On his first day on the job, Yang Zheng arrived at the workshop early.
The majestic steel plant housed three colossal blast furnaces alongside a complex maze of piping.
The heat inside the workshop was intense, and within minutes, beads of sweat broke out across Yang Zheng’s forehead.
Clueless about what he should do, he stood awkwardly, watching the workers bustling about.
“You new here? What are you just standing around for? Who’s your master?” asked a worker whose face was smeared with grease.
“My… my master is Chen Yan,” Yang Zheng stammered.
“The break room is over there; go wait for your master there. This is a restricted production zone—if someone gets hurt, who’s taking the blame?” the worker scolded loudly.
“Oh, right, right…” Yang Zheng hurried away from the high-risk production area and headed straight for the break room.
Inside, a dozen or so workers were scattered about—some finishing the night shift, others getting ready to take over the early shift.
Scanning the room quickly, Yang Zheng saw that his master was nowhere in sight.
“Oh, a new college grad?” asked a young worker who was getting ready to leave.
“N-no… Um, could you tell me where Master Chen Yan is?”
Yang Zheng didn’t know a soul here; the only familiar face he had was Chen Yan.
“Well, well. Don’t tell me you’re Master Chen’s new apprentice, Yang Zheng?”
“Yes, I’m Yang Zheng. Please look after me,” Yang Zheng said, bowing slightly.
“Master Chen hasn’t shown up yet. Him? He shows up late whenever he feels like it, leaves early whenever he wants. Man, Yang Zheng, you’ve really got it made. Five whole years since Master Chen took on an apprentice, and he swore never to take another.”
A thin young worker mocked him with a sneering laugh.
“Master Chen is notoriously strict about taking apprentices; he doesn’t think much of any of us regular junior workers. You’re just a greenhorn with blind luck.”
“Word has it the factory director, Director Tang, gave a strict, do-or-die order—like it or not, he had to take him. No amount of real skill can ever compete with having connections, huh?”
“Totally. If Director Tang was my relative, I’d want Master Chen as my master too.”
An older veteran worker gave a sharp cough and barked angrily, “You lot running your mouths without even growing your whiskers yet—you’re going to ruin your lives with those loose tongues someday.”
“Aren’t we just telling the truth? Yang Zheng, let me ask you: do you even know the steel-making process? Ironmaking in the blast furnace, steelmaking in the converter, secondary metallurgy, continuous casting, and rolling—do you even know what any of those mean?”
Yang Zheng stood frozen in the doorway of the break room, burning with shame. Everything the young worker rattled off was complete gibberish to him.
“Oh, Fang Guangming, Workshop Foreman Fang, sounds like you’ve got plenty of pent-up bitterness toward me? If you’ve got something to say, spit it out—why are you picking on my apprentice?”
With a leisurely, unhurried stride, Chen Yan stepped into the break room.
His face flushed red, Yang Zheng stammered out a timid, “Master.”
Upon seeing Chen Yan, the junior worker Fang Guangming pouted in defiance. “I am bitter! My old man brought cartons of cigarettes and bottles of liquor to your doorstep begging you to take me as your apprentice, and you wouldn’t even consider it. But the second someone gets shoved in through the backdoor, you take him right on. Master Chen, am I really that much more pathetic than him?”
“You brat—who do you think recommended you for that foreman position in the first place?” Chen Yan slapped Fang Guangming right across the back of his cap.
“Master Chen, I don’t care about being foreman; I just want to follow you and learn real skills.” Fang Guangming didn’t look angry in the least, gazing up at Chen Yan with a pitiful expression.
“We work right alongside each other every day. You’ve seen every trick I know just by watching—what else is left to learn? Besides, your old man is a Grade-7 bench fitter. If you actually had a passion for learning, you would’ve surpassed me years ago. Your heart’s set on climbing the administrative ladder anyway, so just focus on being your foreman.”
“Master Chen, you’re biased. You’re just sucking up to Director Tang…” Fang Guangming muttered under his breath.
“What’s that? Me, sucking up to Director Tang? Is that going to win me a promotion and a fortune?”
“You—”
“Alright, enough. Off you go to take over your shift, Foreman Fang.”
Ceasing his banter with Fang Guangming, Chen Yan turned to Yang Zheng and commanded, “Starting today, you’ll shadow Foreman Fang. Whatever he tells you to do, you do.”
“Hey now, Master Chen, he’s your apprentice, not mine,” Fang Guangming protested.
“Didn’t you just say a minute ago that he doesn’t know a thing about blast furnaces, converters, or secondary metallurgy? Well, you know. You’re the foreman, so teaching him is part of your job description.”
“Master Chen, you can’t just bully people like this.”
