Zeng Honglin knew his wife's anxieties and paid close attention to developments in China.
By '78, policies had already relaxed considerably. He sent his younger son back first to scout the terrain and lay the groundwork, also to search for the infant girl given away years ago.
When Zeng Jingchu found the farming family, he discovered that their only daughter, Liu Yuelian, didn't resemble his mother as much as her parents had claimed.
He didn't reveal himself rashly but instead began to investigate.
This investigation uncovered a secret.
It turned out that not long after the farming family adopted the infant girl, she fell ill.
The production team and commune couldn't treat her, so she was sent to the county hospital. She stayed there for half a month before being discharged.
Zeng Jingchu focused his investigation on this half-month period.
Zeng Jingchu discovered that the rural couple had left the hospital room simultaneously at one point.
This was the memory of a younger patient from the same ward at the time.
The patient remembered because shortly after the couple left, a woman entered carrying a swaddling cloth, looking for them.
Upon seeing the infant girl in the hospital bed, she placed the swaddling cloth next to the infant and played with her.
The patient assumed it was a relative and didn't pay much attention.
She also caught a glimpse of the woman opening the swaddling cloth and taking out the baby inside to change her diaper.
Not long after, the woman left, carrying the swaddling cloth.
The rural couple also returned, grumbling about having waited so long and not seeing anyone.
The patient, uninterested, didn't tell them anyone had come looking for them.
Zeng Jingchu believed that this woman had swapped his maternal half-sister.
But why would the woman swap the infant girl?
He didn't blame the rural couple for not noticing the swap, as it was hard to distinguish between infants if one wasn't paying close attention.
Especially since it was a girl. No one would have suspected that a female infant would be swapped for another.
Zeng Jingchu's first suspect was the Chen family. He thought if Chen Guangping had known about a daughter, he might have quietly taken her back.
Upon arriving in a provincial capital, he found that Chen Guangping had been deceased for many years, and Han Shuqin had also passed away.
Only Chen Guangfu, his son Chen Yaoming, and Chen Yaoming's son Chen Yaozhi remained of the Chen family.
Investigating Chen Guangfu led Zeng Jingchu to the Fu Han Gang.
He also discovered that Chen Yaozhi had smuggled arms overseas.
However, he found no information about Chen Yaoming and Xiao Wei.
As the educated youths from Zhangshan had already returned to the city, and the Tian family remained tight-lipped about Tian Jing's identity,
And when he visited Zhangshan, Tian Jing had already married into the Ku Shan family.
The trail went cold. Zeng Jingchu secretly took a hair sample from Liu Yuelian and returned overseas to conduct a paternity test with his mother.
Indeed, Liu Yuelian was not his maternal half-sister.
Upon hearing this news, Han Shuzhen was devastated, unable to sleep for nights on end, her health deteriorating.
In '79, as China embraced reform and opening up, the Zeng family immediately moved back.
Zeng Honglin managed the business, while Zeng Jingchu continued his investigation in the provincial capital.
After casually buying and eating a watermelon from Sister-in-law Ouyang, Zeng Jingchu, with his businessman's habits, took over the watermelon business.
By '81, upon seeing Tian Jing in Ku Shan, Zeng Jingchu immediately investigated the Tian family.
It was then he learned that Chen Yaoming and Xiao Wei had a daughter during their period of rustication.
Without needing a paternity test, Zeng Jingchu knew Tian Jing was his sister.
He returned to the capital and told his mother about Tian Jing.
Han Shuzhen immediately went back to the dilapidated old family home of the Han family to search.
Indeed, in the backyard where Han Shuqin had played as a child, inside a tree hollow known to both sisters, she found a tin box.
The box contained many black and white photos and a letter.
Those black and white photos were of Tian Jing and Liu Yuelian.
One was thin and gaunt, carrying firewood in a back basket; the other was well-fed and smiling brightly.
