Free Web NovelChapter 1: Fixing Cars, Fixing Watches, Fixing Computers
Four hundred years after natural disasters swept across the world...
The once seemingly eternal great empires collapsed and vanished, leaving behind only scattered city-states standing amid the fog of history to bear witness to the glory they once held.
Some said that everything would be rebuilt after destruction, while others said this was merely the final flicker of light before total ruin.
***
The June sun was blazing above Cliff City in Haizhou, in the Northern Federation.
White clouds were scattered loosely across a sky so bright it was painful to look at. Stirred by the sea breeze, their reflections on the ocean gradually blurred and dissolved into the rolling waves. When the distant cries of seabirds rang out, everything seemed to fade into the constant roar of the tide.
For the people of Haizhou, this was an utterly ordinary sight, not something worth paying attention to.
On this stifling afternoon that made sweat pour down one’s back, with nothing but the incessant buzzing of cicadas in the air, traffic on the streets had thinned out. And inside a car repair shop, the atmosphere was slowly heating up as well...
“Mr. Ji, could you take a look at my headlights? I think there’s something wrong with them,” someone asked.
Reflected in the glossy paint of the sports car was a slender, delicate arm, slowly coming to rest against the young mechanic’s back.
The boy lowered his head and looked at the oversized headlights to examine them carefully. They were big and bright, almost as if they were alluring eyes looking back at him.
“Yeah, there does seem to be a bit of a problem.” Ji Jue[1] leaned back confidently[2] and concluded, “Looks like some minor scuffing. A bit of maintenance should fix it. Perfect timing, too. Our shop has just launched a maintenance package for only 998. It includes full-body waxing and four deep cleans. Super cost-effective. Don’t you think so, Feng[3]?”
“Yeah, yeah, exactly!” Feng, another mechanic, who was standing not far away, nodded frantically. He was dark-skinned and solidly built, and he had grease stains everywhere on his clothes.
“Stop it, you...” The car owner flirtatiously tapped Ji Jue on the shoulder and leaned closer to him.
“Then what about this exhaust pipe?” she softly pleaded near his ear. “My husband says every time he starts the car, it makes such a loud noise. It really scares me. Could you maybe grab something and give it a little blow for me?”
As Ji Jue glanced at the exhaust pipe, the dark, weathered, old pipe seemed to stare back at him.
“Just replace it,” Ji Jue concluded. “Perfect timing again. We just got two new ones in the shop. Both are Mustang parts, certified and all. They’re genuine, from Universal Heavy Industries... Only 12,888 and you can take a Mustang exhaust home! Feng, come take a look!”
As he spoke, he tried hard to put some distance between them, but he could not break free from the woman. Instead, he was struggling in vain like a little hamster wrapped up by a python.
“No, I still think there’s something wrong with this car...” The woman with voluminous wavy hair bit her lip lightly, her gaze lingering. “The engine’s been using up a lot of oil these days, and I think it might be leaking... Could you take a look for me?”
“That serious?!” Ji Jue was stunned speechless. After staring at the innocent engine under the hood for a long while, he came to a conclusion. “Might be a lack of proper maintenance. I recommend our full maintenance package for only 24,999. Sign up now and you’ll also get a set of premium floor mats and fragrance tabs. After the maintenance, I guarantee it’ll drive just like it just rolled out of the factory! Right, Feng?”
The man holding a wrench nodded vigorously. “Ah, yeah, exactly! If you sign up for a membership and top up now, there’s even a 20% discount! Grab the deal now!”
Unfortunately, after all that pitching, the car owner did not even glance at him. Instead, she was practically pressed up against Ji Jue, so soft and limp, like she didn’t have a single bone in her body.
“But my husband says he can’t handle driving it after just two minutes, that the acceleration’s too intense.” The female car owner bit her lip and blinked. “Mr. Ji, is that really true?”
I have no idea!
Ji Jue really wanted to tell her that it was useless to ask him. He was only nineteen, had only been fixing cars for three and a half years, and was totally inexperienced. If she wanted him to fix something her husband couldn’t handle, he’d have to bring out the biggest tool in his kit.
Well... it looks like she’s here for some serious bodywork anyway...
But this woman clearly wasn’t harmless.
Damn... What if I break my wrench trying to plug up her oil leaks?
He was terrified. Ever since he was little, he had been subjected to far too much of this kind of covetous attention.
