Chapter 6: Successful Withdrawal

The phone screen was still filled with questions from her fans. Startled, Yu Wei quickly turned around and saw that Yu Hui was sitting quietly on the bed, staring at her. Scared, she immediately exited the live stream.

The little guy had just woken up, but Yu Wei wasn’t sure how long he had been awake. He didn’t call for her, nor did he say anything. He just sat there, watching her.

Yu Wei quickly put her phone back in her pocket, walked over to the bed, and sat down. She looked at the dryness of the little guy’s lips and asked, “You’re awake. Do you want some water?”

Yu Hui looked at her with big eyes and gently nodded his head.

Yu Wei smiled softly, ruffled his soft short hair, picked him up from the bed, and walked outside to find a cup to pour him some water.

The little guy gulped down half a bowl of water. His small mouth couldn’t cover the cup, and the warm water trickled from the corners of his mouth down to his neck. Yu Wei gently wiped it clean for him.

After he finished drinking, Yu Wei sat quietly beside Yu Hui. There were children running and laughing outside the window. Without thinking, her hand moved to her pocket.

There was a phone in there. It wasn’t an illusion—there really was a phone.

She hadn’t just crossed into the 1980s; her phone had come with her too…

“Huihui, do you want to go out and play with the other kids?” Yu Wei turned to look at him. The little guy was also looking at her, but despite hearing the sounds of children playing outside the window, he remained indifferent.

Still, he didn’t respond or speak. Yu Wei sighed. She had thought about taking him outside to play with the other kids. It was boring to stay alone in the room.

But then she suddenly remembered the scene from the morning, when that kid named Da Niu had pushed Yu Hui to the ground, leaving him with a head full of blood, yet his eyes had been empty, like a puppet who couldn’t feel anything.

Something wasn’t right. It really wasn’t. 

Could this child have some kind of psychological issue?

Autism? Or something else?

She had met quiet and introverted kids before, but none were like Yu Hui. Those kids would at least show some expressions and speak to adults. No matter what, they wouldn’t stay completely silent.

Unable to figure it out, she felt helpless. After all, she’d only been here for less than a day, and there were many things she hadn’t figured out yet. She decided to observe him for a while longer.

Given the strange circumstances with the phone — no signal, no data, but still able to start a livestream — Yu Wei’s curiosity couldn’t be contained. She placed Yu Hui on another small bed, letting him play on his own, and quickly took out her phone to continue tinkering with it.

However, when she unlocked the phone, the situation before her eyes shocked her once again.

Battery 100%?

What was going on? She had been using the phone for a full half hour, not to mention that live streaming usually drained the battery quickly.

Full of doubt, she clicked on ‘My Account’. The number of followers hadn’t changed, but when she checked her balance, it no longer showed ‘0’ — instead, it displayed ‘10’.

What?

Wasn’t this from the ‘little rainbow’ gift Fish Head had sent earlier? After the platform’s 50-50 split, she should indeed have received 10 yuan. But now that she was in the 1980s, how was this money automatically transferred to her account?

Then again, if time travel was possible, this didn’t seem that surprising.

In a flash of realisation, Yu Wei suddenly remembered those time-travel novels she’d read in the past. This phone must be her cheat code, her time-travel ‘golden finger’!

So, this was it?

Although she still didn’t fully understand the full extent of this cheat, she was excited and started carefully exploring every function in the ‘JiuMi Live’ app.

The most tempting feature was, of course, the money. She tried clicking on the ‘withdraw’ option. Even though she knew that she couldn’t withdraw less than 100 yuan, she still gave it a try, holding onto a bit of hope.

[Withdrawal successfully initiated. Please wait.]

Even though she was prepared for it, when she saw this message, Yu Wei still widened her eyes in disbelief. Five seconds later, a new message appeared.

[Your funds have been successfully withdrawn.]

It worked?

Yu Wei was dumbfounded. Suddenly, she felt something bulging in her pocket. She reached in and found…

A few paper bills?!

With trembling hands, she counted them. A total of… 1 yuan?!

The small flame of excitement in her heart was instantly extinguished. She was sure her memory wasn’t that bad — it had only been a few seconds, so how could she have misremembered ‘10’ as ‘1’?

Puzzled, she scrolled down to the bottom of the withdrawal screen. In very small, nearly illegible text, there was a note: [Withdrawal formula: Amount divided by 10, no handling fee.]

So… this meant that whenever she earned 100 yuan, she could only withdraw 10?

Yu Wei rubbed her forehead in frustration but suddenly realised that in this time period, with its lack of resources and low prices, 10 yuan had the purchasing power equivalent to 100 yuan in the future. So, did that mean…?

She had just earned her first bucket of gold by live streaming in the 1980s!

Only heaven knew how great Yu Wei felt at this moment. With so many thoughts running through her mind, she suddenly regained her confidence in living in this era!

But… how long had little Hui Hui been staring at her?

Because her phone’s battery remained at 100%, Yu Wei played with it for the entire afternoon. By the time she rubbed her eyes and stretched, Yu Hui hadn’t changed his position from when she left him to play by himself.

Her heart suddenly ached with a bit of guilt. She scolded herself internally for having ignored the child. He truly was an unusual kid — able to entertain himself for so long without getting bored. It seemed like this kind of monotonous life was his norm.

She glanced out the window. The mischievous kids were long gone, leaving the room in complete silence.

Not long after she put away her phone, Yuan Guifang came home from work, followed by Jiang Min. As soon as they walked in and saw Yu Wei and Yu Hui sitting idly on the bed, her mother angrily picked up a feather duster and swung it at her.

Yu Wei, with quick reflexes, dodged and grabbed Yu Hui as she stood up, leaving the room. Yuan Guifang, concerned about the child, didn’t continue to lash out.

“Didn’t I tell you to go apologise to Director Luo? You’ve been sitting here all afternoon, haven’t you?”

“Yes.”

Yu Wei set Yu Hui down by the gate. Maybe because he had been sitting for too long, he was a bit wobbly at first, but Yu Wei caught his hand, preventing him from falling.

“You little rascal, you’re really going to drive me crazy!” Yuan Guifang angrily swung the feather duster at the wall. Her fierce expression startled Yu Wei.

She looked down at Yu Hui, but his eyes remained unfazed, as if he was used to it and felt nothing.

“Hurry up! Yu Wei, get over to the garment factory right now and apologise to Director Luo!”

With her mother shouting at full volume, all the households in the courtyard could hear. Workers returning home after a long day at work poked their heads out to watch the spectacle, while even the kids hid behind doors to secretly watch Yuan Guifang scold her daughter.

Yu Wei had never encountered such a hot-tempered, unreasonable woman before. She frowned, not wanting to confront her mother head-on, and impatiently replied, “I know. Can you stop shouting? I’ll go tomorrow.”

She said out loud that she would go tomorrow, and indeed she intended to go tomorrow.

But as for the reason for going, it was naturally to make things clear to Director Luo and resign at the same time. She had no interest in that ridiculous position in the garment factory office!

Especially if it meant she had to flatter that old man, the thought of it made her shudder.