Courtyard House: A Major Power's Heavy Industry, Hand-Crafted Nuclear Fusion

At noon in the steel rolling mill, the rousing song "We Workers Have Strength" was playing over the loudspeaker, and the boisterous voices of the crowd churned like boiling water in the huge canteen hall.

The air was filled with the aroma of cabbage, radish stewed with vermicelli, and the occasional whiff of meat.

For the workers who have been busy all morning, this mealtime, filled with the warmth of everyday life, is the most relaxing and anticipated moment of the day.

Zhao Ming walked through the crowd, his steps light as if he were floating.

"Brother Zhao, that 'blind filing' move this morning was absolutely amazing! Didn't you see Ma Hua's face? It was as black as the bottom of a pot!"

Wang Tiezhu, standing nearby, was still savoring the morning's victory, excitedly gesturing with his fingers.

"That's because Master taught me well."

Although Zhao Ming was modest, he couldn't hide the smile in his eyes.

He patted the meal tickets in his pocket, waved his hand generously, and said, "Let's go! To celebrate, let's have a good meal! It's on me, one serving of braised pork for everyone!"

Wow! Brother Zhao is so generous!

"Braised pork belly! I haven't had any meat for half a month!"

Several young workers cheered and crowded around Zhao Ming as they squeezed toward the food window.

At this moment, they were immersed in the confidence brought by technological breakthroughs, completely unaware that in this seemingly warm and camaraderie-filled canteen, another set of rules, not only belonging to technology but also to the "underworld," was baring its fangs in the shadows.

……

Window number three.

Sha Zhu wore a greasy apron and a white hat, and held a large iron ladle that he had used for who knows how many years.

He stood behind the huge vegetable bucket, his eyes lazily scanning the crowd in line.

As the "culinary master" of the steel rolling mill, He Yuzhu wields absolute authority in this small area.

Who would dare to cause trouble for him? Who wouldn't want him to give them a little more meat?

Even the factory leaders had to address him politely as "Silly Zhu".

Suddenly, his gaze settled on the figure in the crowd who was the center of attention.

Zhao Ming.

And then there's that "technical faction" clique that annoys him.

"snort."

Sha Zhu exhaled a breath of cold air from his nostrils, a mischievous smirk playing on his lips.

An old man came to see him this morning, and the implication was clear: these kids have been too arrogant lately and need to be disciplined.

Sha Zhu listened to what Yi Zhonghai said.

Moreover, he already disliked Su Zheng, that guy who always wore a "cool and aloof intellectual" face.

What's with this fitter acting all high and mighty?

Still using "science" and "data"?

When it's mealtime, don't they still have to beg me for a spoonful of food?

"Liu Yang," Sha Zhu tapped the edge of the vegetable bucket with the spoon handle, lowering his voice, "keep an eye on them, those kids are coming. You know how to flip this spoon later, I don't need to teach you, do I?"

The young apprentice, Liu Yang, chuckled knowingly, "Master, just you wait and see. I guarantee they'll have an 'unforgettable' meal."

"Go away, go away, I can do it myself."

Sha Zhu shoved his apprentice aside, saying, "You're not skilled enough at this kind of work. Let your master demonstrate what it means to do it 'without anyone noticing'."

The line moved forward slowly.

Finally, it was Zhao Ming's turn.

"Master He, four servings of braised pork, and four ounces of rice!"

Zhao Ming slapped a stack of meal tickets and grain coupons on the windowsill, a happy look on his face.

Sha Zhu raised his eyelids and glanced at him lazily.

"Hey, isn't this the genius Zhao?"

Sha Zhu's voice wasn't loud, but it carried a sarcastic tone, "I heard you showed off in the workshop this morning? What, are you throwing a celebration banquet in the cafeteria?"

Zhao Ming paused for a moment, sensing the barb in those words, but he was in a good mood and didn't want to argue.

"Master He is joking. The brothers are just hungry and want to have a good meal."

"Are you hungry? Then you need to eat something nourishing."

Sha Zhu nodded with a forced smile, then plunged the large ladle in his hand into the pot of braised pork.

Whoosh!

That spoonful was quite substantial.

A spoonful brimming with meat chunks, glistening with oil and red color, looks absolutely mouthwatering.

