Chapter 1 – The Female Military Doctor of the 1950s

End of April.

The ice and snow had melted, the soil was moist—it was the perfect time for spring planting.

That morning, just as the sky began to lighten, the hardworking families of Xujiatun were already carrying their hoes and heading to the fields in small groups.

Xu Hehua had something on her mind. She politely declined her neighbors’ invitation to go to the fields together, hastily ate two bites of breakfast, then returned to her room to change into new clothes. She dipped her fingers in clean water to smooth her hair into place. Only when she was satisfied did she grab the offerings and prepare to head out.

But just as she reached the donkey pen, the courtyard gate creaked open. A cheerful and familiar woman’s voice followed:
“Hehua! You home?”

“I’m here!” Xu Hehua led the donkey out before turning to the visitor. “Lancang-jie, what brings you here so early?”
Although she called her jie (older sister), the two were already far removed in kinship—just fellow villagers who had grown up together.

Xu Lancang pointed to the basket hanging on her arm, her eyes full of smiles. “We made some tofu at home and I brought you two pieces. You’re—” She paused mid-sentence as her eyes landed on the yellow paper in Xu Hehua’s basket, instantly becoming flustered.

Xu Hehua rolled her eyes. “Come on now, Tiedan’s been gone for years.”

“Heh, true… well then, I’ll just leave the tofu on your stove.”
Xu Lancang was straightforward and a bit loose-tongued. Afraid she’d say something that would cut too deep, she quickly laughed it off and headed to the kitchen.

Inwardly, she sighed at her cousin’s misfortunes. Hehua had married at sixteen, and just as she became pregnant, her husband, Li Shanhai, went missing while hunting in the mountains.

It was the early 1930s—a chaotic time. When he remained missing for too long, people in the village said he’d either been attacked by a bear or taken by bandits. Either way, he likely met a bad end. They advised her to terminate the pregnancy and remarry while she was still young.

But Hehua refused to believe her husband had truly met misfortune. She was soft-hearted and dead set on leaving behind a child for Li Shanhai and taking care of his parents in his absence.

Even after their son Tiedan died of illness at age six, this foolish cousin of hers continued to care for Li Shanhai’s elderly parents and never remarried. Who wouldn’t say she was loyal and righteous?

Who could’ve expected that just over a month ago, the man who had been missing for fifteen years—and presumed dead—would return in glory, saying he was here to take his parents to the city to enjoy a good life.

Turns out, Li Shanhai really had been captured by bandits back then. Seeing that he was young and sturdy, they forced him into servitude. After half a year of wandering, he ran into the revolutionary army and joined their new recruits.

That turn of events stretched into fifteen years.

Now that the country had won the war and there were no more battles to fight, he had been reassigned to work as a government official in the city.

Xu Lancang didn’t understand exactly what kind of position he held, but the elders in the village said it wasn’t anything particularly high-ranking.

Still, even a low-ranking official was a city person!

If Li Shanhai had turned out to be a good man, then cousin Hehua’s years of hardship would’ve finally paid off.

But that heartless bastard had already taken a new wife in the city and had two kids with her.

Yes—while Hehua had spent 15 years as a widow, taking care of his aging parents, that sorry excuse of a man had married a younger woman and fathered two children—the eldest already eight years old.

He even had the gall to say that arranged marriages were feudal leftovers, and that since he was educated and capable, he deserved a cultured partner too.

She spat at the thought—Bah!

The more Xu Lancang thought about it, the angrier she became. What a heartless traitor! A shameless ingrate!

Thankfully, Li Shanhai’s parents still had some conscience. Before leaving, they gave Hehua several dozen silver dollars, and even left the family’s donkey behind.

That was a hefty sum.

Of course, no one really knew exactly how much money she was given. But looking at the three-room red-brick tile-roofed house before her, and the well-groomed, shiny-coated donkey, it wasn’t hard to guess the ballpark figure.

With that thought, Xu Lancang finally felt a bit more at ease. Then, glancing at the younger woman tying the courtyard gate, she suddenly looked worried again.
“You really don’t want me to go with you?”
After all, Tiedan was buried just in the hills behind the village—only a few li (miles) away—but it was near the Li family’s village, and who knew what memories might be stirred up to cause grief?

Xu Hehua smiled. “No need. I’m fine on my own. I’m just going to chat with Tiedan, tell him I got divorced, that his father’s still alive, and we built a new house and all that. I’ll be back soon.”

“Alright then, I’ll head back first.”
Xu Hehua was a capable woman, and Xu Lancang didn’t want to say too much and become annoying. She left in a rush, but had only gone a few steps when she suddenly turned around and came back.

