At night, under the thumb-sized bamboo candle, the two sisters were curled up on the small bed, eagerly counting the twenty-three large bills they had, along with some scattered fabric coupons that barely added up to a few feet.

What they said earlier about selling medicine was true, but in reality, the sisters weren’t selling the occasional scenic stonecrop or purple pearls found on the mountain. In fact, a large hospital like this already had its own supply channels. Even if those items were brought in, the county hospital would definitely look down on them.

So what they really sold was actually a small wild ginseng root about twenty years old.

“Ah, sister, we really were lucky to run into such a good find the moment we climbed the mountain.”

“Yeah, but it’s a pity that was just a one-time stroke of luck. We went up many times after that and never saw anything.”

Happily counting the money and dreaming of a good life free from illiteracy, Third Ya sighed again.

An Ning next to her couldn’t help but twitch the corner of her mouth.

“Third sister, what are you thinking? It’s not that easy. So many people go up the mountain every day. If there were really such good things, the villagers would have found out long ago.”

It wasn’t their turn at all. Don’t think that people in the village back then couldn’t tell good stuff. When it comes to money, they understood perfectly well. In fact, the one they found was secretly smuggled out from the space by An Ning and then stealthily buried again.

The ironclad truth proved that the kind of luck where you pick something up the moment you climb the mountain had nothing to do with her!

Sigh! For someone like her, whose luck basically hovered in the negatives, only early preparation could guarantee enough food and clothing!

“That’s true!”

Big-hearted Third Ya decisively stopped dwelling on it.

The two began planning how to use this “huge sum” again. Suddenly, Third Ya frowned:

“Ugh, with just this little fabric coupons, I’m guessing we can’t even make a decent set of clothes. How about we just save them and use some money to buy a school bag in town first?”

After a while, An Ning’s subtle reminders had made Third Ya much more cautious. At least she no longer recklessly spent money.

An Ning nodded in agreement. New clothes were great, but under such troublesome conditions, keeping a low profile was better.

To their surprise, before the sisters even set off for the county town, the next day, two brand-new school bags appeared in their room. They were sent by Li Xiaocao, the birth mother of this body.

The school bags weren’t very big, but the stitches were especially fine. They could barely hold a few textbooks. The overall color was gray-blue, with two small red flowers simply embroidered on the back with red thread.

Later, An Ning learned that the cloth came as a year-end gift from her grandmother’s side. It wasn’t much—barely enough to make pants for a child. It was originally meant for Little Brother Yang, but seeing how eager the two were to go to school, they hurriedly made these instead.

Carrying their new little school bags, in April, the An Ning sisters successfully transferred into the first grade of Hongri Commune’s elementary school.

Joining them was Second Ya from Third Uncle Yang’s household next door.

Life as elementary school students was quite comfortable.

From what it seemed, Hongri Commune wasn’t rich. In the 1950s, very few rural families were willing to spend money to send their kids to school. A full class barely had a few dozen students, and there were even fewer girls.

Suddenly, two little girls appeared. Apart from a few annoying kids who were overly hands-on, they were actually quite welcomed.

But before they could be properly welcomed, just over a year later, the sisters had both advanced multiple grades to join the fifth-grade class. During this time, An Ning made a friend named Huang Xiaotao, a girl whose family worked in the supply and marketing cooperative and was quite generous.

Thanks to occasional homework help activities, An Ning smoothly obtained part of Huang Xiaotao’s snack-sharing privileges.

Of course, the biggest source was still their deskmate, Chubby Boy.

Calling him Chubby Boy was a bit misleading. From An Ning’s perspective, given his current physique, he wasn’t really fat. But in this era of scarce food and clothing, his round little face and extremely robust blood and qi made him stand out awkwardly.

As one of An Ning’s temporary snack suppliers, he was quite generous to help her avoid complicated homework.

For example, now, holding a warm jujube cake in his hand, An Ning swallowed involuntarily, then boldly slapped the half-notebook of neatly summarized notes onto his desk.

“Don’t worry, deskmate. With me here, I guarantee you’ll score a perfect hundred on everything but the composition in the year-end exam!”

Chubby Boy: “…”

Not noticing her slightly stiff expression, he bit into the fragrant jujube cake, still holding several peanut candies in his pocket. An Ning slowly walked home, finally feeling a little hopeful about life.