Zhao Ming's eyes lit up, thinking that although Sha Zhu had a sharp tongue, he was actually quite ruthless.

However, just as the spoon left the food container and was about to fall into the lunchbox...

Sha Zhu's wrist suddenly twitched without warning.

This seemingly slight tremor actually conceals a hidden meaning.

The mountain of meat collapsed instantly, as if struck by an earthquake.

The largest pieces of lean meat on top, as if they had eyes, "slipped" back into the vegetable bucket.

Immediately afterwards, the spoon paused again in mid-air.

As a result, due to inertia, several pieces of pork belly on the edge of the spoon "reluctantly" fell back down.

Finally, when the contents of the spoon actually fell into Zhao Ming's lunchbox...

Snapped.

There was only a pitifully small amount of broth, a few pieces of dazzlingly white fat, and two pieces of potato the size of a fingernail.

"Next!"

Sha Zhu didn't even glance at it, and immediately started knocking on the windowsill and shouting.

Zhao Ming was completely stunned when he saw the pitiful amount of food at the bottom of the lunchbox.

Four tickets for braised pork! And that's all they gave us?

It's not even enough to fill a gap between your teeth!

"Wait a minute!"

Zhao Ming grabbed the windowsill, his face flushed red. "He Yuzhu, what do you mean?"

"What do you mean?"

Sha Zhu looked at him innocently. "Get the food. What, you think it's not enough?"

"Is this what you call complaining about not having enough? This is blatant robbery!"

Zhao Ming angrily held up the lunchbox. "Look everyone! This is four servings of braised pork! It's all fat, not a single piece of real meat! That spoonful you just gave me was clearly full; you deliberately shook it off!"

The workers queuing around peered out and immediately started discussing it amongst themselves.

"Wow, this is so dark!"

"That silly Zhu is acting crazy again; he's deliberately messing with people."

"Shh, keep your voice down. Don't you want to eat?"

Hearing the surrounding chatter, Sha Zhu not only didn't quiet down, but instead threw the large ladle into the bucket with a loud "bang".

"What are you yelling about! What are you yelling about!"

Sha Zhu pointed at Zhao Ming's nose and cursed, "You think it's not enough? If you think it's not enough, then don't eat it! Who's begging you to eat it? That's the rule in the cafeteria: communal cooking, some good, some bad, some fatty, some lean. You got the fatty stuff, that's just good luck, it's meant to help you gain weight! Don't be ungrateful!"

"you……"

Zhao Ming was trembling with anger. "What do you mean by 'all in one pot'?! You were clearly doing it on purpose! You were beating that person perfectly fine, so why did your hand shake when it was my turn?"

"My hands shake? I have Parkinson's! Okay?"

Sha Zhu started acting like a rogue, "I cook hundreds of kilograms of vegetables every day, my wrists are exhausted. What's wrong with shaking them a couple of times? Is it illegal?"

"You're bullying us!" Wang Tiezhu, who was standing nearby, couldn't hold back any longer. "We're going to go to the leaders! We're going to report you!"

"Sue me?"

Sha Zhu chuckled, crossed his arms, leaned forward against the window, and looked down at the group of young workers.

"Kid, are you even fully grown yet before you sue me? Go ahead and sue me! Let's see if Director Yang listens to you or me! Look at these thousands of people in the factory, can they live without your file or my big ladle!"

That's what gives Sha Zhu his confidence.

In this era of scarcity, the chef, who held the power to distribute food, held an invisible and transcendent position.

As long as no major mistakes are made, it's common for them to jerk off their spoons or give you a hard time.

No one would really risk a chef's position over such a "trivial matter".

Zhao Ming gritted his teeth, his eyes reddening.

The dignity earned through technical skills in the workshop that morning was shattered at this moment by the "canteen rules" that exude a primitive and barbaric atmosphere.

He suddenly realized that, beyond technology, there was something even more powerless: "rent-seeking."

Just as Sha Zhu was feeling smug and preparing to kick people out.

A long, clean hand, even carrying a faint scent of soap, gently rested on Zhao Ming's shoulder.

"Shaking hands is a medical condition and needs to be treated."

