Lu Nan woke up feeling hot. 

Is the power out? Or is the air conditioner broken? 

She opened her eyes and suddenly felt that the sunlight was too dazzling. 

This doesn’t make sense. Although the room faces south, there should be thick linen blackout curtains, right? 

Feeling sticky all over, she couldn’t lie still. Sitting up, Lu Nan felt dazed. 

This was a small single room of about seventeen to eighteen square meters, with the bed facing a bay window. The bay window was draped with cheap and tacky pink polyester curtains that didn’t block the light at all. 

Looking again at the freshly painted white walls and ceiling, goodness gracious, there was only one energy-saving light bulb on the ceiling. Air conditioning? It doesn’t exist. 

At the foot of the bed, a small electric fan made a faint noise while blowing hot air. 

Lu Nan thought to herself: Without a doubt, I must be dreaming. 

This environment seemed vaguely familiar, like the single room she had rented near the company during her internship in her senior year. It had a private bathroom and an electric water heater, a bay window but no balcony, and utilities were included but there was no air conditioning. 

Renting it costs six hundred yuan a month, a bit extravagant for someone with only a monthly internship salary of twelve hundred yuan. For example, the girl who was in the same major and interning at the same company chose a smaller room without a private bathroom, and her monthly rent was only four hundred yuan. 

Modestly speaking, Lu Nan came from a relatively comfortable family background and had some savings, so she had some requirements for safety and hygiene when renting a place. 

When she first graduated, apart from the lack of air conditioning, she didn’t find much wrong with this single room. 

Looking back on it ten years after her graduation, she felt that the ceiling was too low and there were too many mosquitoes. There was no balcony, which made it inconvenient to dry clothes. The bathroom had no windows and was too humid. The wardrobe was too small, the bed was too hard, and there were no home appliances. It was as clean as a snow cave. 

Six hundred yuan a month, what more could one ask for? As expected, once accustomed to luxury, it’s hard to be frugal. Lu Nan muttered to herself in her heart, and as she lay back down, she bumped her head with a thud against the headboard. 

“Ah, it hurts …” 

… 

It took Lu Nan some time to confirm that she wasn’t dreaming after all. 

It also took her more time to basically rule out the possibility of encountering something like “The Truman Show.” 

Lu Nan chuckled to herself: It’s more reliable to think of it as a dream. 

After eliminating all impossibilities, whatever remained, no matter how unbelievable, had to be the truth. 

She, Lu Nan. 

It seemed like she had truly been reborn. 

Rebirth, how great! Lu Nan suddenly felt enthusiastic. 

Isn’t rebirth about making up for regrets? 

Speaking of regrets, Lu Nan’s regrets were just like those of most urban and rural residents. She did not buy a house before property prices skyrocketed. 

By the time she was twenty-seven or twenty-eight, she had emptied her savings and bought a necessary residential property in a third or fourth-tier city. Three years later, she gritted her teeth and did not buy a new car. Instead, she scraped together a down payment and purchased a small two-bedroom, one-living-room apartment as an investment and became a mortgage slave with two properties. 

But she hadn’t taken advantage of the second property before being reborn. 

Rubbing the back of her head, the pain felt too real. 

She made up her mind: Since she really had been reborn, this time she must buy a house early! 

… 

Of course, at that moment, she looked at the bank account transaction text message on her mobile phone and found that her total assets were only a little over thirty-three thousand yuan. 

This money comes from three sources: 

Firstly, it’s the surplus from living expenses each semester; 

Secondly, it’s savings from part-time work; 

Thirdly, it’s scholarships. 

Looking at it ten years later, the amount in the bank card is just over thirty thousand yuan, which is hardly enough to call it savings—it can only be considered a balance. 

However, considering Lu Nan’s current income level and the local cost of living, thirty-three thousand isn’t too little. 

With money in hand and peace of mind, Lu Nan carefully studied her mobile phone and laptop, checked the two instant messaging apps upside down, and carefully recalled her situation during this period. 

It could be described as simple as this. 

She had already resigned from the internship at CIMC Logistics Limited, where she earned only twelve hundred yuan a month, and even if she became a regular employee, her salary would only increase by three hundred yuan. This also meant that Lu Nan didn’t have to worry about maintaining her image in front of her colleagues. After all, after working together for half a year, people in the same department were more or less familiar with each other, and it was easy to reveal one’s true intentions. For example, Lu Nan couldn’t remember many routes and airports by heart. 

And a salary of just over a thousand yuan, really, isn’t it too little… What was I thinking at the time, proudly signing a contract with three parties? Was it for the prestige of a big company? Or was I just too young? 

Lu Nan sighed and looked up at her laptop screen. 

There was an offer in her email—a job invitation from Yuan Chuan Group. 

Yuan Chuan Group. 

It was Lu Nan’s former employer. She distinctly remembered that in mid-June of the previous year, she had heard from her senior Yan Kai that Yuan Chuan was hiring. Intrigued by the salary information she had gathered; she enthusiastically attended the interview and successfully got the job. To celebrate her leap from a monthly salary of twelve hundred to four thousand, she joyfully stayed in her rented apartment for half a month before reporting to the Yuan Chuan Group’s office in Hailin City, Qianjiang Province in July. 

She worked there for five years and diligently saved up for the down payment on her first house. 

However, due to various reasons, Lu Nan eventually resigned. 

Now, this offer was once again before Lu Nan. 

She pondered for a moment. Considering that she had missed the campus recruitment of Yuan Chuan Group and had only secured the interview thanks to her senior’s recommendation, backing out now seemed somewhat insincere. Reflecting on the job’s decent pay and manageable workload, she decided—it would still be the right choice! 

Thinking back to how she had been using her meager savings during her internship earlier this year, Lu Nan became even more determined: she would work at Yuan Chuan for a while, save up for six months, and change jobs early next year! 

Today was Thursday. Lu Nan took a minute and made another small decision. 

She clicked reply on the email and informed the provincial personnel office that she could complete the entry procedures next Monday. 

Sure enough, as her senior had said, the city office was short-staffed. Yuan Chuan Group shared office space between the provincial office in Qianjiang and the office in Hailin City. The personnel quickly replied: no problem, see you at the office at 9:30 AM on Monday. 

Lu Nan’s stomach growled, reminding her it was time to eat. 

Of course, her rented apartment didn’t have a refrigerator or stove. Lu Nan knew herself well; she had never been one to snack over the years, so she hadn’t planned on snacking just to satisfy her hunger. 

She changed into a fresh set of clothes and packed her phone, keys, ID, bank card, and bus card into a small bag. She had intended to apply sunscreen, but seeing there was none on the table surprised her. “At twenty-three, I really don’t use sunscreen? It’s a crime!” she exclaimed. “Unforgivable!” 

With no choice, she took an umbrella with her when she left. 

Lu Nan checked the bus schedule and, after so many years, surprisingly she still remembered the location of the shopping mall. 

After riding the bus for seven or eight stops, she got off at Wanda Plaza and found a chain store specializing in pan-fried dumplings. She ordered shrimp pan-fried dumplings and a glass of chilled sweet soybean milk, and it cost twenty yuan. Lu Nan thought, “I’ll eat an apple for dinner tonight to balance out today’s meals expenses.” 

After finishing what felt like breakfast but was actually lunch, Lu Nan found a bookstore to enjoy the air conditioning. By 1:30 PM, she headed to a nearby reputable security company to open an account.