bookmarkrole Chapter 4 Counting Rice is Also a Form of Cultivation
Chapter 4 Counting Rice is Also a Form of Cultivation
In late autumn in Changxiang City, once the rain stops, the temperature drops like a roller coaster.
The glass door of Renxin Pharmacy still bears the faint marks of yesterday's rain.
At eight o'clock in the morning, Boss Liu was holding a rag, wiping the brocade banner on the counter with a worried look on his face.
"A miracle cure, a cure for pretentiousness." These eight characters gleamed in the morning light, almost hurting his eyes.
"Xiao Wang, can we put this thing away?" Boss Liu breathed on the glass and rubbed it vigorously. "Yesterday, Old Zhang, who sells fruit next door, passed by and laughed so hard his dentures almost flew out. We're a legitimate pharmacy, not a branch of Deyun Club."
Wang Minyu sat on a small stool by the door, still holding the stainless steel tea mug in his hands.
Today, he had a few slices of dried lemon soaking in it. He bought them on sale at the supermarket; they were so sour they made his teeth ache, but he found them refreshing.
"Just leave it hanging." Wang Minyu didn't even look up, staring at the secondhand rental information on his phone screen. "To ward off evil spirits."
"What kind of warding off evil spirits? It's more like warding off business troubles," Boss Liu muttered, but he didn't dare to actually take it off.
The scene of Wang Jianguo screaming and howling from the needles yesterday was still vivid in his mind, and he felt a little more wary of this seemingly harmless young man.
Just then, the wind chimes at the door rang once.
The man who came in was a man in a suit, around thirty years old, with his hair neatly combed, but the dark circles under his eyes were so thick they looked like a panda that had just escaped from the zoo.
He walked a little unsteadily and almost tripped over the anti-slip mat at the door as he entered.
"Buy medicine." The man's voice was weak, revealing a restlessness caused by long-term sleep deprivation.
Just as Boss Liu was about to go to him, the man waved his hand, walked straight to Wang Minyu, and pointed to the prescription drug cabinet on the counter: "Do you have zopiclone? Or zolpidem? Give me two boxes."
They were all potent sleeping pills.
Wang Minyu put down his teacup and glanced at him.
A system panel popped up: [Chen Xu, 32 years old, Project Manager at a major internet company. Severe neurasthenia, heart-kidney imbalance. Chronic anxiety, the more he tries to sleep, the less he can. Excessive liver fire, and extreme lack of patience.]
"Where's the prescription?" Wang Minyu asked.
"I didn't bring it." Chen Xu frowned and impatiently pulled out his phone. "Can't I have a photo of my medical record? I got one from the Third Hospital before. Hurry up, I need to get back to a meeting."
"No," Wang Minyu replied crisply. "These are state-controlled drugs; we won't sell them without a paper prescription. The Second Municipal Hospital is two kilometers to the right after you leave. Go there and register."
Chen Xu's temper flared up instantly.
He had been suffering from insomnia for a week straight. Every night when he lay in bed, his mind was like a rock concert, with all sorts of code, KPIs, and mortgage payments dancing around in his head.
After finally getting through the night, there are still endless morning meetings to face.
"Why are you so inflexible?" Chen Xu slammed his hand on the counter. "I'm here to buy medicine, not drugs! Can't you be a little more flexible? I'll pay extra!"
Mr. Liu watched with a pounding heart, fearing that this customer would cause trouble like the bald man from yesterday.
He was about to say something to persuade him when Wang Minyu stood up.
"Even if you offer more money, that's not an option. That's the principle." Wang Minyu walked to the shelf and picked up a bag of vacuum-packed millet from the grains section (the pharmacy also sells some health-promoting grains to diversify its business).
"However, if you really want to sleep, I don't recommend taking sleeping pills. Taking too many of those things will dull your mind and make it easier to make bugs when you're coding."
Chen Xu was taken aback: "How did you know I write code?"
Wang Minyu pointed to his hairline and plaid shirt: "That's not important. What's important is that I have a way to make you sleep tonight without taking any pills."
"What method?" Chen Xu looked at him suspiciously.
"Buy this bag of rice." Wang Minyu slapped the one-pound bag of millet rice on the counter. "Forty-five yuan."
"Are you kidding me?" Chen Xu laughed angrily. "This thing costs eight yuan at the supermarket! Are you ripping me off?"
"This is the medicinal guide," Wang Minyu said without changing his expression. "Besides, my treatment plan is chargeable. Buy it, and before you go to bed tonight, turn off your phone and computer, pour the rice into a plate, and count it grain by grain with tweezers. Count it until you have five thousand grains. If you make a mistake or forget to count, go back and start over."
Chen Xu looked at Wang Minyu like he was an idiot: "Counting meters? Do you think I'm the mouse in Cinderella? I'd rather take two pills and pass out than waste that time!"
"Your brain is overheating right now. Forcing a shutdown will only damage your hard drive," Wang Minyu said lazily, leaning against the counter. "What you need is to cool down. Counting meters is the most tedious and mechanical activity, which can forcibly pull your attention back from KPIs. Extreme focus is boredom; extreme boredom is drowsiness."
"I don't believe it." Chen Xu turned to leave.
"Fine, don't believe me then." Wang Minyu sat back down on the small stool, picked up his teacup, and said, "Anyway, you won't be able to sleep tonight. Around three in the morning, you'll hear the toilet flushing upstairs, around four you'll hear the sanitation workers sweeping, and by five it will be dawn. Then you'll be facing your boss with a completely malfunctioning brain."
