My fourth uncle said our ancestors were secret agents in the Qing Dynasty palace, specializing in the secrets of the imperial court. As for what secrets, he had no idea. I asked my grandfather, and he told me that our ancestors specialized in large mausoleums, finding auspicious sites for feng shui and building new imperial tombs to stabilize the country and benefit future generations. However, my fourth uncle disagreed. He felt that the Qing government wasn't studying feng shui, but rather digging up other people's ancestral graves to repay its own foreign debts.

Rumor has it that the Qing Dynasty had twelve great spies. These twelve agents were arranged according to the twelve zodiac animals, and they were not affiliated with each other, answering only to the emperor. In the late Qing Dynasty, the twelve agents were under the control of Empress Dowager Cixi. By the end of the Qing Dynasty, the agents had disappeared. Family tradition says that after the fall of the Qing Dynasty, some returned to their hometowns, some joined warlords, some changed careers, and some went abroad to study.

My ancestor, Li Chengfeng, was one of the twelve great spies of the Qing Dynasty. He was well aware of the unique nature of his identity and that he would be hunted down if he left Beijing. So he quietly returned to his hometown of Xuzhou, hoping to enjoy a peaceful retirement. However, the secret leaked out, and Yuan Shikai sent someone to find his ancestor and publish the list of his twelve secret agents. With no other choice, his ancestor secretly traveled to Beijing again. Yuan Shikai was ambitious and ruthless, but he didn't know his destiny. Before his ancestor arrived in Beijing, Yuan Shikai died of illness, so he returned to his hometown once again.

This time, his ancestor didn't go to Xuzhou again, but to Lingbi County, Anhui Province, not far from Xuzhou. Because the two places belonged to different provinces, the warlords couldn't find him. He found a village with the surname Li. Since they were both from Daliushu, Shanxi, they quickly established their lineage and bought a house, where they settled down.

The Republic of China was a turbulent era, and people were short of food and clothing. To make ends meet, his ancestor purchased hundreds of acres of land, which was considered a wealthy family at the time. During the Anti-Japanese War, the family business passed down to my great-grandfather's generation. A patriotic young man, he formed a self-defense force and participated in the Kuomintang-organized Battle of Xuzhou. After the war, dissatisfied with the current situation, he resolutely declined a position offered by the Kuomintang and returned home.

After the Huaihai Campaign, Xuzhou was liberated. Knowing the national land policy, my great-grandfather surrendered our 300 mu of land. Because he voluntarily surrendered, the village didn't harass us. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, our family declined steadily, and the traces of landlord status were no longer apparent. Due to our humble background, we were far poorer than the average family. My grandfather said that, in terms of our origins, ours was more like a legitimate proletariat.

However, it was also because of our ancestors' history as secret agents that our family's subsequent story unfolded.

The story begins in 1953.

Although 1953 was only the fourth year after liberation, the economy was still struggling. While urban residents lived frugally, rural residents experienced hunger and satiety. During difficult times, every household in the village had someone starve to death.

In history textbooks, we often see lengthy descriptions of the background, process, and significance of certain historical events. Yet, some historical events persist for decades or even centuries without even being mentioned by historians. When recalling history, the more vividly remembered events are often described in less detail. For example, no one has ever accurately calculated the number of people who starved to death in natural disasters in a given year, or it's simply impossible to do so.

The village I lived in was called Quanji Village. At the time, it had a population of over a thousand, making it the largest natural village in the town. With such a large population, many people starved to death, initially among the elderly, then among the middle-aged.

In the southeast corner of the village, there was a depression where bodies were constantly thrown. The older generation called it the "mass grave." The drought, scorching heat, and plagues raged, and the death toll was even higher. Every year, countless bodies were thrown into the mass graves. Those with mats still wrapped themselves in them, while those without simply wore tattered, thin layers of clothing, leaving the thicker clothes for the living.

With so many deaths in those days, the mass graves were forbidden ground for our village, and no one dared to go there at night. Strange things happened there, including rumors of blue, ghostly lights chasing people at night, and even people singing in the mass graves. Some of these strange things were rumors, while others were witnessed by villagers themselves, but after all these years, there's no way to verify the specifics.

The village next door was the poorest within a radius of fifty miles. With a large population and little land, every year in April and May, during the lean season, there was no food to eat. We called it a spring famine. In 1953, the Huanghuai region suffered an exceptional drought, resulting in a drastic drop in grain production. All the food was consumed, and the newly emerged green shoots from the fields were picked and stewed in soup. Even leaves became a luxury. In times of crisis, village cadres decided to lead the entire village out begging. This was undoubtedly a heroic feat at the time, but it was certainly not an isolated case. However, upon arriving in the county town, they were stopped by county officials. The village cadres claimed that the village had no food left. The county leaders said they didn't care, but that collective begging was absolutely forbidden, saying it would smear New China.

