Chapter 1: Becoming a Stepmother
It was dawn.
Qin Yao carried a hoe and walked across the muddy path, stepping on the deep and shallow paths, towards the west end of the village.
"Mother."
A girl's timid cry came from behind.
Qin Yao stopped and turned around. On the muddy road, two barefoot four-year-old children were stumbling towards her with water jugs in their arms. When they saw her stop, they quickened their pace, their little feet clattering in the mud, splashing mud all over their bodies.
These are the youngest twins of the Liu family, Liu Sanlang and Liu Siniang.
It was early autumn, and the brother and sister were wearing ill-fitting thin linen clothes with sparse warp and weft. A hole was poked in the clothes by their fingers, and a gust of wind blew, causing their thin bodies to shiver violently.
"Why did you two follow me?" Qin Yao asked.
Si Niang answered obediently: "Third brother and I are here to bring water to Auntie."
Without drinking water, people can't work and their stomachs will feel uncomfortable.
Sanlang glared at his sister and said, "That's not our mother. My second brother said you are not allowed to call her mother!"
Si Niang pouted in grievance and murmured in a low voice, "But, but, I want my mother."
Qin Yao was a little helpless. Is it really okay for you two little kids to say this in front of me?
But what Sanlang said was not wrong. She was only their stepmother now, not their biological mother. Moreover, she had only been in the Liu family for two days, so it was normal for the children to be hostile to her.
She placed the hoe on her shoulder horizontally, used her body to control her balance so that the hoe would not fall, and stretched out her hand for the two men to give her the pottery jar. "Give me the water, and you two can go home. The road is long."
Si Niang nodded obediently. Due to long-term malnutrition, the big head on her thin neck made Qin Yao frightened.
Sanlang glanced at Qin Yao before handing her the water pitcher.
"Go back quickly." Qin Yao urged.
Sanlang took his sister's hand and was about to leave. Si Niang broke free from her brother and ran to Qin Yao.
"Mom, can you please not run away?" The little girl looked up at her, her innocent eyes full of longing for motherly love.
The eldest and second brothers said that their stepmother would definitely run away when she saw how poor their family was.
But she didn't want her mother to leave.
Her biological mother died after giving birth to her and her brother. They had been without a mother since childhood, so they were particularly envious of other children who had mothers.
In Si Niang's mind, if Daddy brings back a new A Niang, then she will have her own A Niang!
She will listen to A Niang and help her with work. As long as A Niang is willing to be her A Niang, Si Niang will be very obedient.
How could Qin Yao bear such a passionate and innocent look? She put down the things in her hands, squatted down, and gently touched her little head, "Be good, Si Niang, go home and wait for me."
Hearing that she was coming back, Si Niang's eyes lit up. She tentatively grabbed a finger of Qin Yao with her little hand and gave her a shy smile, "Si Niang, be obedient and go home to wait for mother."
"Okay, go ahead."
"Uh-huh!"
Si Niang was led away by her brother. She looked back at Qin Yao as she walked. Seeing that Qin Yao was also looking at her, she smiled at her. Her smile was so sweet that Qin Yao's heart melted.
Qin Yao watched the two children return to the village, picked up the hoe again, picked up the water jug, and continued walking forward.
The rolling green hills were shrouded in mist, and the air was filled with the scent of moist green grass, which was something that could not be felt in a world plagued by natural disasters and zombies.
Qin Yao greedily took a few deep breaths of the pure and fresh air, cherishing this hard-earned new life.
Even though she became a stepmother of four children, even though the family is now penniless.
But could it be worse than that hopeless end of the world?
As soon as the memories of the original owner emerged in her mind, Qin Yao's eyes instantly became sharp when she thought of the original owner's bastard husband.
The original Yao Niang was a refugee. Her family was wiped out and she fled to Kaiyang County alone.
In order to obtain household registration, the 18-year-old pretty girl accepted official arrangements and found Liu Ji, a 23-year-old widower with four children in Liujia Village, as her stepwife.
I thought I could settle down here, but I didn't expect that Liu Ji was good-looking, but he was useless! He
didn't work, he didn't do anything, he was the first to go to the house where there was a party, he was idle all day, stealing and doing nothing.
If he was born in a wealthy family, he could be a playboy.
But he was born in a commoner family. Although he has such a temper, he himself is carefree, but he brings harm to those around him.
When the step-sons' biological mother, Mrs. Mo, was still alive, she could still govern the town. Although the family was a little poor, they still had fifty acres of land. They worked hard in the fields all year round, and the family would not starve to death.
But since Mrs. Mo died of heavy bleeding after giving birth to twins, there was no one to supervise him. Liu Ji, the prodigal son, disliked farming and refused to work. He sold his land when he was short of food and drink, and soon sold all the good land he had!
Fortunately, his three brothers found out and kept two acres under the pressure of their family.
But the land was farther and farther away, all in the valleys, and the nearest one had to walk five miles!
The family was extremely poor, and it was a miracle that the four children could grow up without much food.
Three days ago, with the help of the government as matchmaker, Liu Ji brought the original owner home, threw the four skinny children in front of her, and went out to live a life of debauchery!
Yao Niang was stunned at the time, she knew that Liu Ji's family was poor and that he had four children and that life was not easy. She naively thought that as long as the couple worked together, their lives would be better.
She never expected that when she opened the rice jar, there was not a single grain of chaff!
Her body had already been stretched to its limit after escaping, and there was nothing to eat or drink at home. As late autumn was approaching and winter was about to come, she picked up her hoe and went to the fields to plant winter wheat to prepare for food next year.
Unexpectedly, he fell on the kang and never woke up again.
And that bastard Liu Ji hasn't returned home yet. If Qin Yao hadn't traveled through time, I'm afraid no one would know that the girl who wanted to work hard to live is dead.
"Oh~" Qin Yao sighed and said in her heart, Yao Niang, let's live well together!
But Qin Yao still had a headache when she thought of the Liu family's current situation.
Winter is coming, and Liu Ji's shabby thatched house will definitely not be able to withstand the cold winter.
It snows heavily here in the winter, so the thatched houses have to be reinforced, otherwise they will collapse when the snow gets heavier.
It doesn't matter if the house collapses, but it would be a tragedy if people were crushed to death.
As for clothes, she and the four children of the Liu family were all wearing old clothes given by others. They not only did not fit them well, but were also very worn out. They didn't dare to wash them when they got dirty, for fear that they would get torn if rubbed by their hands!
You can buy cotton cloth and cotton to make warm clothes yourself. Qin Yao didn't even say whether she could make it or not, but she can learn it anyway, right?
Just buying the raw materials for winter clothes for her and her four children would cost a lot of money.
Money, money, she doesn't have a penny now.
This is not the scariest thing. The scariest thing is that she is hungry now.
It felt like fire was burning in her stomach, as if it was going to burn a big hole in it. Qin Yao felt so uncomfortable that she wanted to kill that bastard Liu Ji and eat his meat!
After finally surviving, she starved to death again. She will die with regret!
(End of this chapter)