Chapter 1

The setting sun cast its golden glow upon the stone-paved road.

Su Xiaoqi walked along the stone-paved road, her head lowered. There were two small shops by the roadside, and no matter the time, there were always people idling there. She hurried past, avoiding looking at the people, afraid that someone might greet her.

As she neared home, she lifted her head slightly, and her steps became lighter.

However, to her surprise, a middle-aged man approached her from the opposite direction, carrying a hoe. Without waiting for her to greet him, he shouted, "Oh, Su Lame's daughter is back. They say you went to get your acceptance letter. Did you get it?"

Su Xiaoqi's face quickly flushed red.

She didn't like it when people called her father "Lame Su." Even though the villagers probably didn't mean any harm by giving him that nickname, she didn't like it.

"Hello, Uncle Li. Yes, I got it," she replied.

"Wow, impressive! You're the first college student from our village." The man spoke loudly, putting down the hoe on his shoulder and acting as if he wanted to chat in the middle of the road.

Xiaoqi felt embarrassed and anxious that he might strike up a conversation with her. She quickly said, "I still have chores to do at home, Uncle Li. I'll go back first."

She walked home without looking back, practically running.

She didn't want to show off. Although she was the only one in the village attending a prestigious high school, her college entrance exam score was only 42 points above the minimum requirement for the second-tier universities. She didn't make it into any of the schools she applied to and was reassigned to a private second-tier university. The tuition fee stated in the acceptance letter was more than three times that of a regular university, far beyond her family's means.

She could hear people gathering around Uncle Li behind her, saying things like, "The lame man's daughter is a college student. Impressive..." She felt even more ashamed.

Her father was one of the few in the village who had completed middle school and was educated. However, he had difficulty walking due to a shorter right leg, which made him limp. He was also short and physically weaker for farm work. Moreover, she was the only daughter in the family, which some people viewed as a disadvantage.

Fortunately, she had good grades and attended a prestigious high school in the city, which made her parents proud.

When others mentioned not having a son, her father would reply with a smile, "My daughter is a good girl."

Her mother, on the other hand, had a more assertive personality and would retort loudly, "My Xiaoqi can study and work hard. She'll have a better life than sons in the future."

But this time, her college entrance exam results were unexpectedly below the minimum requirement. She performed much worse than usual.

She rushed back home in a state of panic.

She ran a few steps, gasping for breath. Her father, who had received the acceptance letter, didn't go out to show it off as usual. He just looked at the letter silently, chopping firewood in the yard.

Her mother was cutting wild vegetables in the backyard. After chopping them into small pieces, she put them in the pot to cook. They had three pigs at home, and her mother took care of them meticulously. Originally, they planned to sell the pigs before their child went to college to gather enough money for tuition and other expenses.

Both her parents were farmers with no fixed income or salary.

They had thought that raising more pigs would bring in more money.

But now, with the tuition fee of over 10,000 yuan per semester, her father couldn't earn that much money in a year.

On top of that, there were living expenses. Where would they get the money?

After Su Xiaoqi arrived home, she looked at her parents' expressions and wanted to help, but was sent back to her room.

"Go back and study. You can't slack off even when you go to college," Su's father said.

At that moment, Su Xiaoqi felt her eyes welling up with tears.

Although she grew up in the countryside, she hardly did any heavy work.

Her so-called "studying" often involved reading novels and other extracurricular books, which her parents considered important and took joy in seeing their daughter read.

"Maybe I should retake the college entrance exam!" These words rolled around in her mind but never made it past her lips.

Tears started to flow instead.

She didn't want to retake the exam.

She was scared and tired of everything in front of her.

Su's father was a kind-hearted man with a limp, always helping others with their work. He was often ridiculed in the village, and his pride and dignity relied solely on his daughter's ability to study.

If she retakes the exam, all of that would cease to exist, and she could imagine how the villagers would mock her parents.

But her family couldn't afford the tuition fees.

Compared to the lack of money, everything she experienced at school yesterday seemed like child's play.

In her senior year of high school, she had developed feelings for a boy in her class. They did homework and studied together, smiled when they saw each other, and missed each other when they were apart.

Both of them had good grades, and the teachers didn't say much because they knew that at this age, the more they tried to stop them, the more rebellious they would become.

She and the boy had agreed to attend the same university, Shida University in the capital.

Yesterday, she went to pick up her admission letter, and he got in, but she didn't.

They didn't even say anything to each other or exchange contact information. They wouldn't see each other again. She returned to her bedroom, her own separate bedroom. It had no glass windows because they couldn't afford them after building the frame of the house. The windows were covered with plastic sheets, making the room hot and stuffy in the summer. She lay on the bed.

There was a small mirror on the bedside table, bought for two yuan from a shop.

It was blue.

She opened the mirror and saw a girl with a melon seed-shaped face, fair skin, and black hair wearing large black-framed glasses.

That was her.

She was considered pretty, but she felt out of place among the other villagers. She heard people mocking her for being aloof.

She wasn't aloof.

She just didn't know how to interact with the people in the village after going to school.

Now, she didn't know what her future held.

Should she go to this university or retake the exam?

She fell asleep in a daze and woke up covered in sweat. There were no glass windows, and air conditioning was out of the question.

When she heard her mother calling her for dinner, she went downstairs.

During dinner, she casually said, "Mom and Dad, maybe I should retake the exam. I didn't do well this time."

Her father didn't immediately respond.

"Go to college, don't retake the exam. I made some calls, and that university you got into, the employment rate is high. We can figure out a way to borrow some money. Don't worry about the finances."

These words came from her father, who had always seemed indecisive and lacking ideas.

His voice was soft, with a mouthful of food, and a bit unclear.

Su Xiaoqi murmured in agreement.

She lowered her head and ate her meal, and once again, tears welled up in her eyes.

The rice, now slightly salty with tears, was being consumed by her when suddenly a voice echoed in her ears.

"Matching host detected. Binding with host in progress. Binding successful. Congratulations to the host for successfully binding with the Level 1 Progress System. This system is a lifelong system, and the binding will be released upon the host's death. The host will receive 0.1 yuan for every step taken, with a maximum limit of ten thousand steps."

Su Xiaoqi paused for a moment, and then her recently graduated-from-high-school mind started calculating. Walking ten thousand steps a day would earn her one thousand yuan? Was she going crazy, obsessing over money?

"Mom, Dad, do you hear any sound?"

Both her parents were holding their bowls, a little puzzled. They couldn't hear any sound.

"No sound. Let's eat, finish up and go for a walk outside. You can also meet up with your classmates. Don't stay cooped up in the house all the time," Su's mom spoke up.