The door to Li Hua's bedroom clicked shut, the sound of Auntie Mei's muffled shrieks fading into a dull hum in the background. Li Hua stood in the center of her small room, her chest heaving. The dim light of a single 40-watt bulb cast long, wavering shadows against the peeling wallpaper.
In 1995, her room was a storage closet for the family's junk, but tonight, it felt like a sanctuary.
Her gaze shifted to her mother's old sewing machine. Under the influence of the Business Insight skill, the machine was no longer just a hunk of rusted iron. It was vibrating with a faint, pulse-like glow that seemed to seep into the floorboards beneath its heavy cast-iron legs.
Something is down there, Li Hua thought, her fingers tingling. Something my mother never told me about.
In her previous life, she had been too submissive to ever look beneath the surface. She had let the scrap collector cart this machine away for five Yuan, never knowing why Auntie Mei had been so eager to clear out this specific corner of the room.
Li Hua knelt on the cold, splintered wooden floor. She began to push the heavy machine aside. It groaned, the metal wheels screeching against the floor, but with her newly issued +10 Agility, she moved it with a fluid strength that surprised her.
As the machine cleared the corner, the golden aura intensified. There, hidden beneath the shadow of the machine's pedal, was a loose floorboard. Unlike the others, which were nailed down with rusted iron, this one had a slight gap, smoothed by years of careful handling.
[Ding! Hidden Cache Detected. Requirement: Host must use 'Stitch Mastery' to unlock the mechanism.]
Li Hua's mind flooded with the complex diagrams of a tailor's precision. She reached out, her fingers dancing along the edge of the board. She didn't pry it open with force; instead, she pressed a specific knot in the wood, a secret toggle her mother must have installed years ago.
Click.
The board popped up. Li Hua's heart hammered against her ribs as she pulled it back.
Inside the dark, dusty hollow sat a small, lacquer box wrapped in a piece of oilcloth. The oilcloth was stained with age, smelling of mothballs and old cedar. Li Hua carefully lifted it out, her hands shaking. This was the "Inheritance" that Auntie Mei had spent years trying to find.
She unwrapped the cloth to reveal a deep red box inlaid with a mother-of-pearl phoenix. She opened the lid.
Inside lay three items that would change her life:
A Stack of 1980s "Blue Notes": Old 10-Yuan bills, pristine and uncirculated. There were at least fifty of them 500 Yuan! In 1995, this was an astronomical sum for a young girl, nearly a year's salary for a factory worker.
A Heavy Gold Seal: A square of solid gold with the name "Li" carved in traditional script. This was her grandfather's business seal from the pre-revolution era, a symbol of a family legacy that had been buried to survive the "turbulent years."
A Handwritten Ledger: A thin book filled with her mother's elegant handwriting, containing secret embroidery techniques and a list of high-end contacts in the capital's silk industry.
[Ding! Hidden Treasure Unlocked! Total Value: 5,000 Yuan (Projected). New Mission: The First Venture. Goal: Use the 500 Yuan to rent a stall in the Morning Market and sell your first 'Modern' garment. Reward: -3kg Weight Loss, 'Fabric Analysis' Skill.]
Li Hua clutched the gold seal to her chest. Tears finally pricked her eyes not tears of sadness, but of vindication. Her mother hadn't left her with nothing. She had left her a map to a throne, hidden right under the feet of her enemies.
Suddenly, a sharp knock echoed on her door.
"Li Hua! I know you're in there!" Auntie Mei's voice was slick with greed. "Open this door right now! I saw you moving that machine. What are you hiding? If you've found something in this house, it belongs to the entire family!"
The doorknob began to rattle violently.
Li Hua quickly shoved the box back into the hole and slid the floorboard into place. She dragged the heavy sewing machine back over the spot just as the door hinge groaned.
She turned toward the door, her face a mask of cold indifference. She had the money, she had the legacy, and she had the System. Auntie Mei was no longer a monster; she was just an obstacle to be cleared on the way to the top.