Yang's Father

Father Yang held his breath and carried the sandbag to the designated pile, setting it down carefully.

Though these sandbags had rough burlap exteriors and cotton cloth linings, preventing sand from leaking while also protecting them from tears caused by minor scrapes.

Even so, Father Yang remained extremely cautious.

Once upon a time, he too had been a young man full of ambition.

He had grown up in a village, vowing to leave the countryside behind.

Decades later, he had indeed left the countryside, but reality gave him no chance to put down roots in the city.

Lower-Registry Commoners were not qualified to buy homes in the city.

If they wanted to buy a house, they could only spend extra money to attach themselves to someone else's household registration.

Thus, the vast majority of Lower-Registry Commoners in the city lived in rented homes.

Although no one had ever shattered Father Yang's dreams as bluntly as Li Yan had.

When he applied for jobs and the résumés he submitted were identified as belonging to a Lower-Registry Commoner and immediately discarded.

When he told a landlord his status and the landlord raised the rent by twenty percent.

When he painstakingly raised Yang Sheng, only for Yang Sheng to enter Martial Arts High School with excellent grades yet be assigned to an ordinary class, while Upper Registry students with worse grades were placed in advanced classes.

Father Yang's youthful ambition had vanished without him even knowing when.

He began teaching Yang Sheng to make more friends among his Upper Registry classmates.

He began talking about whether they should give gifts and use connections.

He became slick and worldly.

Even when people humiliated him, he still turned back with a beaming smile and said, "Boss, don't mind that I work a little slowly. Slow means no mistakes. I'm capable, and I have a son who needs to attend Martial Arts University. He needs a lot of money for cultivation, so please don't dock my pay."

He was a father who had compromised with reality.

Ambition could not put food on the table. What he needed now was to survive, to eat, and to give Yang Sheng every bit of help he could provide.

When they heard Father Yang say that his son wanted to attend Martial Arts University.

The three young men burst into laughter as though they had heard a joke.

"A Lower-Registry Commoner wants to get into Martial Arts University? Keep dreaming. You won't even get into a martial arts vocational college. Not in this lifetime."

The smile on Father Yang's face froze for a moment before he joined in with an awkward laugh.

Then he continued lifting another sandbag.

But the instant he straightened up, his long-damaged lumbar spine sent a piercing pain through him.

Father Yang failed to hold it in and let out a muffled groan, nearly falling over.

A large hand caught the sandbag that was about to drop to the ground.

Father Yang turned around. Just as he was about to offer thanks, he saw Yang Sheng's face, as calm as a placid lake.

"Why are you here?"

Yang Sheng asked.

Father Yang looked slightly embarrassed.

"Business has been bad these past few days. There wasn't any work at night, and I figured lying around at home was still just lying around, so I came out to find something to do."

Seeing Yang Sheng, the three young men teased, "Old man, is this your son?"

Father Yang gave Yang Sheng a shove. "Go home first. I'll talk to you after I'm done."

Then he turned to the three young men. "This is my son. He's pretty tall, isn't he?"

The three young men laughed even louder.

"Big dumb guy. He doesn't even talk."

Yang Sheng ignored them and continued questioning his father.

"How many sandbags are left?"

Father Yang looked up at the truck and said, "More than forty. I'll be done soon. It's so late already. Aren't you going to sleep? Don't you need to get up early tomorrow? Hey, where are you going?"

Before he could finish, Yang Sheng strode to the front of the truck and stomped his foot down. A powerful impact shook the vehicle.

The three young men were flung into the air.

They tumbled head over heels into the truck's cab and turned to look back.

They saw Yang Sheng grab a sandbag in each hand and toss them onto his shoulders, supporting them with his broad shoulders and back.

Once they were secure, he grabbed two more sandbags.

He carried four sandbags at once by himself.

More than four hundred pounds bore down on Yang Sheng.

Yet he leaped down from the truck as if walking on level ground and quickly headed to the stacking area.

After dropping the sandbags, he returned to the truck and repeated the same motions.

After ten trips back and forth, Yang Sheng placed the last sandbag down and wiped the faint sweat from his forehead.

The three young men climbed down from the truck.

The leader had a shaved head and wore a work uniform.

Yang Sheng noticed that the uniform bore the logo of Liu Property Management Company.

"Kid, you're pretty strong. Carrying that many sandbags, and you're not even red in the face or out of breath."

The bald man looked Yang Sheng up and down.

"Want to work as a laborer under me? I'll give your dad eighty, and I'll give you ninety. How about it?"

The three men burst into laughter again.

Yang Sheng remained unmoved.

He held out a hand. "The wages."

The bald man froze for a moment, then reached out to slap away Yang Sheng's outstretched hand.

But when his palm swung over, he found it was like striking a steel plate.

The impact left his hand aching and numb.

"Fuck! That kick of yours nearly flipped the truck over. We're not even asking you to pay for the damage, and you still dare ask me for wages!"

Father Yang reached out and tugged at Yang Sheng.

"It's already so late. If it doesn't work out, I'll go to their company tomorrow and keep working on them. Go home and sleep early."

Yang Sheng did not insist. He turned and walked away.

Seeing this, the bald man became even more arrogant.

"Turns out he's even more spineless than his old man. Hahaha!"

At that moment, Boss Tianhai came out and approached Yang Sheng.

"We've gotten in touch."

As he spoke, he handed the communicator to Yang Sheng.

At that moment, the atmosphere in the executive conference room of Liu Property Management Company in Harbor City was oppressive.

Liu Jianming sat at the head of the conference table, holding the company's third executive meeting of the year.

Liu Chang attended as a shareholder observer.

"The issue of layer-by-layer subcontracting has existed for a long time. It has now grown beyond control. If we continue to ignore it and refuse to deal with it, it will sooner or later drag down the entire property management company."

"Earlier, I heard that the company's general contractor took on a project worth one hundred thousand, subcontracted it to a regional company for fifty thousand, then the regional company hired a studio for twenty thousand. In the end, the studio hired an intern to do the project for two hundred a day."

"Later, that intern ran off halfway through the job without even taking his wages. Just how much will such a collapse in credibility affect us?"

Liu Chang, who had been intently listening to the meeting, suddenly felt the communicator in her arms vibrate.

She took it out and found an unfamiliar number, but answered it anyway.

"Senior Sister Liu, this is Yang Sheng..."

Liu Chang listened as Yang Sheng explained, her brows knitting tightly.

After ending the call, she quickly walked to Liu Jianming's side and whispered something to him.

Liu Jianming slammed his palm against the table.

"Wang Zhuo! Are you in charge of the Martial Arts High School district?"

The company executive whose name had been called suddenly jolted.

He stood up trembling. "Yes, President Liu."

Liu Jianming said, "Go there with Liu Chang. I'm holding a review meeting on the problem of layer-by-layer subcontracting, and your people are openly engaging in subcontracting under your nose!"

"Old Huang, go with them too. At times like this, we need to make examples of a couple of people and prove the company's determination to solve these problems."

As his words fell, the middle-aged man in martial attire who had stood unnoticed in the corner silently nodded.

All the executives present were shocked.

For Liu Jianming to directly deploy one of the Liu Family's trump-card experts, the matter clearly was truly serious.