A clear, cool voice cut through the noisy crowd and penetrated into everyone's ears.

Zhao Ming turned around abruptly: "Master..."

Su Zheng had appeared behind them without them noticing.

He was wearing faded work clothes, yet he exuded the meticulousness of a researcher.

At that moment, he wasn't holding a lunchbox, but rather a small notebook and a pen.

He didn't look at Sha Zhu or the lunchbox; instead, he was writing something down in the notebook.

Sha Zhu frowned slightly when he saw Su Zheng, but quickly regained his nonchalant demeanor.

"Hey, isn't this Su Dabing? What's wrong? Your apprentice's not getting enough to eat, so the master's here to step in? How about I give you face and give him another half spoonful of soup?"

Su Zheng closed the notebook and looked up.

There was no anger, no emotion in those eyes, only a kind of scrutiny that made Shazhu feel inexplicably uneasy.

It's like looking at a malfunctioning machine.

"Comrade He Yuzhu."

Su Zheng spoke up, addressing him formally, "You just said that the cafeteria has its own rules?"

"That's right! In this small territory, I'm the one who sets the rules!" Sha Zhu said stubbornly.

"it is good."

Su Zheng nodded. "Then may I ask, according to the factory's 'rules,' namely the 'Canteen Supply Standard Management Regulations,' how many grams should this serving of braised pork weigh? What should the net meat content be? What should the vegetable ratio be? What is the allowable margin of error?"

These four questions, delivered in rapid succession, completely baffled Sha Zhu.

"Wh...what grams? What ratio?"

Sha Zhu's eyes widened. "Serving food is just a matter of scooping it in with a spoon, there's no need for all that fuss! Do you think this is a lab mixing chemicals?"

"No standard?"

Su Zheng's lips curled into a mocking smile. "So, without standards, you've got your 'personal discretion'? In other words, who gets more or less of the public's resources, it's all up to your whim, He Yuzhu?"

The surrounding workers immediately fell silent.

That's a really hurtful statement.

Although everyone is aware of this unspoken rule, no one has ever dared to expose it so blatantly.

Elevating the issue of "shaking the spoon" to the level of "the right to distribute public property" changes its nature entirely.

Sha Zhu's expression changed: "Don't try to pin this on me! I was just relying on experience! On feel! I've been a master chef for decades, how could I not know how much is in this spoonful?"

"You know what's going on, but we don't."

Su Zheng suddenly turned around, looked towards the side door of the cafeteria, and raised his voice to call out, "Director Liu! Could you please bring out today's 'Food Ingredient Outbound Registration Book' and 'Meal Sales Record' for the cafeteria?"

Old Liu, the canteen manager who was pretending to be dead in the corner in an attempt to get away with it, suddenly froze.

He didn't expect Su Zheng to call out names directly, and to be so accurate.

Under the watchful eyes of everyone, Lao Liu had no choice but to bite the bullet and walk over.

"Master Su, this... this is such a small matter, is it really necessary to make such a fuss?" Old Liu wiped his sweat, not wanting to offend either side.

"Director Liu, this is no small matter."

Su Zheng pointed to Zhao Ming's lunchbox, "Master He just said that he relies on experience and intuition. Let's test his experience."

Su Zheng pulled a delicate little spring scale out of his pocket—actually, from his system space.

"This is what I use to calibrate the weight of the parts; the error is no more than 0.5 grams."

He poured the small amount of "braised pork" from Zhao Ming's lunchbox into a clean plastic bag and hung it on the scale.

Total weight: 85 grams.

Su Zheng coldly reported the data, then looked at Lao Liu, "Director Liu, according to the factory's regulations, the standard serving of one serving of vegetable A should be around 250 grams, right? Even considering water evaporation, it shouldn't be less than 200 grams. There are only 85 grams here."

"This..." Old Liu broke out in a cold sweat.

"60% less."

Su Zheng's voice was like a scalpel, precisely dissecting the facts: "Master He, your feel error is as high as 60%. In the workshop, if a worker's processing error reaches 60%, it is a major production accident, which will result in suspension for reflection or even dismissal."

"you……"

Sha Zhu was speechless, his face turning a deep liver color.

He wanted to argue, but faced with that cold, hard number, any sophistry seemed pale and powerless.