Knowledge is wealth. Sigh! The ancients really didn’t lie.

Not far away, happily eating snacks handed over by her little sister, Third Ya couldn’t help but look admiringly at her little sister, who had become increasingly clever and good-looking since starting school.

Maybe it was the better food, but An Ning had grown so fast in the past year. Her once skinny face had filled out, looking sharp and endearing. Most importantly, she was excellent at explaining problems and had great popularity in class.

Then there was herself, all alone.

Sigh! After a lifetime of transmigration, she still couldn’t become a top student.

Once, she could at least be a little tutor to her younger sister, but now?

Holding her own test paper marked in red with a score of ninety-eight, and looking at her little sister’s fresh perfect hundreds…

Third Ya was almost in tears.

Why? In her previous life, it was understandable if she couldn’t cross the narrow path alone, but this life she had even fallen below elementary students! She had transmigrated, so why couldn’t she have grown some more intelligence?

“Big sister, you’re finally back!”

Hongri Commune wasn’t very close to the village. By the time the two were dawdling back, it was already quite dark. Six-year-old Little Brother Yang was eagerly waiting at the door.

Almost the moment An Ning stepped inside, a bowl of steaming chrysanthemum tea was brought over:

“Big sister, you finally came back!”

“Fifth sister, I listened to you. Yesterday I just put the fishing net there, and this morning there were three fish in total, hehe!” Little Brother Yang said with a face full of eagerness as he held up the small fish with both hands.

Knowing his Fifth Sister was getting cleaner and tidier, he had even carefully wrapped the fish in a clean lotus leaf.

“This one is for Fifth Sister. I specially picked the biggest one.”

The biggest? She’d believe it when she saw it!

But seeing the relatively plump fish in his hands, An Ning nodded. Under his expectant gaze, she slipped two pieces of candy from her pocket into his hand.

Licking the familiar taste, Little Brother Yang’s eyes sparkled brighter. While licking the candy, he didn’t forget to flatter her. If An Ning hadn’t earlier complained about his dirty paws, he might have rushed over to knead her legs in gratitude.

“Don’t worry, big sister. From now on, just call on your little brother for anything. Third Brother next door isn’t as clever as me!”

“Fifth sister, you know he’s much worse at grilling fish than me.”

Afraid that the benefit would switch hands and leave him with no more tasty food, Little Brother Yang flattered as much as possible, even stepping on his little friends hard enough to make Third Ya look away in embarrassment.

As for his father telling him to fetch water for grandma earlier?

Sorry, right now Little Brother Yang couldn’t remember at all.

If it meant good food for his sister, what was there for dad? Grandma’s diapers?

Not paying much attention to her unlucky little brother, An Ning reached out and took the fish.

It had to be said that fish in this era, even without much seasoning and only a bit of salt, was delicious enough.

Maybe it was because this body rarely ate meat. Sharing the small fish with her sister, An Ning finally nodded in satisfaction. She even generously reassured the anxious Little Brother Yang:

“Don’t worry, I’ll always come to you. Sigh, what can I do? You’re my real little brother after all!”

Wuwu… At this moment, Little Brother Yang sincerely felt lucky. Thankfully, he was Fifth Sister’s real brother.

Hmph, no matter how much the annoying Guo An next door flattered, it was useless!

Chewing the sweet candy happily and hiding another piece deep in his pocket to savor in the coming days, Little Brother Yang finally left satisfied.

Just as he left, a tall and slender figure quietly appeared from next door. It was undoubtedly thirteen-year-old Eldest Ya Yang.

She repeatedly glanced to make sure her own birth mother wasn’t around, then tiptoed over, holding a basin of freshly washed clothes.

Once again successfully exchanging two pieces of candy from her Fifth Sister, Eldest Ya left content. Before leaving, she secretly came close and whispered to An Ning:

“Fifth sister, if you have anything to wash in the future, just give it to me. You know, I wash cleaner than Second Sister next door.”

“And about this room, knowing you were coming back soon, I specially helped sweep it once!”

Tsk, no wonder the room was so clean today!

Looking around at the spotless table and floor, Third Ya twitched the corner of her mouth again.

Seriously, her little sister really was a natural-born capitalist seedling.

