To Be the Male Lead's Deceased First Wife in a Historical Chinese Exam-focused Novel - Chapter 1

Chapter 1: I Became the Dead Ex-Wife

Yan An opened her eyes and stared blankly at the thatched roof above her. Her mind was in a daze, and she couldn’t yet understand what had happened.

The last thing she remembered before losing consciousness was being hit by a car and watching both of her shoes fly off.

They say that one shoe represents half a life. With both shoes flying off, it seemed she was completely and utterly dead.

So what was going on with her now?

Yan An thought this and turned her head, looking over the room. A feeling of being choked spread over her.

The walls of the entire room were made of mud, and they had probably been there for many years. The whole place looked grey and dusty, and there were barely any pieces of furniture. Aside from the bed she was lying on, there was only a grey, old wardrobe in the northwest corner. Other than that, the house was destitute.

As Yan An tried to sit up, her body felt weak and she lay back down.

It seemed she had been lying down for too long and had no strength left.

Just as she was pondering what was going on, the wooden door of the room creaked open. A young woman entered, carrying a basin of water. She was wearing a faded, purplish-red coarse cloth dress. Her face was expressionless, and her whole body had a numb aura about it.

But the moment Yan An saw her, she was completely stunned. The thought of transmigration that was already in her mind became even more certain.

Not only had she transmigrated, but it was also clear that the original owner of this body was not from a well-off family!

Wen Ying, who had brought in the water to help clean Yan An’s body, saw that she had opened her eyes. The hand holding the basin trembled, and her footsteps quickened. She first placed the basin on the ground, then carefully checked on Yan An’s condition.

“My wife, you’re awake. Is there anywhere else you’re not feeling well?”

Yan An stared blankly at the woman in front of her, who still had a youthful face. Her mind was racing, trying to figure out what to do.

My wife? Was that the original owner’s name?

“I…” The moment she spoke, a hoarseness in her voice made Yan An frown. Her entire throat felt like a cracked riverbed scorched by the sun. Every word felt like a knife dragging across it.

Wen Ying immediately understood the situation. She turned and walked out quickly. Not long after, she came back with a chipped bowl and helped Yan An sit up to feed her water.

After a whole bowl of water, Yan An finally felt much better and started to regain some strength.

“Ahem, I… what happened to me? I don’t remember you.” Yan An coughed to ease the discomfort in her throat, not forgetting to finish what she had started to say earlier.

Given the current situation, only feigning amnesia could explain everything.

Wen Ying’s hand holding the bowl paused. After letting Yan An lean against the head of the bed, she sat down directly on the edge. She stared at Yan An for a while. Seeing her utterly confused and seemingly genuine expression, her usually stoic face finally showed some change.

“My name is Wen Ying.”

The woman’s voice wasn’t clear like a bell, but it had a sense of calmness that didn’t match her young appearance. It subconsciously made one feel that she was reliable and someone to get along with.

“Ah?”

Yan An’s eyes widened instantly.

Wen Ying slightly furrowed her brows and looked at Yan An with a puzzled expression. Didn’t she say she didn’t remember me? Why is she so agitated after hearing my name?

Yan An’s expression was a little stiff. “Which characters?”

It can’t be the same characters I’m thinking of, can it?

“The Wen from temperature and the Ying from jade,” Wen Ying said in a flat tone.

Yan An: “…”

She stared blankly at the young woman, who looked to be around seventeen or eighteen, and her mind went back to the novel she had been reading on her phone before the car accident.

She had been reading a novel about the imperial examinations, with Wen Ying as the protagonist. In the novel, Wen Ying’s family married her off to a female xiucai as a wife. But the xiucai didn’t like her and even looked down on her. However, this life didn’t last long. The xiucai failed the exams, drank her sorrows away, and drowned in a river on her way back to the village.

From there, Wen Ying’s life took a turn. With no one to hold her back, she used the books the xiucai left behind to pursue her own education, eventually achieving a brilliant life.

Most importantly, the drowned female xiucai, Wen Ying’s early-deceased ex-wife, had the same name as her!

So…

“Who am I?” Yan An asked with a stiff tone.

She suddenly remembered the two words Wen Ying had called her earlier. It wasn’t her name at all. It was “wife.”

In the novel, Wen Ying called her early-deceased ex-wife by that very term!

Yan An had even complained about the name in her mind while reading the novel.

Wen Ying’s eyes lifted slightly. Her deep pupils were like an ancient well, quietly reflecting Yan An’s image.

“Your name is Yan An. The Yan from swallow and the An from stable.”

The last bit of hope in Yan An’s heart died. She looked at Wen Ying and couldn’t say another word.

So, from the looks of it, the original Yan An had fallen into the water and died, and she had transmigrated here to take her place?

She wasn’t particularly devout in her daily life. Why would she be given a second chance at life?

