Shu Wanxiu was born with a beautiful face. But after fleeing a famine, she was starved until she was nothing but skin and bones, her good looks completely ravaged.

After much hardship, she settled down in Fangyuan County. At first, her new neighbors didn’t find her remarkable.

She just looked like a scrawny, withered girl with a bit of spirit in her eyes.

After being nourished for some time, Shu Wanxiu’s figure gradually filled out, and her beauty returned to half its former glory.

The aunties who knew her well, seeing her fresh and natural beauty, like a lotus emerging from clear water, all advised her, “It’s too hard for you to support your family alone. Since you have such good looks, why not find a decent family to marry into and have your husband help you raise your little nephew?”

Shu Wanxiu would always just smile and not respond.

Who would be willing to help their new wife raise her natal family’s nephew? It was simply unheard of.

But since she had promised her dying brother and sister-in-law to take care of their son, she would never abandon her nephew.

Whether she married late or not at all, she would bear the consequences.

…

Xun Yi was a rough man who spent his days bare-chested, tending to his furnace and forging iron.

Hearing that refugees had settled in the village, he felt a sense of kinship and looked after them a little more.

Knowing the Shu family was destitute, without even a pot to cook with, he forged a new one and sent it over. When spring came and it was time for planting, the Shu family had no farm tools, so he carefully selected a set to lend them.

He did things like this whenever he knew the Shu family was in need, always finding a way to help.

Until… he was refused by the young lady of the Shu family.

He understood what she meant she was afraid of receiving too much help from him and being unable to repay the favor in the future.

So, he did as she wished.

But for some reason, whenever he saw her toiling away in the fields under the hot sun, the unease in his heart grew day by day.

It even reached the point where his thoughts were consumed by her during the day, and he couldn’t sleep at night.

Finally, one day, unable to bear it any longer, he rushed to the Shu family’s field before dawn and helped pull weeds for an hour.

After that, his food tasted better, and he slept well.

But… that morning, everything was discovered by an auntie from the same village.

First, she laughed at him heartily, then she enlightened him: “You’re an unmarried man, and she’s an unmarried woman. Why do a good deed without leaving your name? The Shu girl is proper and honest. Without a formal status, she naturally won’t accept too much of your help. She’s a good girl who could only have been raised by a respectable family. You, you’re a seven-foot-tall man. If you’re interested, why not ask someone to be a matchmaker and see if she’s willing to marry you?”

1. The male lead has the appearance of a rough, unrefined man.
2. The male lead is emotionally dense, the type to give a lot without realizing it.
3. The female lead will raise her nephew, but there is no plotline where she desperately burns herself out, trying every means to earn money to support his scholarly pursuits and civil service examinations.
4. A normal farming story. Neither the male lead nor the female lead’s nephew will become an official.
5. Both main characters are virgins.

Tags: Neighbors to Lovers, A Match Made in Heaven, Farming, Sweet, Slice of Life, Daily Life

Shu Wanxiu, Xun Yi

One-sentence summary: A rough man and a beautiful maiden.

Theme: Live life with optimism, whether facing natural or man-made disasters.