Only eight years old, yet already instinctively knew how to exploit people…

After dinner, as usual, the two sisters strolled around before returning to their small room. Seeing her sister still not resting late at night, Third Ya came over:

“Sis, why are you reading comics again?”

“Again, your deskmate gave them to you?”

After spending more than a year with her little sister, Third Ya belatedly realized that her sister hated doing useless work the most. She read these every day without fail and for so long, something must be going on.

An Ning didn’t deny it, just nodded lightly. Looking at the little comics in her hands, her tone carried a trace of sadness:

“Sis, Chubby Boy said that if you send these comics to the newspaper office, you can get a manuscript fee. But I’ve read so many, and I just can’t think of a good story. What should I do?”

Hmm, a good story? She had that!

Third Ya’s eyes lit up. Suddenly thinking of something, she looked at her pitiful little sister with some sympathy.

Sigh, no matter how smart her little sister was, she was still just a child who grew up in the countryside and had little exposure. Naturally, her imagination was limited. But she was different—stories!

As a seasoned manga and novel fan, Third Ya was great at it. Not only could she read, she could also make stories up on the spot!

Thinking this, Third Ya immediately sat up from the bed and pulled her little sister up to chatter:

“Sis, listen to one I tell you. Once upon a time there was a mountain, on the mountain a tree, above the tree a newborn little sparrow. The sparrow originally had a happy childhood, but unfortunately, when it was still an egg, an uninvited guest came to the family…”

In short, it was a story about a little magpie overcoming countless hardships to find its mother.

Not to mention, Third Ya was quite talented in this.

By candlelight, An Ning blinked her eyes, looking at her sister with admiration and occasionally asking clear, innocent questions unique to a frog at the bottom of a well:

“Is it very dangerous for a newly hatched bird to fall out of the nest?”

“And why can’t that bird called the cuckoo raise its own kids, but has to lay its eggs in others’ nests?”

“Why do baby birds hurt others without anyone teaching them?”

“That’s because, sis, you don’t know, it’s called racial instinct, commonly known as a bad seed.”

Since enrolling in school, finding a chance to show off in front of her little sister was rare, so Third Ya was extremely proud. She shook her head and told the story fluently.

In short, that night, both sisters felt very satisfied after achieving their goal.

But having a story was one thing; the necessary drawing was a challenge. For this, An Ning even asked deskmate Chubby Boy for advice. After months of effort, wasting many practice notebooks and spending some of her savings, she finally managed to neatly draw lines that were originally rough and shapeless.

Seeing her sister work so hard, Third Ya immediately perked up. Suddenly, inspiration exploded. She wrote countless little stories and racked her brain for ideas to help her sister make the animal drawings more interesting.

Being clumsy was one thing, but she knew a lot!

In the following period, with their joint efforts, the little comics in An Ning’s hands became increasingly exquisite, and Third Ya grew more confident.

Maybe… she could really make some money!

However, months later, when they finally went to the post office, nervously mailing the manuscript to the lady at the counter, Third Ya was unusually anxious and instinctively tugged on her little sister’s sleeve:

“Sis, do you think this will work?”

“Guo An’s dad, do you think Third Ya’s can?”

That night, as the Third Prince’s wife was getting ready to rest, she glanced curiously at next door and then asked Third Uncle Yang.

The Old Yang Family’s place was small, and the sisters’ long-time fuss wasn’t unnoticed. Not to mention, Eldest Aunt Yang next door had been envious many times.

Those little girls even published a book? What a fantasy!

In fact, like her sister-in-law, the Third Uncle Yang’s wife didn’t really believe in two little kids publishing a book, even a little comic book. But she occasionally glanced at it.

Wow, these drawings are really good!

Seeing her wife’s thoughts, Third Uncle Yang put on a casual expression but spoke sharply:

“Don’t even think about it. Even if it really works, do you think that money will come to our house?”

He casually tossed some boiled soybeans hidden by the bedside into his mouth, resting his head on his arm and clicking his tongue:

“Anyway, I can see it clearly. Whether it works or not, these two nieces of mine look formidable, definitely not from the same path as my second brother. Who knows what will happen in the future!”

Then he warned his wife with a glance:

“Don’t go offending people like that dumb sister-in-law of yours, always blundering around!”

Of course, despite saying this, Third Uncle Yang himself didn’t really believe the nieces would succeed this time.

Publishing a book wasn’t that easy!

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep