The head of the production team in Xujia Village's beloved youngest daughter had fallen into the water.
The entire Xu Family was as gloomy as a cloud-covered sky, yet the villagers gathered around, chattering and gossiping with glee.
By the time the story reached the Youth Corps, it had morphed into:
"The team leader's prized girl had a fever that fried her brain—she's dead!"
"What, Xu Ying is dead?" A female member of the Youth Corps exclaimed, her frail body like a kite about to fall at any moment.
She steadied herself and rushed to the team leader's house without stopping.
Xu Ying couldn't die, if she died.
Wouldn't that mean she had saved her life for nothing?
Xu Ying was awoken by the noise. Having spent several years in the apocalypse, she was long accustomed to sleeping with a weapon under her pillow.
She heard footsteps at the door and reflexively reached under the pillow.
But her hand found nothing, and she opened her eyes and sat up on alert.
As she looked around, Xu Ying was instantly stunned—this room was clearly her boudoir from her previous life!
The dilapidated mud house, with chunks of earth ready to fall off the walls, had a layer of newspapers pasted beside the bed.
Opposite the bed stood a cabinet, one that her sister-in-law had brought as part of her dowry when she married Xu Ying's elder brother.
Back then, envious of her sister-in-law's new cabinet, she had stubbornly forced her sister-in-law to give it to her, and now the thought filled her with guilt.
Meanwhile, a familiar voice came from outside:
"Auntie, is Yingying awake yet?" A delicate girl stood in the courtyard, her face full of concern as she peered into the house.
Mrs. Xu, overwhelmed with maternal love, had reddened eyes from recent tears.
Sitting in the courtyard, she wailed and slapped her thighs, "Oh my dear daughter, if something happens to her, I don't want to live either.
It's all your fault, dead old man. Why did you make her go buy soy sauce for no good reason? If she hadn't gone to buy it, she wouldn't have fallen into the river!"
Mrs. Xu, with snot and tears, angrily pointed at Team Leader Xu Jianguo as she cursed.
Xu Jianguo's face was full of guilt, "It's all my fault. If I had known Yingying would fall into the river, I would never have let her go."
"Uncle Xu? Is Yingying still not awake? She isn't really dead, is she?" Chen Yanran was now pacing anxiously.
Mrs. Xu leaped from her chair with a splash, tearing towards Chen Yanran, "You wench, what nonsense are you spouting?
You wish she was dead. My daughter is just unconscious, and here you are cursing her to die, you little whore, I'll beat you to death."
Xu Jianguo saw his wife going berserk and his head swelled with worry. He hurried after her, "Stop the nonsense, Chen Zhiqing saved our daughter, how can you bite the hand that feeds you?"
"She said our daughter was dead," Mrs. Xu stamped her feet angrily. It was only because she had saved her daughter that she had scratched her a few times.
If it hadn't been for her being a lifesaver, she would have pinned that brat to the ground and beaten her.
Chen Yanran covered her scratched face and wailed, "I heard it from people outside, I didn't believe it, so I came to see Xu Ying."
"Chen Zhiqing, thank you for your concern for my daughter. If it hadn't been for you, my daughter might really be gone.
But now Yingying is just unconscious, so don't say things like that again," Xu Jianguo, normally full of vitality, looked somewhat haggard.
"Team Leader Uncle, I just did what I was supposed to do, there's no need to be strangers. Even if it was someone else who fell into the river, I certainly would have tried to save them," Chen Zhiqing said through the pain, forcing a smile and speaking politely.
Unbeknownst to when, Xu Ying had walked to the doorway, watching the scene unfold with biting irony.
"Chen Zhiqing means—you're the one who saved me?"
Chen Yanran turned around the moment she heard the voice, a flash of jealousy crossing her eyes.
Her black hair cascaded down like clouds, and her willowy eyebrows framed a pair of eyes deep as autumn waters, beautiful as stars, exposing a cold and haughty demeanor.
Her pallor betrayed her weakness, but it couldn't mask her overpowering presence.
Chen Yanran bit her lip as she looked at her. No matter how beautiful, she was nothing but a brainless bimbo.
"Yingying, have you forgotten that it was I who desperately pulled you from the river?"
Xu Ying felt nauseated by her pretense.
Such sincere eyes—anyone unaware would think she was the ungrateful one.
But it made sense; Chen Yanran was a master performer. Otherwise, she would not have been so tragically deceived by her and Dong Wenzhong in her previous life.
"Chen Yanran, how can you be so shameless? It was clearly Lu Daya who saved me. When did it become you? Do you really think I was unconscious and unaware of what happened?"
Xu Ying's lips parted slightly, her gaze mocking as she looked at Chen Yanran.
Those words instantly drained the color from Chen Yanran's face. Indeed, she wasn't the rescuer, but when Xu Ying had briefly opened her eyes, it was her at Xu Ying's side.
"Yingying, what are you implying? You clearly saw me saving you before you fainted.
Even if you don't like me, you shouldn't make a fuss over something like this!" Chen Yanran said with a face full of sorrow, tears streaming down her cheeks.
Xu Jian Country was also getting angry. This was no time for petulance; repaying a life-saving debt was not a matter for jest. Had it not been for Chen Zhiqing's desperate efforts, his daughter would probably be dead by now.
"Yingying, you can't throw a tantrum right now."
"Dad, do you really believe she saved me? Chen Zhiqing is so frail, she probably wouldn't have been able to get herself out of the river, let alone save me."
Chen Yanran, who had come from the big city to join the Youth Corps, had never done any heavy labor in her life. On her first day, it was Dong Wenzhong who helped carry her luggage.
She was later too weak to handle farm work; always unable to lift this or hold that, constantly complaining of discomfort, fragile as Lin Daiyu.
At that, Xu Jian Country's expression changed. He remembered how the girl couldn't even carry her own bag when she first arrived.
His daughter weighed over ninety pounds—could she have managed to pull her up?
Seeing the captain's doubts, Chen Yanran began to cry even more pitifully: "Yingying, I may be weak, but this was a matter of life and death.
You falling into the river gave me a huge fright. I was so afraid something would happen to you, and I mustered all my strength to pull you out."
"If you don't believe me, you can ask Dong Zhiqing."
Hearing the name "Dong Zhiqing," a spark of hatred flared in Xu Ying's eyes.
Dong Wenzhong, the man she harbored a deep grudge against.
In her last life, she had been blind to his true character, mistaking a scoundrel for a decent man, quarreling fiercely with her father over marrying him.
Later, Dong Wenzhong coaxed her, persuading her to beg her father—crying, causing scenes, even threatening suicide—until her father ceded his spot to return to the city to him.
Little did she know that once Dong Wenzhong made it back to the city, he disappeared without a trace.
Because her father gave up his spot for Dong Wenzhong, he became a target of resentment, was bagged and beaten outside, then dumped in the backwoods, where cries to heaven went unanswered, pleas to earth unheard.
It was the onset of winter when they found her father, his body bloody and battered, eyes wide open, stiff and breathless.
It had been pouring that day, and in his anguish, her elder brother slipped and fell while carrying their father down the mountain, breaking his leg right then and there!
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This is a sweet romance with a career-building female protagonist who will later start a business and earn big money.