And this chance wasn’t a good one! She knew that the Yan family was dirt poor at this time!

After Yan An fell silent, Wen Ying didn’t speak again either. She seemed to be a very numb and quiet person. She would only reply if Yan An asked her a question.

Time slowly passed. The basin of hot water Wen Ying had brought in was gradually turning cool. What finally broke the stalemate was the rumbling of Yan An’s stomach.

Hearing the sound of her stomach rumbling, Wen Ying seemed to finally realize that this person had been lying down for two days without eating. She got up and said, “I’ll go get you something to eat. Do you want to tell the village chief and the others now that you’re awake?”

“No!” Yan An quickly refused. Her mind was still a chaotic mess, and she really didn’t want to see so many people at once. She couldn’t handle it.

Seeing her refusal, Wen Ying stood still for a few seconds, as if fighting a mental battle. She then said, “We can wait to tell the village chief and the others, but you should still have a doctor check on you because of your memory loss.”

Hearing her words, Yan An felt both touched and complicated. This heroine was too kind! She had been treated so poorly by the original owner, yet she was still thinking about finding a doctor for her.

“No need. Besides not remembering anything, there are no other issues with my body. Don’t waste the money.” Before she was hit by the car, she had just finished the end of the novel, so she was well aware of the family’s dire situation.

Wen Ying, who had already mentally prepared herself for more debt, was stunned.

“I’m hungry,” Yan An said, her face scrunched up. She rubbed her stomach pitifully when she saw that Wen Ying still wasn’t moving.

Seeing her like this, Wen Ying composed herself and walked out with a thoughtful look.

After she left, Yan An grabbed her hair, her face on the verge of a breakdown.

I transmigrated and became Wen Ying’s early-deceased ex-wife? I knew I shouldn’t have read a novel with a character with the same name as me!

Yan An leaned against the head of the bed with a face that looked like she had lost all will to live. Who would have thought that after she finished reading the novel while waiting at a crosswalk, she would be hit by a speeding car before she even made it halfway across the street?

She banged her head against the headboard in frustration. Looking at the grey, destitute room, Yan An comforted herself, thinking that at least the traffic light was green when she crossed the road, and she was in the crosswalk. She was not at fault in the accident, so the driver would probably have to pay a significant amount of money, which could at least be some comfort to her family.

She just wondered if her younger sister, who was still in kindergarten and waiting for her to come home for her birthday, would cry when she found out.

She probably will, Yan An thought. Her sister had always been a little crybaby and would only stop crying if Yan An was the one who comforted her.

Yan An’s heart felt a little heavy. She was very close to her sister, who was eighteen years younger than her. Now that this had happened, she was even missing her sister’s fifth birthday.

And her current situation was quite hopeless!

She remembered that after the Yan family found out that the original owner liked women, they sold their land and borrowed money from the village chief and the head of the clan. They managed to gather sixty taels of silver to marry Wen Ying into the family. This was so that there would be someone to take care of the original owner after they passed away, as they were getting older and their health wasn’t good.

After all… the original owner only cared about studying and didn’t know how to do any manual labor. She was also full of herself, thinking that she would definitely succeed in the imperial examinations and never worried about such “mundane” matters.

After the original owner’s parents passed away, the family relied entirely on Wen Ying. But the original owner, who kept failing the exams, couldn’t see the reality and didn’t understand who was supporting her. She was always cold and unkind to Wen Ying.

Yan An held her head in pain. Since she had transmigrated to take the original owner’s place, didn’t that mean she had also inherited her debt?

The Yan family was truly broke right now!

As she was wallowing in her misery, the door to the room opened again. Wen Ying brought in a small, completely faded wooden table, then went out again and came back with an earthenware pot, from which white steam was rising.

The moment she smelled the rice, Yan An’s already rumbling stomach started to act up as if in rebellion. She even felt like she was about to get low bl00d sugar. Her head was spinning from hunger.

“Can you hold the bowl?” Wen Ying served a bowl of rice porridge and asked her.

Yan An’s eyes were fixed on the white porridge. Never before had she thought such a simple thing could be so delicious.

“No, I don’t have much strength. I’m afraid I’ll spill it,” Yan An said.

Wen Ying wasn’t surprised by this. She picked up a spoon, blew on it to cool it down, and then fed it to Yan An. Looking at how obediently Yan An ate every spoonful, Wen Ying’s eyes flickered.

Is this person really suffering from amnesia?

In the past, she would never have let Wen Ying get this close, much less let her feed her.

Thinking about their past life together, Wen Ying pursed her lips and stirred the white porridge in the bowl. As she smelled the rice, her own stomach began to cramp. But she had only borrowed enough rice for Yan An to eat.

If Yan An was going to be like this after her amnesia, she wished that Yan An would never regain her memory.