Chapter 38: Mocking others' lack, envying others' gain, despising others' poverty, and fearing others' wealth

Wang Donglai's home is in Wangjia Village, Shiping Town, located right next to a provincial highway, making it quite convenient to return home; he can simply take the county bus to get there.

He had made plans with his childhood friends from the same village to take the bus home together today.

As the name implies, the majority of people in Wangjia Village are surnamed Wang.

Wang Donglai had quite a few childhood companions, but after middle school, they began to drop out one by one.

By high school, only a handful remained; the others had long since entered society to work manual jobs.

At this moment, on the bus.

Wang Donglai, Wang Qingchen, Wang Yang, Wang You, and Wang Xiaoling had formed a small group.

Although there were age gaps among them, they were all seniors in their final year of high school due to their schooling.

On the bus, Wang Donglai could sense a change.

Faced with his skyrocketing academic performance, Wang Yang, Wang You, and the others were clearly still somewhat unaccustomed to it.

"What are you guys planning to do for the summer break? I'm planning to work as a security guard at the Lihua Hotel for two months. Food and lodging are provided, and it pays 1,500 yuan a month. I'm going with a few classmates from the sports classes. Do you want to come?"

Wang Huan asked Wang You and Wang Yang with a smile on his face.

"I'm not going. I don't want to go to junior college either. I'll stay home for a while, then head out to work. I'll go to Shanghai in the south first to learn some technical skills before coming back," Wang You, who had the worst grades, stated his intentions directly.

"Count me out. I'll just have fun at home for two months. My dad said he'd give me some money to go traveling," Wang Yang pushed up his glasses and politely declined Wang Huan's suggestion.

Feeling a bit embarrassed, Wang Huan turned to Wang Donglai and asked, "Donglai, what are you planning to do? If you don't have anything going on, come with me. It'll be more lively with more people, and there's money too. I heard being a security guard there is pretty easy; nobody really manages you."

Shaking his head, Wang Donglai looked at Wang Huan and offered a word of advice: "No matter where you work for a salary, it's never easy. Going out to gain some experience these next two or three months is fine, but being out in the world is different from being in school. You should be careful."

"I had my dad buy some books in Tangdu; they should be brought back by someone tomorrow. I plan to stay home during this time to read and learn some things that I'll need for university."

Hearing this, Wang Yang instantly became interested and leaned forward to ask, "What major are you planning to study? What kind of books did you buy?"

Beside him, Wang Xiaoling and the others also turned their gaze toward Wang Donglai.

In just a few short months, Wang Donglai's school grades had risen like an unstoppable force, becoming the greatest mystery in the hearts of these childhood friends who knew him best.

From elementary to middle and high school—for over a decade of growing up—everyone knew each other's academic standing extremely well.

Originally, Wang Yang had the best grades, followed by Wang Qingchen, Wang Xiaoling, Wang Huan, Wang Donglai, and finally Wang You.

Then, as if he had swallowed some miraculous elixir overnight, Wang Donglai's grades had exploded.

In fact, when they first learned of his grades, it was during the announcement of the first monthly exam results.

At first, they thought it was someone else with the same name, but after checking with the class, they realized it was indeed him.

Afterward, they had even sought out Wang Donglai several times to confirm, only then believing it.

"I bought quite a few books: *Clean Architecture*, *Clean Code*, *The Pragmatic Programmer: From Apprentice to Expert*, *Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code*, *Java Concurrency in Practice*, *Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software*..."

The long string of titles coming from Wang Donglai's mouth made everyone's heads spin; they had no idea what they meant.

Seeing the expressions on their faces, Wang Donglai realized they didn't understand, so he changed his explanation: "These books are just some knowledge about writing software and computer programming."

"Oh, so if you learn them, you can repair computers, right?"

After hearing this, Wang Xiaoling said to Wang Donglai as if she had a sudden realization.

Speechless!

Wang Donglai knew that for these childhood friends, they had almost no understanding of computers, programming, or programmers.

Logging into QQ to chat, playing games, downloading movies.

The utility of a computer was limited to this; they knew nothing of its other functions.

In Shiping Town, there was only one internet cafe, with twenty machines running on electricity.

Three yuan for an hour, five yuan for two hours, seven yuan for three hours, and ten yuan for an overnight pass that allowed ten hours of play.

Many thoughts flashed through his mind; Wang Donglai felt no sense of superiority, but rather a sudden sense of sorrow.

