On the Wedding Night, I Transmigrated to After the Divorce – Chapter 19
by Little PandaThe Down-and-out Beauty
If the money is all spent, I can go back
“…”
Before opening her eyes, Yu Yan prayed countless times in her heart.
All of this was a dream. It was all just a terrifying nightmare she had fallen into after losing consciousness. She hadn’t lost her memory, she hadn’t time-traveled, and it wasn’t the year 2025 right now. She was definitely still lying in that soft, comfortable king-sized bed at the estate, with Fu Yunqing by her side, waiting with a heart full of worry for her to wake up.
Yu Yan took a deep breath, gathered her courage, and forcefully squeezed her eyes open. Her heart instantly went cold.
Mother Heavens1, couldn’t she just have a nightmare to scare her a little and be done with it? Why did it have to be real? How could she have suddenly time-traveled three years into the future? It was completely impossible, it defied the laws of nature, there was no scientific basis for it.
Why would such a thing happen to her?
Yu Yan stared dead ahead at the ceiling, absolutely furious. Lu Yu leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed over her chest, watching her with a patient, leisurely expression.
“Still not getting out of bed?”
“How many more times will it take for you to give up?”
Young Miss Yu firmly believed that she was having a nightmare, fantasizing that the moment she woke up she could return to reality. But in truth, this was already her first full week since time-traveling over.
“Your breakfast is going to get cold.”
She didn’t want to hear Lu Yu’s voice right now.
“Breakfast isn’t good when it’s cold. I’m worried you won’t even be able to swallow it later.”
“Even if it was hot, I wouldn’t be able to swallow it!” the stiff, resentful corpse in the bed suddenly blurted out.
The breakfast Lu Yu was referring to was the soy milk and deep-fried dough sticks she had bought downstairs. Yu Yan had seen that vendor’s stall set up right next to the trash cans. The oil there had been fried pitch-black—who knew how many times it had been reused. For all she knew, it was gutter oil2.
She couldn’t accept it.
She couldn’t face reality, so she absolutely would not allow herself to eat those deep-fried dough sticks.
“Do you have to be so dramatic? It’s ten metres away from the trash can. Sesame oil is just naturally dark in color. That granny has been selling downstairs for over ten years—there isn’t a single shop in Yuncheng that makes tastier deep-fried dough sticks than hers,” Lu Yu said.
Yu Yan spoke in the feeble, exhausted tone of a wandering ghost. “That’s only because you haven’t eaten at a high-end restaurant in many years, Lu Yu. You’ve already gotten used to eating roadside dough sticks.”
Lu Yu informed her, “Actually, you’ve gotten used to eating them too.”
The 2025 Yu Yan had long since lost her spoiled Young Miss temper; she was even more down-to-earth than Lu Yu was.
But Yu Yan, whose memories were still stuck in 2022, clearly could not accept this sort of thing. Her defenses breaking, she emphasized, “I couldn’t possibly be that degenerate. It’s impossible.”
Lu Yu laughed out loud and ruthlessly informed her, “But your money is already all gone.”
It was true. Yu Yan had already spent every last cent of her remaining money.
When she first time-traveled over, she had tallied up her total assets. Between her bank cards, her WeChat, and her Alipay accounts, she shockingly only had ten thousand or so to her name. Because she couldn’t accept reality, Young Miss Yu firmly believed she was dreaming. Consequently, she spent her money with reckless abandon, even harboring the delusion that “if the money is all spent, I can go back.” In just two days, she had squandered it all.
Young Miss Yu’s spending power was as formidable as ever, but she no longer had an ATM machine.
And Lu Yu was certainly not her ATM-ji3.
“If you don’t eat it soon, it really will get cold. It won’t even be crispy anymore.”
Why was she telling her whether it was crispy or not? Was this an issue of crispiness? Even if she starved to death, Yu Yan wouldn’t eat that kind of gutter-oil food.
Lu Yu sighed. “Then should I order you some takeout congee?”
“What kind of congee do you want? You don’t eat century egg… will eight-treasure congee4 do? Or lean pork congee?”
“I want that Cantonese dim sum place on Nanjing West Road.”
“The one you ate at two days ago?”
“Yeah.”
Lu Yu immediately shot her down. “It’s delicious, sure, but no.”