The county leaders had the village cadres escorted back to the village. Upon returning, the villagers, starving to death, died. For several years after that, no one visited the village. The mayor, believing it was plagued by evil spirits, built a primary school there in the hope of dispelling the negative influence.

The economy was bad, and there was no food to eat. A bad economy had its advantages: it made it easier to find a wife. Although parents cherished their daughters and always hoped they would marry well, raising a daughter in difficult times was not easy. How could they raise a daughter when they couldn't even afford to eat themselves?

The more turbulent the situation, the more people rushed to marry their daughters off. Many families actively arrange marriages, marrying off girls as young as fifteen or sixteen. However, our family was relatively poor, and even in this situation, my grandfather remained single until he was twenty-eight. I asked him why he didn't marry when his family was better off. He replied that he hadn't anticipated the family's sudden decline. He was once a young master, yet the next day he was labeled a landlord and a capitalist-roader. In the past, marriage proposals were clamoring for marriage, but now, the clamoring for marriage proposals is a source of deep regret.

Marriage is sometimes about fate, and it can't be forced.

My grandfather's name was Li Changde, and "Long" refers to his generational status. At the Spring Festival of his twenty-eighth birthday, the production team distributed pork, two taels per person. There were only three of us in our family at the time: my great-grandfather, my great-grandmother, and my grandfather, so we received six taels. For a villager who shunned meat year-round, these six taels of pork were incredibly tempting, and we couldn't wait to devour them.

Other families would have already stewed the pork before the New Year, but we saved it for entertaining relatives after the Lunar New Year, so we couldn't bear to part with it. During the Lunar New Year, my great-grandmother, always calculating, suddenly became generous. Unlike other women, she didn't mince the meat finely. Instead, she stewed it whole and served it on a plate. When relatives came, no one was too embarrassed to take the meat, so it ended up being preserved until the fourteenth day of the first lunar month.

On the evening of the fourteenth day of the first lunar month, there was a knock at the door. Grandpa opened the main entrance to the main hall and saw an old man collapsed from hunger at his doorstep. Being a kindhearted man, Grandpa secretly gave the old man the six ounces of meat. After the old man had eaten his fill, he refused to leave and stayed at our house. When Grandma and Grandpa found out, they didn't blame Grandpa and even gave him two extra quilts. The next day, the old man and my great-grandfather chatted. They first discussed village affairs, remarking on the bad times, then moved on to our old house, remarking on its unique design. Finally, the old man saw my grandfather tending the vegetable patch and suddenly remembered something. He asked my great-grandfather, "Brother, you're not young anymore. Are you still married?"

My great-grandfather replied, "Our family is too poor. Who would be interested in a son like me?"

The old man slapped his thigh and said, "Others might not be interested, but I am. I have a daughter who's still unmarried and quite pretty. If you don't mind, let her marry your son."

And so, my grandfather married my grandmother. Their story is truly legendary. My grandmother's family was from Luoyang, Henan. Her surname was Qiu and her given name was Mingju. It's said that my grandmother was incredibly beautiful when she was young, and her marriage to my grandfather was a topic of discussion in the village for a long time. Some said my grandfather was a toad who had found swan meat, others said he was destined to be a young master, and still others said good deeds are rewarded. This conversation didn't last long, however. Food was still scarce, and deaths from starvation were commonplace, leaving no one interested in the affairs of others. But it seemed that after that, our family improved somewhat, sometimes even helping our neighbors. Considering the circumstances at the time, my grandmother's family was relatively well-off. Since she married into our family, we've lived on cornmeal.

My grandmother brought a generous dowry, and our family did enjoy a period of relative prosperity, but that situation only lasted two years. In the winter of 1955, a severe drought reduced the harvest, and the village began to run out of food before the twelfth lunar month. By Laba (Laba Festival), many people had begun to flee. Only the elderly, the unable to walk, and children who didn't know where to go remained. Many families were torn apart, each fleeing their own way, unable to care for their entire families. Those who could return for the Lunar New Year returned, but those who couldn't would have to wait until the summer wheat harvest to avoid burdening their families. As for the elderly and children, their fate was up to their own fate.

By the 24th day of the twelfth lunar month, news of starvation deaths spread daily throughout the village. Because grandma hid two bags of dried sweet potatoes under the bed, the family barely managed to get by. According to grandpa, that was when grandma was the thinnest.