Chapter 1 Congratulations on obtaining the sign-in system (bug fix)...
Guo Baiwen opened his eyes with a splitting headache, clutching a bulging cloth bag in his hand.
Upon closer inspection, it was a piece of slightly worn farm cloth, with several knots carefully tied on it, wrapped tightly.
After realizing that this wasn't his bag, he noticed that his clothes had also changed—he was originally wearing a shirt, T-shirt, and jeans.
The clothes I wear now are not only poorly made and made of rough fabric, but the stitching is also awkward, and there are several patches of different colors on the hem.
What kind of shabby clothes are these?
He didn't sign up for a Southeast Asia tour group either.
Guo Baiwen subconsciously propped himself up, lifted his clothes and glanced at his body; there were no wounds.
Yes, the kidney is still there.
He rolled up his sleeves, and there were no needle marks on his arms.
Well, it's alright.
Before he could even catch his breath, he suddenly heard several people talking outside—they sounded like an elderly woman and a young girl.
Guo Baiwen felt a chill run down his spine—the people outside were speaking with a distinctly regional accent.
These days, the rate of Mandarin proficiency is already very high, not to mention that he has always lived in the Central Plains region. But no matter how hard he tried to listen, those people's accents were clearly not the accents he was familiar with. They sounded more like... accents from Yunnan, Guizhou and Sichuan.
He didn't know when he sleepwalked into a tour group from Yunnan, Guizhou, and Sichuan.
Or is it...?
Guo Baiwen closed his eyes tightly to catch his breath, then lowered his head.
The moment he saw his own palm clearly, his mind went completely blank, and his heart began to pound wildly.
—This is not his hand.
Although he enjoys sports and has some calluses on his hands, this hand is noticeably smaller than his own, and it is also dark and rough, with even the nails that have grown out being unkempt and uneven.
"...Hey, Grandma, Grandma, my brother's awake!"
A voice exploded in his ear like a thunderclap.
Guo Baiwen felt a chill run down his spine and abruptly looked up.
Suddenly, a little girl squeezed in front of him, staring at him with her big eyes.
Outside, the faint sound of an old woman responding could still be heard.
The little girl seemed to be malnourished; she was pale and thin, and her medium-length hair was dry and yellow. It was tied up with a strip of white cloth and hung down behind her head. The only thing on her face that looked relatively big was her eyes.
"Brother, are you still feeling unwell?" the little girl asked. "We're out of money. To make sure you can take your medicine more often, we've boiled that packet of dregs four times already. Grandma said it's better to have a little medicine flavor than no medicine at all."
Guo Baiwen said in a hoarse voice, "Medicine dregs?" Fortunately, he can now understand these words automatically, and even a bitter taste slowly rises in his mouth when he hears them.
"Yes! This packet of medicine costs twelve coins. The barefoot doctor who treated you said that you need at least five packets and it will take three days to gradually get better... But that will cost a lot of money. We just paid our taxes and don't have much money left."
"Pay taxes?" Guo Baiwen felt like a parrot, only able to babble and mimic people's speech.
“Yes,” the little girl sighed knowingly, “our family only has two mu of land, and last year we only harvested one and a half shi of millet. If we were to pay taxes, we would have to pay a full half tael of silver, so we can only use grain to offset the taxes.”
One and a half stones, that's about 180 jin.
Guo Baiwen quickly did the math in his head, "How much grain do I need to pay to offset this year's taxes?"
"Grandma said that about eighty catties of millet were given out. After paying the taxes, the three of us will have to work hard to eat the little grain left over until next year's harvest."
"There's no other way... I can only get two packets of medicine and boil them with water several more times," the little girl said, then happily swayed her braids behind her. "But the barefoot doctor said that as long as you wake up, it means you're getting better!"
"Going to the doctor..." Guo Baiwen only belatedly realized that his back was aching after hearing this, which must be the result of being sick and lying down for a long time.
"Grandma said you got sick because you saved all your food for us and then got caught in the rain, but we don't have any left to feed the chickens... I just took half a pound of millet to Aunt Zhao's house next door and exchanged it for five eggs. I'm going to boil them for you every day to help you recover..."
As she spoke, she leaned forward and opened the cloth bundle he had been clutching, revealing several eggs inside that still smelled of fresh chicken droppings.
Guo Baiwen thought to himself, "Millet for eggs?"
This family can't even afford to raise chickens anymore; they sound really poor.
In addition to what he had just heard: barter, grandmother, brother, and completely unfamiliar hands.
...He actually time-traveled.
I took a deep breath and forced myself to calm down. I don't know if it was because of my illness, but my head was slightly dizzy.
What exactly is this place?
Or rather, what era is this...?
The little girl looked at the eggs with a bit of longing, and even couldn't help but swallow. After showing him the eggs, she carefully wrapped the cloth bag again, preparing to take them all to the kitchen. "Grandma said that eggs are good for you. If you eat eggs, you won't get sick anymore."
Guo Baiwen did not speak.
After watching the little girl leave the house with her cloth bag, he turned to observe his surroundings: a stiff blue coarse cotton quilt was covering him, and the quilt felt sticky and sticky, indicating that he had just sweated it out and the cold that had nearly killed the original owner was now much better.
The room was bare, with bare mud floor, thick stone slab walls, and nothing in it except for the bamboo bed he was sleeping on, three low bamboo chairs beside the bed, and a wooden table with a broken leg that had been repaired opposite him.