Back in school, it was only senior girls and female delinquents who had their eyes on him. But ever since he started working, all these sketchy women kept showing up, eyeing him and trying to get handsy. And now... this woman expected a free ride without even bringing a gift? How low the world had fallen...
What a delulu chick[8]. So cringe.
Ji Jue kept shooting looks at the mechanic beside him, Lu Feng[4], but the latter did not say a word. He just leaned against the wall, watching the show with schadenfreude.
Until finally, a savior descended from the heavens.
At some point, a burly figure like a walking mountain of flesh had appeared at the doorway carrying two brand-new tires. The tires dropped onto the ground, shattering the silence.
Thud!
“What are you guys doing?” The sturdy and broad-shouldered, short-haired female boss, the kind of woman who looked like she could tear across the plains on a galloping horse, wiped her greasy hands on her apron. Her puffy eyes swept over them, and she said, “Replacing the engine, huh? I’ll handle it. Why are you two just standing around? If you’ve got nothing better to do, go unload the cart of tires at the door and take them to the storage room.”
“Right, the tires! How could I forget the tires?! I’m on it!” Ji Jue exclaimed.
Seeing the boss step in to save his toolkit, Ji Jue was overjoyed. Meanwhile, the car owner’s face twitched a couple of times; she was clearly unhappy that someone had ruined her plans. But the boss’s sheer aura spoke volumes about her mountain-shattering strength, and her gaze held the complex emotions of a dead fish. The poor car owner could only open and close her mouth repeatedly, not daring to utter a word in retort.
Awkwardly, she pinched the cheek of the kid doing homework behind the counter, praised him for being cute, then got into her car and left.
Lu Feng, who had enjoyed the show to the fullest, watched the car’s tail lights speeding into the distance and clicked his tongue in regret. Mrs. Lu smacked the back of his head hard, nearly sending him rolling on the ground.
He scrambled up, grinning. “Ow, Mom! If you’d come any later, she might’ve signed up for the 9,999 gold membership!”
“I run a car repair shop, not a gigolo house! Xiaogou[5], are you asking for a beating?” Mrs. Lu snapped, calling out his milk name[6] in fury. “You like watching the fun, huh? Since you’ve had your fill, get your ass to the backyard and move the tires, then clean out the latrine!”
Now it was Ji Jue’s turn to watch the spectacle at the door.
Brilliant. Truly brilliant!
Moving a crate of tires did not take much effort. The shop had an old forklift of its own, and Lu Feng, who had recently returned from military service, had plenty of strength. There was no need to make a college student working part-time break his back.
Business was slow in the afternoon as well. After moving the tires and washing two cars, everyone lay around in the shade to kill time.
Mrs. Lu watched over her kids doing their summer homework, while Lu Feng lay on a mat, watching short videos and chuckling like an idiot. Meanwhile, Ji Jue borrowed the shop’s old computer, which was probably almost as old as he was, and continued working on his thesis.
In the afternoon light, the sun traced the sharp lines of the boy’s side profile, highlighting his handsome features. The girls and middle-aged women passing by couldn’t help but stop and stare.
The only real pity was the burn scar that ran from his neckline up his neck and finally spread across his cheek. It was hideous, and it marred an otherwise flawless face; what a shame. Otherwise, he could have debuted as an idol.
At the very least, rich aunties would have been waving stacks of cash to invite him into their mansions to sing and dance for them. Wouldn’t that beat fixing cars in a place like this?
But Ji Jue didn’t really see it as a pity, and he had never thought there was anything wrong with working in a repair shop.
In recent days, disasters ran rampant, and life was tough. For an orphan whose parents had died early and who’d been plagued by bad luck, just surviving was no small feat. Having a kind-hearted person take him in, let him work without skimping on pay, and even go out of their way to help him was already a blessing straight from heaven.
What was more, he had even gotten into college. Life was not luxurious, but he never went without food or clothes. Compared to the bleak loneliness of the past, his days were visibly getting better.
Since heaven had given him a chance to turn his life around, he had to make it on his own and live a proper life. He had no excuse nor right not to give it his all.
“‘A design and analysis... of a joint... with a high-precision... harmonic drive?’” Lu Feng leaned over to peek. Just reading the title made his head spin. “What the hell is that?”
“Basically, a mechanical joint design paired with a miniature reducer,” Ji Jue explained. “This principle is used in mechanical equipment to lower rotational speed and increase output.”