He had once been just like them.

"If you trust me, go study computer science. Regardless of whether you can major in it, even if you have to pay for tutoring classes, you should learn this. Being a programmer in the future is really lucrative."

"Wang You, instead of going to Shanghai to learn 'skills,' you'd be better off finding a place to learn cooking, or perhaps renovation, or even learning to operate loaders and excavators. If you learn those, you won't lack money."

After Wang Donglai finished these two sentences, he saw that everyone looked indifferent, not listening at all. He shook his head and said no more.

When poor, one should cultivate oneself; when successful, one should benefit the world.

Everyone has their own destiny, and Wang Donglai did not wish to interfere with the fates of others at will.

To be able to offer a reminder was enough.

However, Wang Qingchen looked very serious. After sitting in her seat and thinking for a while, she said firmly and earnestly, "Donglai, when your books arrive, let me see them too. I'll listen to you for university—I'll study computer science."

"Alright, when the books arrive tomorrow, come to my house to get them," Wang Donglai replied with a smile.

The rest of the journey was silent.

Over an hour later, the bus stopped at Wangjia Village.

Carrying his backpack and clutching the quilt he had taken from the bus's trunk, Wang Donglai walked toward his home.

The June weather was incredibly hot. Wang Donglai's house was not far from the highway, only about dozens of meters away, but it required walking up a slope.

By the time he reached the house, sweat was already streaming down his body.

Because Wang Yanxing and Cao Shuxian were working on construction sites in Tangdu, this single-story house, which had been built seven or eight years ago, had gathered a lot of dust.

After spending time doing a thorough cleaning, Wang Donglai finally lay down on the sofa to rest.

"Whew..."

"The system reward settlement probably won't happen until the results come out on June 25th. There are still 16 days left..."

"In these 16 days, I can see exactly how much my learning ability has improved without the boost from the Reading System."

Calculating in his mind, Wang Donglai quickly made a plan for the time ahead.

...

In the afternoon.

"Wang Donglai, you're back?"

"How was the exam? I heard you studied very well these last few months. Are you confident about getting into university?"

"Do your parents proud. Your family is the only one in our village with two high schoolers; their expectations for you are huge."

"When do the results come out? Your second uncle said you might be the top scorer this time. Is that true or not?"

"Your mom and dad can't afford to eat well or dress well because they're working hard to support you and your sister's schooling. Once you graduate, you must work hard and earn money so your parents can enjoy life too."

Walking through the village, many villagers would proactively strike up a conversation when they saw Wang Donglai.

People often say that rural folk are simple and honest.

But Wang Donglai knew that while there were indeed simple and honest people in the countryside, there were even more who envied others' success, mocked others' failures, looked down on the poor, and feared the rich.

This was especially true for Wang Donglai's family; because his grandfather had been prominent for his entire life, he had offended many people.

Many people harbored resentment and would try to marginalize Wang Donglai's branch of the family in their daily lives.

When Wang Donglai was small, he had heard Wang Yanxing say that their family had been quite well-off when he was young, but after his grandfather died, people came to bully them.

Wang Donglai's grandmother had even been beaten. Wang Yanxing was too young to protect her, and Wang Donglai's eldest and second uncles were outnumbered and bullied mercilessly.

In the end, Wang Donglai's second uncle went directly to the Shaolin Temple Tagou Martial Arts School to train.

After two years of training, he returned home with a red-tasseled spear and a large blade.

Only after that did no one dare to bully Wang Yanxing and his family openly.

In secret, however, petty schemes never ceased.

At this moment, the words spoken by these fellow villagers clearly carried a tone of waiting for him to fail. If one were to calculate the lineage, these people shared the same ancestors and had branched off from the same great-grandfather.

Listening to them, Wang Donglai remained calm, as if he hadn't heard anything, and walked straight past.

Seeing his reaction, the villagers' gossip grew even louder.

"Even if he gets into university, so what? He'll be unemployed as soon as he graduates."

"He probably won't even get into a good school. Once he's out, he'll just be working for someone else anyway."

"That branch of the family just wasn't meant for schooling. Going to school is a waste of money. Look at his father's generation and this generation—not a single one has become anything of note."

Hearing these words from a distance, a cold sneer curled at the corner of Wang Donglai's mouth. He suddenly felt a sense of anticipation for the way their faces would change once his results were released.