Jing Shu gave a distracted hum, half-answering while she was busy in her consciousness space. One of her ewes was giving birth again. The little lambs were a bit oversized from all the extra nutrition, and the poor mother was having a hard time. Jing Shu had to keep encouraging her to push, and at the same time stay alert, ready to use her Cube Space ability if things went south.
Since there were more people at home now, the need for wool had gone up too. They needed wool coats, wool pants, even sheepskin boots. So she hadn't bothered limiting the sheep pairings in the Cube Space. It made sense to stock up on warm materials before migration. The next few years wouldn't be peaceful, and items that kept people warm would always be in short supply.
Before the apocalypse, she'd hoarded an insane amount of supplies. But after just three years, her stash was already running low. The end of the world was far from over, and there was no way she'd let her quality of life drop.
The sheep breeding in the villa's pasture was pitifully slow. After all these years, she'd barely collected enough raw materials, and even those had long been turned into finished goods by Zijin and Grandma Jing. She didn't even know if Zijin would have time to work on crafts again. Her handiwork was miles better than Grandma Jing's—not only prettier but much warmer too.
She couldn't help missing her a little.
"Come on, breathe deep, one, two, three!"
"There, one's out! Good job!"
Li Zhu watched Jing Shu with hopeful eyes. After a while, she finally let out a long sigh and said, unhurriedly, "Oh, there's not really much to it. I'm not sure how other cities do things, but Wu City's pretty straightforward. A big sack of rice or flour can buy you an iron rice bowl. Or, if you've got a thousand virtual coins, you can buy yourself a permanent position. Of course, cushier jobs where you get more food for less work cost more. Like being a cook in the cafeteria, that one's pricey—you get to cook and taste-test at the same time.
Cleaning, transport, or garbage collection jobs are cheaper. Trash pickers are the cheapest of all, only a hundred virtual coins. But they all have one thing in common: they include meals."
At this point, nobody cared what the job was. As long as it came with food, it was good. Forget being full—even two meals a day was already a blessing.
Things had been getting worse lately. The government barely managed to provide one free meal a day. Everything else, people had to figure out on their own.
Li Zhu smacked his lips. "Damn, that's what you call cheap? Then what about that manager guy we saw earlier? He's in charge of a whole bunch of people. Is his pay good?"
"That's a contract position. Costs five hundred virtual coins. Benefits are average, but there's plenty of perks." Jing Shu exhaled again, just as another lamb was born.
"Hey, niece," Li Zhu started, grinning, "since you can hook outsiders up with good jobs, you've gotta have one for your own cousin, right? I heard Wu You'ai's job was arranged by you too, and she's got an official position managing more than ten buildings! It'd look bad if you favored outsiders over family. We're not greedy—just a small permanent job's fine. Don't worry, once Li Yun starts earning, he'll give you a little every month as thanks."
Jing Shu chuckled softly. "Of course that's no problem."
Li Zhu's face lit up with joy, ready to spill out a stream of gratitude, when she added, "So, Uncle, just get your virtual coins ready. Once you've picked a job you like, let me know. I'll talk to someone for you, maybe even get you a small discount, and I'll make sure the paperwork's done right."
"Uh… we don't have any money."
Jing Shu blinked, surprised. "So what you're saying is, you want me to pay your virtual coins to get your son a job?"
Grandpa Jing tapped his dry tobacco pipe, the sound sharp in the sudden silence. Everyone turned to stare. Li Yun's head drooped so low it almost touched his chest. For the first time, he wished the floor would just swallow him whole.
Li Zhu did mean exactly that, but he couldn't bring himself to say it. He muttered instead, "Those other people you helped—did they have to pay? How come it's different for us?"
Jing Zhao finally couldn't take it anymore. She jumped up, yanked Li Zhu by the arm, and tried to drag him away. Her face burned with humiliation. She felt like she'd been slapped over and over, and she wished she could crawl into a hole. She'd never realized before just how shameless her husband could be. This was worse than begging on the street.
But Li Zhu clung to the sofa, refusing to budge. "How about this, niece? You pay first, and once Li Yun starts earning, we'll pay you back monthly. Think of it like… installments. Ten years to pay it off, okay? I've still got a whole family to feed, you know?"
Jing Shu smiled faintly, as if she were hearing a joke. "Uncle, you might be a country man, but I've gotta admit, you've got a real business brain."
Grandma Jing was about to lose her temper. She sneered, "You sure are good at playing the white wolf with empty hands."
Grandpa Jing added calmly, "His face is thicker than a city wall."
No one disagreed.
Jing Zhao finally managed to drag him away, and only then did the room's warmth return.
Grandma Jing frowned. "They're not gonna try to freeload off us, are they? This is exactly what I was afraid of. If they keep living here and we can't drive them out, what are we supposed to do?"
"Don't worry, Grandma," Jing Shu said lightly.
The TV chimed twelve times. There were no fireworks or crackers outside, but the whole Xingfu Shiyuan community was full of laughter and light. Wu City had generously kept the power running, so every home glowed bright, and everyone was waving their phones, excitedly fighting for red envelopes online.
Even Grandma Jing was giddy, holding her phone while Jing An helped her tap for luck.
This year's online event had gotten bigger than ever. The "WishHead" app was giving away a total of fifteen billion virtual coins. As long as you'd checked in daily, watered your virtual crops, read a few motivational posts, and left some positive comments, you'd qualify for the New Year's red envelope draw.
"I got 0.5 coins!"
"I got 2.3!"
"Wow, Grandma, you actually got 5.7! You're the luckiest one in the family!"
Grandma Jing beamed from ear to ear.
Jing Shu looked at her own envelope—0.01 virtual coins—and quietly closed the app. She swore she'd never do this again. Too many pointless daily tasks, and after all that effort, they only gave her this pitiful amount? Did she look like someone who needed virtual coins? Hmph!
Her high school group chat was buzzing. Everyone was bragging about how much they'd gotten. Even the lowest amount was 0.1 coins. Jing Shu couldn't help suspecting the system was rigged.
Then Su Mali dropped a screenshot in the chat. "Guess it paid off that I poured my heart into those daily reflections! Look, I got 99.9 virtual coins! Did I hit the jackpot or what?"
The group exploded with envy—and Jing Shu's glare was definitely among them.
Same kind of human, yet such a huge difference.
Then Su Mali tagged her. "@Jing Shu, how much did you get?"
Jing Shu nearly choked. "Of all the things to bring up..."
"I've been pretty busy lately," she typed back. "Didn't have time for those tasks. Besides, I've got terrible luck with these things."
"Don't be so modest," Su Mali replied. "You never know, maybe next time!"
"Yeah, Su Mali, send one yourself!" someone in the chat teased.
With the crowd cheering her on, Su Mali sent out a red envelope.