The world was a suffocating pressure of damp wood and gritty earth. Zhai Ruoxue, or what was left of her in this cramped darkness, registered the chilling bite of the Mud-Brack Village earth through thin grave-clothes. A dull thud above her head sent a shower of soil sifting through a crack, landing on her face, tasting like grit and decay. She couldn't move. Her chest felt like a collapsed lung, each shallow breath a ragged whisper against the coffin lid. Then, voices, muffled but clear enough to pierce the delirium. A raspy female voice, sharp as a winter wind, sliced through the gloom. "Are you sure she’s properly... gone? The last thing we need is a walking corpse scaring the pigs." Another voice, deeper, weary, replied, "She hadn't stirred in two days, Xifeng. And that cough, like tearing cloth. The fever took her, just like Old Man Luo's wife." Ruoxue’s mind, once a repository of archival records and historical data, struggled to process this. She wasn't just in a box; she was *in a box, underground*. And these people, her supposed family, were burying her alive. The new, frail body convulsed, a silent scream clawing at her throat. This wasn't the air-conditioned calm of the National Museum. This was a nightmare of cold, brutal practicality. "Good," the first voice, Guan Xifeng, Lu Jianyu's mother, snapped. "Her winter stipend is as good as ours now. A pity they only gave her coarse millet. But it’s enough to see us through another fortnight, perhaps." *Stipend?* The word detonated in Ruoxue’s mind. They were burying her, not out of grief, but for a handful of grain. A raw, visceral fury, alien yet potent, surged through her. It was then, as the last shovelful of dirt rained down with a hollow *thump*, that something shifted. The museum curator’s calm resolve, hardened by years of navigating academic politics and preserving fragile history, fused with the new body's frantic will to survive. She would not die here, not for a sack of millet. With a violent wrench of her shoulders, Ruoxue channeled every ounce of borrowed strength. The thin coffin wood groaned, a splintering shriek echoing in the confined space. Another surge, a primal roar tearing from her throat, and the lid buckled, then gave way. Earth and splinters rained onto her face as she pushed upwards, gasping for air, her fingers scrabbling at the mud. The cold bite of the autumn air was a shock, a sudden, violent jolt to her starved lungs. She broke free, a mud-streaked specter clawing her way out of the shallow grave. Her hair was matted with soil, her eyes, wide and blazing, stared into the fading light of the Iron Blossom Era dusk. Guan Xifeng, a gaunt woman with a face etched by famine and resentment, dropped her shovel with a metallic clatter. Her sunken eyes went rigid with shock. Her husband, Lu Pingbo, a man whose spine seemed permanently bent under an invisible burden, stumbled backward, a strangled gasp escaping his lips. "Ghost!" Guan Xifeng shrieked, pointing a trembling finger. "She’s come back!" Ruoxue, still half-buried, her new body shaking uncontrollably, pushed herself fully upright. Her breath came in ragged gasps, but the sight of their terror was a bitter balm. Her genuine kindness, a flaw that made her ache at the slightest injustice, welled up alongside a calculated cunning she hadn't known she possessed. She *should* be furious. She *was* furious. But they were also starving, just like everyone else. “Mother… Father…” Her voice rasped, raw from disuse and the cold. A genuine tear, born of the original Zhai Ruoxue’s overwhelming empathy for the suffering of others, traced a clean path through the grime on her cheek. “I… I know you meant well. The famine… it tries us all.” She extended a trembling hand, indicating a coarse burlap sack lying near the grave. "My rations… take them. Please. Don’t starve.” Guan Xifeng eyed the sack, then Ruoxue, her fear warring with her greed. The sight of the 'ghost wife' openly weeping for *them* was disorienting. Slowly, cautiously, Guan Xifeng snatched the sack. Her fingers tightened around the rough fabric, a greedy, feral grip. Ruoxue watched, her empathetic tears still flowing, but a cold, hard knot of satisfaction tightened in her stomach. Inside that sack, hidden beneath a paltry layer of millet, were forbidden mechanical blueprints – Lu Jianyu’s last failed attempt to send a message to the outside, a message the purges would deem treasonous. She had found them while packing her few belongings, anticipating a forced relocation, not a premature burial. Their greed would now seal their doom. With a strength that felt borrowed, Ruoxue stumbled away from the gravesite, her legs wobbling like a newborn fawn’s. She heard the in-laws whispering frantically behind her, debating if the ghost wife was truly gone, if the grain was cursed. The village path was overgrown, leading into the skeletal woods. A faint whimpering sound, thin and muffled, caught her attention. Under a gnarled blackthorn bush, a small creature, no bigger than a kitten, thrashed weakly. It was a fox, its fur the color of twilight mist, and shockingly, it had three distinct tails, one tangled in a crudely fashioned snare. Its eyes, the color of polished jade, met hers, brimming with fear and pain. Ruoxue’s heart, despite the lingering trauma of her own near-death, twisted with an agonizing empathy. “Oh, you poor thing,” she murmured, dropping to her knees, ignoring the sharp pain in her chest. She carefully unpicked the rusted wire, her fingers clumsy but determined. The fox nipped at her, a weak, frightened gesture, but then, as the snare loosened, it licked her hand. The air hummed against her skin like vibrating wire. The fox, now free, nudged her palm with its soft muzzle, then vanished into the undergrowth with a silent leap. As the fox disappeared, a strange sensation bloomed in Ruoxue’s mind – a vast, dusty storeroom filled with ancient, impossible artifacts, bathed in an otherworldly glow. It was gone as quickly as it came, leaving behind a faint, sweet aroma of aged paper and iron. Suddenly, the distant sound of heavy boots on the village path, accompanied by angry shouts, shattered the quiet. “Open up! Militia! We have intel on subversive materials!” Ruoxue knew. She just *knew*. Her in-laws’ small dwelling, a hovel barely larger than a chicken coop, would soon be overflowing with uniformed men. She closed her eyes, picturing the blueprints. The Iron Blossom Era militia showed no mercy for those who harbored ‘treasonous’ knowledge. As the first crash of a splintering door echoed through the night, a searing heat erupted in Ruoxue’s left hand. She looked down. Her palm, still smudged with grave dirt, was now stained with a spreading bloom of blood-red ink. A brittle, yellowed receipt, its edges singed, had materialized there, its impossible script bleeding into her skin. [Transaction Complete: One Soul-Bound Debt Forged.] [Reward: One Pristine Ration (Instant Noodle Cup – Spicy Beef Flavor).] [Penalty: 0.5% Life Force & 0.1% Memory Fragment (Childhood memory of the smell of freshly baked bread) Absorbed.]

The Premature Burial