The Advocate on the Soil

A farmwoman is fired by a factory whose owner is a local business magnate. He hires the county's most experienced lawyer. She has no employment contract, and everyone urges Ouyang Shu not to take the case. “You just graduated. You can't beat someone like him.” Ouyang Shu asks for no money upfront and takes the case. He doesn't pull strings or call in favors. He simply goes through every attendance record and pay slip in his rented room. On the day of the hearing, he produces a time-clock record everyone else had overlooked. It shows the farmwoman's daily hours, bears her coworkers' signatures, and has the workshop supervisor's stamp. The veteran lawyer's expression changes. The judge brings down the gavel, and the case is settled in court. The client receives compensation, but Ouyang Shu loses many more potential clients. The county seat is small, and no one dares hire a young lawyer who has offended a local power broker. He sits in his empty office, watching neighbors come and go outside the window. No one knows where this young man will find his next meal. But he knows those shoes, caked in mud, won't stop.