In her previous life, Shen Qinghe starved to death on the road as she fled a famine in its third year. Only as she lay dying did she understand: the disaster had shown signs long ago, and her relatives had traded her little brother for half a sack of coarse rice so they could seize her land deed.
When she opens her eyes again, she is back forty days before the disaster.
Her land deed stolen? She takes it back on the spot. Vicious relatives asking for trouble? She settles every score. The jade pendant on her finger transforms into a space called the "Grain Storehouse," where nothing spoils. She races ahead of everyone to stockpile food, dig wells, and cultivate seeds, turning a dying little village into the one place in a chaotic world where nobody goes hungry.
What she doesn't expect is that the frail scholar staying next door keeps gazing at her granary late at night and softly asking,
"Miss Shen, could you save a place for me in your rice jar, too?"
Later, as the sky falls and the whole county kneels to beg for food, he holds her tight, his eyes red: "They want the grain. I want you."
She smiles and places the key to her space in his palm. "Then live well. Don't let my granary lose its keeper."
This novel and its characters are entirely fictional. Any resemblance to actual people or events is purely coincidental. Do not imitate.
