This was not, in fact, the first time Shen Banyue had traveled between worlds.
Shen Banyue slowly came to, her eyes landing on a rotted, crumbling beam overhead and rows of exposed gray-blue tiles.
A flicker of confusion stirred in her chest. She thought to herself, this kind of fragile, flimsy shack wouldn't even hold up against a couple of zombie bumps—was she out of her mind, choosing to hide out in a place like this?
No sooner had the thought crossed her mind than a sharp ringing stabbed through her ears, and her head felt like it had been slammed by a sledgehammer. The searing pain forced a muffled groan from her lips.
At the same time, a flood of information was violently forced into her brain.
It was like pouring too much water into an air balloon—Shen Banyue half-wondered if she was going to burst from the overload.
"Big Sis~"
A tiny, squeaky voice piped up, and a warm, squishy bundle suddenly crashed into her arms.
Shen Banyue nearly ground her molars to dust holding back her reflex, barely stopping herself from swinging a fist at the little thing.
Where did a kid come from?
The thought had barely formed before it was drowned under a tidal wave of information, and a name surfaced abruptly from that sea of data. Shen Banyue murmured, "Little Di... the female lead?"
The little bundle's face was smeared with dirt and grime, like a little alley cat. Her big eyes were clear and bright, black and white sharply defined. Her soft little hand patted Shen Banyue's cheek again and again, her mouth puffing out tiny breaths as she whispered, "Sis, huff huff, no more ouchies."
Miraculously, the pain in her head really did seem to ease.
Shen Banyue closed her eyes briefly and quickly sorted out the situation.
She had transmigrated into a book, and the little bundle nestled in her arms right now was the female lead, Shen Di.
The little girl had plot armor. During a transaction between human traffickers and a buyer, a kind-hearted couple had seen through what was happening and rescued her. The police never managed to find her biological parents, so the kind couple eventually adopted her.
The other children trafficked alongside her weren't so lucky. Before the police could find them, the traffickers' accomplices had already moved them. Some were sold deep into the mountains, others sent to brutal sweatshops.
The police never gave up the hunt. Over the years, some children were found, some were confirmed dead, and it wasn't until decades later—when the final victim was rescued—that the case was finally fully closed.
And the original owner of this body, Chen Yueyue, was that final victim.
A textbook cannon fodder character.
This was not, in fact, the first time Shen Banyue had traveled between worlds.
Eight years ago, she'd been a college student, on her way to visit an elder at an orphanage, when she inexplicably found herself thrown into an apocalypse. Fighting to survive in that hellscape, she awakened two powers. Later, she joined an organization of ability users and made friends she could trust with her back.
Everything had been looking up. The ranks of ability users were growing, research institutes had made breakthroughs on vaccines for both ability users and ordinary humans, and soon, the peaceful order of the world would be restored.
And then she'd been yanked through worlds again during a low-level mission—fetching clean water.
One second she was punching zombies, the next her vision went dark and she blacked out. When she woke up, the world was no longer the same world.
Yes, again.
Shen Banyue's heart sank like a stone.
How was this any different from having your account stolen right before you beat the final boss in a game?
And the "new account" she'd been assigned—a nine-year-old little girl whose parents had died and who had been sold to traffickers by her own uncle—
Not only did she have to start a new account, she had to start from age nine. Not only did she have to start from age nine, but after living through three worlds, she was still an orphan with no parents.
A capital tragedy.
Footsteps approached, and the door suddenly swung open. A burly man stood silhouetted against the light, cursed something like "you little brats," tossed a few items down into the dark, cramped room, then slammed the door shut again.
The moment the door closed, several small shadows huddled in the corners lunged forward, snatching up the few blackened, rock-hard bran buns on the floor. Each one scrambled to a corner and wolfed them down.
Shen Banyue felt the little bundle in her arms wiggle, probably wanting to grab some food, but before she could even scramble up, everything was already gone. She slumped back into Shen Banyue's arms and started quietly sobbing.
