Chapter 514: Operator John
Sapir Rachel once had the opportunity to be hired as a contract worker at Innadri City Hall.
During the winter celebration two years ago, he took his eldest brother Joey, accompanied by his sister-in-law Lisa and a priest, to Inadelli for help; after getting rid of the vampire curse with the help of Bishop Lee Gene and the undead, the Inadelli City Hall sent people to comfort the family of three, and also gave Rachel and her brother the opportunity to learn about Inadelli's recruitment policy.
The Rachel brothers had a brief impulse, but after some hesitation, they still chose to return to Moses Port... The contract worker job seemed too tiring to the brothers at the time.
The so-called contract workers are temporary workers who have to do all kinds of work. The scope of work includes but is not limited to building garbage dumps and toilets for citizens, repairing houses for residents on a voluntary basis, cleaning out stinking ditches, maintaining order when roads are congested, etc. In addition, contract workers will also be transferred to the countryside to assist farmers in spring ploughing, land reclamation, repairing rural roads and canals, sowing, harvesting and transporting grain, and doing all kinds of work...
Even though contract workers have a complete set of welfare subsidies for food, clothing, housing and transportation, and the policy of allocating housing after meeting the working years requirements is very attractive, the Rachel brothers are still daunted by it - in the eyes of their younger brother Sapir, who is a bartender, and their older brother Joey, who has an accounting certificate, they are not willing to accept this heavy, complicated, year-round work unless it is absolutely necessary.
This idea changed half a year after the Rachel brothers returned to Moses Port.
The Innadili Weekly from Newin Town published a series of new decrees and personnel changes issued by the Innadili City Hall. It also listed a list of contract workers who performed well during their work and were promoted to clerks in the City Hall according to regulations, publicly praising and commending these "advanced workers"...
When Sapir saw this report, he was dumbfounded - he only knew that contract workers had the opportunity to become regular workers in public institutions, but he had no idea that contract workers also had the opportunity to enter the city hall!
A few months later, the Undead Army conquered Adler County and overthrew Count Ezekiel.
In the current weekly report of Innadeli, only a few words were mentioned about the good news from the front, and the rest of the page was used to praise its own outstanding workers. Not only did it mention that a new batch of contract workers passed the cultural course assessment and were transferred to the official establishment of the city hall, but it also used a separate page to explain that this batch of contract workers who passed the assessment will receive further in-depth education and will soon be involved in grassroots work practice ...
Sapir still remembers the explanation of "grassroots work practice" in the weekly newspaper - in fact, it means allowing outstanding contract workers to take up official positions in townships!
From village chiefs in the countryside to sheriffs, clerks, and stewards in the town... these outstanding talents who stand out from the contract workers all have the opportunity to get jobs.
Sapir had never imagined that a contract worker who worked hard to repair toilets for citizens would have such an amazing development prospect. Even his elder brother Joey, who was always very smart, could not imagine that there would be such an outrageous thing in the world.
The two brothers regretted their original choice more than once, but regret was of no use. Today, Innadeli is no longer open to recruiting contract workers like it was two years ago.
The Odysse family moved to the Rose Kingdom, and the wealthy Moses Port was turned into its current miserable state in just two months. The Rachel brothers were full of regret... If either of them had stayed in Innadri, the family would not have been unable to get food - the salary of contract workers was not high, but the benefits were really good, and the grain and oil subsidies were more than enough to feed the family!
Two years later, the same opportunity came again. This time, Sapir, who had even lost his job as a bartender, did not dare to slack off. He followed the Vio Shipping team back to the dock and began to perform hard.
He gritted his teeth and unloaded half of the cargo in the hold. The boatswain saw that the young man was exhausted, so he asked him to get off the boat and follow him out to sell the goods.
Sapir walked weakly to the side of the loaded tricycle. The boatswain handed him a loudspeaker and a stack of advertising leaflets. "Are you a local? You won't be too shy to speak when you come to hawk your wares, right?"
"No, I used to be a bartender." Sapir quickly patted his chest, "I studied in a private classroom for four years, and when I was a bartender, I also helped manage the bar's accounts."
"Okay, then you have to perform well." The boatswain smiled and turned to the operator in charge of the cargo and said, "Operator John, this kid is in your charge."
Operator John glanced at Sapir's thin figure, and without asking who this "connected person" who was not wearing work clothes had squeezed in, he nodded and said, "Okay, let's go."
