Tòumíng pulled up to the mine entrance, the electric bike humming softly beneath him as he surveyed the parking situation. There was a bike rack. Technically. If you could call the rusted, bent metal frame that looked like it had survived multiple attempted thefts and possibly a small explosion a "bike rack."
It looked spectacularly unsafe. Like, aggressively unsafe. The kind of unsafe where you could watch your bike getting stolen in real-time and the rack would probably help the thieves by collapsing at just the right moment.
But Tòumíng had bought a fancy lock last week—three hundred yuan for something that claimed to be "military grade" and "theft proof"—so surely that would compensate for the structural inadequacy of the rack itself.
He parked the bike, wrapped the heavy chain through the frame and around what remained of the rack's support beam, and clicked the lock shut with a satisfying mechanical sound. There. Perfectly secure. Probably.
The guards at the entrance did a double-take as he approached. Their eyes tracked him from head to toe, taking in the band t-shirt, the designer pants, the fanny pack that screamed "I have money now." One of them actually squinted, like he was trying to confirm this was the same blood-soaked, half-dead kid who used to shuffle through here every morning.
"Tòumíng?" The guard's voice carried genuine uncertainty.
"Yeah, it's me."
"You look... different."
"I showered."
He walked past them before they could ask more questions, his designer sneakers crunching on the gravel. The mine complex looked the same as always—industrial, depressing, filled with the sounds of machinery and distant drilling. But the faces were different.
New workers everywhere. Fresh bodies to replace the ones who'd disappeared during the riot. Tòumíng recognized maybe one in three people, the rest were strangers who'd been hired in the past two weeks to fill vacancies.
Vacancies he'd technically created by erasing seven people from existence. But that was their fault for stealing his quartz, so really, no guilt necessary.
"TÒUMÍNG!"
The shout came from across the yard. Zhāng Wěi was running actually running, which Tòumíng had never seen him do his arms spread wide like he was greeting a long-lost son returning from war.
He crashed into Tòumíng with a hug that was surprisingly strong for a man who spent most of his time sitting behind a desk counting money. "You're alive! You're back! I thought—I didn't know what happened to you!"
The hug lasted about three seconds before Zhāng Wěi pulled back, his hands gripping Tòumíng's shoulders, his expression shifting from relief to suspicion so fast it gave Tòumíng whiplash.
"Where have you been?" The warmth drained from his voice, replaced by the sharp edge of an employer who'd just lost two weeks of labor. "You disappeared. No call, no message, nothing. I have schedules to maintain, quotas to meet. Do you have any idea how many times I've had to explain to upper management why cart three has been sitting empty?"
Tòumíng's mind raced. He hadn't prepared an excuse. Hadn't thought this far ahead because he'd been too busy watching videos of people making elaborate coffee drinks and playing mobile games where anime girls shot lasers at demons. (anyone who guesses the game im refrencing gets to add a character to any of my books)
But he was damn good at bullshitting.
Time for theater.
Tòumíng let his shoulders slump, his expression crumbling into something that approximated grief. "I... I went to the hospital." His voice came out shaky, perfectly pitched between shame and sorrow. "After the beating, after everything, I collapsed on my way home. Someone found me and called an ambulance."
Zhāng Wěi's suspicion flickered, uncertainty creeping in.
"The hospital bill..." Tòumíng continued, letting his voice crack slightly. "It was insane. Forty thousand yuan for treatment, for scans, for monitoring. I was sure I'd have even more debt piled on me. I thought I was finished."
"Forty thousand?" Zhāng Wěi's grip on his shoulders loosened slightly.
"But then..." Tòumíng paused for effect, letting moisture gather at the corners of his eyes. Not quite tears, but the threat of them. "I reunited with my aunt. My father's sister. I didn't even know she was still alive. She'd been looking for me for years, and the hospital... they contacted her somehow through old family records."
The moisture became actual tears now, sliding down his cheeks in what was objectively an Oscar-worthy performance. "She had terminal cancer, Boss. Stage four. The doctors said she had weeks, maybe a month."
"Oh no," Zhāng Wěi breathed.
"She paid my hospital bills. All of it. Wouldn't let me refuse. Said family takes care of family." Tòumíng's voice dropped to a whisper. "I stayed with her. For her final weeks. I held her hand when she... when she..."
He couldn't finish the sentence, just let it hang there, heavy with unspoken grief.
Zhāng Wěi's eyes were glistening now too.
"She left me her will. A modest fifty thousand yuan. Everything she had saved. She said..." More tears, flowing freely now. "She said she was sorry she couldn't find me sooner. Sorry she couldn't help my parents. Sorry I had to grow up alone."
That did it.
Zhāng Wěi started openly crying, pulling Tòumíng into another hug, this one lasting much longer. "I'm so sorry," he sobbed into Tòumíng's shoulder. "So, so sorry. You poor boy. You've been through so much."
"I should have called," Tòumíng managed, his voice muffled against his boss's shirt. "Should have let you know. But I couldn't leave her. Not at the end."
"No, no, you did the right thing!" Zhāng Wěi pulled back, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand. "Family comes first. Always. I understand completely."
He composed himself with visible effort, straightening his shirt, clearing his throat. "Since I'm the best boss—and I am, everyone says so—I'm not going to be mad about this. You're back now, that's what matters. And given your recent trauma and loss, I'm putting you on first-floor duty. Lighter work. Established veins. Less risk."
"No."
The word came out firm, decisive. Tòumíng met Zhāng Wěi's surprised gaze with determination that wasn't entirely faked.
"I want to go below. To the deeper levels. I need to make up for the money I failed to get you by disappearing for two weeks. My aunt's gift it's for my future, for my debts. But I owe you, Boss. I owe you my loyalty, my labor. Let me work the hard veins. Let me find you something valuable."
Zhāng Wěi's tears came back with a vengeance. "Your work ethic," he choked out. "Your dedication. I have three grandsons and I wish—I WISH—they had half, HALF the integrity you show."
He grabbed Tòumíng's hand and shook it vigorously, then pulled him into yet another hug. "You're a good boy. A noble boy. Your parents would be proud. Your aunt, may she rest in peace, would be proud."
Finally releasing him, Zhāng Wěi patted Tòumíng on the back with enough force to make him stumble slightly. "Go. Go make me proud..." He paused dramatically, a single tear rolling down his cheek. "...son."
The moment hung in the air, heavy with manufactured emotion.
Tòumíng nodded solemnly and headed toward the equipment room to gear up.
As soon as he was out of earshot, Cupid's voice erupted in his chest, dripping with mock emotion. "It's enough to make a grown man cry." The sarcasm was so thick you could cut it with a knife. "Truly, that was beautiful. Moving. I'm getting misty-eyed and I don't even have eyes."
"Shut up," Tòumíng muttered, unable to suppress his grin.
"No, seriously. That was godly manipulation. The tears? The voice crack? The perfectly timed pause before you couldn't finish the sentence about your fake dying aunt? You should be in films. That was Oscar-winning bullshit."
"It worked, didn't it?"
"Oh, it worked magnificently. You're a terrible person and I'm genuinely impressed."
Tòumíng grabbed his helmet and pickaxe from the equipment room, still grinning. Two weeks of lying in bed watching social media had apparently taught him more than just dance challenges and makeup tutorials. He'd absorbed countless dramatic storytelling videos, emotional manipulation tactics disguised as "life hacks," and apparently enough performance techniques to fool a grown man into sobbing over a completely fabricated story.
The mining system might give him the ability to find valuable ores.
But natural talent? That was all him.