I Feel Like I'm About to Die!

So, as the food in the communal canteen got worse and worse,

Those who were better off and earned higher wages began occasionally cooking a meal at home to give themselves a little extra nourishment.

Later, more and more people started doing it.

According to the rules, it wasn't allowed.

But the first to do it were all well-off, including leaders and their families.

So everyone else began following their example.

The higher-ups could only turn a blind eye.

Keep one eye open and the other shut long enough, and you'd go blind.

So when Liang Xin started his job, the supplies assigned to him actually included a small pot.

According to the rules, everyone had to eat at the canteen. What did they mean by openly handing him a pot?

Weren't they encouraging him to break the rules?

Liang Xin walked around the canteen, looked at what everyone was eating, and launched into a round of criticism in his head.

Then he returned to his department, perfectly satisfied.

The procurement department took up quite a bit of space, mainly because it acquired a large amount of goods and needed more room to store them.

The organizational structure had a department head and a deputy head.

Below them were directors and deputy directors.

Below them were teams, and he belonged to the third purchasing team.

He was an employee at the very bottom of the ladder.

Liang Xin had arrived fairly early. After a while, the others in the department came to work one by one.

Including him and their team leader, Zhou Aimin, there were only seven people on their team.

Their department's work was somewhat demanding, so most of the employees were men.

Female comrades were generally assigned to the supply and marketing cooperative next door to work as sales clerks and the like.

Liang Xin's neighbor Jiang Ting, for example, was a sales clerk.

Soon, the team leader Zhou Aimin and everyone else arrived. They held a brief morning meeting and arranged the day's work.

"Xiao Liang, you haven't been here long, and you still need to get more familiar with the surrounding towns and villages. Go out with Xiao Li today."

Xiao Li's name was Li Haiyang, and he wasn't that young anymore. He was nearly thirty, and his children were already in their teens.

But the team leader Zhou Aimin was older than him, so he could only be Xiao Li.

Liang Xin's current body was only eighteen and had just started working, so naturally he couldn't call him Xiao Li too.

That would get him beaten up!

"Brother Li, sorry for the trouble."

"What trouble? With you coming along, I'll actually have an easier time."

And so, Liang Xin went to work with Li Haiyang.

The two of them first went to the logistics department to arrange for two horse-drawn carts.

Then they rode the carts out to the countryside.

The ride was bumpy, but it was still better than walking.

Liang Xin had never ridden in a horse-drawn cart in his previous life. Sitting in one that bounced like a trampoline all the way was quite a novel experience.

The unfamiliar old houses along the road looked very much of the era, which was novel too.

After a while, they left the city and began to see villages and farmland, and occasionally passed through stretches of forest.

He watched it all with great interest.

After all, he had never seen any of it before, so everything looked new to him.

When they reached the designated village, Liang Xin watched Li Haiyang discuss purchases with the villagers.

There were uniform requirements for the quality, quantity, and price of agricultural products. They didn't get to decide those things; whatever the set amount was, that was what it was.

Cases that were too ambiguous to grade were few and far between, after all.

Their task was simple: count the goods, load them onto the carts, and haul them away.

They had to load the carts themselves too?

Liang Xin was a little dumbfounded.

But there was nothing he could do about it. He would just have to pitch in.

He couldn't let someone else work while he stood there watching. What kind of behavior would that be?

Fortunately, though, the body he had inherited from this brother, who shared his full name and looked exactly like him, was in excellent shape.

It was nothing like his own body before he had died suddenly.

So although he worked up quite a sweat loading the carts, it was still bearable.

It was just boring and tedious.

And the simple bowl of noodles he had eaten that morning had pretty much been digested.

By the time they finished loading, it was lunchtime.

Liang Xin and Li Haiyang went to have a look at the village canteen.

Was this food for people?

Even their workplace canteen was much better than this!

But there was nothing he could do. Liang Xin was hungry, after all, so in the end he spent four liang in grain coupons and one mao on two bowls of thin congee with pickled vegetables.

Grain coupons weren't money; they were permission to buy grain.

Money alone wouldn't do, and coupons alone wouldn't do either. You had to have both before anyone would sell you anything.

After an unsatisfying lunch, Liang Xin and Li Haiyang headed back.

On the way there, he had ridden in a cart, and with the novelty of it, the trip had felt pretty good.

On the way back, the carts were loaded with goods, so he could only walk.

On top of loading the carts all morning, he now had a long way to walk.

That felt pretty awful, as though each day dragged on like a year.

After finally making it back to the workplace, Liang Xin was dumbfounded again.

"What? I have to unload the carts too?"

"For fuck's sake..."

But there was nothing he could do. He had to get on with it!

After unloading the carts on an empty stomach, Liang Xin felt as though he had died.

His body could still take it, but his soul was nearly at its limit.

He was a modern man, an outstanding, veteran big-company ox and horse at the balding level. When had he ever suffered like this?

He had no problem staying up late. He could stay up all night, but he couldn't be made to do physical labor!

He really wanted to quit right then and there!

When Liang Xin got home, he flopped straight onto the kang.

He let his exhausted body rest for a while.

Meanwhile, he considered whether he could keep doing this job.

This felt even harder than working in his previous life!

If he absolutely had to pick one of the two, he really might rather go back to being a big-company ox and horse.

He would rather stay up all night than carry sacks for half a day.

"Forget it. I'll think about it later."

"I'm starving. I need to eat!"