Siheyuan: From the Start, I Arrived Before Liberation

In his previous life, Lin Yuan was a chef at a small restaurant. He’d spent half his life tossing a wok but hadn’t saved a single cent. Most of his earnings went to “a gambling-addicted father, a sick mother, a younger brother in school, and a broken family.” If I don’t help her, who will? Love begins with the chime and lingers when it stops...

When he woke, he found himself in the countryside outside Beiping in 1948.

This time, he didn’t want to be just a cook.

He’d “borrow” gold from collaborators and “take” silver dollars from rich landlords, quietly making a fortune.

He’d settle in a courtyard house and seek refuge with his maternal uncle, He Daqing, learning his trade and experiencing life in the 1940s and 1950s.

In this life, if Silly Zhu doesn’t keep supporting Jia Dongxu, and Jia Dongxu doesn’t die, will he properly care for Yi Zhonghai in his old age?

With the times about to change and a storm on the horizon, Lin Yuan made a bold decision:

Before 1966, he would head south to Hong Kong.

Years later, he returned to the courtyard with his wealth and his stories, and pushed open that weathered wooden door.

The people who once lived in the same courtyard had all grown old.