Xiao Mandong had barely stepped through the threshold of the Lu family home with her divorce certificate in hand when she heard a crash from inside.
She rushed into the room and saw Wang Xiumei and Lu Hong rifling through her camphorwood chest. The lock had been pried open and was now bent out of shape, and the kang mat had been tossed about in disarray.
"What do you think you’re doing?" Xiao Mandong’s roar startled the pair.
Lu Hong quickly pulled her hands back, her eyes darting around nervously as she stammered, "It was her, not me!"
This sister-in-law had caused Xiao Mandong no small amount of trouble in her past life. She seemed honest and simple, but she was secretly a nasty piece of work—this ransacking had to be her idea.
Wang Xiumei looked at Lu Hong in disbelief. It had been Lu Hong who had dragged her here, insisting they search for something, claiming Xiao Mandong had a beautiful silver ring. If Lu Hong hadn’t threatened her, she would never have dared to provoke Xiao Mandong again—she had only just suffered at Xiao Mandong’s hands the day before.
Tears welled up in Lu Hong’s eyes as she grabbed Xiao Mandong’s arm and shook it, pleading, "Sister Mandong, it was our sister-in-law. She heard you had a pretty silver ring and dragged me here to look for it, saying she just wanted to see it. I… I know I was wrong to go through your things. Please don’t be angry, okay? I really do like that ring. How about… you sell it to me—name your price."
"You’re lying! How would I even know she had a silver ring? You’re the one who said you liked it the moment you saw it. You dragged me along to help you find it. Don’t try to frame me!"
Wang Xiumei knew her reputation was already ruined. If she were accused of stealing on top of everything else, how could she go on living? She couldn’t let Lu Hong pin this on her.
"You’re lying! If you keep talking nonsense, I’ll have my mother send you back to your parents’ home," Lu Hong threatened viciously.
Wang Xiumei choked back her retort, her face turning green with rage. She gasped for breath, biting her lip so hard it almost bled. If she had a reliable family to go back to, she wouldn’t be struggling to stay in the Lu household.
"Sister Mandong, where’s the ring? Won’t you sell it to me?" Lu Hong couldn’t explain why, but from the moment she first saw the ring hanging around Xiao Mandong’s neck, she had been madly obsessed with it.
She had managed to steal it in the middle of the night once, but Xiao Mandong had forced her to return it. Lu Hong had only given it back because Second Brother promised he’d find a way to make Xiao Mandong gift it to her. But now the ring hadn’t come to her yet, and the two were getting divorced—what about her ring?
That damned woman had sold the sewing machine yesterday. There was no way she’d give the ring to Lu Hong either. Lu Hong had planned to steal it again, but she hadn’t found it and had gotten caught instead. What rotten luck!
Just as she finished speaking, she looked up and spotted the red string around Xiao Mandong’s neck. Lu Hong lunged forward to grab it, snapping the string instantly. Xiao Mandong caught Lu Hong’s wrist with her right hand and clutched the ring in her left:
"Lu Hong, are you trying to rob me? If I report you to the police, do you think you’ll end up in jail?"
Seeing that the ring had been snatched away again, Lu Hong dropped her act and gritted her teeth. "Xiao Mandong, if you don’t give me that ring, I’ll report you to the commune. They’ll say you’re hiding capitalist property that should be turned over. I’ll have the commune send you to be re-educated in the countryside!"
"Fine, go ahead and report me. Your family helped cover up my identity as a capitalist when you married me into this family. We’ll go down together." Xiao Mandong shoved Lu Hong aside, sending her staggering.
"You…" Lu Hong pointed at Xiao Mandong in a fury, unable to get another word out.
"Lu Hong, I’ve always treated you like a sister. I was planning to sell you the job I have selling my 38-yuan-per-month position when I go to the countryside, but I never expected you to be so ungrateful!"
With that, Xiao Mandong pushed both of them out of the room and locked the door.
Lu Hong stood outside, completely stunned. It took her a while to come to her senses. Did she say sell a job to her? She no longer cared about the ring; she ran out at full speed to find her mother and discuss this. Job openings were scarce—people couldn’t even buy their way in—especially a cushy office job like Xiao Mandong’s.
