Gu Yuzhu turned to him. “No one said we had to cook yesterday.”

Hu Yang smirked, “Come on, do I really need to say it? Cooking’s always the woman’s job, isn’t it?”

Gu Yuzhu frowned, clearly unhappy. “Says who?”

Hu Yang shrugged, “Seriously, when have you ever seen a man cooking?”

Seeing that an argument was about to break out, Han Ting quickly stepped in, “Alright, that’s enough.”

Gu Yuzhu and Hu Yang quieted down. Han Ting went on, “It’s my fault for not assigning responsibilities last night. But now that things are like this, let’s stop wasting time. Either go to work hungry or skip the morning shift and make something to eat. Your choice.”

Everyone exchanged glances again, silent.

Then Chen Sisi quietly said, “I want to eat—I’m not going to work.”

Another male youth, Wang Xiangqian, followed up, “Who wants to work? But if we don’t work, we don’t earn work points. Without work points, we won’t get food later. You better think this through.”

Chen Sisi muttered, “Missing one shift probably won’t matter that much… right?”

No one answered.

Li Qiao looked at Han Ting again. “Han Ting, you decide—we’ll follow you.”

But Han Ting didn’t make the decision himself. Instead, he said, “Let’s vote.”

He scanned the group. “Raise your hand if you want to go work hungry.”

Only four people raised their hands.

“Alright then,” Han Ting concluded. “We’ll stay and cook now, and go work in the afternoon.”

With that, the matter was settled, and they quickly split up the work.

Temporarily, they formed two teams—guys in one, girls in the other. Cooking duties would rotate between the groups by day.

Today, the girls would cook.

So the girls got to work in the kitchen.

As for the four who had raised their hands to go to work—they didn’t actually leave. After all, the ten of them were living communally. Everything was shared—the labor points earned and the food rations eaten.

Going to work on an empty stomach to earn work points that everyone would share?

Who would be foolish enough to do that?

No one was willing to play the sucker.

Now that everything had been sorted out, the mood relaxed.

The girls in the kitchen started planning the meal. First, they examined the rations they’d been given.

There was very little wheat and rice—and the wheat was whole grain, while the rice still had husks on it. Neither could be used for cooking as-is.

What they had the most of were sorghum grains, corn, and dried sweet potatoes. But the corn couldn’t be cooked whole either. They remembered how the local villagers used to make a thin porridge with sorghum and dried sweet potato pieces, so after discussing it a bit, they decided to cook something similar.

Only, unlike the villagers’ watery version, theirs would be much thicker.

Once they agreed on that, the four girls started preparing the porridge and began chatting idly.

After a while, Li Qiao suddenly remembered Chu Xia and asked, “Did Chu Xia eat and leave earlier?”

Gu Yuzhu replied, “Of course she did. You think she’d leave without eating?”

Chen Sisi sighed, “Why didn’t she wake us up when she got up?”

Gu Yuzhu snorted, “Who knows what’s gotten into her? She was so sharp-tongued last night—what do you expect from her?”

Chen Sisi sighed again, “I actually had hopes for her… She cooks well and is so capable. I really thought we’d get to eat the food she made. Who knew she was dead set on not joining us.”

Those words actually struck a chord with the other three girls as well.

They all knew that Chu Xia was a good cook—and they’d all secretly craved the food she made.

Chen Sisi kept on talking. “She used to be just fine, but suddenly changed yesterday. Do you think maybe she’s gotten close with Lin Xiaohan? Maybe he talked her into this?”

Li Qiao responded without hesitation, “Impossible.”

Chen Sisi looked at her. “Why is it impossible?”

Li Qiao replied, “Ugh, you really can’t read people at all. Someone like Lin Xiaohan? There’s no way he’d get close to anyone. And haven’t you noticed? Out of all of us, the one he looks down on most is Chu Xia—he practically has ‘disdain’ written across his forehead whenever he looks at her.”

Chen Sisi thought for a moment. “Yeah, I guess that’s true.”

Then she lowered her voice and asked, “But what’s really going on with her? She’s acting so strange.”

Who could really say what was going on with her?

Su Yun, who had been quiet the whole time, finally spoke up. “Don’t overthink it. Maybe she’s just having a moment, acting out for attention. Once she suffers a little, she’ll regret it.”

Gu Yuzhu chimed in, “I’m just waiting for her to cry.”

Chen Sisi sighed, “Let’s hope she regrets it sooner rather than later…”

Across the vast fields, the wheat seedlings swayed and turned green in the breeze.

It was now the season for top-dressing the wheat, and figures of all heights bustled about in the fields.

Chu Xia had a thin scarf wrapped around her face to cover her nose and mouth, and she held a long-handled fertilizer ladle, working alongside the villagers to fertilize the wheat.

