He Burned My Future, So I Built a New One

I'd wrecked my body in the countryside, grinding through every last day just to earn that single shot at a city-transfer slot.

And the day before the papers came through, my husband, the party secretary himself, burned my file with his own hands.

All because Olympia Swanson, a city youth from the neighboring settlement, had wept about not wanting to marry the village ruffian.

Luther watched me scream in front of the fire pit, his brow creased with nothing but impatience：

“Even if you stay in the countryside, you're still my wife. You think I'd let you starve? But if Olympia stays here, her whole life is over!”

“When did you get so selfish? You can't even spare her one way out?”

Later, Olympia took my name, my slot, and went back to the city. She rose through the ranks without looking back.

……

The flames in the charcoal pit licked greedily at those few thin sheets of paper.

My city-transfer papers. And the recommendation form stamped with the Village Brigade's official seal.

“No!”

I lunged for the pit like a woman possessed, reaching bare-handed into the coals, not caring that the fire scorched my skin.

His hand clamped around my wrist, iron-tight, locking me in place.

“Isabella Henson, are you done with this tantrum?!”

Luther Gilbert's brows were knotted so tight they could have snapped. His eyes held nothing but disappointment and blame, as if I were the one being unreasonable.

“That was my life! Luther Gilbert, give it back to me!”

I screamed until my throat tore, tears flooding down my face, watching helplessly as those pages with their bright red stamps curled and blackened in the flames, then crumbled to ash.

In that moment I heard something shatter inside me, a sound more piercing than the north wind howling outside.

The firelight carved Luther Gilbert's face into something hard and cold.

He let go of me, brushed nonexistent dust from his hands, and spoke in a tone so matter-of-fact it chilled me to the bone.

“Don't be so dramatic about 'your life.' You're my wife. As long as I'm running this brigade, you'll have food on the table. You stay here, we stay together. Isn't that a good thing?”

I collapsed to the floor and stared at the basin of ash, shaking all over.

Not just from the cold. From a despair so deep it reached my bones.

In my last life, it had been exactly like this.

The day before my transfer papers came through, Olympia Swanson had come running in tears, sobbing that the village ruffian Reginald Ryder had his eye on her and was going to force her into marriage.

If she couldn't get back to the city, she'd be ruined.

And so my good husband, the beloved Secretary Gilbert whom everyone at the Settlement praised as noble and selfless, had righteously burned my file.

He used his authority at the Village Brigade to swap my name for Olympia's behind closed doors.

In my previous life, I fell gravely ill over what he'd done and never recovered enough to leave the countryside.

Meanwhile, Olympia went back to the city, got into college, landed a government position, and married the son of a senior official.

A few years later, Luther made it back to the city too.

But I'd been broken by years of hard labor. My body gave out completely, and I bled away the last of my strength on that freezing brick bed.

Before I died, I heard that Olympia had sighed at a class reunion：

“Thank God Luther had the guts to do what he did back then. Otherwise, where would I be today?”

I also heard that Luther had drunk too much at that same reunion, eyes red, saying he was sorry about what happened to me, but he didn't regret saving a life.

Didn't regret it!

Saving a life!

Was my life not a life?

“Isabella, please don't blame Luther.”

A timid voice drifted in from the doorway.

Olympia Swanson stood there in an oversized military coat that swallowed her frame. It was Luther's coat.

She hunched her shoulders, her small pale face glistening with tears, the picture of fragile helplessness.

“This is all my fault. I was born unlucky. If this is going to make you resent Luther, then I……then I'll just go marry Reginald Ryder. The worst that can happen is I die!”