He withdrew his gaze from the house, struggled to his feet, grabbed a pair of worn-out straw sandals from under the kang (heated brick bed), and sauntered to the door. When he opened it, the sun was hanging obliquely in the western sky, and the low fence gave him a clear view of the small village.
The village is crisscrossed by narrow dirt roads. Most of the houses in the village are made of the same stone, with thick stone slabs for walls and thin stone slabs for roofs. A few houses are a bit more elaborate, with roofs made of green tiles instead of thin stone slabs.
He had really traveled through time... Looking at this unfamiliar environment, Guo Baiwen finally accepted this reality.
"Brother, why are you up?"
"I'm getting up to get a drink of water."
The completely backward ecological environment further confirmed his conjecture, and Guo Baiwen became even more silent.
While her brother was thinking, the little girl who had heard that he was thirsty scooped a ladle of water from the water vat outside the door. "Brother, drink a little less, we're about to eat."
The old lady, who had been busy in the kitchen, came out and brought out two plates, a bowl, and three pairs of chopsticks. The plates and bowls were all made of wood. One plate contained bland boiled vegetables, and the other plate contained slightly oily, white stewed tofu that looked like it had only a little salt added. There were also three bowls of rice porridge.
The old lady handed him a bowl of porridge that was noticeably thicker, with more millet than barley and a peeled hard-boiled egg nestled in it. She handed him a second bowl of porridge, which was thinner and contained more barley than millet, to the little girl who had been watching eagerly. She then sipped the last bowl of porridge, which was mostly water with very few grains of barley, and drank it herself.
Guo Baiwen felt a little reluctant and was about to scoop some rice from his own bowl into hers when the old lady pushed him away. "Grandma is old and has no teeth. This little bit of barley porridge is just right. You can eat it yourself, Wen'er."
After saying that, fearing that he would have to hand her the bowl of porridge again, she moved the chair she was sitting on and moved closer to the corner of the wall before slowly starting to eat.
It seemed that he couldn't persuade her anymore. For the sake of his health, Guo Baiwen didn't try to persuade her any further. He quickly finished the rice porridge and egg in his bowl, watched the little girl put away the dishes and utensils, and then he swayed back home, leaning against the wall.
Looking at the bare room, he lay on the bed and couldn't help but sigh. He had to find a way to earn some money. Although he should be cured now, judging from his physical condition, he would probably need to take medicine a few more times to stabilize his condition. And the little girl and the old woman both looked malnourished.
Leaving aside the little girl, the old lady, although she seemed to be in good spirits, had a sallow complexion and was thin.
Meat, eggs, and milk—he can still get an egg to eat now because he's a patient, but the others get nothing.
As if sensing his thoughts, a colorful light screen appeared in front of him the next moment.
Congratulations on accessing the sign-in system. Would you like to bind your account?
Below the gold lettering are two large buttons: one is a gleaming gold "Yes," and the other is a miniature gray "No."
Finally seeing a glimmer of hope in these hard times, Guo Baiwen didn't hesitate and clicked 'Yes'.
The moment he finished clicking, the golden text disappeared. He was a little confused. Was it over already?
Where is the user guide?
What about artificial intelligence?
After searching through the colorful screen for a while, Guo Baiwen finally spotted the question mark icon with a circle at the bottom. Clicking on it brought up the user guide.
This system is highly mechanical, lacking any cute artificial intelligence. Its functions are also very simple: you have only one chance to sign in each day, and you can randomly sign in from the system's vast store to receive three items. If you don't actively take the items, you can store the items you receive in the system's warehouse for free, but you can only have a maximum of ten items.
If you want a second chance to sign in and win a prize within a day, you need to spend money. Increasing your warehouse slots also requires spending money.
Converted to the currency of this ancient world, it would cost ten taels of silver to draw once, and one hundred taels of silver for one more slot.
He first opened the online store and took a look. The store's catalog was simply divided into several sections based on clothing, food, housing, and transportation, and it contained a wide variety of items that covered almost every aspect of life. Picking out just a few items would significantly improve his current living conditions.
But now he doesn't even have ten coins, let alone ten taels of silver.
Stopping thinking about the things he didn't have, he let out a long breath, looked at the "Confirm Today's Check-in" button in the very center of the screen, and carefully pressed it.
It's time to witness your luck once a day.
As the buttons disappeared, an interface resembling a slot machine wheel appeared, with patterns flashing rapidly on the white wheels inside three golden machines.
As the results were about to be released, he couldn't help but swallow hard.
finally--
The first spinning wheel slowly came to a stop, and the icon on it read—【Pork 500g】.
The second and third spinning wheels then appeared, offering [2.5kg of rice] and [one box of cold medicine] respectively.
Although they weren't very expensive, they were things he needed right now, and Guo Baiwen couldn't help but wonder if the sign-in system could sense the thoughts of the person it was bound to.
Next time, maybe try thinking about gold or jewelry before checking in; you might actually win something.
He thought this to himself, but looking at what was displayed in the system's inventory, he was still somewhat pleased.
At the very least, with this check-in system, he should be able to survive well in this unfamiliar place.
On a whim, he took out the cold medicine he had stored in the system's warehouse.
It was a fairly common brand of cold medicine. There were two strips of medicine in the box. He pressed out one pill, and thinking about where the little girl had been scooping water earlier, he went to the water vat, filled it with water, swallowed the pill whole, and then went back to sleep.
A note from the author:
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