"You're using a fallacy of logic!" Sha Zhu retorted angrily. "Can cooking be compared to making spare parts?!"

Why are they different?

Su Zheng retorted, "It's all labor, all serving the people, and all consuming national resources. Why should a worker be punished for being a millimeter off, while you can be so self-righteous when you're more than half off?"

"Is it because no one can supervise you? No one can quantify your abilities?"

Su Zheng stepped forward, staring intently at Sha Zhu, his aura fully unleashed.

"What you call 'rules' are nothing more than a personal system of favors and power that you've established by abusing your authority. You give more when you're happy, and you lash out when you're not. You've turned everyone's right to eat into a favor you bestow upon them."

"He Yuzhu, this isn't true character, it's abuse of power for personal gain."

boom--!

These words resounded like a thunderclap in the cafeteria.

The workers' gazes towards Sha Zhu changed.

The previous fear and fawning turned into anger and contempt.

Yes, why should we have to eat at his mercy?

Why should he "rule" our food rations?

"Well said!" someone in the crowd shouted.

"Exactly! Why should the spoon be shaking!"

"Master Su is right! There needs to be a standard!"

The noise grew louder and louder, and Sha Zhu, standing behind the window, felt panicked for the first time.

He gripped the large spoon tightly, his knuckles turning white, but he dared not bang on the windowsill as arrogantly as before.

His much-vaunted "mass base" crumbled under Su Zheng's "logical offensive."

Seeing the situation was turning sour, Old Liu quickly stepped in to smooth things over: "Well... Master Su is right, we'll definitely strengthen management and set standards in the future... Pillar! Hurry up and replace it for Zhao Ming! Replace it completely!"

Sha Zhu gritted his teeth, glared fiercely at Su Zheng, and reluctantly picked up a spoon, shoveling two more spoonfuls of meat into Zhao Ming's lunchbox.

"Take it! You'll stuff yourself to death!"

Looking at the overflowing lunchbox, Zhao Ming finally felt a sense of relief.

He looked at Su Zheng with admiration; this was a true genius!

Without lifting a finger or using any force, a few words were enough to subdue that troublemaker, Sha Zhu!

Su Zheng, however, did not show any joy of victory.

Looking at the still defiant and even vengeful Sha Zhu, he knew in his heart that this was only temporary.

As long as the spoon is still in people's hands, and as long as the power to distribute it remains in people's hands, this kind of thing can never be stopped.

He's keeping watch here today, and Sha Zhu doesn't dare to tremble.

If he doesn't come tomorrow, Sha Zhu will only become more and more outrageous.

It is not feasible to use "rule by man" to oppose "rule by man".

It must rely on a "mechanism".

The "person" must be removed from this process.

Su Zheng turned around, said nothing more, and left the canteen with his apprentices.

……

Back in the workshop, Zhao Ming and the others were still excitedly discussing their victory.

"Master, you were so cool just now! The moment you took out that scale, Shazhu's face turned green!"

"Exactly! Let's see if he dares to shake the ladle like that again!"

Su Zheng did not participate in their discussion, but went straight to his own small, independent laboratory.

"Master, where are you going? Aren't you going to rest for a while?" Zhao Ming asked.

"You guys eat," Su Zheng said without turning his head. "I'm going to draw something."

He closed the laboratory door, shutting out the noise from the outside world.

Sitting at his worktable, Su Zheng spread out a clean white sheet of paper.

In his mind, the [Eye of Truth] system was activated.

"Since you think shaking the spoon is your privilege, since you think the cafeteria won't function without you..."

A cold, metallic glint flashed in Su Zheng's eyes.

"Then I'll create a 'new chef' who doesn't shake the ladle, has no emotions, and is absolutely fair."

At the top of the drawing, he wrote a line of large characters:

Project code: Fairness - Design drawing of a multi-functional automatic vegetable cutting and portioning mechanism.

The pen tip lands on the paper, and the lines begin to extend.

The feed hopper, planetary gear reducer, centrifugal cutting disc, and the most crucial component—a quantitative distributor based on the Archimedes spiral.

Every component, every line, is a declaration of war against the old order.

Sha Zhu, your era has ended.

……