Exile

"Quit playing dead and get up!"

In her groggy haze, Shen Tang felt someone kick her.

As if one kick wasn't enough, the person kept cursing, too.

MD, who kicked me?

She curled up her aching legs and weakly opened her eyes.

The world before her seemed to have its veil of thinly veiled mystery pulled away, shifting from a frosted-glass blur to high-definition clarity.

What happened?

Pain that felt like her head was about to split made her suck in a sharp breath. She stared, dazed, at everything unfamiliar around her.

Wasn't I drinking with someone last night?

She vaguely remembered that halfway through, her editor had called to rush her for the manuscript. She'd had no choice but to force herself through the drunken haze and pick up her drawing brush...

No matter how hard she tried, she couldn't remember anything else.

But one thing was certain: she absolutely shouldn't be in a place like this!

Shen Tang secretly pinched herself hard. The clear sting in her skin shattered her hopes.

Looking at her unfamiliar hands, four words sprang into her mind—

She'd transmigrated!

Along with them came the meaning of "transmigration."

I just don't know if I drank myself to death or worked myself to death pulling an all-nighter.

The more she thought, the more her head hurt, as if a little person inside it were hammering away nonstop. Shen Tang hurriedly stopped.

"Eat up. Once you're done, you can be on your way."

She was clutching her head, trying to soothe the pain, when a tall figure blocked the sunlight above her.

The newcomer wore a pair of straw sandals caked with dark brown mud. He casually tossed her a palm-sized flatbread, its surface charred and rough. It landed in the mud outside her skirt. He didn't care whether Shen Tang would eat a muddy flatbread or not, and simply went on handing them out to the next person.

The next moment, a hand shot out beside her like lightning.

It snatched up the flatbread and withdrew.

Shen Tang was a beat too slow, so she could only turn and look suspiciously.

The thief was a disheveled woman, holding the flatbread in both hands and shoving it into her mouth, like a Reincarnated Hungry Ghost.

Afraid Shen Tang might snatch it back, she didn't even brush the mud off. In no time, she stuffed the whole little flatbread into her mouth, then sucked the crumbs from her fingers as if she still couldn't get enough.

Shen Tang: "..."

Who knew how many days it had been since the woman had washed? Her once glossy black hair was greasy and matted, and a closer look at the exposed scalp revealed a layer of yellowish grime. A careful sniff caught a strange, rank stench coming from her—kind of like the juice you'd get from mashing together a pair of socks left to rot for three to five weeks and a blooming bradford pear. The only thing she had going for her was a set of striking features that grime couldn't quite conceal.

Shen Tang patiently reasoned with her. "Ma'am, that was my flatbread."

But the woman seemed deaf. She paid Shen Tang no mind and smacked her lips, savoring the taste.

Shen Tang now noticed that the woman's knuckles were several shades darker than the rest of her hands. Her throat convulsed uncontrollably.

She wasn't a germaphobe, but being hit with that kind of visual assault from so close made her feel physically sick.

Catching a change in Shen Tang's expression from the corner of her eye, the woman worried that this fool might fly into a rage and hit her, so she scooted her butt in the opposite direction.

That would've been fine if she hadn't moved. But when she did, Shen Tang felt a tug, too.

She looked down at the source of the pull around her waist. It was an extremely thick hemp rope, the very one that had strung her body together with the woman and several other disheveled women of various ages, like grasshoppers tied on a string.

She raised her head and looked all around. As far as she could see, everyone wore coarse hemp prison clothes and looked exhausted. There were old people, the young, women and children—and men, too.

A dozen or so able-bodied young men wore fairly uniform outfits, with sabers hanging from their waists. Some kept watch, while others kept an eye on the prisoners.

Their gazes would occasionally linger a little longer when they passed over young female prisoners with shapely figures.

Th-this—

Had a whole family gotten into trouble and been dragged off to the execution ground to have their names erased from the family register?

It was also possible they were being sent into exile.

The only difference was whether they'd die sooner and be reborn sooner, or die later and be reborn later.