From the window, Xiao Mandong watched the running figure disappear and smiled. The cotton mill where she worked would close down in 1979 anyway. That meant Lu Hong would get about four years of salary from buying the job. Even with severance pay, Lu Hong’s four years of seniority wouldn’t net her much. Since Lu Hong loved scheming so much, let this be her comeuppance.
The chest wasn’t completely pried open, but the lock was broken. Xiao Mandong put down the ring and picked up a tool to try fixing it herself, but she accidentally pricked her finger on a nail. She wanted to go wash the wound, but just as she was about to leave, she remembered the ring.
She snatched up the ring and held it tightly in her palm as she started to step outside. Suddenly, she found herself in a strange place. Where was this? Xiao Mandong felt a surge of panic.
The surrounding area was circular, with no walls, and patterns she recognized, but it was as if an invisible barrier blocked her. She walked in circles but couldn’t find an exit. What was she going to do? She hadn’t even saved her family yet, and now she was trapped in this unfamiliar place.
She desperately wanted to go back. And then—in a flash of thought—she was standing in the room again.
Suddenly, Xiao Mandong understood. She sat on the kang and stared at the ring in her hand. There was blood on it. An idea struck her: in her past life, a neighbor had recommended a mobile app called Fanqie Novel, where she loved listening to stories about heroines being reborn. This often involved pocket dimensions and spiritual springs, where a jade pendant would bond to its owner through a drop of blood.
Could it be that her rebirth had brought her a golden cheat? Had the ring bonded to her through blood?
With a nervous heart, she silently called out "space," and sure enough, she was back inside. After trying it a few times, she found she could come and go freely.
Xiao Mandong quickly found a new string and slipped the ring back around her neck. But then, the ring slowly faded into her chest, as if melting into her flesh.
She sat on the kang, laughing giddily to herself. In the chaos, she hadn’t taken a good look at the space. Now, with her mind collected, she returned to explore. The patterns on the walls matched those on the ring. There was a lush green meadow, and not far off, several plots of land were growing vegetables and melons. To the left stood four rooms in a row, each with a sign over the door: Bedroom, Study, Medicine Room, and Warehouse.
On the right side of the yard was a well. A stone block next to it read "Spiritual Spring Water."
Entering the bedroom suite, she found it fully furnished with a wardrobe, bedding, and more. Inside, there was a bathroom, an attached washroom, and a kitchen with all the pots and pans she could need.
The study was packed to the brim with medical books. Xiao Mandong came from a family of traditional Chinese medicine healers. As she flipped through, she recognized these texts as precious medical classics. But what really blew her away was opening the warehouse door.
Row after row of shelves were stocked with rice, flour, cooking oil, daily necessities, hygiene products, and in the pharmacy, there were not just the usual ginseng, deer antler, lingzhi mushrooms, saffron, and cordyceps but also natural ox bezoar and rhinoceros horn—everything she could imagine.
Her heart raced like she had just gotten off a rollercoaster. She couldn’t stop the wild pounding in her chest or suppress the smile spreading across her face as she lay down on the big bed in the space, utterly ecstatic.
With this space, her and her family’s future, no matter where they ended up, would be bright. But some things couldn’t be taken out until after the economic reforms.
She gave it a try, and her space could also retrieve objects just by thought. She ate a cucumber from the space—it was sweet and refreshing, and after finishing it, her whole body felt energized.
Coincidentally, her hand was injured, so she thought of testing the effects of the spiritual spring water. She went to the storeroom to find a cup, filled it with the spiritual spring, and let it flow across her wound. The pain instantly lessened, and a cool, soothing sensation spread through her. She also took a sip; it was crisp and sweet, and a wave of relaxation washed over her, immediately lightening the heaviness caused by her physical weakness.
This ring was originally meant for her mother, passed down from her grandmother. But Xiao Mandong had been frail and sickly since childhood. Her grandmother, having heard that old keepsakes could bring safety, asked her mother to give it back and had worn it around her neck ever since she was little. In her previous life, this ring was eventually secretly given to Lu Hong by Lu Jianguo. Later, Lu Hong made a name for herself abroad, and no one knew if it had anything to do with this space.
