Su Xiaocai clutched her chest, her heart and lungs burning painfully, making her retch. She had a fever, the worst she'd had in years.
Exhaling a breath of hot air, she felt her body grow even hotter.
Her vision was blurry, even though she was already exhausted, her heels were chafed and blistered, but sheer determination drove her forward.
She couldn't stop; she was surrounded by mountains of garbage with over a dozen hungry creatures chasing after her.
The real Su Xiaocai had died, a five-year-old child, abandoned on the outskirts of the Garbage Star.
She had survived one night by luck, only to die from a cold.
The Su Xiaocai from another Interstellar Era took her place.
When she woke up that morning, she almost got her eyes pecked out by a big crow.
Although Su Xiaocai had become smaller, her reflexes remained; she grabbed the crow's neck with both hands, twisted hard, causing the crow to perish before throwing it away.
Instantly, dozens of birds circling in the sky swooped down, along with rats, ravenously dividing up the carcass.
Su Xiaocai knew she couldn't stay there any longer.
Under the scorching sun, the five-year-old girl walked with uneven steps. She had lost her sense of direction and didn't know which way to go.
All she knew was that if she stopped, the scavengers behind and above her would devour her.
The girl's high fever made those creatures sense that her end was near, closely following her, not wanting to miss out on a rare feast.
As she walked numbly, Su Xiaocai suddenly saw an illusion — a girl her age standing before her with malice in her eyes, "Since you don't care, then give me all your things."
Perhaps it was the influence of the original body's memory, for Su Xiaocai was sure she had never met that girl.
But she hadn't inherited the original body's memories, she only knew that the original body hadn't lived a great life, as evidenced by the calluses on her hands.
There was no energy for Su Xiaocai to think more; she stumbled to dodge a swooping crow and just happened to see a building ahead.
Su Xiaocai was delighted but hesitated as she sped up. Could people surviving in the boundless mountains of garbage be trusted?
This body was only five years old...
Yes, only five years old. If she hesitated any longer, she might die.
When you're dead, you have nothing.
Better save herself first.
A man with a broken arm appeared in her line of sight,
The man saw her too and was about to scold her as she kept approaching.
"Daddy."
The man with the broken arm: Unexpectedly gained a child!
Su Xiaocai hugged his leg tightly; she could only gamble that he wouldn't kick her away.
Su Xiaocai was left with no options; she wanted to live. In her past life, she had died miserably, besieged by aliens; being torn to pieces was not too much to say.
In this life, having taken the place of a young girl, becoming younger, she wanted to live even more.
There was another friend beside the man with a broken arm, who tried to suppress a laugh, "When did you get a daughter? Spent the night with a beauty, did you?"
"I've never even been with a woman, where would I get a daughter?" The man with the broken arm frowned, wanting to push the girl away, but as soon as he touched her, she collapsed softly.
"Hey, wake up." The man with the broken arm touched her forehead, shocked by the high fever, "Quick, save her."
From then on, Su Xiaocai clung onto the man with the broken arm's leg.
The man with the broken arm had intended to send her away, but she was an orphan, and for some reason, the original orphanage refused to take her back.
There was no way around it; Su Xiaocai had accepted him, so he had to take on this trouble, completing the paperwork to adopt her.
...
Ten years later.
On a remote star far from the Garbage Star, with a favorable climate, where plants were abundant.
Every year, many tourists came to visit, and some biologists came to collect flora and fauna samples for research.
Apart from wild plants, thousands of acres of grain and orchards were cultivated here.
At this moment, at the edge of the orchard, a hideous mecha seemingly cobbled together was parked, its hatch open, and a girl jumped down without any precaution.
Witnessing everything, Daddy Su flew into a rage, "Su Xiaocai, are you tired of living?"
The girl turned her head, startled, and quickly ran.
Unfortunately, it was too late, and she received two lashes from a vine.
"Daddy, I'm already sixteen, soon going to university, I'm trying to earn for the family, why still beat me?"
Daddy Su retorted angrily, "It's only a profit if you didn't drown my medicinal orchids."
Having a fiery temper, Daddy Su's demeanor had been mellowed by raising Su Xiaocai.
After all, he used to discipline children with steel pipes.
But Su Xiaocai was always up to some fresh mischief, and running with a steel pipe was impractical, the vine was lighter and didn't require holding back.
Su Xiaocai forced a laugh, sheepishly moved around to the back of the mecha to change the energy source. After replacing it, she climbed back up and used the mecha to deftly pick fruits with actions beyond ordinary reach, harvesting perfectly intact fruit.
"Why did you pick the agriculture department instead of the mecha department, which would've been much better?" Daddy Su, also surnamed Su, was an advanced maintenance master, betrayed by a friend, resulting in the loss of an arm in battle, leading him to use his savings to purchase this small star in despondency.
For ten years, he had lived with Su Xiaocai here, leading a farmer's life from sunrise to sunset.
They didn't earn much money, and they definitely couldn't afford high-performance mechas, so the robots and mechas in the fields were creations from second-hand parts or raw materials combined by Su Xiaocai and Daddy Su.
"Tonight's your fifteenth birthday, did you read the Qi Cultivation tutorial online? Remember to practice if you did, don't assume that being a farmer means you don't need martial skills, practicing more is beneficial and can protect yourself."
During the Interstellar Era, martial arts thrived.
The backstory was, more than twenty years ago, when high-performance mechas were newly available on the market, people found them difficult to maneuver flexibly, requiring sufficient martial prowess.
Thus, the military, who had been using mechas for a considerable time, released online tutorials for the public to train themselves.
However, the newly developed qi mechanism training could only be practiced at fifteen, as starting too early could affect physical development.
During childhood, learning martial arts techniques could be beneficial, allowing one to achieve double the results with half the effort once practicing the qi mechanism at fifteen.
Hearing Daddy Su's instructions, Su Xiaocai felt guilty and nodded vigorously.
In truth, she had memorized the tutorial and had already cultivated the qi mechanism; it wasn't that she wanted to, but while following the tutorial online at twelve, she inexplicably unblocked her "governor and conception vessels" and generated qi sensing within.
Still only 1.6 meters tall to this day, she suspected it was the development issue the military mentioned, firmly believing there was no other explanation.
Surely not her own reckless doings.
She hadn't told Daddy Su about cultivating qi sensing to avoid yet another lecture about not choosing the mecha department.
Daddy Su was somewhat skeptical but didn't pursue it, going to haggle prices with the merchants.
After the fruit was picked, it was the merchants who came to pick them up in person.
Su Family's fruits and vegetables lacked reputation externally but were quite popular among merchants; the Su Family raised many chickens, ducks, geese, pigs, cows, and sheep, preferring to use organic fertilizer when planting.
The benefit of using organic fertilizer was the better taste of the fruits and vegetables; the downside was that it attracted pests easily.
But Su Xiaocai disliked using pesticides, so the small robots in the fields were designated to chase and catch pests.