After dinner ended, everyone moved venues to a bar. Liu Jun couldn’t join the conversation anyway, so he bid farewell. In the parking lot, he leaned against Shen Huadong’s car window: “Dongdong, I suggest you need to calm down and gather your economic analysts to analyze the current economy from a broader perspective. You’re different from other stockholders. In China, stock trading indeed requires watching policy signals, but you’re running a business—you need to see more broadly. I suggest you combine London copper’s sudden drop with the continuous decline in US housing prices, plus global hot money and speculative funds entering China, and analyze these aspects together. Don’t just stare at one policy today and another policy tomorrow.”

Shen Huadong was stunned for a moment. “Ah, I have a research report done by the group here. Take it and have a look.”

“Your father… wouldn’t be like you, discussing the stock market every day, would he? In other words, wouldn’t connect everything to the stock market, would he?”

“My father told me recently that he cares more about politics and macroeconomic data than ever before. Previously, he’d read briefings when he remembered; now he reads them daily. He’s grasping both the stock market and the real estate market, hehe. Liu Jun, you’re too much of an outsider—it’s somewhat inappropriate.”

“From a business operator’s perspective, don’t you think reduced stock market bubbles, meaning hot money chasing capital gains flowing out of the country, would be a good thing?”

“But big brother, I’m a listed company—stock index decline means my assets shrink. And… sigh, read my research report first. Our real estate and stock market are inseparable. We need financing to buy land, then financing after buying land. We need this bubble.”

Liu Jun was speechless. Yes, everyone’s perspective depends on where their butt sits. For example, he most hated that domestic oil prices never adjusted upward, causing nationwide artificial oil shortages, with trucks queuing day and night, unable to get fuel, disrupting his company’s shipments. But if he dared complain about oil prices not rising on busy streets, a bunch of taxi drivers would probably beat him to death. And wasn’t the oil shortage also an extreme demand from another stakeholder for their profits? These were all helpless realities.

Returning home, Cui Bingbing, who was taking her turn staying home to watch Dandan today, told him that someone claiming to be former Chief Engineer Wang from Shi Yiji had called. Liu Jun thought: Mr. Wang? Usually he was the one calling Mr. Wang during holidays to send greetings and report research progress—it was rare for Mr. Wang to proactively call him. Maybe because he had his phone off during the afternoon meeting at the Overseas Chinese Association, Mr. Wang had to call his home number. He quickly called back. It turned out that after Mr. Wang retired from Shi Yiji with some unfulfilled ambitions, he stayed home declining invitations from other companies to utilize his experience, including Tengfei Company’s invitation, wanting to properly arrange his later years. But after only a year of quiet retirement, he began to have “unrepentant thoughts,” recalling some difficult problems encountered during work, and started feeling restless. He was currently thinking about the grinding and reuse of CNC machine tool blades. The more he thought about it, the happier he became—it was even more fun than playing games. Currently, domestic blades, due to poor materials, though cheap, are not of good quality. After five continuous hours of use, they’d affect precision. Generally, companies would rather choose foreign blades at ten times the price for operational continuity. But such expensive non-domestic blades had to be discarded after one use because grinding techniques were difficult to master. Mr. Wang had been thinking at home about how to solve this blade grinding and reuse problem. He’d thought of several methods but needed a practical operation to verify them. He could, of course, return to Shi Yiji, where his influence remained. He just needed to bring problems there and watch his disciples operate while he relaxed. But the problem was that Shi Yiji’s boss might not value such small innovations that Mr. Wang found lovely. He’d have to sneak back to Shi Yiji like underground work. This didn’t sit well with him, so after much thought, he found Liu Jun. Indeed, Liu Jun immediately agreed upon hearing about it.

But Mr. Wang was awkward, cautiously asking: “Little Liu, you’re not just agreeing reluctantly out of respect for my old face, are you? This is just for my amusement—don’t force yourself. We retirees playing around should be premised on not affecting you young people’s normal work.”

Liu Jun smiled: “No way, Mr. Wang. This modification you mentioned is something I’ve thought about but never pursued deeply. But undoubtedly, this modification is interesting.”

“Oh, then first tell me where the interest lies.”

Cui Bingbing had been very busy lately but was getting fatter despite tightening her watch band. She had Liu Jun reattach a segment he’d previously removed, so Liu Jun was on speakerphone with Mr. Wang while fiddling with Cui Bingbing’s watch band with both hands. When Cui Bingbing heard the old man on the phone asking Liu Jun for help but grilling him thoroughly before agreeing to be helped, with an attitude of playing hard to get, she found it amusing and pricked up her ears to eavesdrop.

