Cheng Rushan stood up and said, “Thank you, Captain Cen.”

Captain Cen smiled, “You’ve done transport work before, right? How about being an off-the-books transport team leader? You’ll be responsible for transporting daily supplies other than military materials.”

Weapons and ammunition were transported by internal military teams, but everyday essentials like food, oil, rice, and coal were supplied by local governments and required reliable transport personnel.

It was a cushy job!

Cheng Rushan remained composed, nodding. “As long as Captain Cen trusts me, I won’t disappoint.”

Captain Cen patted his shoulder. “It’s not a life-or-death job. It’s not that serious.” He walked aside and pulled out a few forms, handing them to Cheng Rushan. “I’ll arrange for your file to be transferred back, with additional documents to resolve your classification issues. Also, here are your allowance receipts for the past few years. If you’re not satisfied, you can raise it.”

Cheng Rushan glanced at the forms.

Although he typically remained indifferent to material things, his eyes lit up at the sight of the seven thousand yuan.

For comparison, ordinary workers earned around thirty yuan a month, and regular members made just a few cents a day.

Seven thousand yuan was indeed a substantial sum.

Food and clothing were another matter.

Captain Cen tilted his head and eyed Cheng Rushan, finally detecting a hint of emotion on his face.

He coughed lightly, remarking, “Not easy, huh? This kid used to smirk with sarcasm, but now he’s all about the money!”

He patted Cheng Rushan’s shoulder again. “Alright, go handle the paperwork and head home. When delivering supplies, remember to bring us the freshest vegetables, meat, and eggs.”

…

After a night of deep sleep, Jiang Lin woke up feeling a bit dazed.

She opened her eyes to see the smoke-stained roof, with wooden beams, thatched roof walls, and whitewashed walls, somewhat resembling her grandmother’s house.

Her mother remarried a “two face man,” and they both were drama kings.

The two face man was overly affectionate towards her in front of her mother, and they were tolerable to her before her younger brother was born.

Later, she found out that her mother initially didn’t want another child, at least when she was still young.

But the drama duo, mother and son, played their games, and the old lady helped her son deceive by claiming an accidental pregnancy.

All of this was later boasted about by the old lady to relatives, and Jiang Lin overheard it.

After her brother was born, the drama duo started bullying her behind her mother’s back.

At first, she was angry and caused scenes, but her methods only pushed her mother further away.

She felt her mother didn’t support her, while her mother felt she was rebellious and hard to manage.

Later on, she started scheming, recording the drama duo’s words and actions with a voice recorder, and showing them to her mother.

At that time, she was young and didn’t understand the difficulties of marriage and family, thinking the world was simply black and white.

If it weren’t for her brother, perhaps her mother could have left her father and maintained a close mother-daughter relationship.

But because of her brother, her actions only made things difficult for her mother, and her love for her mother would ultimately be redundant.

She was stubborn, but she lacked love, even if she wouldn’t admit it.

Otherwise, Bian Haitao wouldn’t have touched her.

Back then, she disliked her biological father, who was handsome and sweet-talking, and even more disliked her stepfather, who was burly and fierce-looking.

Bian Haitao, with his height of 175 cm and a gentle and approachable appearance, without sharp edges, made her feel secure.

Bian Haitao graduated from a top university after growing up in a poor village, pursuing both a master’s and a doctorate, and he was the pride of their village and county.

Who wouldn’t praise such a promising young man?

They dated for several years, and he was gentle and caring towards her.

However, she still felt that he looked down on her for her lower education, yet he liked her beauty and ability to earn money.

Actually, she was a good student when she was young, but during her rebellious phase, she couldn’t hold it together, and her grades plummeted.

Later, she could only attend a vocational school.

The drama duo often took advantage of this, which infuriated her, so she dropped out of school and worked hard, even laying bricks was better than enduring their antics.

Although life in that world wasn’t particularly exciting, it was her familiar territory.

Sadly, she knew she could never go back.

Her eyes welled up with tears as she closed them, containing the surge of emotions within.

No matter where she was, she vowed to live comfortably and freely.

This was her own insight.

Cheng Xiaobao also woke up.

He scrambled to sit up, looking around eagerly.

When he saw Jiang Lin lying beside him, he immediately broke into a smile—Mom was still here!

Rubbing his little hands together excitedly, his eyes gleamed with joy as he quietly leaned closer to Jiang Lin.

“Mom looks really pretty.”

