Can Jiuluoyu Also Work As Customer Service In Wuxianliu? Chapter 4

Company lunch break was at twelve. Zhang Yu rushed into the Break Room right on time. Perhaps he had arrived too early, as the room was currently empty; even the Ghost Painter wasn’t there.

Zhang Yu secretly felt relieved. He looked around quickly and indeed spotted several lunch boxes placed conspicuously on the table.

Just by looking at the packaging, Zhang Yu knew these lunch boxes were not cheap.

He leaned in closer. The dishes were plentiful: cumin beef cubes, braised lion’s head meatballs, stir-fried water spinach, and cold cucumber salad. A few boxes even had an extra large chicken drumstick on top.

Zhang Yu was so hungry his eyes couldn’t move away. He couldn’t remember the last time he had eaten such a substantial amount of meat.

The lunch boxes before him were incredibly tempting.

Today truly hadn’t been wasted.

Zhang Yu stopped being polite, picked up a box, and began to devour it.

It was truly delicious.

He wondered how much one box cost. This was so much better than the large-scale cafeteria food he used to eat!

After eating his fill, Zhang Yu started to feel drowsy.

He thought it over. Since there was no one else in the Break Room, and the sofa looked so comfortable, surely it would be fine if he just took a quick nap.

Unable to resist the temptation, Zhang Yu nervously lay down and quickly drifted off to sleep.

In his dream, he owned a bright, spacious house. Every day, warm sunlight streamed into the room when he woke up. Outside the window was a beautiful garden and endless green mountains and clear waters.

It was utterly wonderful.

Zhang Yu was practically smiling in his sleep.

“Ah…!”

Zhang Yu rolled over and nearly tumbled off the sofa, waking himself up with a start.

He was still a little groggy after waking up, wondering where his big mansion had gone. After a moment of confusion, he realized it had all been a dream.

Back in Reality, he was still a low-level worker, without a house or car, renting a Partitioned Apartment.

The good news, however, was that he had a new job with a Monthly Salary of 5,000. That was sixty thousand a year. If he managed to save fifty thousand a year, in ten years he would have five hundred thousand. He was young and strong; working for another thirty years wouldn’t be a problem. If things went smoothly, he could save one and a half million!

One and a half million!

One and a half million…

This was a figure Zhang Yu could only accumulate by tightening his belt and working hard his entire life, yet it still seemed quite far from buying that bright, spacious mansion.

Sigh, better stick to dreaming.

He suddenly felt something was off. He turned his head and saw the Ghost Painter sitting leisurely on a single armchair, reading a book.

Zhang Yu’s heart tightened. Had he overslept and missed the time to return to work?

Oh no!

The Ghost Painter seemed to sense his panic, closed the book, and spoke at the right moment: “It’s not time to start work yet.”

Zhang Yu let out a long breath, relieved that he had narrowly escaped disaster. Next time he took a nap, he definitely needed to set an alarm.

Zhang Yu shook off the distracting thoughts, pulled out his phone, and looked up at the Ghost Painter: “Can I add you on WeChat?”

Adding and chatting on WeChat were Zhang Yu’s hobbies. Not only did it help maintain social relationships, but it also allowed him to practice his language skills—a hundred benefits and no harm. Of course, he should add everyone he could.

The usually calm Ghost Painter looked slightly taken aback. After a moment, he smiled again: “Of course.”

Saying this, the Ghost Painter pulled out a phone of an unrecognizable brand from his sleeve.

The current phone market was booming with many brands and models, so Zhang Yu didn’t notice anything unusual.

After adding the contact, Zhang Yu happily returned to his cubicle, unaware that the Ghost Painter watched his retreating back for a long time.

·

In the afternoon, with no one supervising him, Zhang Yu slacked off the entire time.

Thanks to his excellent disguise skills, his colleagues hadn’t yet discovered the fact that he was illiterate.

That was great; he had managed to blend in.

The salary was 5,000 per month, roughly calculating to over 160 yuan per day!

He earned this much just by sitting at his desk for a day!