“Just casually ordering two dishes from there costs over a thousand. Young Miss, I don’t have that kind of money for you to blow through. I have to pay rent soon, and my salary hasn’t even been issued yet.”
Yu Yan fell silent.
Lu Yu knew she was making a silent protest, but what could be done? If she continued to indulge her like this, Lu Yu’s meager savings would be completely decimated by her in no time.
“Let’s just order from this place. Wumi Congee Shop. I’ll get you a pork rib congee, but if I order it, you’re not allowed to refuse to eat it.”
“…”
Yu Yan’s silence dragged on for so long that Lu Yu’s order was about to time out. Finally, under Lu Yu’s urging, she reluctantly hummed an acknowledgment. “Oh.”
Lu Yu finished the payment. “Alright, get up and wash up first.”
Yu Yan had been entirely too despondent these past few days. Looking thoroughly dispirited, she weakly climbed out of bed and walked into the bathroom.
This apartment only had one bathroom, which she and Lu Yu shared. However, Lu Yu kept the bathroom very clean—there wasn’t a single repulsive stain anywhere, and she kept an aromatherapy diffuser running that gave off a faint hint of jasmine.
Yu Yan lowered her head, splashed water on her face, and then looked at herself in the mirror. She had suddenly aged three years.
What had happened over these three years?
It wasn’t that she hadn’t considered running to someone else for support, or borrowing a little money from someone to spend in the meantime. After all, the one thing she hadn’t lacked was wealthy friends.
But everything had changed; the people remained, but the circumstances were different.
Her former situationships had long since lost touch with her, even Li Tong. And as for her three roommates, no one had spoken a single word in their dorm group chat for half a year.
All their previous chat history was gone, as if it had been wiped clean. Yu Yan checked their WeChat Moments and found that they had all started new lives. She was the only one still stuck in the past. Against such a backdrop, she couldn’t bring herself to suddenly pop up and act spoiled or complain about her hardships to any of them.
She felt completely lost.
She had asked Lu Yu why she had abandoned her social life and even given up on raising fish5. Lu Yu had vaguely explained that it was because she had divorced Fu Yunqing, her mother had gone bankrupt, and she had no money to spend, which led to her being in a bad mood.
Oh, that made sense. Yu Yan couldn’t even imagine the level of collapse she must have felt at the time. A Young Miss worth tens of billions, falling overnight into a penniless, homeless state. It was already a miracle she hadn’t gone crazy; where would she have found the energy to mess around with all that nonsense?
So now she not only had no mom, no money, and no Wife, but she had even lost all her former jiejies and meimeis, right?
She couldn’t have possibly anticipated that her future self three years later would end up in such a miserable state. The more Yu Yan thought about it, the more her heart ached. She felt so utterly desperate. Returning to the dining table, she had no choice but to face the plastic delivery bag brought up by the rider, still damp from the rain.
Yu Yan didn’t even know how to untie the knot and picked at it for quite a while. The congee could technically be considered fragrant (thanks to the artificial flavoring), featuring two pieces of pork rib and a little sprinkle of chopped green onions. Yu Yan scooped up a little and took a sip. Even though the flavor wasn’t overly salty, after a few mouthfuls, her mouth felt numb and dry, as if she had eaten straight salt. There must have been way too much technology6 added to it.
It was barely edible.
It would barely keep Yu Yan from dying for the time being.
She knew Lu Yu had already done her best.
Lu Yu knew exactly how spoiled and delicate she was. The fact that she hadn’t been pushing her to go out and find a job was already incredibly kind. Even though she was essentially feeding her animal feed, at least she was keeping her housed, ensuring she neither froze nor starved. That was more than good enough. If Yu Yan kept throwing tantrums, and Lu Yu got upset and decided she didn’t want her anymore, wouldn’t she be forced to go jump into the Yun River?
She had to be well-behaved. What right did she have to make a fuss?
Before Yu Yan had even finished her congee, Lu Yu left for work. She worked at a travel agency, and the office wasn’t too far from home—just a twenty-minute direct subway ride. Usually, Yu Yan would wait for her to get off work so they could eat takeout together. After all, with her best friend keeping her company, eating garbage didn’t feel quite so miserable. But today, Lu Yu messaged her early to tell her to eat dinner first. After picking and choosing forever, Yu Yan finally settled on a sushi place that didn’t have a single bad review.
