Chapter 3: The Beginning of the Journey into the Book

“Mom, do you think she’s dead?”
“She’s fine. I just checked—she’s still breathing. Hurry up and search. That wretched girl really knows how to hide things. Where on earth did she stash the bankbook?”
Ming Yan, watching the feverish, flushed girl on the bed, still felt uneasy. She tugged at her mother’s sleeve. “Mom, maybe we should get her looked at. What if her brain gets cooked and the Youth Office doesn’t want her anymore?”
“Mom! I don’t want to be sent down to the countryside.”
Reminded by her eldest daughter, Xing Cuilan realized the situation wasn’t right either. Cursing under her breath, she went out to the clinic to fetch some medicine. But then she remembered medicine costs money, and her pockets were emptier than her face was clean. She simply walked off instead. Whether that wretched girl lived or died—well, let fate decide.
Alone in the room, Ming Yan recalled that Ming Changhe had died in this very room. The place felt haunted and chilly. Goosebumps rose on her arms, and she hurried outside too.
What she didn’t know was that, the moment she left, the girl on the bed succumbed to her convulsions and fever, and died.
A minute later, a soul from another world entered the girl’s body.
With a weak groan, the girl on the bed opened her eyes. Gazing at the dingy mosquito net, Ming Dai’s eyes widened.
Damn it! She’d been tricked!
The moment she became conscious, an avalanche of memories flooded her mind.
Ming Dai instantly understood her current predicament.
She was now inside a serialized novel called “Sweet Little Wife in the Seventies,” her identity that of a cannon-fodder cousin to the female lead’s sister-in-law.
The Underworld Travel Agency’s new project, branded as “time-travel adventures,” was just a book-transmigration experiment, still in its trial phase.
In other words, Ming Dai had been duped into being a guinea pig!
Knowing she couldn’t contact the Underworld for now, and had no way to return, she accepted her fate and resolved to survive in this new life.
Closing her eyes to gather her thoughts, she saw the information and couldn’t help cursing the “Double Door” system.
Her name in this life was also Ming Dai.
She’d asked for a wealthy background, and this time she was born into affluence—the beloved youngest granddaughter of Commander Jiang’s family in Beijing.
Unfortunately, soon after birth, her own mother abandoned her at a train station, where the recently retired bachelor Ming Changhe found and raised her—a pitiful child growing up in hardship.
She’d wanted a childhood free from hunger and labor, and that wish had been granted too. Ming Changhe, a lifelong bachelor, never married and doted on the little girl. While he couldn’t provide luxury, she never went hungry nor had to do heavy work—just light chores like cleaning and cooking.
As for the intelligent mind she requested, she’d awoken to find a head brimming with knowledge; she could now be a walking library.
Health, though, was questionable—after all, she’d nearly died from fever just now.
Thinking of the “space” the Double Door had promised, Ming Dai touched the small, burning red mole on her chest. That must be it.
She silently chanted, “Enter.”
In an instant, the dim room was empty.
Inside the space, Ming Dai still marveled—she’d really come in just like that?
In her past life, she’d dreamed of a place like this.
No more lugging heavy bags on trips, exhausting herself every time she traveled.
Overcome with excitement, she surveyed her domain.
It looked just like the outside—a modern villa with a vast stretch of black earth in front and a pool in the back. The villa was fully equipped, and much of the décor was just like her former apartment, making her feel instantly at home.
Following her memory, she opened the storage room on the first floor and was stunned.
This wasn’t a storage room—it was a warehouse!
There was a sign listing the types, names, and locations of goods.
Shelves were packed with vintage army coats, ceramic basins, kettles, Double Happiness bedsheets, and more.
Boxes of malted milk, White Rabbit candies, and canned fruit; piles of wheat flour and refined rice; even bicycles, sewing machines, and radios—all lined up on the shelves.
At least now she didn’t have to worry about starving in the seventies!
All this must have been provided out of pocket by Double Door—a well-stocked starter kit.
Turning to another storage room, she was nearly blinded by a mound of goldfish—her precious savings from her previous life, exchanged for these treasures.
After admiring them, she opened a small box inside which lay ten thousand yuan and a box of universal ration tickets for this world, of every kind.
This must be the “starter kit” Double Door mentioned—practical indeed.
After a quick tour, she was too tired to inspect everything. She headed straight for the bathroom.
After two days of fever and the recent ordeal, she was about to stink.
Finished showering, she looked in the mirror and tutted.
Her body was the same as before, though a bit shorter and thinner than at fourteen in her previous life.
She blinked at her reflection, and the pale, delicate girl in the mirror blinked back—so pitiful looking, she almost wanted to squash her.
Who’d have thought she could look so much like a scheming beauty herself?
Recalling this girl’s life, she’d been a premature baby. Though Ming Changhe cared for her deeply, in such a time of scarcity, she’d always been sickly.
If not for Ming Changhe working in the hospital’s herbal pharmacy, she might not have survived—the cost of medicine alone exceeded most families’ budgets.
She checked her own pulse—nothing amiss. The Double Door had kept its promise.
Still, this frail, sickly look was novel to her; it was nothing like her previous life’s healthy, radiant self.

With this new world open to her, she couldn’t resist pulling faces in the mirror—one moment she was a fierce heroine, the next a tragic beauty, thoroughly enjoying herself.
Sadly, her body wasn’t up to the fun.
Soon, her stomach protested.
“Gurgle.”
A crisp rumble interrupted her antics.
She quickly donned a robe, tossed her dirty clothes in the washing machine, and headed to the kitchen.
She pulled out some ingredients and cooked herself a rich bowl of instant noodles.
Slurping down the noodles—delicious!
Sated, she slept soundly, waking up to a new day.
Stretching lazily, she felt all the aches gone from her body.
She bounced in place, energy coursing through her like never before.
She ran outside, lapped the villa a few times, and checked the time—she’d broken her own record from her past life.
With her health restored, she had one less worry. Now, the only remaining problem was dealing with the troublesome relatives attached to this body.
Over breakfast, Ming Dai hatched a plan.
She would have to go to the countryside; it was 1972, five years before the first university entrance exams. By going now, she could avoid any suspicion if her personality changed.
This wasn’t like her previous life, where neighbors barely knew each other after years—here, if she ate something unusual today, the entire compound would know by tomorrow.
And little Ming Dai had grown up under the eyes of everyone here.
With enemy agents being hunted everywhere, any oddity might draw suspicion.
She wouldn’t risk a thing.
Going to the countryside meant that even if she changed after five years and returned, she could explain it as a result of her experiences there.
Besides, her “excellent” relatives would keep coming around to make her life miserable.
As for changing jobs or moving, she’d thought about it, but it was complicated—her records would follow her, and her dreadful uncle’s family would eventually find her anyway.
With supplies in her space and her own medical skills, she didn’t fear surviving in the countryside.
But as for her uncle’s family—she wasn’t going to let them off easy!
Before she left, she’d make sure to give them a memorable parting gift.