This stark contrast brought Han Shuzhen immense pain. With trembling hands, she opened the letter.
The letter was written by her eldest sister, Han Shuqin.
That night, Han Shuqin followed her husband into the courtyard where her sister lived.
She stood outside the door, listening, unwilling to save her sister.
Because from childhood to adulthood, Han Shuqin had resented her sister.
Her sister was the late-born child of their parents, and she felt her sister had stolen their parents' affection.
Even their brother hadn't been doted on by their parents in the same way.
Moreover, she had overheard her parents discussing that they had already verbally betrothed her sister to the Zeng family.
Although she was four years older than Zeng Honglin, in her heart, she had developed feelings for the steady and handsome young man.
After marrying into the Chen family, she had intended to live a good life with Chen Guangping.
But after returning to the capital for her sister's wedding, she discovered her husband had changed.
He had become incapable of even a normal marital relationship.
It wasn't until her sister and her husband brought their eldest nephew to seek medical help that she uncovered her husband's secret.
She was filled with hatred, hating her sister for stealing her parents' love, hating her sister for flaunting her affection with the man she secretly admired.
And now, her sister had stolen her husband's love.
Very well, as a wife, she should consider her husband's feelings.
So, she stood guard outside...
She knew her sister was pregnant, and calculating the timing, she knew the child was her husband's.
She sent people to watch her sister in the capital, eager to see her sister's downfall.
Who knew Zeng Honglin's love was so great that he could tolerate his wife's infidelity and the child born from it.
The Zeng family planned to move overseas, and they sent the infant girl to a farming family in the outskirts of the capital.
Her hatred had no outlet. Coincidentally, her eldest son had a daughter born in the countryside.
She loathed baby girls!
She personally went to the countryside, feigning care for Xiao Wei during her postpartum confinement, and secretly arranged for two infant girls to be swapped.
To demonstrate her affection for this 'granddaughter' and to make her presence during Xiao Wei's confinement seem natural, she placed a family heirloom of the Chen family on the infant girl.
Her original intention was to personally torment this infant girl. Little did she know that Xiao Wei would give the baby girl to the Tian family.
Upon inquiring about the Tian family's character, she felt relieved.
At the end of the letter, Han Shuqin expressed regret that she hadn't had the chance to marry her 'granddaughter' into a 'good' family.
Whether it was retribution or something else, Liu Yuelian, despite living a good life, was targeted by a hooligan when she was fifteen.
The Liu family hastily arranged a marriage for Liu Yuelian, and after the engagement, the hooligan murdered the fiancé.
After two consecutive fiancés died, no one dared to propose to the Liu family.
When the hooligan came to propose, how could the Liu family agree?
Looking at the belongings left by Liu Yuelian's birth parents, they dared not marry Liu Yuelian off to the hooligan.
The family did their best to protect Liu Yuelian until the reform and opening up, when the Liu family quietly sent Liu Yuelian south...
Sun Liyang causing trouble for Tian Jing worried Zeng Jingchu greatly.
He sought help from his cousin.
The Han family's misfortune stemmed from their members' supernatural abilities.
When the Zeng family moved overseas, Zeng Jingrong, harboring hatred and only twelve years old, refused to go abroad.
Han Shuzhen couldn't persuade him. After Zeng Honglin spoke with Zeng Jingrong personally, he agreed to let Zeng Jingrong stay.
The remaining Zeng Jingrong first found an ordinary Zeng family, gave them considerable benefits, and obtained the identity of a distant nephew of this family.
He lived with this Zeng family for three years before enlisting in the army.
He claimed to be eighteen when enlisting, but this was exposed during identity verification.
Zeng Jingrong had been waiting for this moment of attention. He displayed his supernatural abilities to the person verifying his identity.
He was then taken away by the individual...
Over the next decade, Zeng Jingrong rose to the position of captain in the special abilities team.
Over the next decade, Zeng Jingrong also avenged his family.