Chapter 1: Desert Rebirth
It was scorching hot at noon.
In the middle of a desolate desert, beneath a sand dune, lay over twenty corpses scattered in disarray.
Below the bodies, dried blood had mixed with the sand, staining a wide area dark brown.
It was clear these people had been dead for quite some time.
Amidst the corpses were several overturned wagons, which appeared to have been used for transporting goods. But the horses were gone, and all the cargo had vanished without a trace.
The wrecked wagons were covered in marks as if hacked apart with weapons. Looking closely, the cuts on the wagons matched the wounds on the bodies.
On one of the wagons lay a young girl wearing a short cyan outfit and a matching headscarf.
Despite her delicate features, about fifteen or sixteen years old, there was a faint trace of determination in her expression.
But her face was pale, devoid of color, and a large, gruesome wound stretched across her back—she appeared lifeless.
At that moment, a palm-sized desert lizard poked its head out of the sand. It glanced around curiously before climbing up the girl’s body.
It reached her back and paused, stretching its neck to look into the distance. But just then, the girl’s body suddenly twitched.
Sensing danger, the lizard panicked and leaped off her body, diving straight into the sand and disappearing.
Yuan Zhao slowly opened her eyes with difficulty.
Immediately, intense pain radiated from her back and every part of her body ached.
She gasped, feeling like she’d just been run over by a truck.
Looking around, all she could see was endless golden sand.
The midday sun blazed across the boundless desert, turning the sand scorching hot. The heat made the air ahead shimmer and distort.
The surrounding corpses startled Yuan Zhao so badly that she stumbled backward in a panic. The movement tugged at her wound, and she hissed in pain again.
*What’s going on? Wasn’t I dead?
Where am I?
Yuan Zhao instinctively wondered.
She quickly realized that the people around her were all dressed strangely.
They wore matching cyan uniforms and had tiger-head emblems embroidered on their headscarves. Looking down at her own clothes, it was identical.
Then she looked at her hands. They were slender but covered in thick calluses.
These aren’t my hands! Yuan Zhao gasped in shock.
She had been a cancer patient—emaciated, frail, with pale, powerless hands. These hands were strong and firm.
She immediately realized: she had been reborn in someone else’s body. And by the looks of it, this wasn’t her original world.
She had read enough novels to recognize what this was, a transmigration.
Fighting through the pain, she slowly got to her feet and examined the corpses around her.
All of them looked weathered and strong as if once full of life, but now nothing more than lifeless husks.
They were probably this body’s relatives or comrades, Yuan Zhao guessed.
Unfortunately, she had no memory from the body’s original owner, so she had no idea who she was, how she got here, or why everyone was dead.
The blazing sun overhead and searing pain on her back quickly brought her thoughts back to reality.
She had to leave, fast, or she’d end up dead again.
Being reborn was a miracle, but her current situation was dire.
Before leaving, though, she dug several pits and buried the corpses. They may have been her body’s friends or family. She had taken over this body so she couldn’t just leave them to rot under the sun.
Thankfully, it was the desert. Digging wasn’t too hard, or her injured body wouldn’t have managed it.
Strangely, Yuan Zhao found this body much stronger than she’d expected. With some wood she pulled off one of the carts, she quickly dug over twenty deep pits.
After burying them, she bowed to the makeshift graves and said softly:
“Rest in peace. We won’t meet again.”
This was the desert. A single sandstorm would bury these graves deep beneath the dunes. Even if she came back to visit, she’d never find the spot again.
After that, she carefully went through the corpses for supplies. She found:
A half-full water pouch.
A dull dagger.
And a small bag of crushed, almost powdery dried food.
That was all she had to survive.
Whoever had attacked them probably took everything else.
In the vast desert, Yuan Zhao couldn’t tell east from west. She had no choice but to pick a direction at random and start walking.
She stepped onto the scorching sand and moved under the blinding sun, enduring the constant agony from her back wound.
Because of where the wound was, she couldn’t even treat it. She didn’t know how long she had walked, but the desert ahead still stretched endlessly. Her mouth was dry, her tongue parched. But she didn’t dare drink any water.
That half pouch was her lifeline, it had to last.
What she didn’t know was…
Something was following her.
Not too close, not too far, were two jade-green eyes, full of hunger and greed, tracking her every move from behind.
But Yuan Zhao was simply too exhausted to pay attention to her surroundings. Naturally, she didn’t notice that she was being followed.
After walking for who knows how long, she was already extremely weak. At last, the sun began to set, and twilight slowly consumed the sky.
With the coming dusk, the intense heat finally began to subside.
Just as Yuan Zhao was hesitating about whether to keep going, she noticed she had entered a rocky desert area. In the distance, she spotted a patch of dried-up forest.
Her face lit up with hope, wishing she could find some resources there, and she couldn’t help but quicken her pace. But moving too quickly tugged at the wound on her back, causing it to reopen, and the once-dried wound became damp again.
The intense pain brought her to her knees, and with a thud, she collapsed onto the ground. Clutching the yellow sand tightly, she gasped for breath and cursed under her breath.
A wave of overwhelming sorrow surged in her chest.
Am I going to die here like this?
In her previous life, she had been diagnosed with cancer at a young age, spending her final days in agony, lying in bed waiting for death. Back then, her biggest wish was simply to live a healthy life.
Yet even that simple, humble wish had been an unattainable luxury.
Now, she had finally gotten another chance to live, but…
As Yuan Zhao collapsed, the stalker behind her began to stir. This was the perfect chance for a sneak attack.