“The entire city needs 423 machine tools using this type of blade—let’s conservatively say 400. Each machine tool needs 200-250 blades annually, so the whole city uses 80,000-100,000 blades. Just solving the blade grinding problem, even if they can only be reused once, would save 4-5 million yuan in imported blade costs. But I think theoretically, the number of times they can be repaired and reused won’t be less than three. Actually, the money saved spread across each company and each machine tool doesn’t seem to significantly impact costs, but innovation can’t be measured purely by monetary cost. Some things, like our pollution control, are matters of conscience. But it’s not entirely about conscience, Mr. Wang’s concept involves mostly curve calculation work. You need to invest a lot of time in calculations, but I only need to spend what two machine tools save in blade costs annually. This is a worthwhile business.”

“Good, your attitude is very practical. With you thinking this way, even if I, an old man, dawdle for a long time without producing results, you won’t despise me or force me to give up halfway. Tomorrow I’ll go to your factory myself—you don’t need to go, just give me proper introductions. Hehe, I modified a second-hand Santana I bought for 20,000 yuan myself—very useful. I’ll drive it tomorrow to show you.”

Seeing Liu Jun end the call, Cui Bingbing curiously said: “Wow, this old gentleman is even more impressive than your father-in-law with his single blade.”

“Mr. Wang’s impressiveness isn’t inferior to One Blade. I’ve known his name since I was old enough to understand things. Not only is his technique good, but his character is admirable. Back then, when rebels wanted to struggle against him, not only did workers throughout the city unite to protect him, but fishermen whose boats he’d repaired and farmers whose threshing machines and water pumps he’d fixed during rural support also came to confront the rebels. Many industry insiders show him…” Liu Jun stood up and made a gesture of bowing respectfully.

Cui Bingbing touched her face: “Does your wife look easy to fool? How are there unknown masters everywhere?”

Liu Jun waved his fist: “Mr. Wang comes from an old family background, very traditional. Half of old Shi Yiji’s achievements were his doing. Many old-timers at Shi Yiji are his disciples. First, he’s reluctant to leave—actually, I invited him long ago. Second, he’s loyal. Now that processing technology changes daily, Shi Yiji’s new workshops completely exclude those old workers, who are being eliminated quickly. He has to find ways to give those old workers something to do at Shi Yiji. That’s the kind of person he is. He also mentored me a lot before. Now that he wants to experiment at my company, I couldn’t ask for more. Look—as soon as he acts, it’s the most difficult, time-consuming, inconspicuous, and boss-unappreciated aspect of traditional craftsmanship. Such people are true technical experts.”

“You’re also a boss. What benefit does this bring you? You’re so happy.”

“Teaching—Old Wang’s mind is too rich with treasures. Many of our young technical personnel lack traditional mechanical practical experience. I’m also hoping he’ll stay at my place… Amitabha, God bless.” He handed the fixed watch to Cui Bingbing. “I’ll read the recent economic research report Dongdong smuggled to me. I won’t compete with you for the bathroom tonight.”

Cui Bingbing immediately knew it was good stuff upon hearing this. She threw down her laptop and squeezed onto the single-seat sofa to read together. Opening the portfolio, Liu Jun saw the report’s signature and smiled first. He knew this person, Dongdong, had brought him to dinner together. He was Liu Jun’s high school alumnus, two grades above him, and currently almost Shen Baotian’s deputy. Coming from such a person, it naturally wouldn’t be ordinary. However, having Shen Baotian’s deputy take time from his busy schedule to write a routine monthly economic report already carried a somewhat unusual significance.

When masters act, it’s indeed extraordinary. The report started with international situations, linked point by point to domestic situations, then discussed local policy responses in these two months and their connections to domestic and international situations, thus analyzing impacts on the group’s three major sectors and the group company’s response suggestions. After reading, Cui Bingbing nodded: “Not bad, very systematic. You should poach this person.”

“Can’t poach him. I only attract technical personnel. His ambitions are greater—he’s somewhat like Director Dong.” Liu Jun slapped his forehead. “The approach—his approach is very good. I can do it too. I’ll establish a clearer correlation diagram. Wife, I’m applying for an all-nighter.”

