CH 1

At the end of June in 1970, the summer heat was scorching at noon. In the past, the members of Shanzui Village would be resting for a while, but today, they were all gathered in the yard of the brigade headquarters. 

There was a sharp shrill from the crowd, “Tell him that if he doesn’t come back, [1] I will drink these pesticides and just let him collect my dead body!”

“Oh my gosh, did she really drink it?”

“The 1605 pesticide is very poisonous!”

“Aiyo, mother! There’s a dead person! There’s a dead person!”

The crowd screamed, and the crowd became chaotic.

The captain yelled, “His wife is already dead, Doctor Chijiao!”

The party secretary glared at him and said: “Go and send a telegram again. This is urgent!”

. . . . .

Headache, dizziness, and thirst. These are Lin Lan’s biggest feelings about having a hangover.

Last night she was in a bad mood and drank two more glasses. She went back to her apartment and fell asleep. The nightmare kept going all night and constantly heard the sounds of calls and the door slamming in her ears.

Unexpectedly, when she woke up, there was another buzzing sound in my ears that disturbed her dreams.

“Second brother, do you think Mother really drank pesticides and died?”

“Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Keep it quiet. Mother is acting to scare them. She just wants Dad to come back home. Let’s go cut grass.”

Lin Lan tried her best to open her eyes, but her eyelids seemed to be stuck together by something, and she couldn’t open them.

After a while, there was another harsh voice, “The Third Eldest [2] is in the army. I’ve seen her taking care of her five children, spending the whole day on her kids. She doesn’t even help us out. If she doesn’t want to live, she can just go back to her maternal home. No one even cares about her. It’s not like she hung herself, she just drank some pesticides. This is just showing that she dislikes this mother-in-law, wanting to let me die first. Goodness, gracious! Never have I ever seen such a malicious daughter-in-law! You want to separate the family? Why don’t you just get a rope and choke me to death? Stop poking her. Just go do whatever work you have to do. Don’t try to be lazy!” 

Then, there was the sound of the door slamming.

What was this about drinking pesticides and separating the family?

What a mess.

Lin Lan had a splitting headache and almost exhausted all of her energy just to open her eyes.

When she opened her eyes, she first saw the narrow and cramped room. She didn’t see any windows, only a broken grass curtain hanging. The walls and roof were black and smokey, and the corners of the room were covered with black ash. There was an unpleasant smell mixed with various scents. Lin Lan couldn’t tell whether it was animal feces or urine from the children as well as a moldy smell and some other kind of strange smell. 

This kind of environment was bound to make people unhappy and irritated.

Lin Lan suddenly thought, “Did I cross over and transmigrate?

Lin Lan waited for a long time with her eyes closed, and then opened her eyes. It was still the smoky yellow mud wall.

At this moment, she was convinced that she had really crossed. 

The reason for this conclusion is that some information that did not belong to her had appeared in her mind, as if she had read a book or a movie, and was deeply engraved in her mind.

She was in the 1970s of ancient China, Province D, a small village in the north of China, Shanzui Village.

The original owner has the same name as her. Her maternal family was Lin Jia Village. Her husband’s surname is Han, and her husband, Han Qingsong, is a soldier. The two have five children.

The original owner had never gone to school and only attended a literacy class for a few days. She could not recognize more than fifty words. Since she was a child, she had been strong and violent. Her temper was not very good. She was ignorant and not cultured. When she encountered problems, she wouldn’t calmly think of a solution. The most common method she used was making a fuss so when she went to her mother’s house, she was not welcome.

She was married to Han Qingsong at the age of 16. He was not at home all the time. She was suppressed by her mother-in-law and her sisters-in-law. She couldn’t think of a way to resolve conflicts and to ease the relationship.

Han Qingsong served as a soldier at the age of 17. After more than ten years of hard work, he is now a company commander.

His future was promising.

Because of this, the original owner was not at ease, always suspecting that he looked down on her and wanted to climb higher to have a better future. 

This was why she kept making a fuss to make him go home to live so he wouldn’t be hooked by those educated, young, and beautiful foxes outside.

The reason why she drank the pesticides this time was because the original owner had heard some people discussing the news a demobilized soldier had brought back—Han Qingsong had someone outside, and she was the daughter of a certain commander!

Han Qingsong definitely wanted to talk with her about his desire to divorce her! This had become the last straw that crushed the camel. The original owner ran to the commune to telegraph the troops again and again. He had to change his job and go home. If he didn’t go home, she would just die! And she would bring all five of their children to go die together.

This matter was known by her mother-in-law, and she naturally disagreed. The good future of her son was the glory and financial support of the old Han family. If her son was brought back, wouldn’t that be like going back to the liberation overnight? [3]

This absolutely could not happen!

Then the original asked her mother-in-law to give her man’s salary to her. Otherwise, she would force her man to come home. If she didn’t agree, she would drink pesticides!

