From Wage Slave to Tycoon

The New Year is all about eating, eating, and more eating!

After burning incense on the first day of the New Year, the tour of visiting relatives officially began. Lunch was at Third Great-Granduncle’s house. After all, as the most senior member of the Su family, things naturally had to start with him.

Logically, it should have been Su Chen’s family’s turn after Third Great-Granduncle’s. But since their branch of the family used to have no standing, the evening meal on the first was scheduled at the home of Third Great-Granduncle’s eldest son.

So, Su Chen’s family was naturally pushed to the second day of the New Year.

As for Second Great-Granduncle’s family, Su Chen only remembered taking a boat to Fuzhou specifically for the New Year’s feast once or twice when he was little. He’d never gone back since. As for the reason... Su Chen wasn’t entirely sure, nor had he ever really thought about it.

Master Su and the three Su brothers all drank quite a bit. The ride home was a boisterous affair, especially with Su Zhuyun in the passenger seat, muttering to himself from time to time about how the eldest branch of the Su family could finally walk with their heads held high.

When he got emotional, the tears would stream down uncontrollably. At that moment, Su Chen understood that the decades of bitterness his father had accumulated were finally being released.

Even his Second and Third Uncles were the same. Only Master Su was a bit more composed. He wasn’t shouting and carrying on like Su Zhuyun and his brothers, but leaned quietly against the window, wiping away a tear now and then.

The house was bustling early on the morning of the second. Even Su Chen was not spared, dragged out of bed by Chen Shufen herself.

They say a red apron is the battle uniform of a Sichuan man; once he ties it on, there’s nothing left for the women to do in the kitchen.

In reality, that wasn’t entirely true... For a big New Year’s feast like this, the men were mostly responsible for prepping the ingredients—killing the chickens, gutting the fish, and so on—while the women handled the more intricate dishes.

In the Su family, the one who usually ran the kitchen was Su Chen’s mother, Chen Shufen. It couldn’t be helped; none of the Su men were skilled enough in the kitchen to match her.

And the person running the kitchen... naturally had a much firmer say in things.

Su Chen sighed at the large basin of potatoes in front of him and started peeling with the peeler from beside it. As for getting outside help, it was out of the question. Beside him, Su Yan and Su Qingya were already swamped with work.

This year’s New Year’s feast was much more lavish than last year’s, but it was still pretty similar to the meal at Third Great-Granduncle’s house yesterday—at most, there were just one or two extra meat dishes.

It wasn’t that they hadn’t considered adding some seafood. When Su Chen had suggested it earlier, Master Su had shot down the idea immediately.

The reason was simple: you couldn’t break the unwritten rules of the New Year’s feast. Just because your family had money now, you couldn’t go and make your feast overly extravagant with giant prawns, sea cucumbers, and abalone.

What would that make the relatives who had to host their own New Year’s feasts later think? Should they also spend a fortune on extravagant ingredients?

That would just be needlessly stirring up resentment. How could the Su family do something like that?

Su Chen was busy from six or seven in the morning until well after nine before he finished his tasks. He wasn’t needed for the rest of the preparations.

Just as he was about to run upstairs to rest, several cars pulled into the courtyard. A glance at the lead car, a Mercedes S300, told him it had to be the other two branches of the family arriving.

"Brother, ever since the relatives found out about our family’s good fortune yesterday, their attitudes have completely changed. In previous years, they wouldn’t have shown up until after eleven. It was never like this!" Su Yan, who usually seemed simple and honest, sounded surprisingly snarky.

Su Chen shot him a glare and said irritably, "Keep that kind of talk inside the house. Don’t say such things outside. They’re our elders, after all. What would outsiders say about the Su family if they heard you?"

Hearing this, Su Yan shrank back and nodded. "Got it."

As the eldest of his generation in the Su family, with Su Zhuyun and the others busy in the kitchen, the responsibility of greeting the guests fell to Su Chen. He had Su Yan fetch him a few packs of Zhonghua cigarettes, then rubbed his face, put on a smile, and went to welcome them.

They were mostly from his grandfather’s generation, and he addressed them with a uniform string of "Second Granduncle," "Third Granduncle," "Fourth Granduncle," and so on. As he greeted them, he offered each a cigarette. They were all incredibly enthusiastic, patting Su Chen on the shoulder and saying, "Xiaochen, you’ve really made something of yourself!"

Su Chen just smiled at these words without responding. ’They’re just empty pleasantries,’ he thought. ’They don’t even know what I do. "Made something of myself"... it’s all because Dad has finally found his footing again.’

After getting all the elders seated, he brought out two sets of mahjong tiles and placed them on the tables in the courtyard.

Without any prompting from Su Chen, they all found their partners and sat down at the tables.

Su Yan and Su Qingya naturally took on the role of assistants, placing two plates of melon seeds, peanuts, and fruit on each table.

Only after finishing all this did Su Chen and his two siblings finally get a short break.

When lunchtime came, it was a flurry of serving dishes and asking the elders if they needed more rice. After the chaotic rush, he looked at the lavish New Year’s feast before him and had absolutely no appetite.

「In the kitchen.」

"You worked hard today!" Su Zhuyun said, patting Su Chen’s arm with a gratified smile.

"It was okay," Su Chen said, forcing a smile.

This was the first time he’d ever been so busy during the New Year. When he was a student, the holiday was all about playing around and waiting for the family to cook the feast so he could just start eating.

After graduation, he had spent several years in Shanghai without coming home. Now that he was finally helping with the New Year’s meal for a change, he was exhausted just from doing the minor prep work, to say nothing of actually chopping meat or stir-frying the dishes.