Effort Until Almost 30

"Chen Jue, you'll work until the end of this month. You don't need to come in starting the 1st of next month."

"The company's performance is poor right now. The shareholders held a meeting until 3:00 AM yesterday and decided to liquidate and dissolve. There's nothing the company can do."

Inside a trendy glass office, a sophisticated-looking HR manager in her thirties was formally delivering the notice to a slightly greasy-looking young man with glasses.

"Sister Li, I've worked here for over four years. I'm almost thirty—where am I supposed to find another core position like this?" The young man with glasses looked unwilling to accept it.

Don't let the bustling atmosphere of the Asian Games fool you; the current job market is difficult, and layoffs are happening all the time.

Even here in the Binjiang High-tech Industrial Park in Hang City, all sorts of small and medium-sized enterprises are struggling on the verge of bankruptcy.

In the same Huaye Building where Chen Jue works, one can see various small and medium-sized companies moving in and clearing out every single day.

As the saying goes, a single penny can stump a hero; without money, it's impossible to move an inch in society!

This applies not only to individuals but also to the operation of businesses.

"General Manager Liu and General Manager Zhou didn't introduce you to other company owners?"

"No reply?" the HR manager named Sister Li asked, looking somewhat surprised.

"None!"

"It's not the season for job hunting after the Spring Festival; there aren't any core positions open! I've sent out so many resumes lately, and it's useless. Besides, the overall environment is so bad right now, with layoffs everywhere—how could I possibly find a suitable new job all of a sudden?" Chen Jue was getting agitated, nearly shouting in the office.

"Then there's nothing I can do. I'm also leaving next month to look for work."

"The company paying us a few months' severance is already doing its best. If you have any other demands, you'll have to go talk to the bosses yourself!" Sister Li shook her head, looking helpless.

With things having reached this point, Chen Jue could only pout bitterly.

After all, she was just an employee herself.

Why should one worker make things difficult for another?

Everyone was an adult, and bickering wouldn't solve the problem, so Chen Jue could only get up and leave the HR office in resignation.

After leaving the HR office and passing the company conference room, Chen Jue could faintly hear arguing coming through the two heavy wooden doors.

It was the company's top executives and shareholders tearing each other apart over the last scraps of profit.

When the tree falls, the monkeys scatter, huh? Chen Jue sighed to himself.

Back at his desk, several employees were openly discussing their search for new jobs.

When an avalanche hits, no snowflake is innocent.

With the company about to dissolve, it wasn't just the bosses and shareholders fighting for interests; employees like Chen Jue were also looking for the best way out for themselves.

Who had the heart to keep working at a time like this?

"Brother Jue, how did it go? Is the severance still N+1?" A thin young man with glasses leaned over from the next cubicle.

This young man was Jiang Lin, a junior apprentice Chen Jue had taken on a year ago. He currently worked under Chen Jue, handling mechanical tasks like data checking.

The work was easy, and with the housing subsidy, he brought home 7k a month.

But with the company liquidating, Jiang Lin, a senior student who had only been interning for a year after finding a relevant job, was equally worried about being unemployed right after graduation.

"It's still N+1 for now. For a small company like ours, it's good enough to get any severance at all." Chen Jue shook his head. Seeing the expectant look in his apprentice's eyes, he could only respond with a helpless expression.

He had joined this auto finance guarantee company in 2019 and had worked there for over four years, making him one of the company's veterans.

Relying on his skills in risk control data, he had managed to become a small supervisor, managing three people and earning a guaranteed monthly income of 12k, not including other subsidies.

While this money wouldn't make Chen Jue wealthy, it was enough to get by in a high-cost city like Hang City.

Losing this stable job meant that his four years of hard work had all gone down the drain.

Finding another position with similar pay would be harder than climbing to the heavens!

For one, Chen Jue's associate degree was a drag; he couldn't pass the educational threshold required by large corporations or banks.

Secondly, the entire industry was in a slump, especially finance guarantee companies, which had been on a downward trend for years.

Mid-level technical positions like risk control data analysts were extremely scarce in the market; they were mostly one-to-one roles with very little turnover.

He had paid for VIP status on various job-hunting apps, thinking it would increase his resume's visibility.

But after sending out a pile of resumes with no response, Chen Jue realized he had been completely played by the capital-controlled job market, and his temper instantly vanished.

He had occasionally seen news online about the tight job market over the past few years, but he never expected it to hit him so soon.

Sitting at his desk feeling restless, with only a dozen working days left before he was forced out, Chen Jue had no heart for work anymore.

After perfunctorily auditing the customer orders uploaded by the backend risk control system, Chen Jue made an excuse to go to the restroom, dumped his pending work on his three subordinates, and told them to call him if anything came up.

After settling the trivial matters, Chen Jue walked through the long office area, exited the company, and took the elevator to the top floor alone.

Land prices in Hang City were skyrocketing, so the ground outside the office building was mostly used as a parking lot.

Commuters driving to work would pass the gate, park for the day, and pay 20 yuan upon entry and exit.

With hundreds or thousands of parking spaces, the daily turnover from parking fees alone was in the tens of thousands—a staggering amount over the course of a year.

Faced with such immense profits, no developer or property management company is willing to build parks for leisure and relaxation on the ground level; they have all moved them to the rooftops of the buildings, which is truly bizarre to the extreme.

Chen Jue used to come to the small rooftop garden during his lunch break to get some fresh air, look at the greenery, the pond, and the rockery, swing on the swings, and smoke a few cigarettes to relieve stress.

With more than three hours left until the end of the workday, there were only a few people dressed like management chatting in the distance; there were very few employees who dared to be so blatant about skipping work and slacking off during office hours.

"Click~"

He walked to the edge of the pond, took out his lighter, and lit a cigarette.

"Hiss~ Phew~"

Chen Jue took a deep drag, using the nicotine inhaled into his body to stimulate his brain to secrete more dopamine.

He wanted to get himself excited.

However, the pressure of life and work was too great; in a fast-changing metropolis like Hang City, he had struggled hard until nearly thirty years old and still hadn't lived the good life he wanted.

Rent and daily expenses left him breathless.

Now, the job he relied on for a living was about to be lost, and after a few cigarettes, Chen Jue didn't feel relieved; instead, he felt increasingly dejected.

To use the trendy slang of the moment, he was "emo."

After finishing the rest of the cigarette, he kicked the pebbles laid out at his feet, crouched down to pick up a relatively smooth one, weighed it in his hand, and then let out a roar at the artificial pond in front of him: "Damn it~"

Then he flicked the stone flat, causing it to skip across the water with several slapping sounds, and a few ripples spread out in a straight line across the smooth surface of the pond.

But just after throwing the stone, Chen Jue froze!

Because a semi-transparent pixelated box had inexplicably appeared in his field of vision, and a few lines of text were scrolling down inside it:

[Ding~]

[Action meets requirements]

[Skill mastered: Stone Skipping]

The new book is uploaded, I hope everyone will support it!

If you have votes, please vote; if you like it, please click to bookmark and follow~

A one-click triple combo, Pianfeng begs for everyone's support!

This is the sister volume to Adding Points to Cultivation in the Real World, and it will be a different and interesting story (funny).