Half an hour later, with five hundred dollars tucked against my skin, I walked out of Village Chief Abbott's front door.
I turned back and glanced at the Fox family's run-down courtyard. Jade was inside trying on her wedding dress, grinning like an idiot.
Sis, I'm taking the money you sold your life for and heading to Seaview City to become the richest woman alive.
You shouldn't be idle either—hurry up and get to that crappy thatched hut and dig your gold.
Early the next morning, before dawn even broke, the village came alive.
On one side, the Fox family was marrying off a daughter. On the other, the village chief's son was heading to the city.
Jade wore a red cotton jacket that had been taken in to fit her, face painted up like a monkey's backside, beaming as she climbed onto Quinn Mason's borrowed flatbed cart. Quinn limped alongside it, face full of stubble, eyes so dark and hollow it sent chills down your spine.
In my last life, it took two years of patience and gentleness to thaw that block of ice. I'd coaxed him off the bottle. Taught him to read.
This life? With someone as pampered and spoiled as Jade, she'd be lucky not to make things worse.
As she passed me, Jade lowered her voice to a whisper only we could hear. "Evelyn, you can relax and go work at your little factory. When you strike it rich someday, I'll burn paper money for your grave."
I laughed—brighter than her.
"Thanks for the kind words. Hope you dig up exactly what you're looking for."
Firecrackers split the air.
The village chief's place was even louder—gongs, drums, the whole production. Derek Lambert sat on a tractor bound for the county seat, a big red flower pinned to his chest, looking smug as hell. The whole village seethed with envy.
Only I knew that tractor was a hearse headed straight for hell.
I slung a small cloth bundle over my shoulder and slipped away through the chaos toward the train station.
The five hundred dollars was sewn into my underwear, digging into my skin. Uncomfortable as hell. But it made me feel untouchable.
The green train rattled and clanked. The car reeked of sweat, feet, and cheap tobacco. I squeezed into the aisle by the restroom door, watching the fields blur past the window.
Two words pounded in my chest: Seaview City.
These days, the bold choke on their own ambition; the timid starve. I knew exactly what seismic shifts would rock this land over the next thirty years.
Half a month later, I stood on Border Market Street in Sha Tau Kok District.
This place was a special zone within a special zone—an adventurer's paradise. I didn't rush to start flipping goods. First, I watched. Three full days.
Digital watches.
Those flashy little things that lit up when you pressed them—over in the Harbor District, they were street-stall junk. A few bucks each. But inland? You could flip them for twenty, thirty, even forty or fifty.
Massive margins.
I went all-in with my five hundred—digital watches and a batch of Harbor-brand shirts.
It was around then that news came from back home. I heard it from a fellow villager who'd come to Seaview City to buy goods.
"God, it's awful. Just awful." He shook his head, gnawing on a stick of sugarcane. "That state-run factory—the boiler room blew up. Word is the new guy violated protocol. Was even smoking inside."
My heart lurched. Derek's smoking habit was legendary.
"What happened to him? Dead?" I asked.
"Not quite dead, but close enough." He spat out a wad of pulp. "Both legs blown clean off. Face burned so bad it doesn't look human anymore. Heard the old couple at the village chief's place cried themselves unconscious."
I took a silent sip of soda.
If I hadn't sold that slot, the one lying in that hospital bed—legless, faceless—would be me.
Or the Jade Fox of my last life.
Fate. Sometimes it really does come down to a single choice.
So what about Jade now?
She was probably ordering Quinn around, making him dig for gold.
