Chapter 75

Factory Director Lu, after listening to Su Ye’s words, was deeply inspired and pondered for a long time. He never expected that an ordinary middle school teacher could say such things. Factory Director Lu felt deeply ashamed.

He had once been proud of his boldness in introducing new production lines from abroad, but looking back now, after learning from his failures, he had to admit that he had been arrogant and impulsive, lacking experience. His past reliance on experience seemed like a firefly compared to the moonlight of Teacher Su’s suggestions.

Factory Director Lu sincerely asked Su Ye, “Then, can I hire Teacher Su to work at the oil factory, to help train this talent team?”

The other teachers in the office were shocked when they heard this, looking at Factory Director Lu in disbelief.

The director of a large oil factory was actually trying to poach a middle school teacher? Was he crazy? If the principal were present, he would probably be so angry he would faint…

Su Ye firmly rejected, “As the saying goes, every profession has its own expertise. I’m just a teacher, I can teach, but handling factory matters would be difficult for me. This task needs to be handled personally by Factory Director Lu. You need to train and develop the talent from within the factory, starting with the younger generation.”

After hearing Su Ye’s words, Factory Director Lu left the school feeling warmly inspired.

After he left, the food and high-end pastries piled up on Su Ye’s desk became highly sought after.

Dozens of eyes focused on the fine grains and pastries. So much refined grain!

Su Ye chuckled as she watched the gazes, then looked down at the food in front of her—ten pounds of premium flour, five pounds of white sugar, and two boxes of fancy pastries. It was quite a substantial reward!

But as a “grain-rich household,” Su Ye wasn’t really in need of such things. She had already earned nearly a thousand pounds of grain and meat from the factory.

The teachers in the office, seeing the food on Su Ye’s desk, were filled with envy. Ten pounds of premium flour! How long had it been since they’d seen so much fine grain?

Town residents were allotted only a couple of taels of sugar coupons per month. For an ordinary family, saving up five pounds of sugar could take years, but only a large factory like Changyou could afford to give away such food.

Su Ye smiled at her colleagues’ envious looks and decided to share the food on her desk with everyone.

“I can’t eat all of this by myself, so let’s share it. I won’t be dividing the flour, though. Since graduation exams are coming up, I’ll treat the student who earns their high school diploma to some steamed buns made from white flour.”

The teachers in the office were thrilled, each taking a spoonful of white sugar.

The students couldn’t help but cheer with excitement. It was rare to get a chance to eat fine grains in a year, and now, to their surprise, getting a high school diploma meant they’d be treated to steamed buns?

The middle school students couldn’t stop drooling, repeatedly asking, “Teacher Su, what about us? If we get our junior high diploma, will we have steamed buns too?”

Although ten pounds of premium flour wasn’t a small amount, it wasn’t much when shared among an entire grade. Each student would probably only get a bun the size of a fist, not to mention having to share with the ninth-grade students as well.

However, for someone from a “grain-rich household,” a few pounds or even ten pounds of premium flour wasn’t much—it was just a drop in the ocean.

Su Ye smiled and confidently nodded. “Yes, there will be! Every hard working kid will get their steamed bun, no one will be left out!”

The children cheered with joy, their faces brimming with happiness at the thought of tasting the fragrant, soft white buns.

—

The teachers in the office busily divided up Su Ye’s food. He Meimei got a piece of high-end pastry, the sweet treat making her feel delighted all over. After everyone had finished sharing the pastries, they noticed Su Ye was lost in thought.

They hurriedly called out, “Su Ye, there are two more pieces of pastry left on your desk! Thank you!”

Su Ye snapped out of her thoughts and replied, “Oh, it’s fine, Meimei can finish them!”

During those few minutes of distraction, Su Ye was reflecting on why she had received the food.

This reward of food confirmed her earlier assumption: the reward from labor ≈ the influence of labor.