Seven children were locked in the room. The only girls were Chen Yueyue and Little Di, and by age, they happened to take the two ends—oldest and youngest, one nine, one three. The other five boys were all around five or six.
They'd been locked in here for four days already. Chen Yueyue, being an older kid, had tried to quietly listen in on the traffickers' conversations outside, but she couldn't understand their criminal slang, so even what she overheard made little sense.
Shen Banyue recalled those conversations and pieced them together with fragments from the original book, deducing that within a day or two, the traffickers would find buyers and start "moving the goods."
Transmigrating into a nine-year-old cannon fodder—Shen Banyue felt deep despair. But thinking about what happened to the cannon fodder after being sold—first working like a beast of burden from dawn to dusk, then being forced to bear children for a simple-minded husband—she certainly wasn't going to sit around and wait for that fate.
Before any of that, though, Shen Banyue decided to get herself something to eat.
Before the transmigration, she'd been on a mission and had only choked down a few compressed biscuits that morning. After transmigrating, things were even worse: Chen Yueyue had started running a fever yesterday, and in total she'd barely managed to snag one bran bun, most of which she'd given to Little Di. After that, she'd been too groggy to grab anything else.
Now that Shen Banyue inhabited this body, she felt ravenous, weak from the fever, and sticky all over.
She patted the little bundle in her arms. "Stop crying. Big Sis will get you something to eat."
The sobbing stopped abruptly. Little Di sat up in one quick motion, her big grape-like eyes staring blankly at Shen Banyue, tears streaking down her cheeks, her thin little brows furrowed. With a hint of sadness, but firm, she shook her head. "Little Di isn't hungry. Little Di won't cry."
The little girl knew there was no chance of food, so she was trying to comfort Shen Banyue instead.
Shen Banyue laughed softly and patted her fluffy little head. "Be a good girl and wait."
The few boys had been eyeing Shen Banyue warily the moment she stood up, but she ignored them. She looked up toward the small ventilation window set high in the wall.
This room seemed built specifically to hold people. The beams in the ceiling were nearly rotted through, but the door was sturdy, the walls solid, no windows on any side—only that small vent near the roof.
Shen Banyue revised her earlier assessment: run-down as the place was, a zombie would have a pretty hard time collapsing it.
That said, to her, with her strength enhancement ability, it was still no match.
Shen Banyue clenched her fists, feeling the familiar surge of power spreading through her limbs, and slowly let out a breath.
Good. Her abilities were still there.
Of course, she couldn't just punch straight through the wall in front of a bunch of kids—that would be way too conspicuous. So she chose a method she thought was more low-key, more in line with common sense—
She took a running start, jumped, grabbed onto the slightly recessed cracks between the bricks on the wall, quickly climbed up to the position of the vent window, easily pushed open the rusty window, and slipped out.
Sitting astride the windowsill, Shen Banyue glanced back at the dim interior and saw several little boys staring in shock, their eyes nearly bulging out of their heads, while Little Di had both tiny hands clamped tightly over her mouth, her big eyes blinking rapidly as she looked at her.
Only then did it dawn on her—this plan hadn’t exactly been low-key or conventional after all.
Whatever. So be it.
Shen Banyue thought, resigning herself to the absurdity.
“Never thought the little girl would be the first to make a move—a three-year-old babe who can’t even wash clothes or cook. Even for a child bride, you don’t start raising them this young. What does that family want with a baby like that?”
“You’d never guess unless I told you. The youngest son in that family is in the army. His wife died in childbirth two years ago, leaving behind a daughter with the grandparents. Babies are hard to care for, and the grandparents couldn’t be bothered—when she was seven or eight months old, she got sick with a fever and passed away. The grandparents never told anyone, just kept it quiet. Now the son is coming home on leave, so they’re buying a child to keep fooling him.”
“Hey, what are they getting out of it?”
“The money and ration tickets the soldier son sends home every year—that’s what. If not for the daughter being raised at home, would he send that much back? There are several older brothers too, and what does supporting the parents cost? That whole family lives pretty well off that money.”
