Chapter 147 - 148: My Older Sister is Coming Home Tomorrow

Chapter 147: Chapter 148: My Older Sister is Coming Home Tomorrow

"This much for a bonus?"

Chen Dequan was equal parts shocked and delighted.

Back when he worked construction, forget bonuses — he’d never once gotten his wages on time. Half the time, you’d finish an entire job and still walk away empty-handed.

Getting stiffed for six months was par for the course. Money earned this year got paid next year, wages from early in the year didn’t come until the end — and that was the good scenario. Sometimes the whole thing just went sour, and they’d string you along indefinitely.

Working for Chen Yuan was different. Not only did payday actually happen at the end of the month, there were bonuses on top of it — five hundred yuan a pop.

This job was a good deal.

"Aunt Liu, this is your wages — same as Uncle Chen’s, with a five-hundred bonus included."

Chen Yuan counted out Liu Fang’s pay and tucked the bonus in with it.

"I get a bonus too?"

Liu Fang blinked, caught off guard.

Every worker does the math in their head — Liu Fang had been doing it too. She’d already felt plenty satisfied with two thousand five hundred in wages, so a bonus on top of that was the last thing she expected.

And they both got one.

That was an extra thousand yuan between them.

"You put in the work, you deserve the reward. That bonus is yours, no question."

Chen Yuan urged them to take it, adding a few words of encouragement along the way.

"Alright, we’ll take it then. I’m not much for fancy words, but you can count on me to show it through my work — I won’t let you down."

Chen Dequan didn’t make a fuss. Money was already in his hands, so he’d keep it and let his work ethic do the talking.

"Anyone who’d drop the ball on a job like this would have to be an idiot."

Chen Jun cracked a joke and waved for Chen Dequan and his wife to sit down.

"Mr. Liang, this here is your wages."

Chen Yuan finally counted out Chen Youliang’s pay.

"I get wages?"

Chen Youliang was genuinely surprised. Chen Dequan and his wife had been at it for nearly a month — their pay made sense. But he’d only been on the job a few days.

"Everyone gets paid at the end of the month — it’s cleaner that way and easier to keep track."

Chen Youliang thought about it and figured that was fair enough. At his age, there was no point making a scene over something reasonable, so he accepted it.

"The bonus isn’t much — just a little something to round it up nicely. Don’t take offense, Mr. Liang."

Chen Yuan pressed the remaining cash into Chen Youliang’s hand.

"I can’t take this — I only did what was expected of me."

Chen Youliang tried to wave it off.

"Sure, it’s what the job calls for, but I’d originally planned to have two people on this. My uncle has to help out at the fishing pond and with meal prep, which means you’ve been pulling close to half again what you were hired for. Three thousand is already on the low side for that — keep the bonus."

Chen Yuan didn’t give Chen Youliang a chance to argue any further. He picked up his glass, poured himself some liquor, and called for everyone to sit down and eat.

"The wages and the duties were agreed on upfront. There’s no such thing as doing too much or too little."

He’d known what the job involved when he signed on, and he’d known that Chen Kingdom had other things on his plate too.

If anyone thought the pay was too low for the work, they could’ve walked away. Once you accepted the deal, there was nothing more to say about it.

Still, seeing Chen Yuan’s sincerity, Chen Youliang let it go without further fuss. He pocketed the bonus and made up his mind to keep doing good work.

"Come on, let’s eat."

With everyone freshly paid, the meal was a cheerful one — though since night fishing was still running, nobody went overboard with the drinking.

Once dinner was done, Chen Dequan and his wife hopped on their three-wheeler and headed off to the pond. With cash in their pockets, they were raring to go.

Chen Youliang sat back for a smoke, said his goodbyes, and headed home.

"Big brother, we won’t bother with cash — we’ll just transfer your share on WeChat, alright?"

After the others left and the kitchen was squared away, Chen Jun called his brother and sister-in-law over to settle up.

"WeChat works fine."

Chen Kingdom smiled and nodded.

He’d been expecting maybe a few thousand, so when Chen Kingdom saw Chen Jun transfer over twenty thousand, his jaw nearly dropped.

"How is it that much?"

"Revenue this month came in just under fifty thousand."

Chen Jun pulled out a cigarette with a grin, handed one to Chen Kingdom, and tossed another to Chen Yuan.

"That much?"

Lin Cuiju looked up from her teacup in disbelief. She’d been cooking there every single day and had no idea the numbers were that high.

"A lot of it is thanks to you, sis-in-law. There was a stretch where the meal side orders were really going crazy — take a look."

Tang Ying flipped open a notebook that had daily records of the bento orders and side dishes, along with the revenue figures.

It wasn’t exactly a formal ledger — mainly just a way to track the actual revenue, since WeChat transfers going back and forth made the numbers hard to pin down.

"Still, that seems like too much."

Chen Kingdom shook his head, lit his cigarette, and said, "There’s still costs to account for — Yuan covered a lot of the purchases himself, and the air conditioning installation fee needs to come out too."

