☆, Part 1: An Unexpected Space (2281 words)
Li Yaxi sat blankly on the balcony, hugging his knees. Aside from the chatter of the old women cooling off downstairs, he could faintly hear his stepfather and stepmother—or rather, that woman—arguing. Yes, a completely unrelated woman. His hand unconsciously touched the jade pendant around his neck. A faint throbbing pain in his heart reminded him that this was not a dream; he had died, and he was alive again.
His back and abdomen ached terribly, caused by the woman throwing a small chair at him and kicking him in the stomach. If it were four-year-old Li Yaxi, he would have secretly shed tears from the pain. Indeed, in his past life, Li Yaxi would only hide and quietly weep after being beaten; it wasn't even a proper cry. He didn't know who his father was. After his mother died, he lived with what he thought was his father. Then his father married another woman, and since that woman entered the family, he hadn't had a single good day. His injuries never healed, and after his younger sister was born, his life became even more miserable.
But he endured it, because his father was there, even though his father treated him like a stranger, at least he was still family. Until he got into university, while his younger sister was far short of the required score for high school and had to pay to get in. He understood that he couldn't continue his studies, and he accepted it. But then he heard something he shouldn't have heard.
It turns out that the father was the mother's stepfather after her remarriage; they weren't related by blood. They raised him because they couldn't abandon him under the law, and at least his existence allowed the woman to vent her frustrations when she was upset. Also, because of him, their family was the envy of others, receiving a substantial scholarship every year. Now he can't continue his studies, but he still has one use: he can be sold for a good amount of money.
Li Yaxi was very beautiful, like his mother, gentle yet not effeminate, and always stood out wherever he went. His stepfather was the manager of the Yi family's foreign trade company, often in contact with wealthy people, many of whom had subtly hinted to him that they wanted to support him. So now that woman was urging his stepfather to offer a good price, and his stepfather was seriously considering how much he could be sold for. In his past life, Li Yaxi returned to the storage room, his room, pale-faced. Then he secretly took his bag and left the place he had lived for seventeen years, taking nothing but pain with him.
A burst of hearty laughter pulled Li Yaxi back from his memories of his past life—the joy of his stepfather upon learning that the woman was pregnant. The sound entering his ears sent waves of dizziness and chest tightness through him. Li Yaxi, supported by Qiang, slowly stood up. He could bear the pulling pain in his back, but the pain in his abdomen made it impossible for him to straighten up. He could only walk back to his room, hunched over. Four-year-old Li Yaxi still had his own room, but he knew that soon it would become a nursery. This so-called home would no longer have a place for him.
Lying on his side in the small bed, Li Yaxi was confused. He knew that the man had nothing to do with him, and there was nothing here worth staying for, but staying meant more than a decade of mental and physical torture. If he left, where could he go? After all, he was only four years old. Li Yaxi closed his eyes and sighed heavily. When he opened them again, the scene before him stunned him for a long time.
A lush green meadow stretched out before a lake shrouded in mist, seemingly endless. Countless complex thoughts flashed through his mind, but he quickly grasped only one: Had he died again? Faced with the fact that he had returned to the age of four, he calmly accepted his second death and this inexplicable place.
Li Yaxi got up from the ground, the unknown place before him making him forget the pain in his body. He looked around, trying to find something that could solve his confusion, but unfortunately, all he saw were grass and lakes. Li Yaxi gave up on pushing his body to its limits and found a large rock to lean against and sit down. He then noticed that there were words on the rock, thankfully in traditional Chinese characters, not oracle bone script.
Li Yaxi read each word carefully, finally understanding that this place was called "Jie," which could also be called "space." His connection to this space seemed to be the jade pendant around his neck. The lake water was a spiritual spring, the grassland a spiritual jade. The stone inscription said that this place could be cultivated, and jade could be nurtured in the spring to increase its spiritual energy. The only thing Li Yaxi could connect to was that his spatial game seemed to have materialized. Returning to his room through willpower, Li Yaxi touched the jade pendant, lost in endless感慨 (gǎnkǎi, deep emotion). "Han Weiming, oh Han Weiming, if you knew this jade contained so much mysterious power, wouldn't you be disgusted?" Thinking of that person, Li Yaxi felt a bitter, agonizing sadness.
Li Yaxi tried putting things from outside into his spatial dimension, and there were no obstacles at all. That very night, Li Yaxi smuggled quite a few things in: his mother's belongings, some books, and some fruits and vegetables. These days, vegetables were cheap, not more expensive than meat. Following the instructions on the stone, he planted the fruits and vegetables in the ground. Thankfully, seeds weren't required, otherwise where would he have found them!
There was no distinction between day and night in this space. When Li Yaxi finished her work and returned to her room, she realized it was already dawn. Li Yaxi didn't need to go to kindergarten because that woman wasn't willing to spend a single penny more on her. Lying on her small bed, Li Yaxi's face was pale from a night of work. Her misty eyes looked pitifully at her stepfather, her voice weak and aggrieved.
"Dad, my stomach hurts."
Li Li frowned slightly. He was there yesterday when his wife kicked Li Yaxi. The child's body is very tender. It's been a whole night and her stomach still hurts. Could it be that her internal organs were injured?
"Then you'd better stay home and not go out today. Your mom and I are going to visit your grandparents. Be good, okay?"
Li Yaxi nodded obediently, closed his eyes, and continued to sleep. He heard the woman cursing and the sound of the door closing; he knew he couldn't stay any longer. Before the woman became pregnant, his life was manageable, but ever since his grandparents found out she was pregnant, the woman had tormented him even more relentlessly, claiming that pregnant women were prone to mood swings.
Li Yaxi lay in bed for a while, making sure they were far away before getting up. She wandered around the room, grabbed some necessities, tossed them into her spatial storage, left a note, and left. The moment she closed the door, although still confused, Li Yaxi felt an unprecedented sense of relief.
Li Yaxi walked for a while, but the faint pain in his abdomen and back reminded him that he was running out of strength. Finally, Li Yaxi reached a relatively secluded corner of an open park and flashed into his spatial dimension. Li Yaxi was a little surprised to see the tender sprouts emerging from the soil, but he quickly came to terms with it. After all, if he were to be surprised by the plants growing too fast after experiencing so many strange things, he would be too unsettled.
Li Yaxi took off her clothes and slowly immersed herself in the spiritual spring. Her back felt tingly but very comfortable. She drank a few sips of water and took a bath. It wasn't that Li Yaxi wasn't afraid of getting dirty; she knew this spiritual spring had purifying abilities—it was written on the stone! The temperature was just right. Li Yaxi lay naked on the grass to dry off the water droplets, then put on her clothes, lay down on the blanket spread on the ground, and slowly fell asleep.
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