In the first year of Yong'an, in the depths of winter.
Xinghua Village.
The cold wind howled, and snowflakes fluttered like willow catkins, covering the entire village in silvery white.
In the thatched hut, in the small courtyard, a thin man was squatting on the ground, washing clothes. His ten fingers were red from the cold, and he kept coughing. The washed clothes in the wooden basin next to him had already formed a thin layer of ice.
The door creaked open, and a woman in her forties walked in, wearing a blue headscarf. Upon seeing the man squatting on the ground washing clothes, she exclaimed in surprise, "Mr. Li, why are you washing clothes outside in this freezing weather? Is Little Li dead?"
The man married into the Li family and became their son-in-law, so he was referred to as a member of the Li family.
Li Xiaoxiao was lying on the bed. There was no heated kang in the room, and she was shivering with cold. Looking at the drafty thatched house, she wanted to cry but had no tears. She wished she could die again.
That's right, she transmigrated into a book, into a novel she read before the apocalypse, and became the wicked wife of the main villain in the book, Li Xiaoxiao.
The original owner's biological mother was a widow. On her deathbed, she was worried about her lazy and unmarriageable daughter, so she spent her life savings of four taels of silver to buy her a husband, who would later be the man that Li Xiaoxiao tormented into becoming a major villain, Qi Yu.
The original owner of this body was spoiled since childhood and looked down on her sickly husband. A month after their marriage, she had an affair with a young man in town. In order to go to town often to eat, drink and have fun, she forced her husband to work hard and used all the money he had saved for the imperial examination to support the young man.
Qi Yu was already in poor health, and the original owner of the body wore him down to the point that he was completely exhausted and could no longer work. The original owner simply squeezed out his last bit of value and sold him to a brothel. Qi Yu managed to escape the den of evil with all his might, and after many hardships, he went to the battlefield. Because of his outstanding strategy, he was appreciated and was eventually promoted to general.
The first thing he did after becoming famous was to go back to the village and cut that vicious woman in half.
Oh my god!
Li Xiaoxiao felt even colder, her heart turned cold!
"Li Xiaoxiao, you borrowed three taels of silver from my family for your mother's burial. When are you going to pay it back?" The woman with the headscarf stormed in, and when she saw Li Xiaoxiao still huddled in bed, she became even angrier. "In this freezing weather, you made your husband wash so many clothes. Even if you bought them, you shouldn't treat people like this!"
How can you sit in bed while your husband washes clothes in the dead of winter with cold water?
Li Xiaoxiao's head was buzzing from being called out, and she vaguely remembered that when her mother was buried, her family couldn't even afford to buy a coffin. The widow Dong next door, thinking that widows had it tough, lent Li Xiaoxiao three taels of silver.
Originally, Li Xiaoxiao had only been married for a little over half a month, and Widow Dong did not want to be in such a hurry to ask for money. However, Li Xiaoxiao's reputation was really bad. She heard her beating and scolding her husband every now and then next door. She also heard that she went to town to fool around, buying Xuan paper and brushes that only scholars used, and waiting to run into scholars near Qingshan Academy.
This kind of woman who doesn't examine herself...
Pooh!
Widow Dong wanted to get back the money the woman owed her as soon as possible so that she would have nothing more to do with her.
Li Xiaoxiao's heart skipped a beat. Oh no! She touched where the original owner had hidden her money; only a few hundred coins remained...
“Auntie,” Li Xiaoxiao rubbed her hands together and gave a charming smile, “I’m a little short on money these days, could you be a little more lenient?” Seeing that Widow Dong looked somewhat doubtful, she held up four fingers and promised, “Three months, I will definitely pay you back within three months.”
Widow Dong sneered, "You have money to buy those useless papers and pens, but no money to pay me back?"
Paper and pen?
Li Xiaoxiao suddenly remembered that the original owner of this body had squandered all the money left over from her mother's funeral on paper and pens in order to seduce a poor scholar from Qingshan Academy...
“Auntie,” Li Xiaoxiao wiped away her tears, “Isn’t it because my husband wants to take the imperial examination? No matter how poor we are, we can’t let him suffer. So, I bought those two reams of Xuan paper and a brush. As long as my husband can pass the county-level examination this year, all the suffering I’ve endured will be worth it.”
As Li Xiaoxiao spoke, she became a little guilty. She was lying comfortably in bed and didn't seem to be suffering at all.
Qi Yu, who was washing clothes outside the door, trembled involuntarily when he heard Li Xiaoxiao's voice. He was furious. That vicious woman! She's full of lies!
Widow Dong snorted coldly, "You have plenty of excuses. At most, three months. If you still can't pay back the money, I'll tear your house down!"
She slammed the door shut as she stormed out, leaving the small, dilapidated door teetering on the verge of collapse.
At this moment, Qi Yu also came in. He was hunched over and hung his clothes one by one in the room, even though it was just as cold inside as outside.
"The Xuan paper and brush, are they for me?" His voice was still hoarse as he glanced at her.
Although he knew that asking such a question might provoke a tirade from this hot-tempered woman, he couldn't help but make a sarcastic remark.
Ever since his stepmother sold him here for four taels of silver to become her son-in-law, he has never had a single good day under this woman's rule.
The paper and pen, were they for him? Who would believe that?
It's probably for one of her lovers, that shameless woman!
Li Xiaoxiao chuckled dryly, then immediately got up and took out the Xuan paper and brush that the original owner had locked in the cabinet. She said, "Of course they're for you. You're my husband. Who else would I give them to?"
"I hope you remember what I said today." Qi Yu sneered. Did she still remember that he was her husband?
In the depths of winter, the days are short, and the sky darkened in no time.
Li Xiaoxiao's stomach was growling with hunger. She didn't know where Qi Yu was, so she took a candle and went to the stove to look for something to eat.
This family was truly poor. They had only two or three sweet potatoes, some of which had been gnawed by rats. The rice in the rice jar was yellowed and there was only a little bit left. There were a few wilted scallions, and the only seasoning they had was a jar of salt. As for the lard jar, it was completely empty.
She sighed and opened her spatial ability. Fortunately, although she had traveled from the apocalypse to ancient times, her spatial ability had not disappeared, which prevented her from feeling too desperate.
Inside the space, Li Xiaoxiao looked at her reflection in the spiritual spring. Her face was sallow and thin, making it impossible to tell that she was a fifteen or sixteen-year-old girl.
She couldn't help but feel a little heartbroken. Fortunately, her eyes were quite big and bright, and with some care, she could still take human form.
Li Xiaoxiao didn't quite understand the original owner of this body. She was so hungry that she still wanted to seduce a pretty boy.
She scooped up a mouthful of the sweet spring water and drank it down, and her previously murky body immediately felt a little lighter.
The space was filled with many spiritual fruits, but Li Xiaoxiao immediately slaughtered a fat chicken and didn't forget to take out another hen from the space to raise for laying eggs.
Look how thin her husband is, shouldn't he be given some proper nourishment?
Feelings, well, they're all built through shared meals.
If Qi Yu asks, she'll say that she bought the fat chicken, since he doesn't know how much money she has anyway.
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