HPDBC Chapter 58 The Midnight Gardener and the Glass Jars
Chapter 58 The Midnight Gardener and the Glass Jars
At two o'clock in the morning, the old street of Changxiang City was like a sleeping old dog, occasionally emitting a few muffled snores.
The roller shutter door of Renxin Pharmacy was half-drawn, letting in a dim, warm light.
The air was filled with a strange mixture of smells: the coolness of high concentration of mint, the lemony scent of dish soap, and the aroma of the braised beef noodles that Guanshan had just finished eating.
"Boss, this batch of bottles is washed." Li Siyuan carried the last basket of canning jars onto the counter, his back aching.
These bottles are a motley collection; some are for canned yellow peaches, some for Lao Gan Ma chili sauce, and even a few were originally for fermented bean curd.
After being steamed at high temperatures and disinfected with alcohol, they are now crystal clear, but their shapes are really ugly.
"This is our new packaging?" Zhao Na looked at the bottle cap that originally had the words "Spicy Crispy" printed on it, her lips twitching. "Master, isn't this a bit too... hasty? We're a popular online store, after all."
"This is called industrial wasteland style, do you understand?" Wang Minyu was holding a brush and writing labels on cut kraft paper.
His handwriting remained cursive, and each slip of paper was inscribed with the words "Benevolent Heart Nourishing Qi - Special Supply," which were then tied to the neck of the bottle with hemp rope.
With this little fuss, the originally rustic canning jars suddenly exude a strange "high-end handmade feel".
"Young people these days buy into this." Wang Minyu held up a labeled bottle to examine it under the light. "As long as it works, they'll line up to buy it even if it's served in a urinal."
"Boss, the grass in the backyard is growing like crazy." Guan Shan squeezed in through the back door, munching on half a cucumber.
Wang Minyu put down his pen and went into the backyard.
Under the nourishment of the system's [Spiritual Liquid], the mutated astragalus and mint plants that had been stripped bare not only sprouted new leaves but also began to spread to the surrounding area.
Countless tender green seedlings sprouted from the once barren land.
That vitality, visible to the naked eye, seemed somewhat eerie in the dead of night.
Wang Minyu squatted down and touched a mint leaf with his finger.
[Mutant Mint (Generation 2): Its medicinal efficacy is approximately 80% of the parent plant, and its growth cycle is shortened to 12 hours. Characteristics: Invigorating and refreshing, with trace amounts of hallucinogenic effects (limited to making one feel that the world is a wonderful place).]
"Good stuff." Wang Minyu nodded in satisfaction.
Although the second-generation plant has a lower medicinal effect, it has the advantage of a large quantity, making it perfect for making a popular version of Qi-boosting tea.
"Guan Shan, you'll sleep here tonight." Wang Minyu pointed to the recliner next to the vegetable garden. "If anyone dares to climb over the wall, don't kill them, just break their legs and throw them out."
"Alright." Guan Shan stuffed the cucumber butt into his mouth, lay down on the recliner, and the chair creaked under the weight.
Back in the front hall, Su Qing was staring blankly at the microscope.
"What's wrong?" Wang Minyu leaned closer.
"The ingredients are a mess." Su Qing didn't look up, her voice as cold as ice. "In that 'Top Scholar Pill,' besides the artificially synthesized stimulant, there's also an extract. I just did a protein comparison, and the source should be... placenta."
Li Siyuan was drinking water when he heard this and immediately spat it out: "Placeus? That's a placenta!"
"And it's not fresh, it's a chemically treated waste placenta." Su Qing turned her head, a hint of disgust in her eyes. "It contains a lot of residual viruses and hormones. Zhao Dezhu is using medical waste to make medicine."
Wang Minyu's face darkened.
Although he was a heartless doctor, it was limited to his sharp tongue and his ruthlessness in taking money.
This act of feeding people medical waste has crossed the line of human decency.
"Print out the report." Wang Minyu tapped the table. "It'll be very useful tomorrow."
Just then, someone knocked on the half-closed roller shutter door.
"Thump, thump, thump."
The sound was very soft and rhythmic, not like an emergency room call, but more like some kind of code.
Guan Shan rushed out from the backyard in an instant, grabbing a rolling pin in his hand.
Su Qing's hand also reached for the scalpel in her pocket.
"Excuse me... are you still open for business?"
A man's voice came in, sounding extremely tired, like a ghost who hadn't slept for three days.
Wang Minyu gestured to Guan Shan to open the door.
A middle-aged man with thinning hair, wearing a plaid shirt, stood at the door.
He carried a huge backpack, his glasses were as thick as the bottom of a beer bottle, and his eye bags drooped down to his cheekbones.
"Who are you?" Wang Minyu looked him up and down.
[Zhang Wei, 35 years old, senior architect at a major company. Condition: Overworked, mentally exhausted, cervical lordosis reversed.]
"My name is Zhang Wei." The man pushed up his glasses, his voice weak. "I saw your tea online... I'm not here to buy tea, I'm here for help."
"Go to the Second Hospital for help." Wang Minyu pointed outside the door, "Turn left after you go out and take a taxi."
"The Second Hospital can't cure my illness." Zhang Wei gave a bitter smile, walked into the store, and put his backpack on the ground.
The bag was so heavy it made a dull thud. "I have severe obsessive-compulsive disorder and anxiety. I've been rushing to finish a project lately, and I haven't slept for 48 hours straight. But I can't sleep; all I see when I close my eyes is code. I feel like my brain is going to explode."
"Then you should see a psychologist."
"I looked, they prescribed sleeping pills, but it didn't work." Zhang Wei pulled a delicate thermos from his bag. "I heard you guys have that kind of... method that can force a person's brain to shut down? Like that programmer who counts meters?"
Wang Minyu laughed.
It seems that Chen Xu's "counting rice therapy" has become a legend in the industry.
"Counting meters is useless to you." Wang Minyu glanced at his hands, his fingers long and slender, with thick calluses on the tips, the result of long hours of typing. "Your logical thinking is too strong. Counting meters is a mechanical task; your brain will automatically run it in the background, it won't take up your CPU at all."
"What can I do?" Zhang Wei cried out in despair, clutching his hair. "I'll pay any price as long as I can fall asleep. I have money, but I don't have the life to spend it."
Wang Minyu looked at the basket of freshly washed glass bottles and suddenly had an idea.
"Don't bother counting the rice." Wang Minyu pointed to the pile of bottles. "See these bottles? And those hemp ropes too."
Zhang Wei paused for a moment, then said, "I saw it."
"Tonight's task is to tie all one thousand bottles with hemp rope and attach labels." Wang Minyu picked up a bottle to demonstrate. "Note that the knot of the hemp rope must be tied exactly in the center of the bottle neck, with an error margin of no more than one millimeter. The labels must be attached perfectly, without a single air bubble. If even one is not up to standard, we have to start all over again."
Zhang Wei's eyes lit up instantly.
For an architect with severe obsessive-compulsive disorder, requirements such as "errors cannot exceed one millimeter" and "no air bubbles" are simply temptations etched into their DNA.
"This...this is treatment?" Zhang Wei swallowed hard.
"This is the 'Ultimate Focused Desensitization Therapy'," Wang Minyu said with a straight face, spouting nonsense. "The consultation fee is two thousand, and you pay after the job is done. You can't leave until it's finished."
"Okay! I'll do it!" Without saying a word, Zhang Wei took off his coat, rolled up his sleeves, and sat down in front of the pile of bottles.
Ten minutes later, a bizarre scene unfolded in the pharmacy.
Zhang Wei, an architect with an annual salary of one million yuan, was tying knots in Lao Gan Ma bottles with complete concentration, just like a skilled worker on an assembly line.
His movements were terrifyingly precise; every knot was as perfect as if it had been measured with a ruler.
Li Siyuan and Zhao Na watched in stunned silence, feeling ashamed of their own inferiority.
"This will work?" Zhao Na asked in a low voice.
"For those who do mental labor, physical exhaustion is the best sleeping pill," Wang Minyu said, taking a sip of tea. "Besides, this also solves our manpower shortage problem. Free labor, why not use it?"
Four o'clock in the morning.
Zhang Wei finally finished tying the last bottle.
He looked at the neat array of canned food jars in front of him, which resembled works of art, and let out a long sigh.
The anxiety that had been building up in my chest miraculously dissipated with each of the thousands of repetitive movements.
A wave of overwhelming drowsiness washed over me.
"Boss...I..." Zhang Wei didn't finish his sentence before his head lolled to the side and he collapsed onto the table, snoring loudly.
Wang Minyu walked over and draped a coat over him.
"Go to sleep." Wang Minyu looked at the finished products on the table and nodded in satisfaction. "Tomorrow, this batch of 'Programmer Special Edition' Qi-boosting tea can be sold for twenty yuan more."