"The air conditioning cost has already been deducted, and your expenses are factored in too. Besides, we agreed on how to split this beforehand — just take it, big brother."

Chen Jun nudged Chen Kingdom to stop holding out.

The two of them kept batting it back and forth, while Tang Ying and Lin Cuiju did the same on their end.

Chen Yuan stayed out of it. How to split the bento profits was their business to sort out — as long as nobody was complaining it wasn’t enough, everything was fine.

He turned away and tried to light his cigarette, but the air conditioning was blasting cold air right at him and he couldn’t get the flame to catch.

"Phew~"

He finally got a drag in and made his way toward the pond to check on things and see how Wang Tao’s progress was coming along.

He’d barely stood up when his phone buzzed in his pocket. He pulled it out and the moment he saw who it was, his eyes curved into a smile.

"Sis."

Chen Yuan answered the call and stepped outside.

A few minutes later he walked back into the main hall. His dad and uncle had apparently stopped going back and forth — it looked like they’d already worked out the split.

Chen Yuan didn’t ask about it. He just grinned and said, "My sister’s coming home tomorrow."

"Already? That soon?"

Chen Jun was caught off guard. It wasn’t even August yet, and Zhou Jianming’s son’s wedding was still a few days away — she was coming back way ahead of schedule.

"I talked to her a few days ago and she agreed to come back and help run the fishing pond. She’s been using these last few days of the month to wrap things up, today was her last shift, and she can officially quit tomorrow. I’m heading into the city tomorrow anyway, so I’ll just pick her up on the way."

When he’d first mentioned his sister coming back, his parents had been on board, so Chen Yuan had called her that same night and they’d talked for over an hour.

She’d also been added to the fishing pond group chat, and after watching business explode over the past while, she didn’t have a single reservation left. She wrapped up her handover as fast as humanly possible.

"That’s wonderful news."

Tang Ying’s smile grew even brighter.

Ever since business at the pond started picking up, she’d been quietly hoping that one day her daughter would find her way home too — the whole family together, making a go of things.

Now it was finally happening.

Her daughter would be back tomorrow, both her kids would be by her side, and the fishing pond was doing better than she ever could have imagined. It all felt like a dream.

"Coming home’s the right call. Home is home — doesn’t matter how good things are out there, nothing beats being back where you belong."

Chen Kingdom and Lin Cuiju were genuinely happy to hear the news, but there was a faint shadow behind their smiles that neither of them could quite hide.

Watching their nephew and niece both come back home, they couldn’t help thinking of their own two sons still drifting around out there. There was more than a little envy in it.

"Uncle, why not call my two cousins back too? The pond keeps growing, business is getting better by the day, we’re short on hands — and family’s always easier to trust."

Chen Yuan slipped the suggestion in casually.

"Those two little rascals are still out there running wild. I’ll see what they have to say when they come back for the New Year."

Chen Kingdom grumbled with his mouth but smiled with his face.

Uncle had definitely told them about the fishing pond, but right now there was no reason to think about calling them back — the operation was still pretty small scale.

Besides, his sister hadn’t even been back yet when all this started, so there was no reason for his cousins to rush back either.

If they still needed the extra hands by year’s end, it’d be worth bringing up again.

They didn’t linger much longer — everyone still had things to do, and Chen Yuan headed off toward the pond.

"How’d everyone do tonight, gentlemen? Anyone land a full creel?"

Same as always, Chen Yuan hopped off the three-wheeler and asked for the rundown first. Anyone who’d gone home empty-handed got a ribbing; anyone who’d had a bumper haul got a reward — twenty percent off their session fee, refunded on the spot.

"Boss Chen, who do you think you’re talking to? Landing fish is the bare minimum — there’s no suspense there."

"We’re not even halfway through and I’ve already got eight. Pulling a hundred jin on Boss Chen tonight is no problem at all."

The anglers were in high spirits. It was already past eight, four hours of solid action, and every single person at the pond had made it onto the board.

Heavy Chummer even came out with a particularly smug line.

"I barely made a move and the fish went absolutely crazy. I could fish till midnight and never want to leave — but I guess Boss Chen might not want to keep me~"

Even the guys from Air Force Alliance were talking trash like that — which said everything about how well the session was going.

Chen Yuan was pleased. He did a lap around the pond but didn’t handle any refunds himself — that was his dad’s job.

After his round, he tracked down Wang Tao to get a proper update on the guesthouse.

With the hoarding up around the site, he had no real sense of how far along things were or when it might be finished.

"We’re wrapping up tonight. Official completion tomorrow — you can come do the walkthrough whenever you’re ready, Boss Chen."

That was good news.

Chen Yuan chatted with Wang Tao for a bit, then headed home humming to himself.

He grabbed his clothes, took a shower, came out, and face-planted onto the bed in a full starfish spread, not an ounce of motivation left to move.

After a while he rolled over, pulled up the system while lying there, got the next day’s fish release sorted out, set his alarm, and was out like a light~