Twelve tricycles loaded with food formed a team, and each team was led by an operator; Operator John spoke with a distinct Innadri accent, but seemed to be very familiar with Moses Port. He rode the first vehicle and led the way into Sailor Alley, a civilian neighborhood in the port area.
The convoy arrived at the square near the fountain in Sailor Alley. Operator John looked back at Sapir, who was jogging after the convoy. Sapir then cleverly picked up the horn and shouted loudly according to the promotional advertisement...
Most of the bakeries, rice shops, and even vegetable and fruit shops in Sailor Lane have closed. The shelves of the few that are still open are empty, and the prices on the labels are shockingly high. The sound of food advertisements that cost a few copper coins a piece comes through the loudspeaker, and countless residents are busy opening their doors and windows to look out...
Soon, the tricycle convoy was surrounded by residents who flocked to the area.
Residents of big cities have to be more or less decent, and with a dozen strong young men surrounding the convoy to maintain order, there was no embarrassing looting scene. After Operator John scolded them a few times, the residents reluctantly formed a messy formation.
But the hungry residents obviously could not be as reserved as usual. Sapir, who was guarding the tricycle to help keep accounts and collect money, saw with his own eyes that a woman who had bought mashed potatoes had just squeezed out of the crowd, and she couldn't wait to grab the mashed potatoes with her hands and stuff them into her own mouth and the mouths of her children waiting outside the crowd.
Sapir, who had originally only wanted to work hard and get the good job he had missed, suddenly felt very uncomfortable.
Sailor Alley is the busiest street in the port area, second only to the neighboring street, Gillette Street. People living in this area rent out their rooms to outsiders, earning an enviable extra income, and are not considered poor among the citizens of Moses Port.
But even the residents of Sailor Alley are so few and far between that they have to fight over mashed potatoes.
The same was true for his own family. He earned the income of a bartender and his eldest brother had an accounting certificate. When had their family ever been so poor that they had to turn to distant relatives on their mother's side to borrow food to survive?
Their brothers' mother was such a proud person - if she knew that their brothers had fallen to such a state, she would be so angry.
"But we did nothing wrong. My brothers... Lisa's sister-in-law, and Lisa's family... we didn't do anything wrong."
Over the past month, food prices in the city have been alarmingly high. The money that used to buy a whole bag of brown bread can now only buy one or two slices, or even nothing. Most citizens have to bear the pain of using up their savings in order to keep their families alive.
The old woman, who had finally got a seat in line, was holding onto the few remaining copper coins, hesitating between the cheap corn tortillas and the even cheaper noodles. Under a series of urgings, the old woman chose the one she thought was the best deal, and she gritted her teeth and paid with the coins, her palms full of sweat. In Sapir's hands, they felt as heavy as a piece of iron.
There were obvious signs on the old woman's fingers from years of wearing rings, but now the rings were no longer visible on her hands.
Sapir couldn't help but think of his sister-in-law Lisa's empty neck. Last week, in order to prevent so many mouths in the family from starving to death, Lisa pawned the necklace that she and her husband bought together when they got married.
"She...they, what did they do wrong..."
Sapir collected the money numbly and recorded the accounts in a table with a pen - he just had to put a small dot under the commodity table and draw a small circle on the number of purchases to indicate how many residents bought how many servings of food.
This simple account book is not used to calculate profits, but to let the city hall know how many ordinary families in the city have spare money to buy daily necessities, how much they can afford, and how many days they can last.
Sapir had no idea how much the Innadri City Hall had tried to stabilize the situation in the city, and how they had even gone so far as to care about the food plates of the citizens of Moses Port. When he saw from close range the faces of the citizens who were tortured by anxiety, hunger, and uneasiness, he felt more and more blocked and uncomfortable in his heart.
Most of the food brought by the twelve iron-frame tricycles was quickly sold out, but citizens who came to line up were still coming in an endless stream; Agent John took a look at the orderly purchasing queue that had gradually become a habit, and removed a few sailors who maintained order to ride the empty tricycles back to the dock to load the goods. He also asked another contract worker who knew how to count to replace Sapir, who had been busy for a long time and whose reactions and movements were beginning to slow down, to let him rest.
Sapir withdrew his sore hands to the side of the road outside the crowd to rest. Operator John handed him a meat pie wrapped in oil paper and said, "Take care of it first. We may not have dinner until dark tonight."
"Thank you." Sapir, who was already very hungry, quickly took it with both hands.
Operator John smiled and said, "You don't seem to remember me, Sapir Rachel."
Sapir, who had just taken two bites of the meat pie, looked up at the operator in astonishment.
