"Mom, I know your concerns. How about this: I'll pretend to sign up for the countryside, and ask her to accompany me. Then I'll have her register first, and afterward I'll claim I forgot to bring my household registration booklet. By the time she realizes what's happened, it will be a done deal."
Jiang Yun quickly blurted out her plan, looking at her mother with hopeful eyes.
"Will this actually work?" Feng Damei was still somewhat hesitant. In her view, they should secure the job and the housing first, and everything else could be handled later.
However, seeing her most cherished daughter looking at her with such eager eyes—and figuring that with Jiang Yun keeping an eye on things, it should be fine—she finally nodded.
At the evening dinner table.
In the Jiang family, one could rarely hear anyone talking, because by the time you finished a sentence, half the dishes might already be gone. Besides, no one had time to listen when filling their stomachs was the priority—after all, food was scarce for everyone these days.
Tonight, however, was different.
Jiang Hongbing, the head of the Jiang family, was present. Since this was probably Feng Qingqing's first time staying at their home officially, to show proper respect, he expressed a warm welcome to her before they started eating. Of course, what he truly thought underneath was anyone's guess.
Jiang Hongbing was a man in his forties who looked honest and dependable. One could tell from his well-defined facial features that he must have been quite a handsome fellow in his youth; otherwise, he wouldn't have won over Feng Damei.
Yet Feng Qingqing knew that the rise of this family in her past life was due to two things: Jiang Yun's inexplicable intuition for good fortune, and Jiang Hongbing's scheming behind the scenes. Without either of them, none of it would have been possible.
Therefore, Feng Qingqing never dared to underestimate a single one of them.
By this time, Jiang Hongbing had already learned about the countryside assignment from Jiang Yun, and he basically supported the idea. Given his understanding of this young girl over the years, there shouldn't be any major problems.
That was why he had deliberately staged this little scene. Sure enough, the moment Jiang Hongbing stopped speaking, Jiang Yun chimed in.
"Dad, Mom, since we're all here, I have something to say." After saying this, she glanced around the table, letting her gaze linger on Feng Qingqing for an extra two seconds.
"Director Wang from the neighborhood committee has been to our house several times already. Our family is the only one in this entire neighborhood without children sent to the countryside, and that doesn't look good for Dad's work. Considering the family, and since I'm a girl, I think I should be the one to go to the countryside." She cast a wronged look around the table as she finished.
"Only, once I'm down in the countryside, Dad, Mom, and my brothers mustn't forget about me. You'll still have to think of me just like before whenever you have good food or fun things." She deliberately batted her eyelashes at her brothers in a coquettish manner.
After all, the brothers truly doted on this only sister, and they were currently torn over whether they should volunteer to go in her place. This was the seventies, after all, and everyone knew the countryside was no picnic.
Before the brothers could make up their minds, Feng Damei, terrified that her sons would mess things up, slammed her hand on the table and settled the matter immediately.
"It's settled then. But you boys better remember your sister's selflessness."
Seeing that her sons no longer showed any intention of arguing, she finally let out a sigh of relief. Thank goodness those little rascals hadn't ruined it.
"It's just that Yunyun is a girl after all, and I really can't rest easy letting her go alone. She's never traveled far from home all these years. If she had someone she knew and trusted to go with her, I'd feel a lot better."
With that, she deliberately let out a sigh and glanced sideways at Feng Qingqing.
By this time, the eldest brother, Jiang Hongbing, had also caught on to the hint. He tentatively turned to Feng Qingqing and said,
"Qingqing, you're a girl too. Why don't you go to the countryside with Yunyun? That way you two can keep each other company. Don't worry, you're like a real sister to me; whatever Yunyun gets down there, you won't be shorted a single cent."
"That's right, why didn't I think of that? Qingqing, to me, you and Yunyun are exactly the same. Including half of your eldest cousin's future salary, I will mail it to you on time. Come to think of it, while they call it going to the countryside, you're really just staying in a rural area. As long as you have money and ration coupons in your hands, life won't be hard anywhere."
Feng Damei finished and looked at Feng Qingqing with hopeful anticipation.
Meanwhile, Feng Qingqing had been waiting for this exact move. Her job and housing were already sorted out; all she was missing was this trip to the countryside.
Though the outcome would most likely mirror her past life, until it was set in stone, her heart remained uneasy.
