Nobody spoke. A quiet oppression seeped through the air.

If not for the necessities of survival, surely no one would willingly expose themselves — their entire life — to the gaze of strangers.

With nowhere else to go, Bai Youwei followed the group of children to their home —

Rusted iron gates. An overgrown activity yard. The school building stood crumbling and desolate, broken glass windows letting in cold gusts of wind.

It was a children’s welfare home.

Bai Youwei had expected to find many children, but stepping inside she found it completely empty. It seemed only these five lived here.

The boy who led the group was named Yi Zichu, sixteen years old, the oldest among them. He told Bai Youwei, “If you don’t have enough points to purchase lodging, you can stay here for now. But we have very little food, so… you’ll have to figure that part out on your own.”

Bai Youwei thanked him. She wasn’t about to compete with a bunch of children for food.

A girl brought her a set of bedding — white cotton cloth faded to yellow with age, clearly worn, but carrying a faint smell of soap, freshly washed and sun-dried.

Her name was Ning Yao, twelve years old. Despite her age, she was responsible for almost all the household chores in the welfare home: laundry, cooking, everything.

“You’ll sleep in our room,” Ning Yao said, her cheeks slightly flushed, her tone stiff. “The windows in the other rooms are broken. The wind blows straight through, and we don’t have money to replace the glass.”

Bai Youwei glanced around the room. It was one large open space — a door on one side, a window on the other, with seven or eight small beds pushed against the walls on either end. Near the door stood a storage cabinet holding teacups, books, a wall calendar, candlesticks, and various other odds and ends.

She was definitely not satisfied, but she had just arrived and Shen Mo wasn’t with her — she had no room to be picky.

“Where’s the bathroom?” Bai Youwei asked.

Ning Yao pointed. “Out the door, turn right, walk to the end.”

“Thank you.” She set down the bedding and turned to leave.

She’d only taken a few steps before she noticed Ning Yao following her.

Bai Youwei stopped and looked at the girl. “Something you need?”

The girl pressed her lips together, her tone carrying a trace of awkwardness. “You… try to use as little water as possible. There’s no running water or electricity here. If the water runs out, we’d have to go to a river far away to carry it back.”

Bai Youwei: “……”

Life here was truly harder than anything she’d imagined…

Having said her piece, Ning Yao looked embarrassed herself — cheeks red, head lowered — and turned to go back inside.

“Hey…” Bai Youwei called after her.

She stopped and turned, looking at Bai Youwei with questioning eyes.

“I wanted to ask — is it really that hard to earn points here?” Bai Youwei was genuinely puzzled. “With so many of you, how can you not even afford water and electricity?”

Whether the question struck a nerve or not, the color drained from the girl’s face in an instant. She answered coldly, “You’ll understand once you try. For some people, earning points is easy. But for others… it’s hard. Very, very hard.”

Ning Yao turned and walked away.

Bai Youwei stood where she was, let out a quiet sigh, and headed toward the bathroom.

The welfare home’s bathrooms were divided by gender. Near the entrance sat a row of plastic buckets — some with water in them, others empty.

Bai Youwei sighed to herself, thinking how fortunate it was that she hadn’t asked to take a bath. She’d probably have been chased out by that girl in sheer fury.

The conditions here were truly terrible. She had to figure out how this livestream business worked as quickly as possible and then improve her living situation…

Bai Youwei used the bathroom in the most water-conserving manner she could manage, then returned to the room.

She opened the door to find two neat rows of beds. From pillows to sheets, to the slippers beside each bed, everything was identical. The children, all wearing matching pajamas, were crowded around Yi Zichu listening to him tell a story.

She stood for a moment, slightly disoriented, unable to remember which bed was hers…

After a few steps, she noticed that each bed had a nameplate at the foot — Yi Zichu, Ning Yao, Youyou, Diandian, Jiujiu.

The one with no name must be hers.

She lay down and closed her eyes to sleep. Yi Zichu’s low voice drifted to her: “And from that day on, the princess and prince lived happily ever after…”

—