"Where is this?"
Ye Hao opened his eyes groggily, his face filled with confusion as he gazed at the surrounding buildings, which resembled a dilapidated temple.
His mind was a muddled mess, and then a sharp pain suddenly shot through the depths of his brain, causing Ye Hao to fall into a coma again.
In the pitch-black room, Ye Hao slowly regained consciousness, immediately understanding his situation. He had been reborn, reborn into the 1960s of a parallel world, a world with many similarities and many differences from his previous life. The original owner was also named Ye Hao, an orphan from a young age, adopted during that chaotic era.
But good times didn't last long; the war caused the family who adopted Ye Hao to become refugees. During their escape, his adoptive father gave Ye Hao his last bit of food, but he himself collapsed on the escape route. Ye Hao was only 6 years old that year.
Later, he survived by begging all the way to the current City, thinking that begging in the City might be easier, but he didn't realize that the country had just been established and everything was in ruins; life was hard everywhere.
Because he had always lived by begging, he missed the first household registration, so now he could only live in a dilapidated temple in the City suburbs.
"What kind of divine start is this? In my last life, I was a lone star of calamity, and in this life, I'm still a damned lone star of calamity. God, since you've let me be reborn, don't ask for royalty or great wealth, but at least give me a commoner's family, with a house and land. How am I, a 21st-century wage slave, supposed to survive in this famine era?!"
Grrrrumble~~~
A wave of hunger came from his belly, and only then did Ye Hao remember that the original owner had left this world due to hunger, giving him the opportunity to take over.
"Where am I supposed to find food in the middle of the night? Am I going to be the first reborn person to starve to death right after being reborn?"
Ye Hao stumbled out of his dwelling. Fortunately, it wasn't severe winter; there was only hunger, no hunger and cold.
But it was late at night, and he had no money. Where could he find food?
Recalling the original owner's memories, he thought about where he might find food, and a place that might have food came to mind: a small stream.
Fortunately, the stream was not far from the dilapidated temple where he lived. Following the original owner's memories, Ye Hao fumbled his way to the stream bank under the moonlight.
The first thing he did upon reaching the stream was to lie on the bank and gulp down several mouthfuls of water, which eased the cramping in his stomach. In the original owner's memory, this small stream had fish, shrimp, and crabs, but they were rare and small, and without tools, it was difficult to catch them on a large scale. But at this moment, Ye Hao couldn't care less; it was better than starving to death.
With the idea of treating a dead horse as if it were alive, Ye Hao directly stepped into the water. Under the moonlight, he moved a stone, and his luck was pretty good; he had a catch on his first try. Although it was only a crab the size of a coin, Ye Hao couldn't care less at this moment; he directly put it into his mouth, chewed twice, and swallowed it.
A good start is half the battle. Ye Hao continued to move stones, but it seemed his luck had run out. After moving several more stones, he didn't see a single crab. He did see a few small fish fry, but with Ye Hao's current weakness and no tools in hand, catching these small fish fry was still a bit difficult.
With no continuous harvest, Ye Hao grew anxious. The cramping in his stomach told him he couldn't last much longer. Keep moving, move hard; if he didn't find food, he would starve to death. Hunger made Ye Hao's body increasingly weak; he couldn't move large stones, and small stones yielded no harvest.
Perhaps Heaven didn't want to see the newly reborn Ye Hao starve to death. After moving several stones without success, he finally had a harvest. After moving a basketball-sized stone, two crabs about the same size as the previous one were hiding underneath. Ye Hao was overjoyed and, with lightning speed, caught the two poor little crabs.
Chicken flavor, crispy-crunchy~~~
He finally came back to life.
With two crabs in his stomach, the feeling of hunger finally subsided a little.
This also brought Ye Hao hope for survival. For the rest of the time, Ye Hao moved every stone he could see, harvesting a total of four crabs of varying sizes. The smallest two were only the size of a five-jiao coin in later generations, the largest one was egg-sized, and another was the same size as the previous ones, a one-yuan coin size.
After eating three smaller crabs raw, the protests from his stomach weren't as strong. He still hesitated to eat the last, larger one raw.
Fortunately, he wasn't as hungry anymore, so Ye Hao prepared to go back and make a fire to roast it.
Since he was going to roast it, he couldn't just roast this one. Ye Hao planned to catch a few more to have a full meal when he got back.
Ye Hao broke off a slender willow branch from a nearby weeping willow tree and tied up the crab in his hand to prevent it from escaping.
He also broke off a few more branches from the tree for later use.
Fortunately, with something in his stomach, Ye Hao had regained some strength. "Since the small stones nearby have all been moved, I can only move the large ones. If there are egg-sized crabs under small stones, there must be even larger crabs under big stones. Even if I only catch a few egg-sized ones, it'll still fill my belly." Ye Hao thought.
Thinking it, he did it. Rolling up his sleeves and getting to work, Ye Hao pushed aside two large stones, only to see a loach, which then escaped.
Ye Hao wasn't discouraged and continued to push stones.
Those the size of coins, he ate raw directly. Those slightly larger, he tied with willow branches and threw onto the bank.
Engrossed in his work, Ye Hao lost track of time until a sliver of dawn appeared in the east, and he finally awoke from his busy state.
