Twins

The days flew by.

Over the past few days, Chen Miao gradually settled into his role. With Elder Uncle looking after him, he grew increasingly familiar with the funeral home.

But because of that, most of the staff began to sense that something was off. Gradually, rumors spread that Chen Miao would become the director.

Chen Miao never confirmed it, but Elder Uncle offered no explanation either.

Elder Uncle's attitude seemed to tacitly acknowledge that Chen Miao would take over as director.

At first, Chen Miao had no idea what that would mean. Only when people started talking about resigning again did he understand the consequences.

With Elder Uncle at the helm, the longtime staff at the Tianmen Funeral Home might not have given it much thought, and the Fushou Funeral Center would have had to pay handsomely to poach them. But if Chen Miao became director, they would have to reconsider.

Leaving before the Tianmen Funeral Home closed down was very different from leaving afterward.

Still, as Elder Uncle put it, those who wanted to leave would leave. They could recruit replacements gradually. As long as Old Yu the crematory operator, Shi Manman the mortuary cosmetologist, and Chen Miao the funeral officiant—the three licensed professionals—stayed, the funeral home could keep running.

The other positions were no great concern.

With Elder Uncle taking that attitude, Chen Miao stopped dwelling on it and focused on his own work.

Soon, the day of Old Wang's memorial service arrived.

Old Wang's memorial service was held in the main farewell hall. This was not because his family was willing to spend money on him. After they had come to make a scene, Elder Uncle had not only paid them two hundred thousand yuan in compensation but also arranged a complete funeral package for Old Wang.

The funeral home covered all of Old Wang's funeral expenses, which was why his memorial service was being held in the main farewell hall.

But while Old Wang's send-off was grand, few people came to mourn him.

There were only a dozen or so people in the spacious farewell hall.

Of those, only half wore expressions of genuine grief.

Old Wang's wife was not among them.

Soon, the memorial service began.

"Like spring rain, his kindness nourished us in silence; his gentle face and smile will live on in our hearts. Today, we gather here to bid farewell to Wang Tao, a man who lived his life with generosity and compassion."

"He was like the warm sun in winter, nurturing his family with patience and tenderness; like still waters running deep, his steadfast devotion in everyday life embodied the power of love."

"Now, with gratitude in our hearts, let us bid him our final farewell..."

Old Wang's memorial service went smoothly.

What Chen Miao had not expected, however, was that Old Wang's wife would leave his urn in the Tianmen Funeral Home's columbarium instead of taking it away for burial.

Chen Miao did his best to believe that she had left Old Wang here because resting in this familiar place would be more comfortable than lying in the cold earth, rather than because the funeral home had offered to store his ashes free of charge forever.

After offering incense to Old Wang, Chen Miao left the columbarium.

"Have you heard? A pair of twins fell into the Twin Ridge River and drowned."

While eating, Chen Miao overheard two sales representatives talking nearby.

"Of course I have. I even saw the surveillance footage. The younger sister accidentally fell into the river, and the older sister went in to save her. They both drowned. What a tragedy!"

"Twins, too! I don't know how their parents can bear a blow like that. By the way, did you try to see whether we could bring them to our funeral home...?"

Listening to their conversation, Chen Miao sighed inwardly, but he did not feel much of an emotional stir.

Over the past week, aside from officiating Old Wang's memorial service, he had also taken part in the funeral arrangements for three other deceased people.

One had not even been placed in cold storage or given a memorial service. The body had stayed in the mourning hall for only half a day before being cremated, after which the urn was taken away.

Throughout the process, Chen Miao had heard no sobbing and seen no tears. Yet the sight of that elderly man walking away with his son's ashes had left him with a deeper sense of sorrow and loneliness than Old Wang's memorial service.

Having witnessed so many partings in life and death, Chen Miao had become somewhat numb to them.

After eating, Chen Miao returned to his office to continue studying folk customs.

Lately, he had not only picked up his old textbooks again but also begun discussing folk traditions with people on folklore forums.

He used to be nothing more than a lurker on those forums. Now, he posted so much he was practically the Dragon King of the chatterboxes.

Besides that, Chen Miao had also begun showing up more frequently in his classmates' group chat.

The classmates he had gotten along with at school had set up a group called [Full-Service Funerals].

The name was not entirely a joke. Between them, the members really did have the skills needed to cover every stage of a funeral.

But two years after graduation, [Full-Service Funerals] existed in name only.

From their conversations, Chen Miao learned that some had switched careers, some were still slaving away at funeral homes, and some were unemployed at home, occasionally picking up temporary work as officiants.

Of course, while some had settled for getting by, others were constantly striving to climb higher in the industry.

People with that kind of ambition were uncommon in the funeral business.

Most people who chose this line of work had little drive. They only needed to earn their qualifications and do their jobs routinely to support themselves.

The fact that only two of the twenty people in the group fell into that category said enough.

One of those two had taken an unusual path. His name was Yang Jiuhua, and he had started doing spooky outdoor livestreams, specializing in exploring eerie places!

Combined with the funeral-related folk knowledge he had learned at school, his streams worked quite well. Almost every broadcast drew several hundred regular viewers. He had managed to carve out a path of his own.

The other had taken a more conventional route. His name was Wang Feiyang, and like Chen Miao, he had majored in Funeral Rites.

But compared with the unremarkable Chen Miao, Wang Feiyang had stood out among their classmates. He had ranked near the top in every subject and gone straight to a funeral center in a first-tier city after graduation.

His monthly salary had already passed ten thousand yuan, but that was not the bulk of his income.

In a first-tier city, the white envelopes clients gave as tips contained much more money.

For officiating the same three memorial services, Chen Miao might receive six hundred yuan in white-envelope tips, while Wang Feiyang would receive three thousand!

By any real calculation, Wang Feiyang's income in that first-tier city already exceeded that of most white-collar workers. But the industry's "reputation" was what it was. Even earning thirty thousand yuan a month, he still could not find a partner there.

That was why Wang Feiyang kept striving to climb higher. He wanted to move into management, leave frontline work behind, then buy a home and a car and put down roots in a first-tier city!

Chen Miao found that quite inspiring.

At least before inheriting the Tianmen Funeral Home, he could not compare with either of them.

Through his recent chatter in the group, Chen Miao had gained a fair understanding of how his former classmates were doing.

Naturally, his purpose was to make it easier to recruit them to the Tianmen Funeral Home if it needed staff in the future.

Compared with strangers whose backgrounds he knew nothing about, Chen Miao at least knew a little about these classmates.

Just as Chen Miao was lurking in the group as usual, reading his classmates' conversation, the sales representative Kong Fang sent him a message.

"San Shui, I've landed a job. The deceased will be placed in cold storage this afternoon, and there'll be a memorial service afterward in the main farewell hall. Keep an eye on it, okay?"

After replying, Chen Miao opened the information Kong Fang had sent him.

The first thing he saw was two identical photographs.

Twins!