Zhang Yu had never earned money this easily before!

At five in the afternoon, Zhang Yu could barely contain his eagerness to leave, but since it was his first day, he felt he had to put on a show and forced himself to endure it.

Only when Tong Wei told him he could clock out did Zhang Yu grab the lunch boxes and rush out—the leftover lunch boxes in the Break Room from noon hadn’t been eaten. Zhang Yu asked around, and everyone told him they didn’t want them, so he could take them if he liked.

Zhang Yu certainly wasn’t going to be polite.

Running all the way, Zhang Yu successfully snagged an almost new shared bicycle.

The basket was intact, the seat cushion was plump, the QR code hadn’t been scratched off, and there were no flyers on the handlebars.

A good bike, a very good bike.

Scanning the code to unlock, elegantly swinging his leg over, Zhang Yu executed the sequence flawlessly.

The company location was slightly remote, but where Zhang Yu lived was even more remote. Even cycling would take fifty minutes. The subway didn’t go directly between the two points, requiring transfers between the subway and bus, which was also more expensive. Cycling with a monthly pass was more cost-effective.

It would be even more cost-effective if Zhang Yu could own his own electric bike.

The first thing he would do after getting paid was buy one outright! Zhang Yu secretly vowed.

He absolutely wouldn’t let capital earn an extra penny off him.

Thinking about the five thousand yuan waiting for him in the future, Zhang Yu was filled with motivation.

When he first arrived in the city, he didn’t understand anything. He couldn’t read, didn’t know how to read the room, and often failed to grasp the underlying meaning of what people said. Even when he exerted himself, his efforts were misplaced. He tried his best at every job, but things often went against his wishes, and he never lasted long.

The temperature was perfect this season. Zhang Yu cycled, enjoying the breeze. The road was bustling with traffic. Following the electric bikes in front of him, stopping and starting, he felt as if he had found a small place for himself in this bottomless steel jungle.

Before he knew it, an hour had passed, and Zhang Yu finally returned to his Rental Apartment.

The Rental Apartment was in the City Outskirts, a clearly illegal Partitioned Apartment. Each room was less than ten square meters. Zhang Yu’s room faced away from the sun, making it perpetually damp, furnished only with a small bed and a row of cabinets built into the wall.

Downstairs, Zhang Yu ran into his landlord, Tong Guoqiang.

Tong Guoqiang was an old man in his sixties, but he was still quite healthy and rode his tricycle out to set up a stall every day.

The old man looked surprised to see Zhang Yu return: “Why are you back?”

“I finished work, what else would I do but come back?”

“Work?” Tong Guoqiang scoffed. “Seriously? Aren’t they just using the job recruitment as an excuse to trick you into getting your kidneys harvested?”

“They are a legitimate company. They rented an entire floor of the Office Building, you wouldn’t have seen anything like it.”

“Heh, legitimate company? Then it’s even less likely they’d hire you.”

“You, sir, are a frog in a well. You don’t know what the modern era is like.”

“A frog in a well? You, an illiterate man, are telling me this? Don’t try to put on airs, it’s ridiculous. You just learned that phrase today, didn’t you?”

Zhang Yu had indeed only learned the phrase that morning. He had intended to seize the opportunity to show off, but Tong Guoqiang saw right through him: “So what if I did? At least I genuinely learned it. Learn one today, learn another tomorrow… I can learn thirty in a month, over three hundred in a year. I won’t be worse than a college student!”

Tong Guoqiang couldn’t argue with Zhang Yu. He snorted, twisted the handle, and his tricycle shot away with a “swoosh.” The printed cloth hanging off the back fluttered in the wind, flapping loudly.

The cloth, however, wasn’t advertising snacks, but a large, bold missing person notice.

·

Zhang Yu didn’t take the old man’s mockery to heart. He carried the lunch boxes upstairs happily.

The Rental Apartment was on the fourth floor. The old building had no elevator, so he had to climb up and down. Fortunately, Zhang Yu was in the prime of his life, and the stairs were nothing to him.

