In the winter of 1970, the north wind howled without pause. It hit people’s faces like knife blades, cold clear into the bones.

The little village had been quiet one second, then a sharp, panicked cry tore straight through it.

"Something’s happened! Someone fell in the water!"

"Quick, go have a look!"

"In weather like this, how’d anybody end up in the river?"

Nobody could make sense of it right away, but a life was at stake, so everyone dropped what they were doing and ran toward the riverbank.

It was the dead of winter, the wind over the water cut like ice, and not one soul had expected anyone to fall in.

By the time the crowd reached the bank, before they could even ask what had happened, they saw a figure in the middle of the pond, bobbing up and down in the water, looking ready to sink for good at any second.

Team leader Gordon Ashford heard the commotion and hurried over too. The moment he arrived, he shouted for anyone in the village who could swim to get in and save the person.

The words had barely landed when the whole bank went silent.

Most of the village men and young fellows had grown up around the water and were decent swimmers, but this was the bitter end of winter, the water so cold it could flay the skin off you. Nobody dared jump in lightly.

Gordon Ashford looked at them shrinking back and felt both angry and anxious. Usually, when he told them not to go in the river, he couldn’t stop them no matter what he said. Now that something had really happened, every last one of them had gone mute.

Just then, a woman on the bank pointed at the figure rising and sinking in the water, her voice shaking. "I saw clearly. That’s Old Second Ji’s girl, Amber Holt!"

"Looks like... looks like it really is..."

"It’s her! It’s Amber Holt! Hurry up and save her, we can’t just stand here and watch her drown!"

"Then who’s going in?"

One man had only just started to move when the woman beside him yanked him back hard. "My man’s not going into that water. If any of you want to save her, you go."

Everybody in the village knew what kind of girl Amber Holt was. A perfectly good young woman, yet her behavior was all wrong. Of all things, she insisted on climbing into a man’s bed, and not just any man’s bed either, but Nathan Mercer’s, the golden boy of the whole village.

Nathan Mercer was the only high school graduate in the village. He’d already joined the army and had a bright future ahead of him. He was the hope of the whole place. Plenty of families had their eyes on that match, hoping to tie themselves to the Mercer family and win a better road for their own children and younger kin. And yet that lazy, gluttonous Amber Holt had somehow latched onto him.

Why, she herself had even been thinking about matching her own younger sister with Nathan Mercer.

Seeing nobody move, Gordon Ashford’s face darkened further. He barked again, "Are you people saving her or not?"

But the villagers still shook their heads one after another. "Not me! I’m not going!"

Deep down, most of them felt that if not for Amber Holt, their own sister or daughter might already have married Nathan Mercer. One way or another, they all carried a bit of resentment toward her.

Gordon Ashford had never expected the people under his watch to be the sort who’d stand by and let someone die. Inwardly, he was already thinking he’d have to crack down hard on political and moral education in the village from now on. He swept his eyes over the crowd, saw all of them dodging and avoiding his gaze, and his temper shot up. Still, he understood one thing clearly: even if he forced them into the water, if they dragged their feet and didn’t truly try, the Holt girl still wouldn’t make it.

At that moment, Amber Holt was shivering violently in the water. Wasn’t she supposed to be at work in the office? How had she ended up in a river? She remembered her boss saying they had to strictly carry out the 996 schedule from now on, really throw themselves into the grind, and then he’d hand out bonuses. For the sake of that bonus, she’d practically treated his words like an imperial decree, getting up earlier than the chickens and sleeping later than a dog...

What was going on...

All of a sudden, another mouthful of water rushed into her mouth. Only then did she fully realize she’d fallen into the water. "Help! Help! Somebody save me!"

The people on shore all froze. Staring at the water, they thought, that girl actually called for help?

Splash.

While everyone was distracted, a figure jumped into the water and swam toward Amber Holt.

"Who was that?"

"Who else could it be? Old Second Ji, obviously. He knows his daughter’s reputation is rotten, so he had no choice but to jump in himself."