Chen Xu stopped in his tracks.
The description was so accurate that it sent chills down his spine.
He spent every night like this for the past week.
The despair of waiting for dawn in the dark is worse than death.
He gritted his teeth, turned around, took out his phone, and scanned the QR code: "Forty-five, right? Fine! I'll buy it! If I don't use it tonight, I'll come back tomorrow and tear this shop down!"
"Welcome to come and demolish it." Wang Minyu didn't even lift his eyelids. "Remember to keep the receipt."
Chen Xu stormed off, carrying the bag of exorbitantly priced millet.
Boss Liu leaned closer, looking worried: "Xiao Wang, will this really work? Counting rice to cure insomnia? I've never heard of such a folk remedy. What if he really comes to cause trouble tomorrow?"
"It won't work." Wang Minyu took a sip of his sour lemonade. "That kind of anxious personality, the more you force him to do boring things, the more likely he is to develop psychological defensive fatigue. And..."
"And what?"
"Besides, that bag of rice was leaking air from the vacuum seal, so it was going to be disposed of anyway. We sold it for forty-five yuan including the consultation fee, and we made a profit."
Boss Liu opened his mouth wide, speechless for a long time.
After a long while, he gave a thumbs up: "A shrewd businessman. No, a master."
The rest of the day passed uneventfully.
Life in Changxiang City is actually quite fast-paced, but in this small pharmacy, time seems to stretch out.
Aside from giving directions to a few customers who came to buy band-aids and cold medicine, Wang Minyu spent most of his time reading.
He was reading "Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Diseases," the pages of which were yellowed and the edges were worn.
Although the system provides the skills, you still need to fill in the gaps in the basic theory yourself.
He didn't want to be a machine that only followed system prompts.
At 5 p.m., Zhang Kai sent a WeChat message.
Zhang Kai: [Are you still alive? I heard you showed off your amazing skills yesterday, even paralyzing your own father with your acupuncture? Now the whole Second Hospital is talking about a 'cupuncture maniac' at Renxin Pharmacy.]
Wang Minyu: [Rumor. That was to help him unblock his meridians through acupressure; he should thank me.]
Zhang Kai: [Come on. By the way, your awful parents seem to have calmed down; they didn't come to the hospital to cause trouble today. They're probably scared out of their wits. But be careful, those kinds of people never learn their lesson; who knows what kind of bad things they're up to.]
Wang Minyu: [As long as they don't bother me, I'll let them do as they please.]
Putting down his phone, Wang Minyu looked out the window at the gradually darkening sky.
The streetlights came on, casting long shadows of pedestrians.
He suddenly felt a little hungry.
"Boss, what are we having for dinner?"
Boss Liu was doing his accounts, not even looking up: "I'll treat you to duck leg rice at that Shaxian restaurant at the street corner. By the way, the turnover has increased a bit these past few days, not by much, but it's a good sign. I'll remember your commission."
Thanks.
Wang Minyu didn't actually care about the commission. What he cared about was that section on the system panel:
[Current Task Progress: The second patient has been successfully cured after experiencing self-doubt, wondering "Am I an idiot?". Completion: In progress.]
The pharmacy closes at 10 p.m.
Wang Minyu returned to that cramped little cubicle.
The soundproofing is terrible; you can hear the bass from the hair salon next door and the couple arguing upstairs.
He lay on his cot, staring at the mold on the ceiling.
I wonder how many grains that unlucky guy named Chen Xu has counted to now?
……
In a high-end apartment on the other side of the city.
Chen Xu was wearing pajamas and sitting cross-legged on the carpet.
In front of me was an exquisite bone china plate, into which the bag of millet worth forty-five yuan had been poured, piling up like a small mountain of gold.
He held the tweezers his wife used to pluck her eyebrows, his expression as serious as if he were defusing a bomb.
"One hundred and twenty-three, one hundred and twenty-four..."
Only a floor lamp was on in the room, casting a dim, yellowish light on his face.
"Damn it, I must be crazy!" Chen Xu cursed as he picked up rice. "I'm a top student from a 985 university, a project manager with a million-dollar annual salary, and I'm counting rice in the middle of the night? That quack doctor is definitely playing me!"
He wanted to flip the plate over.
But when he thought of Wang Minyu's confident yet mocking face, he held back.
"I'll count them off for you! Tomorrow I'll take the counted numbers and slap you in the face!"
This competitive spirit and obsessive-compulsive disorder worked wonders at this moment.
"Three hundred and fifty-six, three hundred and fifty-seven..."
Monotonous movements, tiny grains of rice, and the need for intense concentration.
The chaotic KPIs in my mind were gradually replaced by numbers.
Aside from "this grain of rice is a little crooked" and "which one to pick next," his mind couldn't hold anything else.
Time passed second by second.
When the clock struck twelve, Chen Xu counted to two thousand three hundred and forty-two.
His eyelids began to droop, and the tweezers in his hands felt incredibly heavy.
That long-lost, heavy drowsiness came crashing down on me like a tidal wave.
"Two thousand three hundred...four..."
With a clang.
The tweezers fell into the plate.
Chen Xu slumped to the side and fell onto the carpet, burying his face in the sofa cushions, snoring loudly.
This was the deepest sleep he had had in half a month.