Seeing this, Xu Hehua—who had just been wondering what return gift to give her sister Lancang—looked puzzled and asked, “What’s wrong?”

Xu Lancang looked around, making sure no one was nearby, then leaned in and lowered her voice:
“A couple days ago, someone asked me how much money you still had. I told them you were broke—that you even owe 2 silver dollars in debt just to build this house. So make sure you don’t slip up and reveal anything.”

“It’s true I spent it all anyway. I’m just a woman—if I have money, I probably can’t hold onto it. Might as well use it all to build the house.”
Xu Hehua wasn’t lying. As soon as she received the money, she went back to her home village and, through the help of an elder, bought a residential plot and built this big house—just so people would believe she had no money left.

There aren’t many truly evil people among relatives and neighbors, but when you suddenly come into wealth, you become a target.

It wasn’t that Xu Hehua was cold-hearted and unwilling to help, but most people came with the mindset of taking advantage. She wasn’t a saint—she’d rather spend it on herself.

Sure enough, although plenty of people gossiped that a woman building such a big house was wasteful, at least no one shamelessly came to borrow money anymore.

Of course, that was just the story she told people. In reality, she still had several small gold ingots (xiao huangyu) tucked away—gifts from her former mother-in-law. No one knew about those.

“As long as you’ve got a plan, that’s what matters. I’ll head back now.”
Xu Lancang was finally reassured and this time really left—walking off so fast that in just a few breaths, she was gone.

Xu Hehua chuckled, “Still as fiery as ever.”

On the way to the back mountain, she passed a few villagers carrying hoes.

They greeted her warmly face-to-face, only to whisper behind her back the moment they turned around.

It had only been just over a month since her divorce, but Xu Hehua was already used to it—so much so she couldn’t even be bothered to roll her eyes anymore.

The envious, the jealous, the sympathetic, the slanderous—it was always the same few lines going in circles.

She’d been a widow for more than ten years. What insults hadn’t she heard? What filth hadn’t been thrown her way? A few idle remarks were nothing.

Fortunately, the deeper she went into the hills, the fewer people there were.

After walking for about an hour, she passed an old, dilapidated Earth God shrine at the foot of the mountain. Xu Hehua hesitated for a moment, then stopped.

She tied the donkey to a large tree, gathered some dry grass and twigs into a bundle, and carefully cleaned the shrine.

It wasn’t very large, so after about half an hour of work, it was neat and tidy again.

Before leaving, Xu Hehua took out two steamed corn buns (wowo tou) she had brought for Tiedan, placed them in a chipped clay bowl as an offering, and turned to leave—without making any wish.

Xu Hehua didn’t believe in gods or Buddha. Could they bring Tiedan back to her?

But she did believe in karma and retribution. Doing good within her ability—well, it couldn’t hurt.

Because of several delays along the way, by the time she reached the burial ground, the sun was already high in the sky.

To call it a burial ground was a bit of a stretch—it wasn’t the family ancestral tomb.

According to tradition, children who hadn’t reached the age of twelve weren’t allowed to be buried in ancestral graves. Over time, the nearby villages developed a kind of unspoken agreement, setting aside this piece of land for children who died young.

Tiedan had passed when he was only six, so naturally, he was buried here.

But Xu Hehua had grieved that the child left the world too young and hadn’t seen much of it. So she buried him at the highest point.

After all, there was an old saying: The higher you stand, the farther you see.

She was illiterate and didn’t understand lofty reasoning, but she believed it was never wrong to give the best to her child.

It just meant that visiting him each time was a bit of a challenge—she had to step over dead branches and rotting leaves, passing one small grave mound after another, before climbing to the top.

This time was no exception.

Fortunately, the snow melted slower in the mountains, so the trail wasn’t too muddy. After about half an hour, she reached her destination.

Unexpectedly, near Tiedan’s grave mound, there was a rolled-up, tattered straw mat.

Xu Hehua frowned, immediately understanding that yet another child had died.

In these hard times, death was nothing unusual.

But she couldn’t help thinking how heartless this family must be—at the very least, they should have buried the child. There were wild boars and wolves in these mountains, after all.

Sighing, Xu Hehua crouched in front of Tiedan’s grave, placed the offerings, burned the ritual paper while murmuring to him, then pulled out all the weeds around the grave. Only then did she grab her self-defense shovel and start digging a hole nearby.

Whoever’s child it was, now that she’d come across it, she couldn’t just ignore it. Giving the child a proper burial would count as a good deed.

Xu Hehua had worked the land for years and was strong. Plus, with the snow just melted, the soil was damp. In no time at all, she had dug a pit nearly one meter deep.