After more than half a month doing farm work in the countryside, she had gotten the hang of it.

She could now understand most of the local dialect and manage a conversation or two with the villagers.

Not far away, Auntie Wu praised her for getting better and better at the work.

Chu Xia smiled and thanked her.

Just as she turned back to her task, team leader Liang Youtian came looking for her again.

He walked up and asked directly, “The sun’s already high in the sky—where’s Han Ting and the rest?”

Chu Xia looked around after hearing that, but didn’t see anyone.

She turned back and said, “I don’t know.”

She had come straight to work after breakfast and hadn’t paid much attention to the others.

Liang Youtian put his hands on his hips and gritted his teeth in frustration.

There were twelve educated youths assigned to the village. Today, only Lin Xiaohan and Chu Xia had shown up for work on time. The rest were nowhere to be seen—and hadn’t even sent word why.

But what excuse could they have? Just a bunch of lazy good-for-nothings.

He sighed at their misfortune—how unlucky their Tanxi Brigade was to have ended up with this lot.

In the half month since the educated youths had arrived, only Lin Xiaohan and Chu Xia had kept out of trouble, worked diligently, and stayed focused.

The rest stirred up trouble every few days.

One day it was stealing chickens, the next, chasing dogs.

They’d brawled with thugs and clashed with hooligans.

When it came to fighting, they had all the energy in the world—every punch was real.

But when it came to working, suddenly their legs hurt, their stomachs ached—any excuse to slack off.

Especially that ringleader, Han Ting. He was the worst of them all.

In just over half a month, he had already been dragged into the commune’s public security office and called out at a criticism meeting.

Anyone else would have buried their head in shame, but he acted like it was nothing—completely unfazed.

Thick-skinned as a fortress wall. Even missiles wouldn’t get through.

And now this nonsense today.

Liang Youtian stood there, fists on hips, gritting his teeth, letting his anger simmer.

When he finally cooled down, he called out to Chu Xia, “Stop what you’re doing for a minute. Come with me to the edge of the field—I have something to talk to you about.”

As he walked along the ridge, he shouted, “Lin Xiaohan! Come here for a second!”

From about twenty meters away, Lin Xiaohan answered him.

Chu Xia didn’t waste any time. She set down the long-handled ladle and climbed up onto the ridge.

As she neared the field’s edge, she pulled down the scarf from her face.

Lin Xiaohan jogged over a bit, and the two of them arrived at the edge of the field together.

They stood before Liang Youtian.

Lin Xiaohan spoke first. “Team Leader Liang, what did you want to talk about?”

Chu Xia didn’t say anything—she assumed it had to do with the others not showing up for work.

But what Liang Youtian said next surprised her.

“Well,” he began, “our brigade’s Revolutionary Committee had a meeting yesterday. We’ve decided we want to reopen our elementary school. We used to have one, but it was shut down during the chaos of the past few years, and we haven’t had a teacher to reopen it. Right now, kids have to go all the way to Shazhuang or the commune school, and that’s quite a hike. Now that you educated youths are here, we thought we could start the school up again. Over the past few weeks, the two of you have proven to be the most reliable. So, we’d like to ask you both to be the teachers. What do you think?”

Chu Xia froze for a moment after hearing that.

It was certainly a pleasant surprise, but that wasn’t the reason she paused.

What caught her off guard was that her mind immediately recalled a scene from the novel—and she found herself believing the story’s version of events a bit more.

Because this situation had also happened in the book.

Only, in the novel, after learning about the opportunity, Han Ting came to her and asked her to give it up—so Su Yun could take the job and become the teacher.

Lin Xiaohan responded with excitement and gratitude right away.

Seeing that Chu Xia was still frozen and hadn’t answered, Liang Youtian asked again, “What’s with that reaction? You don’t want to be a teacher?”

That snapped Chu Xia out of it.

She quickly smiled and said brightly, “Team Leader Liang, I’d love to! I’m just so surprised that such a great opportunity came to me—I was so happy I got a little dazed.”

Who wouldn’t want something like this?

Being a teacher meant earning a stable monthly salary, without having to toil under the blazing sun in the fields every day. Compared to the hard labor for work points, this was a massive step up.

Hearing what Chu Xia said, Liang Youtian laughed as well.

He struck a serious pose and said, “Alright, then let’s go now. I’ll take you two to see the school first.”

Chu Xia, overjoyed, was ready to follow. Her happiness made her instinctively glance at Lin Xiaohan before stepping forward.

After all, they both received this opportunity together, and joy is often shared.

But the moment her eyes landed on Lin Xiaohan’s face and met his gaze, she instantly remembered the nature of their relationship.

So she quickly restrained her smile, pretended as if nothing had happened, and turned away to walk forward.

Lin Xiaohan: “……”