Grrrrr.

Her hungry innards began acting up at the worst possible time, making such a loud noise that even the others could hear.

Shen Tang covered her faintly cramping stomach. Hunger made her mouth water.

The more she swallowed, the more obvious the hunger became—so intense she couldn't ignore it.

Shen Tang frowned inwardly. She could only distract herself from the torment of hunger by focusing on something else. Within her field of vision, a prisoner had eaten too quickly, and the flatbread was dry. It had gotten stuck in his throat. He kept pounding his chest, trying to force it down, his face gradually turning blue.

Everyone else seemed used to it.

No one stepped forward to pat his back or offer him water.

He struggled to kick his legs and crawl toward the guards, stretching out his right hand with all his might to beg for help. But even as he drew his last breath and his right hand fell limply to the ground, the guard still made no move to save him. He kicked the man twice, saw he really was dead, and muttered, "What bad luck!"

He drew the dagger at his waist, bent down, and cut off the man's right ear, near the top. Then he casually tossed it into a filthy cloth bag.

Shen Tang: "..."

"Time to get moving!"

"Get a move on!"

"Get up, or I'll whip you myself!"

The prisoners put their heavy shackles back on.

The women's shackles were small, weighing around thirty-five pounds. The men's were more than a size larger, weighing at least fifty pounds, if not eighty.

As the dozen or so uniformed young men urged them on, they kicked prisoners who were slow to react. If kicking didn't get them up, they went straight to the whip. Their blows were brutal; one lash left a blood-red welt an inch wide, enough to make anyone's hair stand on end.

Shen Tang silently lowered her head and walked, searching for memories belonging to this body.

The results were unfortunate.

Not only had she missed out on a transmigrator's starter pack and the original owner's memories, she'd also been robbed blind. Apart from knowing that her name was Shen Tang, that she had the pen name You Li, that she made a living drawing, and that she feared her editor's deadline reminders, all her other memories were a complete blur!!!

She stole glances at the prisoners and the guards watching them, sighing inwardly: What rotten luck. This is a freaking hell-level start, isn't it?

She was so unlucky that even Misfortune's mother had come knocking—she'd hit rock bottom!

Whatever the starting point, staying alive was what mattered most.

Should she try to escape along the way?

Or follow the group to its destination, then look for a chance to escape?

For now, neither option looked promising.

They traveled beneath the blazing sun, and several more prisoners fainted along the way. It wasn't until the evening glow dyed the horizon that they were finally allowed to rest where they were for the night.

The guards gathered to build a fire. They took dried meat from their packs and boiled it in a pottery urn, then added a little salt to make a pot of meat soup.

This time Shen Tang reacted quickly and managed to keep her flatbread.

She sat down on the ground and chewed the hard, cold flatbread slowly, using her saliva to soften it before swallowing. Meanwhile, she kept her attention on the guards chatting in low voices. Their conversation was scattered, but she could just barely piece together some of the information.

The prisoners were all one family.

Their surname was Gong. No one in the clan had escaped—not even the old and young, or the servants and maids. They'd all been arrested.

They were split into three groups and escorted to their destination in batches.

The men were being sent to the frontier to serve in the army and do hard labor; the women were being sent to the Entertainment Quarter in Xiaocheng.

Shen Tang's group was the second batch. It consisted mostly of womenfolk from Gong Manor and their maids. Among them were the highest-ranking Old Matriarch, several young madams in their prime, beautiful young concubines and secondary wives, children of various ages, and the servants and maids who attended them.

She reckoned that this body was either a maid or one of the children.

A quick check of her bones put her at only eleven or twelve.

Men were branded on the face; women were tattooed behind the ear.

If a prisoner died along the way, they cut off the bit of face or the ear bearing the mark as proof of the death.

She raised a hand to her ear and, sure enough, felt a patch of scabbed blood behind her left ear.

Shen Tang: "...Damn!"

A new book was underway, and I was finally asking for recommendation votes again after all this time.

7.15, setting off once more.