He grinned widely, but in his excitement, his baby teeth were loose, and a bit of drool accidentally landed on Jiang Lin’s left cheek.

Cheng Xiaobao: “!!!”

Feeling something amiss, Jiang Lin opened her eyes and saw Cheng Xiaobao’s shocked and flustered expression, looking like he didn’t know what to do after doing something wrong.

“Mom, you’re awake?” Cheng Xiaobao quickly kissed the spot where the drool had landed, trying to prevent Mom from noticing and getting mad.

Jiang Lin was taken aback, touched her wet cheek in surprise, then burst into laughter.

When she was a child, she used to play around like this with her own parents.

Her childish heart was stirred, and she immediately hugged Cheng Xiaobao and sat up, starting to playfully swing him around.

Seeing her smile, Cheng Xiaobao’s own grin widened, laughing heartily and waking up Yan Runzhi and Cheng Dabao in the process.

Cheng Dabao got up and saw Jiang Lin playing with Xiaobao.

She was singing, “Swing, swing, swing the big ball, eat some potatoes, and spin around…”

He started laughing too as he watched.

Yan Runzhi sat up and nudged Cheng Dabao, motioning for him to join in the fun.

Cheng Dabao straightened his face instantly. “I have to cook.”

He was the man of the house, after all!

Jiang Lin gently put down the giggling Cheng Xiaobao and said, “Get up and make breakfast! You two need to go to school.”

In the village, children from ages three to six or seven couldn’t work and were placed in school where teachers helped take care of them.

Only at seven or eight did they formally start studying.

The two boys were still too young for first grade, so they had been happily playing at home.

Cheng Xiaobao wrapped his tender arms around Jiang Lin’s neck, his voice soft and pleading, “Mom, I want to stay with you. I don’t want to go to school.”

Jiang Lin smiled, “Let’s cook first, then we’ll discuss.”

No one understood better than her about not liking school.

During her rebellious phase, she would think of skipping classes all day long, feel annoyed at the sight of the school, and find math and English lessons daunting.

After getting dressed, Jiang Lin took Xiaobao to tidy up the things in the house courtyard, while Yan Runzhi took Dabao to prepare breakfast.

Jiang Lin surveyed the small courtyard—three main rooms and one southern room. It wasn’t as large as before, but it was their own.

Originally, Cheng’s large courtyard was requisitioned as the brigade and production team headquarters.

Some small courtyards were occupied by officials and cadres for their own residence, but later during the purge of grassroots cadres, they vacated, and later the bricks and tiles were dismantled to repair their own house, leaving behind this small brick courtyard in good condition.

Jiang Lin glanced at the pigsty to see if it could be used.

She could raise a pig there to earn work points and accumulate manure.

During the Great Leap Forward when pigs’ tails were cut off, pigs were collectively raised by the brigade, but the results were not good.

After all, raising pigs was not as easy and pleasant as it sounded.

They needed to be fed three times a day, even in summer, they couldn’t just feed them grass, or else the pigs wouldn’t fatten up.

Apart from feeding, they also had to clean the pigsty, clear the pig manure, and lay down new soil to accumulate fertilizer.

In a brigade, the task of raising pigs could amount to several dozen, which was too much for just three to five women to handle.

Moreover, village pigsties weren’t usually large enough for collective pig farming.

Therefore, brigades ignored higher policies and encouraged members to raise pigs at home.

Raising pigs provided subsidies for coarse grains to feed the pigs, and accumulating pig manure also earned work points. Calculating roughly, as long as the pigs didn’t die, each pig could substitute for a labor force in earning work points.

As a result, everyone scrambled to raise pigs. Of course, decisions regarding pig meat weren’t made by the members themselves, because tasks were assigned to piglets from the time they were born.

Breaking down the collective whole, there was space for pigsties.

Even if some didn’t raise pigs, each brigade would have nearly two hundred heads.

After washing her face and inspecting the surroundings, Jiang Lin returned to the doorway of the main hall.

Yan Runzhi, the “Mother-in-law,” approached her to ask, “Bao’er’s mother, what should we have for breakfast?”

Jiang Lin paused, thinking, “Have the chickens laid eggs?”

They had brought over three chickens the previous night, and they were now kept under the west wall, but she wasn’t sure if they had laid any eggs yet.

Just as she spoke, “Cluck cluck cluck,” a speckled hen flew out, joyously announcing its egg in the yard.