"The harvest is quite substantial."
Ye Hao grabbed the last large crab he caught and went ashore. The City in spring was still a bit cold, but Ye Hao was sweating profusely from exhaustion, having moved stones for several hours. Ye Hao tallied his night's harvest: including the one he caught earlier, there were 5 egg-sized crabs, 3 adult-fist-sized ones, and one adult-palm-sized one. As for the coin-sized ones, Ye Hao had eaten them raw as snacks.
All the crabs were tied with willow branches, so he wasn't afraid of being pinched or them escaping.
Ye Hao strung all the crabs together with willow branches, humming, "Today is a good day, everything you wish for will come true, today is a good day. Open the door and welcome the spring breeze..." He walked towards the dilapidated temple with an arrogant swagger.
Back at the dilapidated temple, he took out the matches the original owner had treasured. This box of matches was given to him by a kind old woman who felt sorry for him during the coldest winter last year. The original owner had always been reluctant to use them.
Every time the original owner went out to beg, he would add firewood to the fire, fearing it would go out, as matches were not easy to obtain in that era. Since the 1950s, various coupons had been used, and with the original owner's circumstances, he had no chance of getting these coupons.
This was also one of the few possessions the original owner left for Ye Hao.
Ye Hao threw the crabs aside and went outside to gather some dry branches. He also took a handful of dry thatch from where he slept to use as kindling.
With the fire lit, Ye Hao first took out a treasured tin can. This was the original owner's "pot" for boiling water and cooking. This "pot" was secretly brought to him by a sympathetic little girl from a large compound in the City two years ago when he was begging. However, the original owner had always been reluctant to eat the beef in the can until that winter when he almost starved to death. He finally ate it then. It was the first time the original owner had ever tasted beef, and the flavor was unforgettable for a lifetime. Ye Hao, inheriting the original owner's memories, couldn't help but salivate at the thought.
Ye Hao took the can to the stream and filled it with water. After all, it wasn't like when he had just been reborn; Chinese people, if they had the conditions, still preferred to drink boiled water.
While the water was boiling, Ye Hao began to process the harvested crabs. To "process" them simply meant to stun them so they wouldn't run around, as there were no other conditions, so he could only roast them directly.
Ye Hao took out the smallest of the processed crabs and put it into the "pot," preparing to make a crab soup. The largest one remained untouched, and the rest were prepared for roasting. He had been hungry for too long and couldn't eat too much, as his stomach might not be able to handle it.
Ye Hao found a stone slab and a few stones in the dilapidated temple, propped the slab over the fire, and let it heat up. Once the slab was hot, he placed the crabs on it to roast slowly.
After twenty minutes, the crabs were almost cooked. Ye Hao impatiently moved the crabs into his usual begging bowl. Unable to wait for them to cool, Ye Hao grabbed a crab and bit into it, the heat making him jump up from the ground. Even so, Ye Hao didn't let go; he was simply too afraid of hunger.
The despair of that hunger, those who haven't experienced it will never know.
Although no seasonings were added to these crabs, Ye Hao ate them with great satisfaction.
After eating a few crabs and drinking a few mouthfuls of crab soup, even though the soup had no seasonings, Ye Hao found it exceptionally fresh and sweet, letting out a satisfied burp.
Full and content, Ye Hao began to consider his next steps. First, he needed to get an identity. Without an identity in this era, he could only live as a wild person in the mountains or a beggar in the City, neither of which Ye Hao wanted.
There were quite a few unregistered people in this era, so he should be able to get an identity at the Street Office. Then, he would have to think about what to do next.
Perhaps it was because he hadn't slept all night and had been busy all night, but Ye Hao drifted off to sleep while thinking.
In his dream, he returned to modern society, without worries about food or clothing. Although it was 996, he no longer had to experience the feeling of hunger.
When Ye Hao opened his eyes again, the sun was already setting. The matter of getting an identity would have to wait until tomorrow.
Ye Hao checked the campfire and found that it had long since extinguished. He went out again to find some firewood and rekindled the fire.
When Ye Hao went to roast the remaining crab from the morning, he found that this large crab was still alive and quite energetic.
As Ye Hao untied the willow branch, intending to stun it for roasting, the crab seemed to know its impending fate of being eaten. It fought back, its large pincers clamping directly onto Ye Hao's left thumb. Ye Hao cried out in pain and quickly tried to pull the crab off. But the crab clamped down harder. Ye Hao, in a panic, violently shook his left hand, and the crab finally came off, but a small piece of skin was torn from Ye Hao's hand by the crab, and blood flowed from the wound.
Seeing that not much blood was flowing, Ye Hao didn't bother with the wound, nor did he have the means to treat it.
He looked back at the agitated crab and found that it was either dead or stunned from being thrown, as it was completely motionless. Ye Hao picked up the crab, briefly rinsed it by the stream, and then returned to continue roasting it.
After eating the roasted crab, Ye Hao decided to wash up by the stream, as he needed to go to the Street Office tomorrow and couldn't be too disheveled.
By the river, using the stream water, Ye Hao also saw his appearance after rebirth: a sallow complexion and dry hair, clearly due to long-term malnutrition. However, his facial features were still good, and with proper nutrition, he should become a handsome young man.