Even though Yu Yan didn’t know how to cook or wash dishes, she still had the awareness to tidy up. Because she couldn’t stand things being too dirty and messy, she stuffed all the garbage into a bag, set it outside the door, and wiped down the table after finishing her takeout.
Then, she sat on the sofa and spaced out.
By nine o’clock that night, Lu Yu still hadn’t come home.
Yu Yan suddenly felt that Lu Yu had it so hard.
She suddenly felt a bit of regret over spending money so extravagantly a few days ago. At the very least, she should have helped Lu Yu shoulder some of the rent.
But it was too late to discover her conscience now. Yu Yan only had a few hundred yuan left in her account. It was money Lu Yu had transferred to her, telling her it was meant to act as a meal card. Because she was afraid Yu Yan would spend recklessly again, she only gave her a week’s allowance at a time.
She was so bored.
There was no TV in the apartment, only a projector. Yu Yan didn’t really know how to operate it, nor was she in the mood to watch any movies. She had been exceptionally decadent lately, neglecting everything. She hadn’t put on makeup or done her skincare routine in ages. Suddenly, as if jolted awake by something, she ran to the bathroom. After scrutinizing her skin in the mirror for quite a while, she finally let out a sigh of relief.
Aside from the wound on her forehead and a slightly dull complexion from her day-and-night reversed sleeping schedule, there wasn’t much difference from three years ago.
At the very least, she was still a down-and-out beauty.
Very good.
Acting on impulse, Yu Yan rallied her spirits and put on a full face of makeup. Even though her future self from three years later only owned cheap cosmetic brands she had never even heard of before, her eye for selecting these items remained unique. Even though they were cheap, they suited her perfectly and were barely usable.
What should she do after finishing her makeup? It was so late, and she didn’t want to go out, but she also didn’t want to just wash it off. Driven by some inexplicable urge, she opened Douyin. She had already registered an account but had never posted any videos; she mostly just used it to “like” pretty girls. Her username was the system default “User xxxx.” Yu Yan found it an eyesore and changed it to: “Don’t Be Fooled By Women Anymore”
She turned off the main lights, went into the bedroom to grab the night light for illumination, and curled up on the sofa to take a few selfies. There were shots of her sitting up and shots of her lying down. In the dim room where day and night blurred together, Yu Yan’s gaze looked fragile. Amidst her shattered, down-and-out appearance, she calculatingly carried a hint of desire. She looked as if she were drunk, giving off the perfect atmospheric vibe of someone who had been left riddled with wounds by a woman. Yu Yan was very satisfied.
She chose a currently trending BGM, posted the picture-video, added a #le7 tag, and wrote the caption: 【Who will ache for my pain, who will solve it for me】
The author has something to say:
Buy Yan-jie a Dou+ boost8 to support her 🥳
The BGM is 《Can’t Learn》.
Footnotes
- 'Lǎo tiān nǎi' (Mother Heavens) is a humorous modern Chinese internet slang twist on the traditional 'lǎo tiān yé' (Grandfather Heaven / God), used by women to invoke a female deity when exasperated.
- 'Gutter oil' (dìgōu yóu) is a notorious slang term for illicitly recycled or substandard cooking oil, used here hyperbolically to describe unhygienic street food.
- A pun on ATM machine (ATM jī). The character 姬 (jī) sounds identical to 机 (machine) but is modern Chinese internet slang for a lesbian. Thus, an 'ATM-ji' is a lesbian who acts as a cash dispenser for someone else.
- Eight-treasure congee (bābǎo zhōu) is a traditional Chinese sweet or savory congee made with a variety of grains, beans, nuts, and dried fruits.
- In Chinese internet slang, 'to raise fish' (yǎng yú) means to keep a roster of romantic backups or casual flirtations, treating them like fish in a pond.
- In Chinese internet slang, referring to food as having too much 'technology' (kējì) means it is loaded with artificial flavorings, preservatives, and synthetic additives.
- In Chinese internet slang, '#le' is a common hashtag used as an abbreviation for 'lesbian' (lāzi).
- Dou+ (Dǒujiā) is Douyin's built-in paid promotion tool used to boost a video's traffic and visibility.
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