Jiang Lin: …

“How about we make egg noodles then?”

Yan Runzhi agreed, “Sure.”

Xiaobao dashed over to collect the eggs, exclaiming, “Let’s eat egg noodles!”

In the past, eggs at home were either sold for salt and kerosene or eaten by the elders, and he never got to enjoy them.

The three chickens had laid two eggs, seemingly undisturbed by yesterday’s move, adapting well like Dabao and Xiaobao.

Jiang Lin tidied things up while Yan Runzhi kneaded the dough, giving it a firm texture for good chewiness in the noodles.

After preparing the dough, she rolled out the pancakes, cut the noodles, chopped the green onions, and julienned the ginger.

Her cooking actions were swift and skillful, showing no trace of her previous timidness and shrinking.

She exuded confidence throughout.

“Dabao, light the fire.”

Cheng Da Bao immediately struck a match and lit the fire.

They were burning wheat straw and some dry branches.

The members of the cooperative mostly burned crop stalks from their fields, allocated by work or population quotas.

Usually, it wasn’t enough, so they had to go to the mountains to cut some bushes or vines to supplement it.

The fire they were burning now belonged to the commune; theirs was still at Cheng Ru Hai’s house, to be brought over after work when they divided up the shares.

Yan Run Zhi cut thin slices of ginger and chopped scallions, splashing oil into the pot.

The fragrance of scallion oil filled the air as she added water and brought it to a boil before putting in the noodles.

She wanted to give her daughter-in-law and grandson two eggs, so she cracked them into the pot whole.

Jiang Lin saw her break the eggs with chopsticks. “This way, the noodle soup will be more fragrant.”

She disliked it when her family insisted on giving chicken eggs or legs to her younger siblings during meals!

In her past life, since her younger brother started eating meat, she had not eaten chicken legs at home.

It wasn’t that she couldn’t afford them; it just made her feel inexplicably resentful.

Later, she tried not to eat at home as much as possible, out of sight and out of mind.

Jiang Lin saw only a little water left in the water tank, so she took the water bucket she was allotted to the well platform to fetch water.

She was really strong.

She didn’t find it hard to carry most of the bucket full of water back and forth.

She filled the water tank at home with just two turns.

Yan Runzhi said softly, “In the future, carry the water in the evening.”

Jiang Lin: “Okay.”

Yan Runzhi took a curious look at her, but didn’t ask why she had agreed so readily.

In the evening, the water was carried to ensure that there was water available in case of a fire and to have enough water for cooking in the morning.

During the day, there was no time to work, and water was picked up again at night after work.

Jiang Lin didn’t think so much.

After carrying the water, breakfast was fine.

Yan Runzhi made a small salted vegetable and fragrant chives for her in the spring.

The tender chive head was minced and a drop of sesame oil was added.

It was very fragrant when mixed into the noodles.

Jiang Lin ate until beads of sweat formed on her forehead and nose.

It was delicious!

She smiled at Cheng Da Bao and Cheng Xiao Bao, saying, “It’s so good!”

Yan Runzhi smiled slightly, watching her, and said before her daughter-in-law had said that her cooking was really bad.

She now said it was really fragrant.

She scooped up another chopstick of noodles for Jiang Lin and said, “Bao’er’s Mother, if it’s tasty, eat more. If you want something, just tell me, I can make it.”

Jiang Lin smiled at her, “I feel like eating… pancakes, scallion oil ones, dry ones, baked ones, steamed ones, fried ones, rolled ones, leavened ones… Oh my, so many.”

Yan Runzhi listened quietly, “Let’s take it slow, we’ll make one type each day.” You’re enjoying it so much, you won’t want to leave.

While they were eating, they heard Meng Yiyi’s voice from outside, “Lin Lin.”

She’s here to eat!!! Jiang Lin’s expression tightened, and she immediately gave Yan Runzhi a meaningful look.

Yan Runzhi surprisingly understood instantly.

She picked up the remaining bowl of noodles and took it inside to save for Da Bao and Xiao Bao’s snack in the morning.

Returning to sit down and continue eating, Yan Runzhi’s heart was still pounding.

Her daughter-in-law was really different now.

Before, when there was something delicious, she would rush to give it to Meng Yiyi.

Now she was instructing her to hide it away.

This feeling… feels weird, but… kinda nice.

Cheng Xiao Bao: o(n_n)o Haha~

Cheng Da Bao: Σ(⊙⊙”a Haha!