The kitchen in the Partitioned Apartment was supposedly shared, but every time someone used it, Tong Guoqiang would find fault, claiming it wasn’t cleaned properly. The other tenants knew the landlord was deliberately causing trouble because he begrudged the cost of gas and electricity, so they gradually stopped using it.

Only Zhang Yu persistently made the most of it, treating the old man’s complaints like hot air.

In the past, he was too poor to make proper hot or cold dishes. Most of the time, he just boiled noodles, occasionally adding an egg.

But today, he had acquired a lot of supplies!

Zhang Yu held his head high, carefully took out the lunch boxes, selected one to heat up on the stove, and stuffed the rest into the refrigerator to freeze.

The refrigerator belonged to Tong Guoqiang. Uneaten or precious items were all crammed inside, only entering but never leaving, stuffed again and again. If you dug deep, you could probably “unearth” some zombie meat from the last century.

Zhang Yu had fought many battles of wits with this refrigerator and had plenty of experience. After some maneuvering, he actually managed to squeeze the lunch boxes inside.

After dinner, Zhang Yu meticulously cleaned the kitchen before returning to his room to rest.

His room was also spotless, without a single piece of clutter lying around.

Zhang Yu remembered his self-improvement plan. He quickly pulled out his phone to listen to free online classes. He had started with elementary school language arts and had now reached the fourth-grade level—a pleasing progression.

The online teacher explained things very well, and Zhang Yu listened intently, losing track of time until it was past ten o’clock.

Zhang Yu’s breathing hitched. It was so late, and he hadn’t done his practice for the day yet.

His plan for the day was to write an essay, the theme being his reflections on starting work.

After gathering his thoughts for a moment, Zhang Yu was struck by inspiration. He picked up his pen and wrote quickly, soon producing an original short essay. He read it over himself and felt it was good; his writing skills had clearly surpassed the level of a middle school student. He really wanted to invite someone to appreciate it…

Zhang Yu scrolled through his friends list, finally settling his gaze on the Ghost Painter.

The Ghost Painter’s WeChat nickname was simply Ghost Painter. His profile picture was pure black, and he had no Moments posts, making it impossible to guess his preferences.

Zhang Yu secretly praised him. The Ghost Painter was truly a mature professional, airtight in his presentation.

He learned from this; he would also try to appear so profound and mysterious in the future.

Zhang Yu took a photo of the finished essay, gritted his teeth, and sent it, making sure to select the original image option.

He wasn’t going to skimp on the data usage.

·

At the company, or rather, the Safe House, the Ghost Painter was staring blankly out the window when a short message notification sounded from his sleeve.

Someone had sent him a message.

Players couldn’t return to the real world or use electronic products from Reality; they could only use imitation props provided by the game.

The phones in the game had similar functions to those in Reality, except they couldn’t contact people in Reality.

But Zhang Yu seemed to be an exception.

Zhang Yu sent him a message? The Ghost Painter was intrigued.

Would he belatedly realize that this company was suspicious in every way, and like everyone else before him, resign and run away?

The Ghost Painter was surprised to find that he was genuinely overly curious about Zhang Yu.

He clicked on the message. What greeted his eyes was a sheet of paper crammed with Chinese characters. Every single character was crooked, messy, and painful to look at. Just viewing them was cruel enough, but worse, they were illegally gathered, stacked on top of each other in clumps.

Truly terrifying.

[A beautiful day!

Dear Ghost Painter:

Hello!

I am Little Zhang, the new employee, and I feel very honored to join this company! Today is my first day of work, and I feel very happy, because everyone took very good care of me, making me feel warm, warm enough to be used as firewood! (Hint: This is a metaphor, please don’t actually burn me.)

Also, the food was really delicious, the best food I have ever eaten. I feel very happy after eating it! But, I noticed that my colleagues didn’t come to eat, which is a great waste. I had to take the leftover food home to eat. I asked others, and it shouldn’t count as stealing, right?

In short, today was a very beautiful day. I look forward to seeing you tomorrow!]

[PS: Reply 1 to receive, reply TD to unsubscribe.]