Chapter One: Resigning and Returning to Yellow Mountain
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On a Monday morning when life hardly seemed worth living, the subway station was already packed with people. Everyone was squeezed so tightly together that there was barely a sliver of space between them. Yet Jiang Yuan was nothing like her usual, half-dead self on the way to work, with her head heavy, her eyes vacant, and her whole face radiating the resentment of an overworked wage slave, like a puppet whose soul had been pulled out.
Quite the opposite—today, she looked radiant and full of energy.
Her large eyes sparkled with vitality, making her look like a bubbly, sugar-sweet girl overflowing with spirit.
Though she was jostled from every direction, she had not a single complaint. The happiest song in the world played through her Bluetooth earbuds, her feet tapped lightly to the beat, and she hummed soundlessly through her nose. Her mood was as colorful as a bag of rainbow candy, resembling that of a fresh graduate who had yet to be beaten down by society.
In reality, she had already been working for three years.
Just last week, she had been going mad on her social media feed, posting one bitter “working mule” quote every day:
“Life is full of walls to run into, but somehow I can never run into any money.”
“A poor wage slave never fears getting lost, because the farther you look, the poorer you become.”
“Until the future is decided, you and I may both be dark horses. But once the alarm rings, you and I are both working mules.”
“Sure enough, even the most optimistic person will wear a miserable face on the way to work.”
“Between going to work and working myself to death, I choose going to work until I drop dead.”
“Open both eyes, work until the lights go out.”
“As long as I work hard enough, my boss will soon be able to live the life he wants.”
Anyone who saw those posts would have seriously wondered whether she was mentally all right.
After arriving at her station, Jiang Yuan burst out of the subway full of energy and headed straight for the office building.
The elevators in the lobby were already surrounded by people. Every time the doors opened, the crowd surged inside like a tide. Jiang Yuan refused to fall behind and squeezed her way in with all her might.
Inside the cramped elevator, everyone stood shoulder to shoulder and back to back, checking the time over and over again, racing against the clock for fear of missing the attendance deadline.
Finally, with less than thirty seconds left before clock-in, Jiang Yuan stepped out of the elevator and sprinted all the way to the attendance machine. Her finger successfully pressed against the scanner. The instant the screen displayed “Clock-in Successful,” she could not resist blowing it a kiss.
She even flashed the pretty receptionist a smile that revealed two adorable dimples, sweetness practically spilling from her voice.
“Morning.”
The receptionist was both surprised and intrigued. Jiang Yuan normally came to work looking as though she had a personal vendetta against the entire world. Why was she glowing like sunshine today?
Unable to resist, she asked, “What are you so happy about? Did you win the jackpot on a scratch-off?”
“Hehehe. What’s a scratch-off jackpot compared to this?”
Jiang Yuan smiled so sweetly that everyone became even more curious about what wonderful thing had happened to her.
One after another, her coworkers, already seated at their desks, lifted their heads to stare at her, their minds filled with questions.
Jiang Yuan smiled and greeted everyone who looked her way. Once she returned to her desk, she turned on her computer and began tapping rapidly on the keyboard.
Before long, a resignation letter was finished.
That was right. The reason she was so happy today was that she finally would not have to keep working like a mule.
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Jiang Yuan made no attempt to be tactful in stating her reason for resigning:
“My mother has asked me to come home and become her full-time daughter. She’ll be paying me twenty thousand a month. Oh dear, how could I possibly refuse such warm hospitality? Whoever wants to be a working mule can do it—I’m going home to live off my parents!”
The news quickly spread throughout the company.
The group chat pinged incessantly as gossip erupted:
“Who would’ve guessed? Jiang Yuan is actually a rich second-generation kid?”
“But isn’t her family from the countryside? I remember it’s some little village at the foot of Mount Huang.”
“I think she comes from a single-parent family. Her parents are divorced.”
“Did her family get compensated for a demolition project?”
“Jiang Yuan, what’s going on? Did you really become a demolition heiress?”
Jiang Yuan stared at the computer screen and typed three words:
“Internet royalty.”
“What does that mean?”
“I’ve heard of revolutionary heirs, rich heirs, celebrity heirs, and demolition heirs, but what the hell is an internet heir? Did your parents take out online loans?”
Thirty-five hours earlier, Jiang Yuan herself had not known what an internet heir was.
It had been ten o’clock on Saturday night. She had dragged her exhausted body back to her tiny rented apartment, a fever patch stuck to her forehead. She had not even managed to eat a bite of hot instant noodles when her department manager called and ordered her to stay up late and finish the project proposal.
As she miserably chewed her noodles with one hand and worked on the proposal on her laptop with the other, her mother suddenly called her on WeChat video.
Unable to hold back, Jiang Yuan complained to her mother over the phone that her department manager did not treat her like a human being.
“Even working animals get to return to their sheds and rest at night. I’m worse off than a working animal. Sob, I even have a fever, and I feel awful. I have no appetite at all. Mom, I’m dying for your steamed fish head, pork rib and corn soup, and the cured meat braised with tofu that we make at home.”
