Love in the Midst of Mistaken Identities

In this place, how could one still wish for good food and for other people to call them and save rice for them?

Xia Ruoxin already had a bad feeling about this place, and it was one not considered scary but was actually a pretty frightening place. Even though they did not know what they were here for, the fight between women had already started.

It was not for money or men but for a mouthful of rice and their life.

In the morning the next day…

The door was slammed open, and Xia Ruoxin hurriedly sat up; so did Shen Wei. She rubbed her eyes and wore her shoes, and the woman with a thick waist walked over and pointed at them one by one with her finger.

Ruoxin knew that she was counting the people.

Actually, even if they ran, it should be now; but it was just their first day here so they did not even know what grew here. How could they run and escape?

After the headcount, she passed them a bamboo basket with a net and some other items. Xia Ruoxin took the items but did not know what they were used for. However, when she came out, she understood as it was all women around here and no men.

She turned around to look at Shen Wei who held her head down. She had a nice jawline, and this ending was pretty good for them. At the very least, there were no men here—which meant that they would not be hurt in that way.

However, they might suffer a bit more physically, but there was still hope that they could go out alive and clean.

The woman with a thick waist brought them to a nearby river, and Xia Ruoxin then knew what they were here for.

They had to mine for gold. Yes, mine for gold.

With the net and other tools, they had to stand in the muddy river day after day—year after year—and mine the little bits of gold or gold dust from here. This meant that they were in a mine, even though they were still unsure of their exact location.

Suddenly, she felt a pain in her butt; and the person behind kicked her hard and almost made her fall to the ground.

Shen Wei wanted to stand up for her, but Xia Ruoxin hurriedly held her wrist and shook her head. It was best that they did not do anything as these people were probably like the crew members who did not treat them like humans and would harm and kill them whenever they wished.

They were living other people's roof so they had to bow down to them.

Shen Wei could only tolerate it.

The woman with a thick waist was yelling something, which seemed to be rushing them down to the water.

Xia Ruoxin went down, and even though the weather was pretty hot, the water was ice-cold. When her feet touched the water, a gush of coldness rushed up her entire body from her foot.

She copied the others and took the net container to the sand and started finding gold. However, the containers went down one by one; but let alone gold, they did not even see a single bit of silver.

That was why this was called mining gold. If gold was so easy to be found, there would not be so many people here.

She wiped the sweat on her forehead. The bright sun shone down, and her forehead was filled with sweat, but down at her feet below the water, it was freezing cold.

There had bound to be a few days for the woman. During the three months on the boat, she herself did not know how she endured through it. She only knew that her pants got wet and dried up before they got wet again. Luckily, she was wearing dark blue pants; and other than the bloody smell from her body, one could not tell that there was something wrong with her.

She held her stomach and endured the pain below her abdomen. Finally, the blood flowed down from her leg. The icy cold feeling made her break out in cold sweat, and her feet and hands were cold.

She could not take it and went ashore. The fat lady in charge of them started yelling at her, and even though Xia Ruoxin did not know what she was saying, she knew that she had to go down to the river.

Every step she took forward, the woman's face got darker.

Suddenly, the woman took a wooden stick and hit her shoulder. Xia Ruoxin endured the pain and whimpered while the blood flowed down her pants.

She endured the pain, pointed at her stomach before pointing to the blood on the floor.

The woman squinted and looked pissed off before she raised the stick in her hands and hit Xia Ruoxin with it. Xia Ruoxin was scared of the pain and could only walk backward until she was in the water. At that moment, the icy cold feeling traveled up from her leg and had cramped her abdomen. Her body shivered, and she felt a stinging pain starting from her lower abdomen.

Shen Wei behind her hurriedly helped her up.

"What's the matter?"

Xia Ruoxin smiled bitterly. "Nothing much. My period is here, and it hurts."

Shen Wei held her arm tightly and did not know what to say. Other than the women she was with, the others that came earlier had already been tanned; and one could no longer tell what they looked like originally as they carried on their repeated movements.

With one hand holding her stomach, Xia Ruoxin tugged Shen Wei's sleeves tightly. "Don't stand and do nothing, the people will notice." As expected, the fat woman had noticed them; and irritation had flashed in her eyes. Afterward, she held the stick up with her thick fingers and hit against her own palm from time to time, warning them which was enough for them to gulp in fear.

Xia Ruoxin held Shen Wei's hand and hurriedly get back to work. Then, the fat woman put down the stick and started shaking her head. There was an umbrella on the top of her head, and she was drinking water while munching on nuts.

Xia Ruoxin's stomach was in pain until she could die, but she could only endure it. In no time, her clothes were almost drenched; and she broke out in quite a lot of cold sweat.

When she looked at the other people, they were the same; but theirs was hot sweat and hers was cold.

By the afternoon, she was so tired until she could not lift her arms. The sun was right above her and was the hottest weather in a day. The weather here was pretty weird as it was hot in the day, nearly forty degrees; but the river was freezing cold. Additionally, they still had to cover themselves with blankets at night. It did not seem scientific, but it was true.

This was a weird place that up till now, she and Shen Wei had no idea where it was.