Using the big knife meant performing open surgery.
Compared with minimally invasive surgery, open surgery involved more bleeding, caused greater damage to the body, took longer to recover from, carried a higher risk of infection, and came with more complications.
Its only advantage was that it was cheaper. Especially years ago, many of the instruments used in minimally invasive surgery had to be imported and paid for out of pocket; they weren't covered by insurance, and each one cost at least twenty or thirty thousand yuan.
Shen Le fell silent. When his grandfather was still alive, he'd once needed surgery and had to choose between open surgery and a minimally invasive procedure. His grandfather hadn't wanted to spend the money and insisted on open surgery, but Shen Le had stood firm and pushed for the minimally invasive option.
The cost was that his uncle paid for the operation. After his grandfather passed away, his house went to his uncle, while Shen Le went off to school and, from then on, lost his roots in his hometown.
But he didn't regret it. After the minimally invasive surgery, his grandfather was able to get out of bed that very day and leave the hospital a week later. The other patients who'd had surgery around the same time were all still lying in bed.
...Even so, to give their child a chance to go to high school, to grasp that tiny, almost nonexistent hope, did they really have to make the father suffer so much?
"But what about the child..."
"Let him learn the trade from you!" His wife delivered her verdict without hesitation:
"In a family like ours, it's fine if he gets good grades. But if he doesn't, we can't afford to support him!"
"That won't do! I didn't get an education when I was young, so all I could do was go around making cabinets for people every day. Without an education, you can't even become your own boss." The father shook his head vehemently.
"Do you want our son to go through the same hardships I did? He has to study! He has to!"
"What if he can't focus on his studies? Just because you couldn't, you think he can?!"
"What's that got to do with me? I'm out working all day. If the child won't study, isn't it because you haven't been keeping an eye on him?"
"Why are you blaming me again? You're out working all day, but do you think I just sit around doing nothing?! You come home every day and collapse on the sofa, while I come home every day to shop for groceries, wash clothes, and cook. Who's the one working harder?!"
Then came the mutual accusations, the dredging up of old grievances, and a huge, earth-shaking quarrel. The wife went from complaining that she hadn't liked the food during her confinement to berating him for buying the wrong cut of meat that day: she'd asked for leg meat, but he'd brought home ribs. Her complaints poured down like a torrential rain.
Shen Le covered his ears with both hands, wishing he could escape this memory at once. In a brief pause between his mother's breaths, the child, clutching an old Ink Marker, timidly said:
"Dad, Mom, I still want to be a carpenter..."
"No!"
Bang!
The Ink Marker was snatched from the child's hands and smashed hard against the ground. The delicate Devil's Work Ball flew out of the Ink Reservoir and hit the floor. With a clatter, one of its pieces broke off.
The view before Shen Le went completely dark. He couldn't help letting out a soft sigh:
In the eyes of the previous generation, "being a carpenter" was a job they could take pride in, a job that could earn them honors such as Advanced Producer and March 8th Red Banner Holder, a job they could stand tall and accept recognition for.
The old couple had devoted their whole lives to this work. Even long after retiring, they still dusted and maintained these tools regularly.
But by the time of their son's generation, this kind of work...
Whatever the income, it was no longer the sort of job a father would agree to—or even hope for—his son to take up...
Life, and all its twists and turns...
Before the sigh had even finished, his head suddenly sank. Shen Le raised a hand to his forehead. The veins at his temples throbbed wildly, and his whole brain felt as if it were about to explode:
The experience he'd had when he repaired the puppet last time repeated itself. Memories rushed into his mind like scenes from a film, pouring in without pause:
When the old couple were young, they sat facing each other at the same large table. An open book on Mechanical Drawing lay before the husband as he read intently, while his wife kept her head slightly lowered and briskly shaved a Ruling Pen;
His wife rocked the cradle with her left hand and held a book in her right, softly humming a lullaby. Beside her, her husband planed a few pieces of wood; he'd already built the rough outline of a baby walker;
After they moved into their new home, the husband worked hard sawing wood to make a big bed, while his wife sanded and polished the boards for the small bed;
After they were laid off, his wife went out to do renovation work for people. When she came home, she spread out the sketches and gestured as she told her husband about the new designs, then worked with him to figure out how to make them faster and better;
The elderly husband lay in a hospital bed, clutching his wife's hand. In his other hand, he still held a half-finished Devil's Work Ball...
The pride and elation of making a finished piece they were satisfied with, the joy of inventing a handy tool, the pride and fulfillment of completing a difficult task...
At the same time, choosing materials, marking lines, splitting pieces, sawing, planing, shaving, sanding... All kinds of carpentry skills poured into his head, churning through it like a storm.
In that brief instant, it was as if Shen Le had lived through decades, personally making countless pieces of furniture, tools, and molds.
He felt that if someone gave him a piece of wood right now, he could grab the carpentry tools from the Tool Box and make a table if he wanted a table, or build a cabinet if he wanted a cabinet...
Whether or not Shen Le needed these skills, the flood of memories had already left him dizzy, with his temples pounding. Clutching his forehead, he couldn't help letting out a groan:
"Ugh... Next time, could you make it a little slower? Or at least stretch the time out and let me practice slowly in Soul Space?"
The copper fragment remained silent, completely ignoring him. Shen Le broke out in a heavy sweat before finally recovering. He pulled out the copper fragment to look at it and, sure enough, it had changed again:
The copper fragment, which had been about three-quarters the size of his palm, had grown to fill his whole palm. It had stretched the cord outside it a long way and nearly snapped it.
Another raised line had appeared on the copper fragment. He still couldn't tell what it was meant to be, but it clearly had one more stroke now, bringing it closer and closer to forming a character.
As for the second light that had come on, it might have represented the Ink Marker...
Shen Le had absolutely no intention of poking it. What was he thinking? Having memories forced into him was exhausting, and he'd had more than enough for today!
Whatever it was, it could wait until tomorrow...
Thinking this with perfect justification, Shen Le's fingers flew as he quickly retied the cord around the copper fragment, then hurried to bed.
Early the next morning, after sending Little Puppet off to work, practicing the Five-Animal Exercises, and completing the Spirit Eye Technique, he was about to investigate the copper fragment's new function when a phone call came in.
Shen Le answered, his eyes lighting up.
"You're here to install the air conditioners? Great! Come in through the back door; it's closer. I'll be right there!"
Ah, the two air conditioners he'd ordered had finally arrived.
He'd install one in the bedroom and one in the bathroom. After that, he wouldn't have to put up with the smell of paint, acetone, and all kinds of dust anymore, or go out into the courtyard under the blazing sun just to get some fresh air...
Shen Le happily hurried to the back door. When he opened it, two men were already waiting there, one older and one younger. Each was pulling a small trolley, and between the two trolleys they had four large boxes piled up.
Well, what a familiar face!
Shen Le recognized the older man at a glance. He was Zheng Xiaohua, the second-generation owner of the Ink Marker whom Shen Le had just seen in his memories the day before.
The younger man stood beside him. His face was somewhat similar, and he also bore a resemblance to the boy Shen Le had seen in his memories, the one who'd clutched the Ink Marker and said, "I want to learn carpentry."
Shen Le was already fairly sure of who they were. He nodded and smiled at them.
"Master Zheng? You're here to install the air conditioners? Thanks for the effort. Come on in!"