The Delicate Educated Youth Girl Who Made the Rough Country Man’s Heart Tremble (70s)

Song Ziyao lived a life defined by regret and loss. After wasting twenty years in a loveless marriage to Lu Ming, she finally divorced him at age forty, only to find companionship with Tan Jinhe. Their five years together were vibrant and healing, but Tan Jinhe died of stomach cancer at fifty, leaving Song Ziyao alone. Nine years later, she was murdered by Lu Ming’s former lover, the "white moonlight," who ran her over in a fit of rage. Instead of dying, Song Ziyao woke up in her eighteen-year-old body in 1975, moments before her stepmother Feng Shihui orchestrated her marriage to Lu Ming. Armed with memories of a painful future, she resolved to change her destiny.

Song Ziyao’s stepmother, Feng Shihui, and her father, Song Gaofei, had manipulated her into marrying into the wealthy Lu family to secure social climbing and financial benefits for their own biological children. Feng Shihui’s kindness had always been a calculated act. Upon rebirth, Song Ziyao saw through their hypocrisy. She discovered she had inherited a dimensional space from Tan Jinhe, containing a fully stocked kitchen, a garden with regenerative properties, and a mysterious purification vase that could cleanse water and accelerate plant growth. Realizing she could use this space to survive and thrive, she made a decisive move. She signed up to become an educated youth sent down to the countryside, deliberately rejecting the matchmaking arrangement with Lu Ming.

Her departure caused turmoil at home. Song Gaofei was furious, and Feng Shihui was panicked, but Song Ziyao used her knowledge of social dynamics to force her stepmother into funding her departure. She publicly announced that Feng Shihui would send her twenty yuan monthly and all her ration coupons, turning the stepmother’s reputation for kindness into a financial burden. Song Ziyao also extracted industrial coupons and supplies from her father, ensuring she had resources for her new life. She traveled to Gaoyang County, specifically to Dongxing Commune, which was Tan Jinhe’s hometown. Her goal was to find the young Tan Jinhe, who at twenty years old was still poor, wild, and unaware of her, and to help him avoid the hardships that had ruined his health in her previous life.

Upon arrival, Song Ziyao was assigned to Shengli Brigade. She encountered Liao Hongmei, a former deskmate who had once tried to harm her, and Wen Xue, a fellow educated youth who became a tentative ally. Song Ziyao secured a small, windowless storage room for herself, preferring solitude to avoid conflict. She met Tan Jinhe when he arrived to transport the new arrivals on a tractor. The young Tan Jinhe was rugged, untamed, and initially hostile to her persistent gaze, warning her not to stare at men. Despite his coldness, Song Ziyao remained determined. She visited his family to order furniture, seeing him eating with his relatives, and resolved to win his affection through patience and care rather than force.

Life in the countryside was harsh. The food was scarce, consisting mainly of coarse grains and rare meat, and the work was physically demanding. Song Ziyao struggled with farm labor, particularly weeding, but she used her dimensional space to maintain her health and appearance, storing food and using the purified water to stay refreshed. She bought her own cooking pot to avoid conflicts over shared resources and began to establish a quiet, independent existence. Meanwhile, Tan Jinhe watched her with growing curiosity, noting her delicate nature but also her unusual composure. The story follows Song Ziyao’s efforts to rebuild her life in 1975, protect herself from her manipulative family, and nurture a relationship with Tan Jinhe before the tragedies of his past could unfold.

As Song Ziyao settled into her role as an educated youth, she navigated the complex social dynamics of the brigade. She avoided the scheming of Liao Hongmei, who sought to exploit her for resources, and maintained a polite distance from others. Her primary focus remained on Tan Jinhe. She observed his interactions with his family, noting the tension between his mother Zhou Kailian and his sisters-in-law. She also recognized that Tan Jinhe, though poor, was a capable and respected figure among the local youth. Song Ziyao began to plan how she could support him, using her knowledge of his future success and her dimensional space’s advantages. She intended to help him improve his living conditions and health, ensuring he would live a long life this time. The narrative establishes her dual mission: to escape the fate of being Lu Ming’s wife and to secure a happy future with Tan Jinhe, all while adapting to the rigorous demands of rural life in 1970s China.