A life of success begins with being a landlord.

"What is it? Speak." A sense of foreboding suddenly welled up in my heart.

"I...I...I argued with my father again. My father...he wants to find me a husband back in our hometown." Chunyan was very agitated.

"My dad said that if I go back to work in Dongguan, I'll have to pay you back the money, and I can't afford it. So I might as well not go and just get married in my hometown and receive a dowry."

Holy crap, is Lao Xia really that cunning?

I was furious: "Chunyan, what your father did was really unfair. Not long ago, about ten days ago, your father and Sister Ling called me, saying they didn't have enough money to build the house and asked me for money. I even wired your father 20,000 yuan..."

"Twenty thousand yuan?"

Chunyan yelled, "What? Twenty thousand yuan? How come I didn't know anything about that? Damn it, when did my mom call you more than ten days ago?"

I was so shocked, my brain just went blank!

Did that bastard Lao Xia lie to me? But Sister Ling really did call me that day!

"Old Wang, what exactly happened? Explain yourself!" Chunyan shouted into the phone. "My mom's here too! Explain yourself! We're going to ask my dad when we get back."

"Is Sister Ling with you too?" I took a deep breath and brought up what happened last time.

On the phone, Sister Ling's voice came through: "Yaozu, I know nothing about this. The person who spoke to you last time wasn't me."

"Sister Ling, wasn't that you that day? You said Grandpa Chunyan passed away, and your voice was hoarse from crying. I thought your voice sounded strange too."

I was furious: "That's Lao Xia. He found a woman, deliberately impersonated you, and swindled me out of 20,000 yuan."

Looking back on the phone call that day, it was indeed very suspicious.

Old Xia said Sister Ling's voice was hoarse from crying, and I believed him. My conversation with Sister Ling was only a few words long. If it really was Sister Ling, she wouldn't have been so perfunctory.

Sister Ling burst into tears, "Old Xia is such a scoundrel! He cheated you out of another 20,000 yuan. I knew nothing about it, not a single thing. Yaozu, we are so, so... so sorry."

Chunyan was also furious and cursed on the phone: "Damn it, no wonder that old devil has been eating fish and meat, smoking and drinking good cigarettes and alcohol every day, and gambling every day. He has no shame and says that he won all this money."

I was even more surprised: "That 20,000 yuan... wasn't spent on building the house?"

"Spend it my ass! My dad squandered it all!"

Chunyan cried in anger: "No wonder he wanted to find me a husband in my hometown. No wonder he dared not go back to Dongguan."

Damn, how can there be such a man, such a father, in this world?

I sighed, "It's alright, Sister Chunyan. This is also my fault. After you go back, don't argue anymore. Come back as soon as the house is finished. You don't need to pay back the money; I don't need it."

Sister Ling sobbed, "You can't say that. It's tens of thousands of dollars. Many people don't earn that much money in their entire lives."

All told, Sister Ling and her family have taken fifty or sixty thousand yuan from me in total.

For people in the countryside, this is indeed not a small amount.

My dad could work 24/7, carrying manure for ten years and still not earn this much.

But for me now, it's just a drop in the ocean.

So I comforted Sister Ling, "It's okay, Sister Ling, we're all family, don't worry about it. Focus on building the house. If you need more money, just let me know. I'll wire you the money whenever you come over, so you can fly over and be more comfortable."

"Yaozu, don't say that. Saying that makes me feel even worse..." Sister Ling sobbed uncontrollably.

A dozen minutes later, he hung up the phone.

I felt uneasy too, because the sound of Lingjie and Chunyan crying still lingered in my ears.

Suddenly I remembered the jade pendant Sister Ling gave me. I took it off my neck and looked at it. Oh, I forgot to mention the jade pendant earlier.

Sister Ling and Chunyan would be very happy if they knew that this jade pendant was worth tens of thousands of yuan.

I called back to tell them about it, but it was a public phone, and the person who answered said that the two women who had just called had already left.

I had no choice but to give up.

I'm going to talk to Mr. and Mrs. Li Hanwen about the contract tomorrow, so I'll leave work at 10 p.m. to go home and discuss it with Sister Li.

Erxia is a diligent person and she cares a lot about Sister Li's affairs. She had already prepared a contract for us, which was written very clearly.

I looked at the contract and had Erxia explain it to me clause by clause. It seemed very comprehensive.

Erxia laughed and said, "Starting tomorrow, Sister Li will be a real landlady."

Sister Li said proudly, "Being a landlady is just the beginning. In the future, we'll become real company presidents, expanding our business all over the country. Then, Erxia will be the regional manager for the three northeastern provinces!"

I asked, "So what about me? What should I do?"

"Secretary, carry my bag, pour me tea, massage my back, and rub my feet..."

"That's a eunuch, not a secretary," I rolled my eyes.

Sister Li laughed and beckoned me to look at the junk she had collected over the past two days.

We're going to start a recycling company, so let's start by collecting scrap.

We invested 20,000 yuan in experimental funds, first collecting more than a dozen truckloads of miscellaneous scrap from a tricycle scavenger, and then having technical expert Xu Dingfu teach Erxia, Chen Feng, and Ye Xiaotian how to classify the materials and perform preliminary processing techniques.

Furthermore, we specifically purchased some samples from large scrap metal recycling stations for teaching and research purposes.

If you want to do business, you must first do an internship and master the technology.

These past two days, Sister Li has been participating in the training, and even personally involved in dismantling waste materials. She's become familiar with the tools and speaks very knowledgeably, explaining the different types of waste to me:

"This plastic casing isn't actually plastic; it's called charred wood, and it's worthless. Next time you go out collecting scrap, never mistake this for plastic. And this circuit breaker contains silver contacts; you can extract silver from it—it's a valuable resource."

Erxia also showed off to me: "This is red copper, also called pure copper. This is yellow brass, this is silver-plated copper. This is lead ingot, this is tin bar... and there's also nickel, molybdenum, stainless steel..."

I was so dizzy and confused that I couldn't remember any of it.

Sister Li, with her mature air, patted my shoulder and said, "Young man, this industry is very complex. You'll have to learn slowly. If you want to be a qualified junk collector, you need to hone your skills in the industry for at least a year."

I smiled and said, "It doesn't matter if the water is deep, we'll just grind it down slowly."

Suddenly, I thought of Lao Xia again.

This old guy once told me that collecting scrap metal is very profitable, and his dream is to open a scrap metal recycling station.

That old devil is so shameless, otherwise I could bring him in and make him a supervisor.

Perhaps it was a telepathic connection, but Sister Li suddenly said, "By the way, Wang Yaozu, after our recycling company opens, we'll need some of our own people. Why don't you call Chunyan and her parents to help out, so we don't have to look for workers again?"

I rubbed my nose: "They're building a house back home, it'll be another month before they can come over."

As they were chatting, Bobo came skipping over with Aping.

Bobo will always be Bobo, always wearing tank tops and miniskirts.

With her hopping around like that, I was afraid her tank top straps wouldn't hold up and the things inside would fall out.

"Sister Li, it's Wang Yaozu!"

Bobo jumped over and punched me: "I made money! Here's ten thousand for the medical bills I owed you last time, and I'll treat you to a late-night snack while I'm at it!"

I was astonished: "Do scammers make that much money? They've earned ten thousand yuan in just a few days?"