Chapter 1: The Reset Button of Fate
The damp, musty smell mixed with the scent of disinfectant rushed into his nasal cavity, and Chen Feng abruptly opened his eyes in the darkness. The electronic clock on the bedside table read 3:17 AM. Moonlight streamed through the security bars, cutting diamond-shaped patches of light onto the mottled wall. This was the bedroom he had lived in for three years during high school.
"What is going on?" He propped himself up, his nape hitting the wooden headboard, and he gasped in pain. Memories rushed in like a tidal wave—his father's hospital room in the late stages of liver cancer, his mother's hair turning white overnight, creditors' promissory notes slammed onto a table, and the sight of himself curled up in a rented room in a urban village gnawing on cold steamed buns. Yet right now, the Jay Chou poster pasted on the wall was as good as new, and the wrong-answer notebook from the senior year mock exams still sat on the desk.
His phone vibrated under the pillow, the sudden glare of the screen making him squint. The lock screen date showed May 12, 2008—precisely one month before the college entrance examination. Chen Feng suddenly remembered that in his previous life, on this exact day, he had skipped class to play games at an internet café, missing the final diagnostic exam and making his head teacher so angry she threw her chalk box.
"Reborn? I'm actually reborn?" He pinched his own thigh, the real pain making his heart hammer like a war drum. The cheap quartz watch his father bought ticked away on the nightstand, as if counting down the seconds of fate. Remembering his father's words from his hospital bed in the previous life—"Dad is useless and couldn't protect you for life"—Chen Feng's eyes burned, and his nails dug deep into his palms.
A few barks echoed from outside the window. Groping in the dark, he opened the desk drawer, where a yellowed diary held a crumpled lottery ticket. In his previous life, this combination of numbers had won five million yuan three months later, but back then, he couldn't even scrape together two yuan. As his fingers brushed across the paper, Chen Feng suddenly laughed out loud, his laughter sounding exceptionally jarring in the silent night.
"In this life, I will rewrite the script with my own hands," he murmured in a low voice, the moonlight illuminating the burning intensity in his eyes. He pulled open the wardrobe to dig out his old school uniform, finding a five-yuan coin still nestled in the pants pocket. Thinking of the wild mushrooms and chestnuts on the back mountain, Chen Feng's eyes lit up—in the future, these would all be delicacies sought after by city dwellers. If he could beat others to seize the market...
Just as dawn was breaking, Chen Feng strapped on his canvas bag and headed out. His mother was making pancakes in the kitchen, and seeing him fully dressed, she stared in surprise, "Where are you going so early? Isn't today Saturday?"
"I'm going to the library to study." He took the egg his mother handed him, his fingertips brushing against the calluses on her palm, and his throat tightened. "I won't be back for lunch. You and Dad don't wait for me to eat."
The morning mist on the back mountain had not yet dispersed as Chen Feng stepped on the dew and walked deep into the dense forest. Wild mushrooms from his memory grew in broadleaf forests rich in humus; parting layers of fallen leaves, he finally found a few clusters of grayish-brown hedgehog mushrooms under a pine tree. Carefully cutting them off with a small knife, he placed them into a bamboo basket lined with moss, his movements gentler than when he used to pick strawberries in his past life.
"These are worth at least three hundred yuan." He counted the mushrooms in the basket, his heart speeding up. Suddenly remembering the century-old chestnut tree halfway up the mountain—where he had broken his arm falling out of the tree during the previous summer vacation—he climbed upward without the slightest hesitation. The spiny chestnut burs stung his palms numb, but he gritted his teeth and shook the branches, sending ripe chestnuts rattling down into the grass.
The midday sun was blazing as Chen Feng walked toward town with his heavy bamboo basket. Passing the village committee building, he heard the loudspeaker broadcasting: "Attention villagers, the county supply and marketing cooperative is purchasing wild mushrooms at high prices. Top-quality hedgehog mushrooms are fifty yuan per catty..."
"Fifty yuan?" His footsteps paused. In the future, premium hedgehog mushrooms like these could sell for two hundred yuan a catty in high-end restaurants, but right now the supply and marketing cooperative was only offering wholesale prices. Pulling out the Nokia phone from his pocket, he flipped through his contacts to find high school classmate Lin Xiao's number. He remembered that Lin Xiao's father ran the largest fresh produce supermarket in the county, so perhaps he could sell them for a better price.
The phone rang three times before it was picked up, and Lin Xiao's drowsy voice came through, "Chen Feng? What's up in the middle of the day?"
"Brother Xiao, I picked some hedgehog mushrooms and chestnuts on the back mountain, and the quality is exceptional. Does your dad's supermarket buy them?" Chen Feng tried to keep his tone calm, though his fingers nervously gripped the edge of the bamboo basket.
Rustling sounds came from the other end, as if someone was rummaging through things. "Hold on, let me ask my dad... Hey Dad! Someone is selling wild mushrooms, says they're hedgehog mushrooms!" After a moment, Lin Xiao's voice became clear again. "My dad says let's see the goods. Can you bring them over now?"
"Yes! I'll be there in half an hour!" Chen Feng hung up the phone and strode toward town. Sweat soaked his school uniform, but he felt no fatigue. Passing a small grocery store, he bought a bottle of mineral water and chugged it down, the ice-cold liquid refreshing his mind.
In the supermarket warehouse, Lin's father put on his reading glasses and carefully inspected the mushrooms in the bamboo basket. The caps of the hedgehog mushrooms were thick, their gills a pale pink, and the chestnut shells were glossy and plump, still attached to fresh twigs and leaves. "Young man, these are indeed good items." He pushed up his glasses. "I'll give you sixty yuan a catty for the hedgehog mushrooms, and eight for the chestnuts. How's that?"
Chen Feng was ecstatic inside, but kept his expression calm. "Uncle Lin, these are all top-grade goods. Do you think you could add a little more? The purchasing price at the supply and marketing cooperative right now is..."
"All right, all right." Lin's father laughed and interrupted him. "Seventy for the hedgehog mushrooms, ten for the chestnuts, not a penny more." As he spoke, he pulled out a calculator. "A total of five catties of hedgehog mushrooms and eight catties of chestnuts, four hundred and thirty yuan in all."
When the cash was handed into his hands, Chen Feng's fingertips trembled slightly. At this time in his previous life, he was still worrying about overdue internet café membership fees, but now, the gears of fate had already begun to turn. Bidding farewell to Lin's father, he walked into the bookstore next door and bought "Introduction to Stock Trading" and "Commercial Management Tutorials," then went to the digital mall and bought a second-hand USB flash drive.
As the setting sun went down, Chen Feng stood at the intersection, looking out at the bustling street traffic. The USB drive in his hand held the stock market trends for the next decade copied from the internet café, and the cash in his pocket still held his body heat. In the distance, the high-rise buildings outlined familiar yet unfamiliar silhouettes in the twilight. He took a deep breath and walked toward home.
That night, Chen Feng tossed and turned in bed, unable to sleep. Moonlight spilled through the window onto his diary, and holding a pen, he wrote a line of words: "Dad, this time it's my turn to protect you." Downstairs came the low murmurs of his parents; his father coughed twice, and his mother's footsteps as she got up to pour warm water were light and gentle. Chen Feng pressed his hand against his chest, feeling his powerful heartbeat, and the corners of his mouth slowly curled upward.
The butterfly of fate had already flapped its wings, and the era belonging to Chen Feng officially began.