“Zhou Hanchen!” Old Man Li barked through the cracked doorway. “You are under arrest for capitalist speculation!” Hanchen gripped his thin blanket, the swinging lantern beam catching his rigid posture. Before he could reply, the squad from the grain office, led by the hulking figure of Officer Gao, began tearing through the room. They overturned the wobbly kitchen table, scattering the few dried persimmons Qinyu had been saving. They kicked apart the neat pile of kindling, sending splinters skittering across the packed earth floor. Old Man Li, his thin lips drawn into a tight line, pointed a bony finger at the workbench in the corner. “Search that area thoroughly! I’ve heard whispers of illicit contraptions, radio parts!” Gao’s burly men descended on the workbench. They rummaged through the empty drawers, tossed aside a few rusted screws, and kicked over a bucket filled with tarnished wires. There was a heap of dismantled radio casings, circuit boards ripped clean of their components, and a tangle of defunct antennae. It was all junk, clearly unusable, piled exactly as Hanchen had left it after salvaging for usable parts. They found nothing carrying a live current, nothing that could pass for an assembled unit. Qinyu, nestled deep under her worn quilt, stirred. She peered out, her face a mask of sleepy confusion. “What’s all this racket?” she mumbled, pulling the quilt higher, a slight tremble in her voice. Gao, his neck flushing dark at the lack of findings, stomped toward the sleeping pallet. “Fang Qinyu! Get up! We need to search your sleeping area!” Qinyu blinked slowly, a perfect picture of a woman unwillingly roused. “Search what? I’m resting. My body is weak, and my *HP* will drop below zero.” She coughed softly into her sleeve. “Are you trying to trigger an elimination event, Officer Gao? Is that your protocol?” Her voice, though soft, carried a strange, unyielding stubbornness. The men exchanged uncertain glances. Physically dragging a visibly frail, ‘sickly’ woman from her bed was not a task anyone wanted to perform. The gossip, the shame, the potential accusations of brutality from the women’s federation – it would be a headache of epic proportions. Besides, what could possibly be hidden under a mattress? Gold bars? A whole pig? Hanchen, still sitting on the edge of his pallet, saw a glint in Qinyu’s half-closed eyes that was anything but sleepy. It was a flash of pure, focused determination, a silent promise to make this as difficult as possible. “There’s nothing here, Team Leader,” one of the younger village guards muttered, scuffing his cloth shoes. “Just… her bed.” Gao scowled, sweeping his gaze across the floor and out to the courtyard. Rulan, who had crept in behind the men, stood in the doorway with her grin rapidly thinning. Her jaw set hard as the searchers turned up nothing beyond rusted iron, beginning to drag their feet toward the threshold. “This is ridiculous!” Rulan shrieked, her voice cutting through the waning moonlight. “They’re hiding it! Hanchen is a profiteer! He sold a radio to Li Guozhi! Ask him! Ask my fiancé!” Old Man Li, embarrassed by the fruitless raid and his daughter’s outburst, raised a hand. “We found no proof. We cannot arrest a man on accusations alone, Rulan. Not without evidence.” He shot a withering look at Hanchen. “Consider this a warning, Zhou Hanchen. The commune has eyes everywhere.” With a curt grunt, the search party retreated into the darkness, leaving overturned stools and the sour smell of kerosene smoke in their wake. Rulan remained for a moment, her face contorted, before she, too, stormed away, her furious whispers echoing in the dark. Qinyu finally sat up, pushing the heavy quilt aside. From beneath it, Xiaobo, who had been hiding with the radios, emerged, looking like a startled mouse. He carefully pulled out two perfectly restored radio sets, their polished wooden casings gleaming faintly in the sliver of moonlight, and a small, precise soldering iron, handing them to Hanchen. “Good job, Xiaobo,” Qinyu said, a small, triumphant smile gracing her lips. “Your *stealth* skills are top-notch. Your *stamina bar* is still full.” Hanchen, who had been silently observing, let out a long, shaky breath. He took the radios, placing them gently on the floor. His gaze softened as he looked at Qinyu, then noticed a small, angry red line on her wrist, a scratch from the sharp edge of a radio casing. “You got hurt,” he murmured, reaching out to gently touch her wrist. “When you were hiding them?” Qinyu waved a dismissive hand. “A minor scrape. Nothing my *healing potion* can’t fix.” She looked at him, her eyes surprisingly clear. “They didn’t find anything. We’re safe.” “We’re safe because of you,” Hanchen corrected, his voice low, his fingers still tracing the scratch on her skin. He looked away for a moment, then back at her, a steady gaze that made her pause. “Qinyu, I… I know this marriage was sudden. For convenience. But… I’ve always…” He cleared his throat, his ears turning a tell-tale shade of crimson. “Ever since we were small, I always liked doing your chores. When you’d pretend to have a tummy ache just to get out of weeding the rice paddies, I’d take your hoe and finish your row. When you’d ‘accidentally’ drop your basket of vegetables, I’d pick them all up, even though Old Man Li would grumble.” He met her gaze directly now, his feelings laid bare. “I just… I liked seeing you rest. Liked knowing you weren’t tired. I always wanted to make things easy for you.” Qinyu blinked, a prickle of heat touching the back of her neck. She had always dismissed his childhood actions as the competitive spirit of a rival, or perhaps a misguided sense of obligation. Now, hearing it, seeing the raw honesty in his face, she understood. Her convenient arrangement with Hanchen, the man who had inexplicably married her and worked himself ragged to protect her ‘HP,’ wasn’t just a game of survival. It was a profound, quiet devotion, stretching back further than she could remember. The early morning light, pale and fragile, began to filter through the doorway, painting the ravaged room in hues of soft grey and faint gold. A new, tender warmth bloomed in Qinyu’s chest, a feeling far more potent than any ‘healing potion.’ She reached out, her fingers brushing Hanchen’s arm, a shy, almost imperceptible gesture of acceptance. The quiet intimacy of the moment was shattered by a sharp, authoritative rap on their door. Not the frantic pounding of the Ration Committee, but a measured, resonant knock, followed by a clear, booming voice that spoke with an educated, official cadence. “Is this the residence of Zhou Hanchen? I am Clerk Zhao from the County Industry and Commerce Bureau! I have an urgent matter regarding this device, and I must speak with the mechanic!” A hand, holding aloft a polished, functional radio, appeared in the doorway, glinting in the morning sun.

The Mattress Defense