“Everyone says we’re crooks and criminals, but look—there’s plenty of wickedness in this world. Us dealing with a few kids is nothing! Pah! It’s a case of the crow laughing at the pig for being black, the turtle mocking the soft-shelled turtle for crawling on its belly…”
“Hold on, you’ve had a few swigs of booze and now you’re talking nonsense, are you? Who exactly are you calling a pig?!”
…
Inside the main hall, the human traffickers were arguing, slamming the table with a bang. A few steps away outside, a gaunt, bony girl stood with her hands shoved in her pockets, leaning against the wall, rolling her eyes hard.
What’s there to fight about?
All of you are pigs.
She turned and slipped silently into the kitchen.
These traffickers weren’t shorting themselves, that was for sure—there was a stack of steamed buns on the steamer, and beneath the grate, a small pot of braised pork belly with noodles.
The drinking and arguing over there wouldn’t end anytime soon, so Shen Banyue scalded a bowl and chopsticks with hot water and ate her fill first.
A habit formed in the apocalypse: even with no rush, she finished quickly. After eating, she found a lunchbox, scalded it with hot water the same way, packed it full of braised pork belly and noodles, and then grabbed a net bag with several buns, leaving the kitchen loaded with her spoils.
Inside the main hall, the argument had escalated—two of the traffickers were brawling while a third tried to break it up.
Shen Banyue had no interest in watching two chickens peck at each other. She went back the way she came, easily scaling the wall with one hand.
Sitting astride the windowsill again, she remembered her six-character motto of being low-key and conventional. Instead of jumping straight down, she probed cautiously with her toe, “searching” for a foothold on the wall, “struggling desperately” to find one, then after two steps down, “slipped” and wobbled, finally “barely” steadying herself again, continuing down the wall with exaggerated “trepidation,” until she reached the ground and let out a long “frightened” sigh.
A performance worthy of an acting legend, rewarded with a chorus of gasped exclamations and one sobbing Little Di.
“Big sister~”
The little dumpling threw herself into Shen Banyue’s arms, tears streaming down her face. Shen Banyue had no experience comforting children, so she simply thrust the net bag of buns in front of her. The little one’s wailing caught in her throat with a hiccup, her watery eyes widening, and she pursed her lips, swallowing hard.
Shen Banyue laughed at her food-crazed expression. She pulled her over to sit by the wall, handed her a bun and a spoon, then opened the lunchbox and placed it in front of her.
Slurp!
The little dumpling made a loud sniffing sound, then flashed Shen Banyue an ingratiating smile. “Big sister, you eat.”
Shen Banyue: “Sister’s already eaten. You eat.”
So the little dumpling set to work, taking a bite of bun and a bite of meat. She wasn’t very skilled with her spoon—though that might have been because she only wanted the pork, never bothering to scoop up the noodles or cabbage. Her mouth ended up all greasy and shiny.
Shen Banyue ignored her, leaning back against the wall with her eyes closed, resting. When she reckoned the little one was about full, she patted her fluffy head. “Leave the rest for brother.”
Little Dumpling patted her own slightly bulging belly, then obediently carried the lunchbox over to a corner.
A boy of six or seven lay there, eyes shut.
His name was Lin Mian. Over the past few days, besides the original girl, only he had shared what food he got with Little Di. But he’d stayed lying down without getting up since last night.
Shen Banyue suspected he’d caught whatever the original girl had.
If so—the girl had burned up with fever and died from it. This boy might be in danger too.
The little dumpling smacked a few loud slaps on the boy’s face, practically slapping him awake. He listlessly said, “Thanks,” then slowly got up, ate one bun and the rest of the pork broth, and lay back down.
From the moment Shen Banyue had brought the food back, the other boys had been stealing glances at them. One of them gulped even louder than Little Di had. But none of them dared to say a word.
Shen Banyue tossed the remaining bun into the empty lunchbox, leaned back against the wall, and closed her eyes. She thought to herself: a little lesson first—let them salivate for now. You’ll get your food at night.
