Chapter 1
“Divorce! I can’t stand another day of this miserable life!”
“Gu Zhichun, I’d like to see how you survive without me!”
I huddled in the corner, clutching the head wound Song Weilin had given me. With red-rimmed eyes, I shouted, “I’d rather beg on the streets than live under the same roof as a monster like you!”
Song Weilin sneered and rubbed his wrist.
I thought he was about to hit me again. I shrank back in terror, only for my back to strike a cold wall.
“We’ll get divorced tomorrow morning.” Song Weilin’s lips curled with cruel amusement. “Gu Zhichun, you’d better not come crawling back to me. If you do, you’ll only suffer more.”
The look on his face was so sinister that it took me a long moment to force out a reply. “Don’t worry. I’ll never look back.”
My parents had sold me to Song Weilin for three million yuan.
Our family had gone bankrupt, and Song Weilin had agreed to inject capital on the condition that I marry him.
Only after the wedding did I discover that he was violent. The slightest thing that displeased him earned me a beating.
When I told my parents, all they said was, “A little roughhousing between husband and wife is perfectly normal.”
I had not spoken to them since.
The next day, after we received our divorce certificates, I finally understood why Song Weilin had looked so certain of himself.
He gave me nothing. He even confiscated my personal belongings.
In the end, I wandered aimlessly through the streets in clothes he had “kindly” bestowed on me, with the ten-yuan note he had pulled from his wallet and tossed at my feet tucked into my pocket.
Like a rat.
Somehow, I found myself at Panjiayuan Antique Market.
When I was little, my maternal grandfather often brought me here. After he passed away, I rarely came anymore.
Since I was already here, I might as well take a look around.
Panjiayuan was just as I remembered it—loud, chaotic, and packed with people from every walk of life.
After wandering around for a while, I spotted the exact same bronze ewer at five different stalls.
Every vendor claimed it was a one-of-a-kind piece from the Five Dynasties period.
I smiled and declined. After all these years, this old con had not changed a bit.
“You little bastard! How dare you cheat me? Stop right there!”
Someone shot past me. The force of the collision sent me stumbling into a pillar.
Bang—
I struck my head.
Stars burst across my vision.
When I rubbed my swelling forehead and tried to see who had hit me, something strange happened…
Every object I looked at now had a string of numbers hovering over it!
The clothes worn by the vendor in front of me, for example, were marked 55.
A silver cup I had accidentally nudged with my foot was marked 25,000.
A daring idea took shape in my mind…