“Let’s pull an all-nighter together. I’ll go cook a late-night snack first while you start working.” When Cui Bingbing brought two bowls of vegetable and mushroom noodles, she vaguely heard Liu Jun muttering something. Getting closer, she realized he was bragging about himself: “Oh my, what excellent memory—still remembering early-year events clearly, genius.” “Oh my, this logical level is unmatched, genius.” “Oh my, just a few numbers, but the brain has substance, genius.” Cui Bingbing looked over the computer screen was already covered with dense tables, and Liu Jun was filling in blanks. Cui Bingbing sat down and connected to Google to help Liu Jun fill gaps. But as information accumulated, the computer screen presented a tangled mess. At 2 AM, the red-faced Liu Jun brutally unplugged the perfectly functioning computer power cord, looking frustrated.

“Infinite variables, infinite sufficient relationships. No wonder there are so many frauds among our country’s economists—anyway, rigor is impossible.”

“Bah! You damn engineering chauvinist pig! Can’t build models yourself, so you slander economics as unscientific. Give me back my night’s hard work!” Cui Bingbing was truly furious.

Liu Jun ignored her, threw down the computer, and went to bed. With so many tangled relationships from economic phenomena entangled in his mind, Liu Jun’s brain was overheating. What frustrated him more was that he really couldn’t see clearly how current economic conditions would affect manufacturing. He didn’t believe some public opinion saying US housing price drops were unrelated to China, or that A-share index changes wouldn’t extend to manufacturing. The tables he’d just built told him everything was connected, but he couldn’t find the connection results because of countless variables. He couldn’t clarify the intricate relationships between variables—he lacked understanding. Even that master’s report from Shen Huadong’s group wasn’t rigorous—at least he’d now found flaws during the table-making process.

Cui Bingbing followed into the bedroom and punched him twice, but there was no resistance at all. Cui Bingbing’s strength lay in arguing, but it was difficult to deploy in the quiet night, so she also went to sleep glumly, though unable to sleep. One with a mind full of tangles, one with a belly full of anger—the two didn’t speak to each other, breathing heavily in the darkness.

After some unknown time, Cui Bingbing finally calmed down and said quietly, “Why are you so obsessed with finding answers? With or without answers, you’ll still run your current factory management the same way. Do you have other choices?”

“No. Seeing stocks fall, I’m relieved inside. This year we’ve been troubled by hot money—interest rate hikes, increased reserve requirements—nothing could suppress it, then suddenly stocks fell. They didn’t fall simply—many other factors are correlated, which I figured out today. Some of those factors are policy-related and can be stopped, while others are market-related with unpredictable impacts. Sigh, let’s not talk about it—it’s confusing again. I don’t need to do this, but I think, since I’m not good at scheming and disdain using big banners, I can only rely on my brain to catch up with those who can scheme like Yang Xun. Actually… I know my development speed over the years is inferior to others. I’ve been afraid to face my capability deficiencies. You’re too tolerant of me.”

“Why compare with others? You’re doing quite well.”

“Not well. I really can’t manage. You should criticize me for welcoming Mr. Wang to the company for small technical improvements—this isn’t a public charity center after all.”

“Haven’t you spent enough wasteful money on technology? This doesn’t matter.”

“So you see, I’m very willful. Such people can’t make money.”

“Can’t change anyway. Look how you got possessed as soon as you started building correlation diagrams—that’s your passion.”

“But what’s the point of opening a company if you can’t make money? I might as well happily do my technical work.”

“Your father caused this—you can’t shake it off, so you have to continue. Don’t overthink. Living a lifetime—if you don’t indulge your hobbies a bit, what’s the point of living? I’m willing to indulge you, so indulge yourself.”

“Since deciding on the heat treatment branch factory, I’ve been walking on thin ice, fearful and worried. But I see others very carefree, seemingly very resilient to storms. Look at that research report from Shen Huadong and others—though I now see many flaws in it, you can see the report radiates full confidence throughout. This is what I currently lack. I now rarely use affirmative sentences—all question marks. I can’t see clearly. I increasingly doubt my abilities, doubting from that day until today. Tengfei surviving until now is just my good luck.”

“This… if you wrote something similar now, I guarantee it would be equally confident throughout. Everyone wears armor to show outsiders—actually, we’re all just muddling through life and making a living. Do I look like a legendary bank president? Not at all. I feel insecure every day, encouraging myself every day: I’m the most capable, all my decisions are correct, yeah. How about we recite affirmations before going out from now on?”

Liu Jun didn’t speak again, replacing words with actions.