Wang Dachui's Fantastic Retirement

At 58, Wang Dachui, the former “Chief Screw-Tightening Master” at a machinery factory, had ruled the workshop for thirty years with his signature “three-hammer technique.” But on the day he retired, he received two “surprises.” First, the factory had brought in a fully automated screw-tightening robot named “Wang Dachui 2.0.” Second, his cousin in faraway Hainan had suddenly died, leaving him a “sea-view apartment.”

With his retirement money in hand and dreams of “facing the sea, with spring blossoms all around,” Wang Dachui packed his bags and headed south. But what his cousin had left him was no sea-view apartment. It was a crooked three-story building in an urban village. The ground floor was rented to Li the Lame, who ran a “family-inherited bone-setting” clinic but kept dislocating his patients. The second floor was home to “Little Nezha,” an influencer convinced he was descended from aliens. And on the third floor... marbles were said to roll around there every night.

Worse still, his cousin had left behind a mountain of debt. When the creditors showed up with a “sea-view property mortgage agreement,” Wang Dachui finally understood: retirement was the start of another round of “screw-tightening.” This time, though, the screw he had to turn was the giant, rust-covered nut called life.