Her mother’s eyes grew sore with sympathy. Through the screen, she joined Jiang Yuan in condemning the manager.
“Yuan-Yuan, forget this awful job. Look at how exhausted my daughter is. Why don’t you resign and come back to Mount Huang? Your mother will support you and cook delicious food for you every day.”
Jiang Yuan wished she could immediately throw herself into her mother’s arms and say, “Yes! Yes!”
But reality soon slapped her awake.
Her mother had not been born into wealth, which meant Jiang Yuan had never had the luxury of living off her parents.
Jiang Yuan muttered, “How are you going to support me? Are we going to pick tea, farm the land, and drink the northwest wind together in the countryside?”
Her mother shot her an offended look.
“Looking down on your mother, are you? Don’t worry. I certainly won’t let you starve. Your mother is quite famous now. How about this? Come home and help me. I’ll pay you twenty thousand a month. That’s still better than working at your awful company.”
Her mother rattled on, laying out the figures for her:
“Look at you, working in the big city. I may feel proud whenever I mention it to the neighbors back home, but you only make thirteen thousand a month. After taxes, you take home nine thousand six hundred. Rent eats up four thousand five hundred, and the rest disappears on food, clothes, and a little skincare. You struggle every day and spend every penny each month. Now you’re sick and still have to work overtime into the night. Why not come home with your mother, eat well, drink well, and leave that awful office stink behind?”
Jiang Yuan sprang to her feet in excitement, unable to believe her ears.
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“What? Twenty thousand? Mom, did you eat some poisonous mushrooms? Where did you get that kind of money?”
On the other side of the screen, her mother spoke with unconcealed delight.
“I don’t know either. I just messed around with it. Somehow, I kept earning more and more. Plenty of people have even come looking to discuss collaborations and ask me to take advertisements. I’m almost too busy to keep up.”
Jiang Yuan: “!!!”
Was that even something a human being would say?
Her mother had either eaten poisonous mushrooms or gotten drunk and was dreaming that she had successfully robbed a bank.
“Dear Mother, wake up!”
“Bah! Your mother was born in 1980. I’m only forty-five. How am I old?”
Jiang Yuan argued with her mother over the phone for quite some time before finally confirming that her mother was not dreaming.
Her mother, Jiang Lanfang—the village’s famously energetic and spirited big sister—had actually become an internet celebrity?
Jiang Yuan remembered her mother’s TikTok account. Two months ago, it had only had two or three thousand followers. Now, the number had exploded to eight hundred and ninety thousand.
Jiang Yuan stared in shock.
“My goodness, Ms. Jiang Lanfang, tell me everything! How did you manage this? Since when did you become so good at using TikTok?”
Jiang Lanfang herself could not quite understand it.
“I don’t know either. Everyone in the village had started using TikTok, so I couldn’t exactly refuse to join in, could I? I downloaded it and played around with it. I shared bits of daily life, taught people how to pickle vegetables and cure meat, and introduced some of the specialties and rural customs of our Huizhou region. Somehow, it suddenly went viral at the beginning of this month. Now lots of people watch my videos, and during holidays they even drive to the village to check in. They say the mountains are beautiful, the water is lovely, and the scenery is even better—perfect for a weekend road trip. Oh, and some fishing enthusiast is courting your mother.”
Jiang Yuan watched several of the videos with the most likes.
Her mother was hardworking and capable, frank and talkative, seemingly blessed with an endless supply of energy. She merely shared rural life and food from the Huizhou countryside, yet the content was irresistibly folksy and oddly addictive.
Her most popular video had received 3.048 million likes. Two others posted recently had received 2.177 million and 973,000 likes respectively. Her follower count was still rising every day.
Could it be that her mother was truly about to become famous?
Jiang Lanfang continued, “Someone has asked me to sell products through livestreams. They say I could earn even more money, but what do I know about that? Yuan-Yuan, don’t you work in new media in Shanghai? You must know much more about this than I do. Why don’t you come home and advise your mother?”
It would have been a lie to say Jiang Yuan was not tempted.
No nine-to-nine-six schedule. No two-hour commute on a subway so crowded it made her want to throw up. No more working overtime while watching the boss’s expression. Food and accommodation included, plus a monthly salary of twenty thousand.
What company could offer benefits that good?
Jiang Yuan spent the entire day yesterday studying her mother’s TikTok account, conducting market research, and considering the prospects of livestream commerce.
In the end, she slapped her forehead, picked up the phone, and called her mother at once.
“Mom, I’ve decided. Tomorrow I’ll submit my resignation, and as soon as I finish the formalities, I’ll come home to be your full-time daughter! Love you—mwah!”
Jiang Lanfang was delighted as a child. Their feelings were perfectly mutual.
“Good, good, good. Resign and come home quickly. Having you by my side is worth more than anything.”
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