Clara Bates stared at the dark, cracked adobe wall and the sagging thatched roof in front of her, completely stunned.

She honestly hadn’t expected this—she’d actually fallen into a book.

Last night she’d stayed up reading until four in the morning. Her eyes were burning, her head kept nodding, and the moment she finally knocked out… she woke up here, inside some old‑school novel, as a side character who just happened to share her name.

A tiny role, really—the wife of the eldest son of the Morrison family in Yuqian Village.

She was twenty now. Nathan Morrison, her supposed husband, was eight years older—twenty‑eight this year. Though he ranked first among the brothers, he was the last one to marry. He’d joined the army at eighteen and had been gone for a decade, hardly ever coming home.

She and Nathan had gotten their marriage certificate late last year.

Digging through the original Clara’s memories, she figured out how the whole thing happened—they’d exchanged photos, glanced at each other’s faces, and neither said yes or no.

Then somehow, when the matchmaker came back to ask, both of them just… agreed. Nobody knew why.

After that, Nathan happened to swing by while on a mission. He stayed half a day, they picked up the marriage certificate, didn’t even have time to share a bed, and he was out the door again. And from that day until now, he hadn’t come back once.

It was already August of ’83, which meant that even though they were legally married, they were practically strangers.

The real stars of this story were the Morrisons’ second son, Victor Morrison, and his wife, Joyce Angeles. The two of them had married the year before.

In the book, Victor—being the second son—had never been treated well growing up. But he had brains. After he married Joyce, his life just shot upward like someone had flipped a switch. He shed his farm‑boy status, learned business, opened a restaurant that earned him his first pot of gold, then moved into real estate. By the end, he’d become a well‑known entrepreneur in Jiang City.

Once the leads made their money, they invited the original Clara to live in the city with them.

But “live with them” hardly meant living the good life. She worked in the hotel kitchen, sweating over pots for more than ten hours a day, yet her pay was the lowest.

Look at the rest of the family—they had manager titles or procurement jobs, lounging in offices under the air‑con.

Even someone mild‑tempered like the original Clara couldn’t stand that kind of treatment. After stewing on it, she decided she wanted out. She had a huge fight with the male and female leads and walked out of the hotel altogether.

Still angry, she went to Nathan for a thousand yuan to start a small business. Trouble was, business was never that easy. Within three months, the whole thousand had gone up in smoke.

Once the Morrison family learned she’d secretly asked Nathan for money—and burned through it entirely—they all called her a money‑waster. And since she still hadn’t gotten pregnant, they pushed her to divorce Nathan.

The original Clara, usually timid and terrible at speaking up, actually stood firm for once. She refused the divorce and even threatened to take the Morrison family’s behavior straight to Nathan’s army unit.

There was no way the Morrisons would let her do something like that.

At that time, Nathan Morrison had already made it to regiment commander and looked set to rise even higher.

With someone of that rank in the family, nobody needed to spell out how much weight he carried. Plus, the people he knew all held decent positions around Jiangshi, some even had ties up to the municipal committee.

If Clara Bates caused a scene at the base, Nathan would definitely be dragged down with her. He might even get demoted. And if that happened, the Morrisons—especially the golden couple Victor Morrison and Joyce Angeles, who were busy running their business—wouldn’t be able to benefit from his influence anymore.

So they simply locked the original Clara inside the house and stopped letting her out.

A few months later, the Morrison family announced to the outside world that Clara had gone “mentally ill” and had been sent to a psychiatric hospital.

After that, nobody mentioned her or Nathan again.

When Clara read this part, she honestly felt the author’s moral compass was crooked. Just to make the leads look good, the supporting couple had to be dragged through the mud like that?

No matter what, Nathan was the original Clara’s husband. She lost money doing business—how was that their problem? Over a measly thousand yuan, they not only locked her up but also threw her into a mental hospital. That’s what the leads were supposed to do?

Clara had tossed the book aside right then. But before she threw it, she flipped to the end and saw an extra chapter about Nathan. Out of pure indignation for her namesake, she skimmed it—and unexpectedly learned something useful.

When Nathan heard that the original Clara had mental issues, he actually brought her back to the base and cut ties with the Morrison family.

At the time, she’d even thought, “Well, at least Nathan’s values aren’t completely off in this book.”

But still, that didn’t mean she should be the one tossed into the original Clara’s life, right?

She was Clara—the Clara from modern times—the young executive who had already climbed to deputy director at Guanghua Investment. She had a house, a car, plenty of savings, and was just at the perfect age to find someone decent and enjoy a proper relationship.

Which heartless idiot had pushed her into this mess?

Even if she had to transmigrate, couldn’t she land somewhere better? Maybe into a family with better conditions, or at least as a lead with normal morals? But instead she ended up as a cannon-fodder side character in some rural village in 1985?

Clara let out a long sigh, rolled over, and adjusted herself on the bed. Since she was already here, she might as well sort through the twisted values of this book. Just as she was thinking through all the unreasonable bits, the wooden door creaked open from the outside.

A thin woman in her early forties stepped in, wearing a gray cotton jacket patched all over. She carried a bowl in her hands and gently pushed the door shut again with another soft creak, glancing outside as if afraid of being caught.

Clara knew this was her mother-in-law—Nathan’s mother—Georgia Grant.

Georgia lowered her voice and said, “Xiao Xi, are you feeling any better? You didn’t touch your lunch, so I made you some brown sugar with egg. Come on, sit up and drink a little.”

Clara figured she couldn’t keep lying down forever. She pushed herself upright, opened her mouth wanting to call her “Mom,” but for some reason the word just wouldn’t come out. Something felt awkward and stuck in her chest.

She flipped through the memories the original Clara Bates left behind, and honestly, this mother‑in‑law wasn’t bad to her at all.

Take today for example. She’d just landed here last night and was still completely dazed. She pretended her stomach was acting up and took the whole day off, curling up in bed. Out of everyone in the Nathan Morrison household, only Georgia Grant had checked on her a few times, and now she was even bringing her something to eat.

In the bowl were two brown‑sugar boiled eggs. Two. The warm, sweet smell of the rustic sugar kept drifting into Clara’s nose, and her stomach immediately answered with a couple of loud growls.

Georgia, sharp‑eared as ever, heard it right away. She hurriedly shoved the bowl into Clara’s hands. "Hurry, eat while it's hot!"

Clara felt a little embarrassed. She knew eggs were practically treasure in this era. For Georgia to boil two at once… she must’ve been under quite a bit of pressure.

No wonder she’d slipped in earlier like she was sneaking around. She must’ve taken them without letting anyone see.

But judging from the memories in the original host’s head, this mother‑in‑law had always been the quiet workhorse of the family. She barely talked, just buried her head in chores, and she was pretty intimidated by her husband, Albert Morrison.

By that logic, Georgia really didn’t seem like the type to secretly swipe eggs just to feed her daughter‑in‑law.

Clara was just about to ask where the eggs came from when the door suddenly flew open with a loud bang.