Hearing them urge her to go to the countryside right on schedule, she deliberately put on a slightly nervous expression to hide her eagerness, glancing timidly at the others:
"But I've heard that nowadays many people are unwilling to go to the countryside, and once you go, it's very hard to come back. Auntie, cousin, if I go to the countryside, you won't abandon me, will you?" Feng Qingqing played the pitiful, vulnerable role to absolute perfection.
Hearing this, everyone finally dropped the stone in their hearts and chimed in with competing promises.
And so, after finishing their meal, both sides returned to their rooms with full satisfaction.
Yet there was one person whose obsession with getting her hands on Feng Qingqing's mother's necklace remained as intense as ever: Jiang Yun.
For some reason, this time the urge to claim it for herself was overwhelmingly strong, making her feel inexplicably flustered.
Ever since she was little, she had relied on this intuition to sail smoothly through life at home, at school, and everywhere else. Even her initiative in getting close to Feng Qingqing's family had been something she constantly badgered her mother to do; otherwise, given her mother's temperament, they would have given up long ago.
Therefore, back in her room, thinking about how she would have to register Feng Qingqing for the countryside tomorrow, she forced herself to muster some patience and speak to Feng Qingqing in a friendly tone.
After circling around the conversation for a while, she finally brought it back to the necklace they had discussed previously. Feng Qingqing had anticipated that Jiang Yun wouldn't give up so easily. If Jiang Yun were the type to quit that easily, she wouldn't have managed to thrive under every imaginable condition in her past life.
Unfortunately for her, she had run into Feng Qingqing, who had returned from a rebirth. Feigning a voice on the verge of sleep, Feng Qingqing replied,
"What necklace? Oh, you're still talking about my mom's necklace? It's not even worth anything, and who knows where it got misplaced."
With that, she turned over and went to sleep, completely ignoring Jiang Yun's subsequent attempts to talk.
Realizing she wouldn't get any results out of her, Jiang Yun puffed up with anger and flopped down to sleep as well.
Originally, the matter would have ended right there. After all, Jiang Yun couldn't find the necklace, and Feng Qingqing was going to the countryside, so the issue would naturally have faded away.
However, something happened that very night that drastically changed Jiang Yun's plans.
She had a dream.
It sounded absurdly mystical. If Feng Qingqing knew about it, she would surely raise her middle finger to the heavens and curse, "Is Jiang Yun your biological daughter or something?"
In this dream, Jiang Yun relived the scenario from her past life: after getting the necklace from Feng Qingqing, she unlocked the spatial dimension and thereby climbed to the absolute pinnacle of her life.
Though it was ultimately just a dream—and she wasn't truly the darling of the heavens—for Feng Qingqing, who had been reborn, the fact that past-life Jiang Yun had experienced this precognitive dream even after their timeline reset made it rather extraordinary.
The dream wasn't entirely clear, but her soaring success after obtaining the spatial dimension and the resulting blissful life remained fresh in her memory—a happiness so intoxicating she hardly wished to wake up.
As a result, she made a decision. A decision she told no one about, not even her parents.
In her gut, she felt that the necklace was absolutely crucial; it could dictate the entire trajectory of her life. If she failed to obtain it, she would regret it for the rest of her days.
Therefore, when she returned from the neighborhood committee after informing her parents of her decision, one could imagine their incomprehension and boiling rage.
Early the next morning, Jiang Yun woke up acting like a completely different person. She greeted Feng Qingqing with a smiling face and even proactively scooped her a bowl of corn mush. Even Feng Damei gave her a strange look, assuming her daughter had finally come to her senses.
After breakfast, Jiang Yun pulled her mother into her room and announced that she would be heading to the neighborhood committee with Feng Qingqing later to sort out the countryside registration.
Initially, Jiang Yun had thought she might be able to avoid going to the countryside altogether, but considering that none of the many children in her family had been sent down, it really did look suspicious. Besides, once they were in the countryside where everything was unfamiliar, Feng Qingqing might rely on her even more, and perhaps she would end up handing over the necklace willingly.
Yes, up until now, Jiang Yun still believed that Feng Qingqing refused to give her the necklace simply because it was a keepsake from her late aunt.
Therefore, after much thought and agonizing deliberation, Jiang Yun still decided to go to the countryside with Feng Qingqing.
From Jiang Yun's perspective right now, nothing—not even going to the countryside—was more important than getting her hands on that necklace.
With the spatial dimension, she, Jiang Yun, could thrive and prosper even in the countryside.