It couldn’t be shallow—wild animals might dig the body back up.

Thinking this over, just as she was about to stop, Xu Hehua dug another foot deeper, finally satisfied. She climbed out of the hole and bent down to lift the straw mat.

But to her shock, the moment she picked it up, a faint coughing sound came from within.

Xu Hehua was a brave woman. She was startled for only a moment before quickly reacting. She gently set the mat back down and hastily unwrapped it.

Inside was a thin, bony little girl.

And she recognized her.

She was from Lijiatun—her ex-husband’s village. Her name was Daniu, and she was, what, maybe eight?

If she remembered right, the girl’s parents had already died. She lived with her uncle and aunt.

In times like these, even biological children couldn’t be properly fed—let alone a burden like her. She probably ate less than a chicken and worked more than an ox.

Looking at how skeletal she was, Xu Hehua had a reasonable suspicion: the child had likely starved to death—or, more accurately, hadn’t completely died yet. There was still a trace of breath.

Snapping out of her thoughts, she rushed to Tiedan’s grave to grab a few pieces of the crystal sugar she had brought as an offering. Then she took the water flask from the donkey’s back, drank most of it to make room, and tossed in the sugar cubes, shaking the bottle hard.

After tasting a small sip and confirming it had become sweet, she picked up the girl—who was now coughing more and more violently—and poured the sugar water into her mouth.

Xu Wanchun felt dizzy and weak all over. She had no idea what was happening, but instinctively began swallowing, gulping more and more until she choked and started coughing violently.

“Easy now, don’t rush. Take it slow—there’s more,” Xu Hehua said gently, worried that she might choke. She moved the bottle slightly away. Only after the girl caught her breath did she feed her another few sips.

By this time, Xu Wanchun, having barely calmed her rumbling, empty stomach, slowly opened her eyes—and with that, her awareness began to return.

A faint sense of clarity began to return.

If she remembered correctly, she’d been accidentally injured during a hospital dispute.

Then, amid the chaos and screams, she closed her eyes.

By all logic, she should either be dead—or lying in a hospital bed, receiving treatment.

But right now, Xu Wanchun was dazed. Who was this woman with an old-fashioned bun, dressed in a diagonal-collared, cloth-buttoned short jacket, holding her and feeding her water?

She looked down at her own frail, twig-like body—skin and bones like a bean sprout—and her breath caught. As a vague realization of her situation hit her, her eyes rolled back, and she passed out again.

She had no idea how long she’d been unconscious.

When consciousness returned, Xu Wanchun found herself lying under a warm quilt, her body feeling a bit stronger than before.

She didn’t rush to sit up. Instead, she lifted a hand—thin and bony like a chicken claw—and stared at it.

It was real.

This wasn’t a dream.

She had really become a child.

After a moment of stunned silence, Xu Wanchun closed her eyes as if resigning to fate. But no matter how she tried, she couldn’t access any memories from this body’s original owner. So she gave up and simply opened her eyes again to examine the room.

To be honest, Xu Wanchun had never seen such a primitive house in real life.

Yes—primitive was the only word for it.

It wasn’t even a bare-bones cement home—just plain red bricks.

There was no ceiling; wooden beams and reed poles were fully exposed above her head.

Looking at the sturdy but crude furniture, and recalling the woman who saved her and how she dressed, Xu Wanchun guessed she had somehow traveled back in time.

As for what year exactly—she’d need to ask someone.

At that thought, she couldn’t lie still any longer. She braced herself against the bed and slowly sat up.

Just then, a woman’s voice came from outside the room:

“Hehua-meizi, are you really planning to adopt that girl?”

“Mhm. If the child agrees,” came the reply.

“What’s there to disagree with? That uncle and aunt of hers are pure evil. With you, at least she’ll get enough to eat. I bet the girl’s dying to stay. But what I don’t get is—if you want to adopt a child, there are plenty of hungry kids in our own village. Why adopt a stranger from Lijiatun? And do you think your parents will be okay with this?”

“You don’t understand, Lancao-jie. I feel like it’s fate between me and Daniu. She was abandoned right next to Tiedan’s grave.”

“So what? That doesn’t mean anything! I’m not against you taking in a child—just saying, if you’re going to raise one, at least pick someone a little more decent. Daniu’s really… plain. When she grows up, do you know how much dowry you’ll have to give just to marry her off?”

“…”

Inside the room, Xu Wanchun was trying hard to piece together information from their conversation—only to suddenly freeze as realization hit her.

What?!

Plain-looking?

Were they talking about… her?!