I Just Won't Accept It!

"I'm back."

"ACGN culture is really getting more and more popular now. Can you imagine it? On the subway today, I actually ran into four Lolitas, three people in Hanfu, and a pair of Cosers..."

"Huh? Why is there so much delicious food? And beer, too?"

"Say, Gao Yuan, don't tell me you won the lottery? Or did some rich older woman take a fancy to you, so you'll get to skip twenty years of struggle?"

It was already nearly nine in the evening when Cao Feiyu finally returned home, looking exhausted. He was immediately stunned by the table in the living room, which was piled high with food.

Most of it was delivery or prepared food from the braised-food shop downstairs, but there was truly a lot of it, along with an entire case of Qingdao Augut Beer.

Pop~

Gao Yuan opened a can of beer and said to Cao Feiyu with a smile, "I'd love to skip twenty years of struggle. Sit down. Let's drink and talk."

Cao Feiyu happily agreed. He went to wash his hands first, then sat down across from Gao Yuan. The two grabbed their beer glasses and gulped away.

"Tell me, what's the occasion today? Why did you buy so much good food?" Cao Feiyu asked curiously as he gnawed on a chicken leg.

Gao Yuan poured him another drink. "Consider it a farewell feast. I've decided to go home tomorrow and devote myself to the great cause of textiles."

"So suddenly?" Cao Feiyu was startled at first, then a bitter smile appeared on his face. "So you're the kind of person who has to go home and inherit the family business if you don't work hard enough."

"I remember you used to hate your family's factory. Why the sudden change?"

Gao Yuan thought for a moment. Even though Cao Feiyu was his best friend, he still couldn't tell him about the system.

"Probably because I won't accept it," Gao Yuan said quietly.

"Won't accept it?" Cao Feiyu asked skeptically.

"My fourth uncle moved his factory to Vietnam. You know about that, right?" Gao Yuan asked.

Pfft~

Cao Feiyu seemed to have remembered some amusing gossip and nearly sprayed the beer in his mouth.

"Yeah, yeah. Since it's a fabric factory, there are lots of young Vietnamese female workers. Rumor has it your fourth uncle has been having the time of his life in Vietnam. When he came home for the New Year, he'd gotten noticeably thinner. He was even asking everywhere for medicine, saying he needed to strengthen his kidneys."

Gao Yuan shook his head helplessly. He had no objection to his fourth uncle's private life, but he felt the man had no restraint. His lifelong pursuits were probably nothing more than money and women.

"It's not just my fourth uncle. Lu Yuming moved his factory to Bangladesh, Zhang Xilai went to Cambodia, and Du Ping had worse luck. He moved his factory to India, then ran into changing circumstances. This time, he's probably going to lose everything."

"I thought about it. Back then, all those uncles who had struggled alongside my dad—now not a single one of them remains in the country. Before we knew it, everyone had moved their factories to Southeast Asia. Only my dad, that fool, is still stubbornly holding on."

"Others might not know, but we do. Back then, there were at least several thousand textile and garment factories in the city. How many are left now?"

"These past few years, everyone has been focusing on the Internet industry, finance, real estate, online influencers, and celebrities big and small. But who knows about the decline of manufacturing?"

"Everyone praises the great instruments of a powerful nation. Everyone says real industry is the foundation of a country, that finance is merely a virtual bubble, and that no matter how powerful the Internet industry becomes, it still has to rely on manufacturing."

"But in reality, everyone wants to go into finance. Everyone wants to get into Tencent or Alibaba. Everyone looks down on manufacturing!"

"As they say, you go build the great instruments of a powerful nation, while I rake in money every day. Tell others to be content in poverty, then drink and chase women yourself."

"Anyway, I just won't accept it." Gao Yuan's voice grew somewhat heavy. "I want to create products that are truly world-leading. I want those people who moved their factories abroad for petty profits to lose everything."

Gao Yuan looked up. Slightly drunk now, he looked at Cao Feiyu. "Maybe that sounds a little narrow-minded, but I just can't stand their smug faces. They've already left, yet they keep showing off to my dad, praising themselves behind his back for being clever and calling my dad a fool."

Cao Feiyu gently shook his head. "There's nothing to be done about that. Das Kapital explained it long ago: most capitalists care only about profit. There is no country in their hearts."

They drank a great deal and said a great deal.

The system was merely an opportunity. Even without it, Gao Yuan still felt that if things continued this way, manufacturing would sooner or later face serious problems.

According to a 2018 World Bank report,

in China, the average annual income of a mechanical engineer was 76,140 yuan.

The average annual income of an IT engineer was 132,042 yuan.

The gap was nearly 50,000 yuan, and it was still widening.

They were both engineers, both called Engineers in English, both had endured more than a decade of hard study. Yet in the end, they led completely different lives. Was that really not a problem?

Take Germany, the manufacturing powerhouse, for example. According to the same 2018 World Bank report,

in Germany, the average annual salary of a mechanical engineer was 67,500 euros.

The average annual salary of an IT engineer was 55,776 euros.

You might say Germany did not have many IT companies, and its Internet industry was far less developed than China's, which was why mechanical engineers earned more than IT engineers.

Perhaps. But regardless, they were engineers who had received years of education, pillars of society, yet their wages differed so drastically. Was that really right?

The virtual economy was being worshipped by the entire nation as never before, while Internet entrepreneurs were treated like gods.

At the same time, people were urged away from biotech, chemistry, environmental science, and materials; urged away from mechanical engineering; urged away from civil engineering. Everyone fought to get into the Internet industry, yet no one cared about real industry. Was that really right?

The next day happened to be the weekend, so Cao Feiyu did not have to work. He helped Gao Yuan pack his luggage and accompanied him to the train station.

Standing in the bustling station hall, Gao Yuan was filled with emotion.

Back when he had just graduated from university, he had refused to help out at the factory. All he had wanted was to follow in Boss Ma's footsteps and become a glorious IT industry wage slave.

Yet after more than a year, Cao Feiyu, who had never planned to enter the IT industry, had joined an Internet company, while Gao Yuan had suffered one setback after another in his job search. In the end, he still had not figured out which way the doors of Alibaba Group opened.

"You beast, I'm about to get the hell out of here. From now on, watch yourself when you're alone in Hangzhou," Gao Yuan said in a self-mocking tone.

Cao Feiyu said nonchalantly, "Once you, this rich second-generation kid, inherit the family business, I can always come back and rely on you. With twenty years of friendship between us, surely you'll at least give me a bite to eat."

Pfft~

Gao Yuan nearly burst out laughing. "Rich second generation? More like debt-ridden second generation. My dad, that stubborn mule, has already sold everything he could to keep the factory afloat. What awaits me is probably not sports cars and luxury homes, but having to repay my father's debts."

Cao Feiyu said nothing more. He actually knew about Gao Yuan's family's current situation.

Some things were better left unsaid. They were brothers, after all. Gao Yuan could joke about his own family, but Cao Feiyu could not stab him in the heart. That was the bottom line between brothers.

"If you are not a fish, how can you know the joy of fish?" Cao Feiyu's father was a talented man, and when naming him, he had drawn inspiration from that old saying.

As an adult, Cao Feiyu had inherited seventy percent of his father's brilliance. But his unhurried nature, his tendency not to care too much about anything, could be quite worrying at times.

And so, the two good friends reluctantly bid each other farewell.

Gao Yuan took his backpack from Cao Feiyu and boarded the train home.