The same amount of effort spent on different students might yield the same labor value, but the results would differ due to individual differences. Similarly, the same effort applied to different matters would also produce different outcomes. For instance, selling tea could change the fate of an entire village, while repairing an oil press could alter the future of a factory. Although the number of people affected might not differ greatly, the scope of impact was different.

The oil press could be applied nationwide, which meant it earned her more food as a reward.

After some careful thinking, Su Ye had come up with a few money-making formulas: only by putting effort in the right direction could one achieve the highest reward.

—

Su Ye received 600 pounds of grain and 500 pounds of pork belly, bringing her closer to her goal, and she was in the best of spirits.

She generously gave Mrs. Fang and her husband 10 pounds of pork belly. Normally, Su Ye wasn’t this generous, as she would only sell a few pounds of pork each month, being frugal with her earnings.

But now things are different. With so much grain, she felt confident and decided to sell 20 pounds of premium flour.

Every night, Mr. and Mrs. Fang would wake up at dawn and squat in the small alley to collect their grain. By the end of the month, the dark circles under their eyes were so heavy that not even makeup could hide them. People who didn’t know them might think the couple was staying up late every night for other reasons!

But for the sake of food, it was all worth it! Every meal with fine grains—how sweet and fragrant it was! This kind of hardship was something others could only dream of, but they could never achieve it.

At 3 AM, the couple arrived in the alley. After a series of soft rustling sounds, Guo Aiguo opened a broken water jar and pulled out a bag, which was heavy, weighing a full 10 pounds.

They quickly opened the bag and discovered it was 10 pounds of pork belly!

Oh my God, 10 pounds of pork belly! The fresh, fatty pork still had a faint warmth, as if it had just been slaughtered. The white, shiny fat was at least an inch thick. Who knew how much lard could be rendered from it?

The couple was so happy they almost fainted. They hugged each other, unable to speak for a long time. Guo Aiguo, feeling a rush of excitement, quickly pulled out a stack of large black 10 yuan bills and carefully placed them under a brick. The two of them joyfully embraced the pork belly and went home to light the stove and prepare their meal.

Not long after, the window of a building in the alley emitted strands of blue smoke, filling the air with the rich aroma of meat.

The smell of the meat drifted into the neighbors’ dreams, making them crave large bites of meat in their sleep.

—

A few days later, all 20 of Changyou Oil Factory’s oil presses were successfully repaired and returned to the factory.

The factory had returned to its former prosperity, with a vibrant, thriving atmosphere. The new machines hummed as they worked on the assembly line, and the freshly delivered oil materials were repeatedly pressed into dry oil cakes.

Factory Director Lu solemnly welcomed back all the laid-off employees, and their wages and benefits remained the same as before.

Qin Lan’s father put on his dark blue work uniform again and happily returned to work at the oil factory. Yang Xue’s father happily handed out “start-up red envelopes” to the factory workers, each containing a 50-cent coin.

Factory Director Lu exchanged the small yellow fish for 500 yuan, but the municipal machine tool factory wanted to buy the design plans for the oil press, so the 500 yuan repair fee was returned to him in full. Feeling happy, he generously took 100 yuan from it as a public fund to give to the workers as a welfare bonus. In China, people like to share in the joy, and even the reopening of the factory had its own “reopening red envelopes.”

Yang Xue’s father handed out the red envelopes one by one, smiling and saying, “This is from Director Lu, everyone gets one.”

Early in the morning, Yu Fuda arrived at the oil factory and found that the once dull factory had become lively and bustling. When he approached, he overheard other workers discussing how Director Lu had fixed the oil press. Yu Fuda instinctively didn’t believe it.

At this point, it had been less than half a month since the oil press had broken down.

“Impossible, did Director Lu really fix the machine? Wasn’t the machine originally…” broken? Yu Fuda stopped mid-sentence and quickly bit his tongue.

Yang Xue’s father handed a red envelope to Yu Fuda and asked curiously, “Why is it impossible?”

“Never mind, Deputy Yu, you’re not short on money, so this red envelope is better left for those in financial difficulty,” he said, then firmly snatched the envelope back.