“I am bullying you. What’re you gonna do about it? Go ahead, run home and cry to your old man if you’ve got the spine.”
With that, he turned on his heel and walked right out of the break room, leaving the other junior workers howling with laughter. “I’ve heard of step-fathers, but I’ve never heard of a hand-me-down master. Congratulations on picking up a free apprentice, Foreman Fang!”
“All of you… get out, get out! Hurry up and get to your posts for the shift handover!”
Clutching his logbook and donning his woven bamboo hard hat, Fang Guangming shot Yang Zheng a resentful glare and snapped, “Follow me.”
Every single word exchanged between the foreman and his master had pierced straight into Yang Zheng’s ears. He felt utterly miserable, yet he also understood precisely where he stood in this steel workshop.
Everyone—including his master—looked down on him as a backdoor hire.
This was a place where people survived on genuine skill; without competence, you’d forever be trampled underfoot.
Swallowing down his crushing wave of inferiority, Yang Zheng dutifully trailed behind Fang Guangming like a humble shadow.
Before long, Yang Zheng was led over to the heating furnace workshop. Fang Guangming addressed a young worker who was busy checking temperature gauges: “Liu Dabao, this is Yang Zheng. He’s Master Chen’s apprentice and doesn’t know the workshop processes yet. Start him off here and show him the ropes for a month.”
Liu Dabao glanced at Yang Zheng, gave a brief nod, and said, “Alright.”
Squinting sideways at Yang Zheng, Fang Guangming added, “You stay with Foreman Liu. Once you’ve got the hang of the heating furnaces, we’ll rotate you to another section.”
Yang Zheng bowed his head slightly. “Thank you, Foreman Fang.”
On his very first day on the job, Yang Zheng had been bounced around multiple times, but fortunately, Liu Dabao didn’t subject him to cold mockery. Instead, he patiently began teaching Yang Zheng how to monitor and control the furnace temperatures.
“The very first step of steelmaking starts right here at the heating furnace. Controlling the temperature properly ensures the steel billets reach the right rolling temperature, preventing issues like overburning or underheating.
Just like building a house requires a solid foundation, we are the foundation for producing quality steel, so we can never afford to be careless. Your master can take one single glance and instantly tell the furnace temperature and the state of the billet. I’m not that good—I still have to rely on the data for every time block.”
Listening intently, Yang Zheng stared at the temperature logs Liu Dabao recorded for each interval.
“Say, weren’t all the workers in your hiring batch supposed to go through collective training? How’d you miss it?” Liu Dabao suddenly asked.
“I… I just joined recently.”
Yang Zheng stammered. He was a backdoor hire, and regular workers looked down on those who skipped the proper channels.
“Ah. Well, if you managed to get taken on as Chen Yan’s apprentice, you must have something special about you.” Liu Dabao didn’t press any further and went right back to explaining temperature regulation.
In the blink of an eye, lunchtime arrived. Liu Dabao looked up and said, “Go ahead and get your lunch.”
Yang Zheng nodded. “Got it, Foreman Liu. Do you need me to bring a meal back for you?”
“No need, I brought my own from home. I just need to pop it in the steam room to warm it up. You hurry along—lunch hour’s only an hour long.”
Clutching his lunchbox, Yang Zheng headed to the cafeteria, where almost everyone standing in line was a junior worker.
With meal tickets pinched tightly between his fingers, Yang Zheng arrived at the first service window.
Rice cost one dime for four liang; steamed buns were one dime for two; corn-meal bread rolls were one dime for four.
Yang Zheng opted for four corn-meal rolls.
Next came the dish section: vegetable sides cost two dimes per portion, while meat dishes were five dimes.
The vegetable options were mostly napa cabbage, radishes, eggplant, and string beans cooked with barely a drop of oil.
The meat dishes, however, featured chili-stir-fried pork, vermicelli braised with pork belly, pan-fried fish fillets, and braised pork belly with potatoes.
Having toiled all morning, Yang Zheng was starving. As the rich, savory aroma of the braised pork drifted over, he swallowed hard against a flood of saliva, but in the end, he settled for a plain portion of cabbage.
Since he had just entered the plant, he had no accumulated seniority, no technical rank, and could only draw the rock-bottom starting wage of thirty-five yuan.
Breakfast cost one dime, and lunch and dinner were three dimes each, totaling seven dimes a day.
That came out to twenty-one yuan a month just for food.
Twenty-one yuan! Back in Big Willow Village, that was enough to sustain his entire family for two whole months.
Yang Zheng wanted to pinch every penny, but what he had bought was already the absolute cheapest option available. How on earth was he supposed to save any money?
Sigh. Back home, cabbage was something they grew themselves. Here in the city, it cost two whole dimes—even if it did come with a slightly heavier slick of oil than back home.