“Oh, a flexible joint, right? I’ve seen that on exoskeleton armor back when I was in the army.” Lu Feng caught on immediately, patting Ji Jue on the shoulder and looking even happier than if he’d made a bunch of money. “Not bad, Jue! You’re awesome!”
Ji Jue shook his head and smiled. “Nah, it’s all thanks to my professor’s guidance.”
The new planetary frame, which served as the basis for the paper and design, was originally the professor’s own research. For Ji Jue to even get a taste of it was like a pie falling from the sky.
Besides, now that the only thing left besides the proposal was basically just the framework, Ji Jue was feeling nervous and cautious.
Given Professor Ye’s infamous harshness, if he screwed it up, he might be deemed useless and kicked straight out of the group. He was still counting on her recommendation letter to take the Level Two Engineer exam, so he could not afford to be careless.
Unfortunately, he did not stay busy for long. The old computer’s case soon began to buzz and vibrate, and the fan groaned pitifully. It was clearly unable to handle the heavy task of having a document open while also running two web pages. Ji Jue could only stop for now.
He looked down to check the time. It was just past four.
He pulled out a tissue and carefully wiped the grease off his watchband, his movements slow and meticulous.
These days, aside from a small number of people, wearing a watch had basically shifted from a functional need to a way of showing off. Otherwise, why not just take out your phone and check the time? Because you forgot to charge it last night?
Times were changing.
Back in the day, when Ji Jue’s maternal grandfather was still around, their family’s Hengshi clocks were a big-name brand all over Haizhou. In those years, if a kid managed to pass the Shanghai civil service exam, they were guaranteed to come to the shop to buy a Western pocket watch. Once they put on their uniform and let half the pocket watch chain hang out of their pocket, who knew how many young women’s eyes they’d catch?
Unfortunately, Ji Jue’s parents passed away early, and the times changed too soon. That bit of former glory had long been buried in the dust. What was left for Ji Jue, besides an old shop that could hardly operate anymore, were some meager skills and this watch, the heirloom his parents had left behind. frёeweɓηovel.coɱ
Even after all these years, Ji Jue still had no idea what brand the watch was. All he could do was guess, based on the emblem on the dial that looked like a complex piece of machinery, that it was probably some kind of time-calibration watch used for precision work.
The style was rare, and the design was unlike most watches on the market. It looked somewhat like the kind early sailors favored, but sailors’ watches usually had a perpetual calendar[7] or a moon phase display. This one, however, aside from the hands, had only a single window of unknown purpose on the dial.
The window displayed two digits, and the number slowly increased... at an incredibly slow pace. When Ji Jue first wore it as a child, the number was 06. Now, it was 92.
Even stranger was the fact that it had no crown for setting the time, no visible way to wind it, nor even any visible seams.
Ji Jue had even borrowed a high-precision microscope from the school laboratory. There wasn’t a single seam or weld to be found on the case; it was completely seamless. Even the watch crystal was encased within, fitting perfectly without a gap.
Ji Jue had once left it on the table for months, watching it every day. The hands moved as usual, proving it wasn’t winding itself from arm movement... So where was the power coming from?
Could it really be some kind of perpetual motion machine?
1. Refer to Translator’s Thoughts for extra info on this name. ☜
2. Refer to Translator’s Thoughts for extra info. ☜
3. Refer to Translator’s Thoughts for extra info. ☜
4. Refer to Translator’s Thoughts for extra info. ☜
5. The name 小狗 (Xiao Gou) literally means “little dog” in Chinese. ☜
6. Traditionally, babies were named a hundred days after their birth; modern naming laws in the People's Republic of China grant the parents a month before requiring the baby to be registered. Upon birth, the parents often use a “milk name” (乳名; rǔmíng,) typically employing diminutives like 小; xiǎo, lit. “little”) or doubled characters, before a formal name is settled upon, often in consultation with the grandparents. The milk name may be abandoned but is often continued as a form of familial nickname. A tradition sometimes attached to the milk name is to select an unpleasant name, to ward off demons who might wish to harm the child. ☜
7. A perpetual calendar is a complex part of luxury mechanical watches that automatically tracks the date, day, month, and leap year, requiring no manual adjustment until the year 2100. ☜
8. “普信女” is an internet slang term referring to women who are considered average yet display excessive self confidence. The term highlights a disconnect between self perception and reality, with its core characteristic being the contrast between ordinary qualities and exaggerated confidence.
Refer to Translator's Thoughts for more info.☜