Who did this lowly person think he was to take the factory director’s hard-earned money?

Yu Fuda went to the production workshop and took a look. The new production line was humming, and fresh cooking oil was flowing. He recoiled as if he had seen a ghost, feeling a strange sense of losing control in his heart.

When Yang Xue’s father handed a red envelope to the factory’s engineer, Mr. Zheng, the engineer was also surprised and asked, “Has the factory director really fixed the oil press?”

Yang Xue’s father nodded vigorously. “Yes.”

Mr. Zheng silently adjusted his glasses, and after a long pause, he asked, “The director must be ecstatic… He’s been through a lot lately.”

Another staff member said, “Isn’t that the truth? The director has been working so hard, going days and nights without a full night’s sleep. If it weren’t for the help of experts and his determination, he might have been on the brink of despair and even considered jumping off a building. Look at how many factories are shut down outside, it’s killed so many people!”

“Those foreigners are really hateful! Their hearts are black, doing business without integrity, how could they sell defective machines to others? Old Zheng, don’t you agree?”

Mr. Zheng’s face suddenly turned pale, and he awkwardly avoided eye contact.

With the factory’s performance improving and operations returning to normal, Director Lu had gained the support of all the employees. This allowed him to focus on dealing with the troublemakers in the factory and carefully calculate the overall accounts.

He still couldn’t understand why, during the inspection, the oil press was perfectly fine, but after it was transported to the oil factory, it was broken.

However, before Director Lu could seriously investigate, something major happened on Yu Fuda’s side.

One early morning, Yu Fuda was thrown onto the street, covered in blood, stripped naked, and barely alive.

The citizens passing by on the street were all horrified at the sight. The incident was reported on C City’s news that very day. As people tuned into the radio to listen to the news, the entire city learned about it.

The victim, Yu Fuda, had severe soft tissue bruising and fractured erectile tissue, and he was in critical condition at the hospital. The brutality of the crime shocked everyone.

Lu Siyuan and Yang Chenxing were listening to the news together, exchanging looks of surprise.

If anyone had a grudge against Yu Fuda, they would know who it was — no one else but them, right?

Yang Chenxing slowly had a terrifying thought cross his mind. “Could… could this be something you did?”

Lu Siyuan looked at Yang Chenxing and kicked him, “What nonsense are you talking about? Don’t you know what I was doing last night? Although I would love to do something like that, didn’t Teacher Su refuse?”

Lu Siyuan had long considered ending Yu Fuda’s life. In the darker days of despair for his family, given his temperament, it wouldn’t have been impossible for him to take Yu Fuda down with him. But now that life was improving and all the gloom was fading, Lu Siyuan would have been crazy to go to such extremes.

When Qin Lan heard about Yu Fuda’s unfortunate fate, she felt no sympathy whatsoever, only a sense of satisfaction.

She whispered, “I don’t know which hero did it, but they did a great job! They eliminated a threat to the people! I later heard that many of the female workers at the factory were abused by him. Deputy Yu is a parasite to the people, he deserves to die a hundred times.”

The two boys fell silent upon hearing this. Yang Chenxing, with a wild imagination, suddenly thought of a possibility. “Could it be Su—”

He suddenly became excited. This must be what Teacher Su meant by “civilized people, doing civilized things”? Teacher Su, a civilized person, was surprisingly ruthless!

Lu Siyuan quickly covered Yang Chenxing’s mouth. The two of them rushed to the office to find Su Ye.

Yang Chenxing was so curious that he could hardly contain himself. His face was flushed, unsure of how to ask the questions. He stammered, “Teacher Su, did you hear the radio broadcast at noon today?”

Su Ye, without looking up from her grading, replied, “No, I didn’t hear it. What’s the matter?”

Yang Chenxing gestured and lowered his voice, asking, “That, Yu Fuda, had his… you know, his genitals cut off! Thrown onto the street… Teacher Su really didn’t know about this?”

Su Ye shook her head in confusion and raised her head, asking, “Should I know?”

