Period Siheyuan: Pay Me Back a Hundredfold

Siheyuan, Nine Bends, Beneath Zhengyang Gate, Little Women, Golden Marriage, Family Portrait. In 1959, Li Wusi, who had failed the college entrance exam and was carrying the hopes of his disabled father, who wanted him to become a college graduate, fell asleep. His eldest brother secured him a job in the steel mill’s procurement department, unaware that it was a vortex surrounded by wolves and tigers. In the courtyard, Qin Huairu’s soft-spoken tricks, Silly Zhu’s iron fists, Xu Damao’s schemes, Third Master’s penny-pinching calculations, and Second Master’s mindless hunger for power formed a great net closing around the Li family. At the factory, he was forced to navigate Li Huaide’s political maneuvering, Director Yang’s integrity, and his coworkers’ exclusion. Fortunately, he had the System for Treating Others Well to help him: Sincere goodwill would be repaid tenfold to a hundredfold. Malicious attempts to exploit or harm him would be repaid a hundredfold to a thousandfold. Anyone who tried to take advantage of him would suffer the consequences: at best, diarrhea and weight loss; at worst, public humiliation and a firing squad. From then on, he walked a very unusual path to survival. Against those who schemed against him, he wielded kindness as a blade. Qin Huairu asked to borrow grain? He gave it to her, and the entire Jia family came down with diarrhea the next day. Xu Damao set a trap? He walked right into it, and before long the Xu family was hit by one misfortune after another. Silly Zhu gave him a hard time? He put up with it, until reforms in the cafeteria cost the “Kitchen Tyrant” his standing.