"During the winter festival one year, you and your brother and sister-in-law went to Innadri. Operator Barton took me to visit you when you were staying in the church." Operator John smiled, "Do you remember it?"
"Ah, it's you!" Sapir almost jumped up with excitement.
Operator John... John was a contract worker at the time, a slum youth who had never attended a private classroom for a day; Sapir later saw his name in newspapers, but this name was so common that Sapir had no idea that this John was the contract worker he had met before.
"Your brother has a certificate in accounting. Operator Patton wanted to keep your brother, but it was a pity that it didn't work out." Operator John smiled embarrassedly, "At that time, I was a little dissatisfied and thought that this certificate was nothing great. When I wanted to take the exam for this certificate, I found it was very difficult... Your brother is very capable, and I was too superficial at that time. By the way, how is your eldest brother now?"
Sapir suddenly felt that the meat pie in his mouth was a little hard to swallow... The other party's attitude was very sincere. He was not mocking, but simply expressing his concern. However, this made Sapir feel more upset...
"The company where my brother works... moved to the Rose Kingdom." Sapir couldn't say that his elder brother Joey was fired, so he said it tactfully.
"Is that so?" Operator John said in surprise. "That's fine. Port Moses is such a good port, and more companies will surely be born there. Your brother won't have any trouble finding a job."
Sapir smiled awkwardly, turned his gaze to the still noisy shopping scene, and sighed dejectedly: "Given the current situation... it's hard to say what will happen to Moses Port in the future."
After the Sailor Bar closed down, Sapir has been running around for the past two weeks, trying to find a job to make a living.
Although he was just a commoner and did not have the same information sources as the Vio family, he also vaguely understood one thing...the properties and land left behind by those noble lords who moved away and could not take away were divided up by that group of greedy villains who raised the price of grain in Moses Port twenty times.
Without the supervision of the Odysseus family, those hateful masters would like to squeeze the oil out of the bones of the people of Moses Port - with such a group of villains standing in the way, how could Moses Port regain its former vitality?
Sapir's despair was palpable, but Operator John just smiled and shook his head, saying, "Don't be so pessimistic, buddy. The situation in Moses Port is not as bad as you think."
As he spoke, Operator John raised his hand and pointed towards the end: "They are coming as we speak, look."
Sapir looked in the direction that Operator John pointed, and his eyes immediately widened.
A large group of armored and sharp-armed undead appeared at the end of Sailor Alley. They ignored the hot sales at the fountain and rushed to the central city area excitedly...
The crowd rushing to buy things suddenly quieted down, and Sapir, who was squatting on the roadside to rest, slowly stood up.
“Hoarding, maliciously raising prices, and disrupting the market are criminal acts prohibited by the Rhine Constitution.”
Operator John's calm voice rang in Sapir's ears: "During the period of transition between the ownership of the territory agreed upon by Mr. Yang and the Odysseus family, maliciously spreading rumors and undermining the stability of the territory is unforgivable. Our people have collected enough evidence, and Mr. Yang has found someone willing to come forward to identify the suspect. Once our undead friends complete the capture mission, we can hold a public trial."
The person who pointed the finger... was Adela III who came to the door on his own initiative.
As for the evidence... of course it came from Baron and Lady Vio, who wanted to prove that they had indeed made great efforts to stabilize the grain prices in Moses Port, but were no match for the encirclement and suppression by the local nobles. This couple was frightened by the iron-fisted policy of the Innadri City Hall, and they even recorded clearly in the account book how many food products among the goods shipped to Moses Port by their shipping company were monopolized by which company.
From the very beginning, Political Commissar Zhao judged that after the Odysseus family moved away, the group of nobles who were left behind and whom Phoenix looked down upon would cause trouble.
Instead of sending grain to Moses Port, the Transport Department assigned this task to Vio Shipping. Firstly, they were indeed short-handed. Secondly, Zhao Zhenzhen saw that the Vio family, who belonged to the same aristocratic class, were better at catching these guys' weaknesses and knew how to preserve evidence. When it came to fighting people and guessing people's evil intentions, the Transport Department's agents were indeed no match for Baron and Baron Vio.
Next, the national team only needs to watch from the sidelines and see whether these nobles of Port Moses can overcome their inner greed.
The result is also obvious... Just like Ma X knew that the Chinese government would crack down on collusion between government and business but still wanted to run Lakeside University, and Qu Wanting's mother knew that being a corrupt official would result in life imprisonment but still couldn't control her hands, this noble from another world could not help but risk his life to put his neck on the gallows.
