gained 5 experience points!"

He belatedly remembered the attribute panel and quickly summoned it to check. He saw that all the other items remained unchanged, but the experience points column had changed to 10/100!

"I'm going to be invincible!"

Su Yang was overjoyed. If he could level up by fighting monsters, what was he afraid of?

If I level up dozens of times, will I be as powerful as I am in the game?

Two images flashed through his mind instantly.

I don't eat beef!

I'll do whatever I want!

"Xiao Yangzi, what are you standing there for? The water's boiled, hurry up and pluck the chicken's feathers."

"Oh! Here it comes!"

......

At dinner time, the reformatory was filled with the long-lost aroma of meat.

Cabbage and pork dumplings, with golden oil droplets floating in the glistening chicken broth.

Each person received only 10 dumplings, a few small pieces of chicken, and a small bowl of soup, but for the first time ever, each person was given a steamed bun.

The children's eyes lit up, and they all buried their heads in their food. Even He Dazhuang didn't care about provoking Su Yang; he just kept stuffing dumplings into his mouth, choking until his eyes rolled back.

Wang Cui and another female cadre watched, their faces showing relief, but their eyes concealing a heavy heart.

They knew that after this sumptuous dinner, the children's fate would set sail for an unknown future.

As Su Yang ate the dumplings, the taste was naturally incomparable to what he remembered from his previous life. The flour wasn't white enough, the meat filling wasn't plentiful, and the chicken soup was too diluted with water.

But in an era when oil and fat were scarce, this was a rare delicacy.

He noticed that Wu Xinxue only ate a few dumplings and drank a bowl of soup before carefully wrapping the rest of the dumplings in a handkerchief.

Noticing Su Yang's gaze, she blushed slightly and whispered, "I'll save it... for the journey."