Then, she mockingly said, “Yu Fuda had his genitals cut off, huh… tsk, he must have done a lot of bad things.”

Lu Siyuan, who originally knew nothing about it, sensed that there was more to the situation when he saw the mocking smile on the teacher’s face.

Was it really that simple for Yu Fuda to just fall into misfortune?

Especially after Qin Lan’s incident?

However, that afternoon, local radio mentioned the malicious injury incident on the street again, revealing that it was actually a case of a love murder. Yu Fuda had been spending 200 yuan a month keeping a mistress, who wore new clothes every day and dined out at restaurants daily, which made his wife incredibly jealous.

The night before, Yu Fuda’s wife had rushed into the mistress’s house with a knife, dragged him out of the mistress’s bed, and slashed him several times.

The mistress fled with the money that same night and was already nowhere to be found.

How could an ordinary deputy factory director afford such high expenses?

The police followed this lead and continued their investigation, only to uncover a huge case of embezzlement, bribery, and profiteering. Yu Fuda had embezzled 90,000 yuan from the factory he worked at, spending it on food, drink, and gambling, while also stealing production materials for profiteering.

Yu Fuda had not yet woken up after surgery, but the police were already waiting outside the operating room for him to regain consciousness and provide a confession.

After school that day, Lu Siyuan and his group of friends returned home and heard even juicier gossip circulating among the neighbors.

The place where Yu Fuda was thrown after being stripped was near the oil factory workers’ dormitory. The men, women, and children in the neighborhood had spent the whole day gossiping about Deputy Director Yu.

Yang Chenxing’s mother, always the gossiping friend of the women in the neighborhood, described the situation in vivid detail, saying, “It turns out that the ‘mom’ Yu Fuda had was actually his wife! Oh, I’ve never seen such a heartless man. He totally deserved to be chopped up!”

Yu Fuda had been at the oil factory for two years, and every year during the Spring Festival, his “mom” from the countryside would come to the city to visit him. She would stay for ten days or half a month, then return home with bags of goods. Yu Fuda had told others that it was his real mother, but it turned out it was actually his wife from the countryside.

His wife wasn’t a mild person either. When she discovered that Yu Fuda had secretly kept a mistress in the city, feeding her well and giving her fine food, she became furious and went into the city to attack him. Afterward, she threw away the knife and went to the police to confess.

The news about the deputy factory director being injured in a love murder was the talk of the town for a few days, but gradually, the excitement faded away.

A much bigger piece of good news soon captured everyone’s attention.

The C city supply and marketing cooperative quietly began distributing cooking oil, with a daily limit of one ton. A juicy gossip about a love murder was no match for the importance of daily necessities like rice, oil, and salt. The citizens rushed to line up to get their share.

Then, Changyou Oil Factory made the headlines. Leaders from both the city and the province came in several batches to visit the factory and offer their support.

This was because Zhou Honghan had written a paper based on the labor of the past month. The “Newly Improved Spiral Oil Press” was published in a major domestic scientific journal, sparking national discussions.

Cooking oil is a daily essential for people, critical for their lives. Without enough oil, how could people have the energy to work? In these difficult times, improving the efficiency of machines meant saving food!

The oil saved by Zhou Honghan’s improved oil press would allow for an additional 180,000 tons of cooking oil to be produced every year!

Because Changyou Oil Factory was the first to use the new production line, its oil yield rate increased by six percentage points. Every day, experts from all over the country visit the oil factory to learn about the new technology. After evaluation, it was confirmed that the batch of imported machines from Changyou far exceeded domestic production standards.

The machine tool factory was working overtime to produce new oil presses, and until the new oil presses were launched, southern provinces prioritized supplying oilseeds to Changyou.

After finishing their work, the oil factory workers proudly said, “I heard our production line is amazing, big figures come to visit us every day.”

“Who would have thought that such good things would happen? With things being so tough, our factory is still thriving and even becoming more successful. Our factory director is really great. When you have the right leader, you’ll never have to worry for a lifetime!”