She asked her second son, Han Wangjun, to quietly pick up an empty 1605 bottle and return, thinking that there were no pesticides inside. When she poured the water in, she couldn’t see any pesticides with water so she pretended to drink pesticides to scare them.

Of course, there was also the meaning of making her family see how awesome she was.

How could she have known that this 1605 is highly toxic, and if the liquid drops on the skin when the pesticides are sprayed, she will be poisoned? What’s even worse is that she directly drank the pesticides with some water.

Although she pretended to take a sip, it was enough to kill a woman with an unhealthy body all year round.

Hence, Lin Lan was transmigrated over.

In the original story, this time, the original had actually succeeded.

Her husband, Han Qingsong was frustrated by the trouble and had no intention of having an official career. He finally applied for a job change with the army and would go home in a few days.

But even though he went home, this didn’t make the family reconcile but opened the prelude to the tragedy.

The original owner vowed that as long as the man returned home, she would live in peace, but when the man came back, she suspected again that the man looked down on her and suspected that he had an affair with other women. As long as he left her sight, she would wonder if he has a tryst with someone.

The village’s eldest unmarried women and even widows were part of her suspicions.

As long as the man didn’t follow what her heart wanted, she would make a lot of noise and threaten to kill herself.

Han Qingsong became the director of the commune public security bureau after he changed his job and was later promoted to the deputy director of the county public security bureau. At that time, the Cultural Revolution was coming to an end so control was loosened. Some public servants didn’t follow the law so public security in the county became more and more chaotic.

He was busy with official duties and was troubled internally and externally. Finally, after she made a big fuss, he was physically and mentally exhausted and was stabbed to death in the process of performing official duties.

After his death, she became even more twisted. She resented her children and used them to vent her anger, but she would also shield her children’s shortcomings and spoil her children. She raised them all into wastes, and in the end, none of them had a good death.

Wait for a second!

***    Lin Lan suddenly realized that this familiar plot seemed like a novel she had read a long time ago. The male and female protagonists in the book are childhood sweethearts and were busy making a fortune for a well-off life. The female partner is impressive because of her natural style. She is the daughter of the original owner, Han Maisui, with a pretty, youthful, and lively personality. Since childhood, she has been raised by the original owner to be more vain and vain. She always feels that she is a princess, and she wants what she wants. Anyone that is not good to her is a bad person. The original owner helped her daughter devote herself to pestering the male protagonist, and several of her sons were also crooked and did not have good endings in the end.

The fundamental reason is inseparable from this twisted family.

She actually transmigrated into this kind of home…

What should she do?

Going back? That’s impossible.

Running away from home? Getting a divorce?

No one gets divorced during this time period. If she just divorces herself,  her maternal family probably wouldn’t want her. It is impossible for a divorced woman to return to her maternal family in this era. This time period was just this feudal.

And at this time, she couldn’t go anywhere without her household registration, work points, or letter of introduction. She can’t find a job. She can’t make money. Eating a meal has even become a problem. She can barely even survive. It seems like she can only live as the original owner’s identity.

The only problem was if she suddenly stopped being evil and became a nice person. Who knew if people would become suspicious? But even if people became suspicious, she really couldn’t live her life the same way as the original owner did. 

She suddenly came up with an idea. She can use this disaster to survive. Suddenly she thought of an idea and was no longer disheartened. She could use the reason of no longer wanting to entangle the past to have a steady life. [4]

En, not bad!

But it was because her mother-in-law who suppressed her husband so he had no affection for her. This wasn’t an urgent thing. She still had many ways to pass the days.    

For her, the scariest thing is…

Notes

[1] I will drink these pesticides – Pesticides can also be translated to farming chemicals. This is highly toxic and poisonous to the human body and can cause death.

[2] Third Eldest – In Chinese, they will refer to children by the order in which they are born. 

[3] Liberation – I didn’t quite understand this sentence. Here’s what it is in Chinese. 要是把儿子弄回来，那不是要一夜回到解放前? The first part is definitely “if she was to bring her son back”. The part I don’t get is 解放. The definition of this word is liberation or emancipation. If anyone knows how to translate this, feel free to leave a comment below to help me out. 

[4] I found this small paragraph a bit hard to translate into English. Basically, she thought of an excuse/reason as to why she became nice and stopped being mean in case people became suspicious of why her personality had such a big change. She said that she would use this incident of drinking pesticides and not dying as the reason for not wanting to keep mentioning the past and to live a steady life. 

Translator’s Note: This novel seems to fit with the kind of novel that I’m currently interested in. I found the original owner to be quite stupid and annoying, but I’m excited to read how Lin Lan will adapt to her situation. Please comment below if you enjoyed reading this chapter and let me know if you think I should continue translating this novel.