Siheyuan: I Turn the Tables in the 1970s

From the start, the courtyard’s beasts tear Zhou Ming’s job application to shreds, but he activates the [Myriad Worlds Recycling Station].

The enamel mug they fight over turns out to be a Cybertronian energy core, while rotten vegetable leaves can be exchanged for an interstellar Zerg queen’s nest.

While the whole courtyard waits to see him starve, he’s directing an alien mechanical army to cultivate thousands of acres of fertile land in the Great Northern Wilderness.

Ten years later, American satellites spot clusters of floating cities above China’s black soil. Zhou Jianshe lounges inside the recycling station, toying with the "limited-edition enamel mug" Qin Huairu gave him. "That arsenic you were fighting over isn’t even enough to get stuck in your teeth."