Just as the stalker was about to strike—Yuan Zhao slowly got back up.
Fueled by sheer unwillingness to die, she forced herself to endure the pain, gritted her teeth, and stood up again. Step by step, she staggered toward the withered forest.
Seeing this, the stalker once again concealed itself in the shadows.
Taking slow, painful steps, she finally entered the dead forest… only to be bitterly disappointed. It truly was nothing more than a patch of lifeless trees. Other than the decaying wood, there was absolutely nothing.
A wave of despair washed over her, and Yuan Zhao slumped to the ground. At that moment, all strength seemed to leave her body.
Finally, she couldn’t hold back anymore and began to quietly sob, her weeping echoing in the empty woods.
She didn’t know how much time had passed, but after pouring out all her pent-up grievances, she once again quietly encouraged herself.
I can’t give up. I absolutely won’t give up. I want to live!
So she pushed herself to stand once more. By now, the sky was completely dark. So she decided to spend the night in the withered forest.
First, she ate a bit of dry food to regain some strength. Then she drank a sip of water and, despite the pain, gathered some dried branches to start a fire for warmth.
The desert had drastic temperature shifts between day and night, and with her thin clothing, Yuan Zhao was already shivering from the cold.
I should’ve scavenged some clothes from those bodies…
She regretted it deeply, but it was too late.
She had no survival experience in the desert, how could she have considered everything in that situation?
Without a firestarter, Yuan Zhao tried to start a fire with friction. But it was much harder than she expected. After trying for a long time, she didn’t even see a single spark.
After multiple failed attempts, she had to give up. Continuing would only waste precious energy. What she needed now was to conserve strength, not waste it on hopeless efforts.
Curling up beneath a withered tree, Yuan Zhao hugged herself tightly, trying to resist the cold that seeped in from all sides.
She desperately wanted to close her eyes and rest, but the plummeting temperature made sleep impossible. She was terrified that if she closed her eyes, she might never wake up—just like the little match girl.
At some point, a cold silver moon appeared overhead. She looked up into the night sky.
The desert night was vast and lonely, adding another layer of fear to Yuan Zhao’s heart. Bathed in moonlight, her face looked even more pale, not just from the cold, but from blood loss.
Am I going to die again?
As she felt her body temperature slipping away, a sense of despair rose within her. Her consciousness began to blur.
At that moment, a pair of emerald green eyes emerged from the darkness ahead.
The stalker!
It had finally decided to make its move.
Seeing those eerie eyes made Yuan Zhao suddenly snap back to awareness.
What is that?!
Her body instinctively tried to flee but as she moved, dizziness overwhelmed her, and she collapsed again. After staying in one position too long, her whole body was numb and unresponsive.
With a low, menacing growl, the green eyes crept closer and closer. Now bathed in moonlight, Yuan Zhao finally saw the face behind those eyes.
A wolf.
A tall, lean, bony wolf.
Sensing Yuan Zhao’s weakness, the wolf lunged with a ferocious roar, its voice filled with hunger.
Finally! A real meal!
At the moment the wolf pounced, a surge of unknown strength exploded from Yuan Zhao’s body. She instinctively grabbed the wolf’s mouth and used her other hand to brace its lower jaw.
“Rrrrgh—rrrgh—!”
The wolf thrashed and roared, trying to sink its teeth into her neck.
To her surprise, Yuan Zhao realized the wolf wasn’t as strong as she had expected.
It was an old wolf.
Wolves are pack animals. This one had likely lost a leadership battle within its pack and had been cast out. Old, weak, and starving, it had survived alone for days before finding her. It had only attacked because she looked vulnerable.
But it hadn’t expected this dying girl to suddenly erupt with such fierce power.
No matter how hard it tried, it couldn’t break through the girl’s grip.
It became a life-or-death struggle.
‘Either you die, or I do!’ the old wolf thought.
This was a wolf with intelligence and spirit.
During the struggle, the wolf’s claws tore Yuan Zhao’s skin. Blood streamed from her wounds, further weakening her.
As her strength faded, the wolf’s jaws drew closer and closer to her neck.
Even so, Yuan Zhao refused to give up.
She tried to reach for the dagger on her belt, but with both hands locked onto the wolf, she couldn’t free one. If she let go, the wolf would tear her throat apart instantly.
Even after using all her strength, the wolf’s mouth was still inching closer.
Her death was only a matter of time.
A wave of bitter unwillingness surged in her chest.
Why? Why?!
Why is it that even though I fought so hard to live, the heavens still won’t give me a chance?!
She stared into the wolf’s eyes, her own eyes burning with a fierce desire to survive, a light that seemed to pierce the endless darkness.
Seeing those radiant eyes, the old wolf hesitated. Its actions froze for a moment.
Those eyes…
They reminded it of the wolf king from its youth, the one it had revered above all.
That was the wolf it had once idolized, the one who had inspired it to seek the path of becoming king. But it had grown old and been replaced by a younger, stronger wolf—cast out of the pack.
Just as the wolf’s teeth were about to bite into her flesh, a mysterious energy surged within Yuan Zhao. With all her strength, she punched the wolf in the face.
“DIE! DIE!!”
She roared in fury, landing blow after blow, each one stunning the old wolf.
“Rrrgh—rrrgh—!”
With each whimper, the already feeble wolf was finally knocked out cold.
Huff—huff—
Lying on the ground, Yuan Zhao panted heavily, drenched in sweat. But her body was, miraculously, warm once again.
