Chapter 182 - 178: Building a House for Free

Chapter 182: Chapter 178: Building a House for Free

When text messages confirming their salary deposits arrived on the employees’ phones, the rumors became reality.

A change began to sweep through the employees of Lin Xian Village as their salaries hit their accounts.

"Whoa! Xiaozhang told me I’d be making over thirty thousand this month, and I didn’t believe it. It’s actually true!

"This is just too much. Is Boss Lin going to lose money paying us this much?"

"It really is. I was already happy with over six thousand last month."

In the past, they wouldn’t necessarily earn even ten thousand after a full year of farming.

A salary of over six thousand was already an unimaginable figure for them.

This month’s salary truly shocked them. Some even went to their supervisors to ask if there had been a mistake.

After confirming there was no mistake, their attitude toward their work became even more dedicated.

Over with the security team, even though they had been notified in advance, receiving their salaries still felt a bit unreal.

Yu Hua’s voice came over the walkie-talkie. "Everyone, stay focused. Competition for these security jobs is about to get even more fierce."

"I don’t want to see any of you get kicked off the team for making a mistake, and I’m sure you don’t want that either."

"Don’t worry, Captain Yu! We guarantee we’ll do our jobs diligently."

"Yeah, if I got fired for messing up at a job like this, I think I’d just die."

They knew very well that this security job at Lin Xian Village was the best they would ever find.

’Making a mistake? Not a chance. From now on, I’m memorizing the security regulations until I know them backward and forward.’

At the banquet kitchen, Ma Sandao was beaming. ’Good thing I got my son a job here.’

"Let’s see if those people who talked behind my back can still laugh now."

Niu Sihai walked over. "Uncle Ma, I won’t say much more to thank you. Let’s have a drink tonight."

"Alright. We’ll have a little something tonight, but we can’t let it interfere with work tomorrow."

"Uncle Ma, even if you wanted to drink a lot, I wouldn’t let you. I’d rather die than lose this job."

Liang Damao came over as well. "I’ll have my family pick up some food. We can drink at my place tonight."

"Forget it, let’s go to my house this time. I already called my wife."

After the pay was distributed today, many of their subordinates came to thank them.

But the one they were most grateful to was the boss of Lin Xian Village. They had never even dreamed of a salary this high, and for some, their entire attitude toward work had transformed.

Now, everyone was paying attention to even the minor details they used to overlook.

They knew very well that if one of these minor issues led to a problem, they could easily lose their jobs.

This was especially true for the unskilled jobs. The employees in these positions were now working with an unbelievable level of diligence.

For manual labor tasks like washing dishes or preparing vegetables, they would now double-check their work after finishing.

And that was to say nothing of the back kitchen. The standards there had always been high, but now everyone was meticulously focused on hygiene.

Over at the Restaurant, even though everyone had known their pay would be high, it wasn’t until the money was actually in their accounts that they truly understood. Boss Lin had kept his word, not docking them a single cent from their bonuses.

"Long live the boss!"

"Thank you, Boss!"

Huang Yi said, "Alright, everyone, calm down for now. Let’s finish our shifts, and we can celebrate after work tonight."

Geng Changxin walked over. "Haha! My old classmates from culinary school will be absolutely green with envy when they see this salary."

"Back then, when our teacher was looking for people, so many of them were unwilling to come. In the end, I was the only one who did."

’Who would have thought I’d not only get a chance to advance my culinary skills here, but also earn such a high salary?’

Even a wealthy man like Chen Yuyuan was astounded by the wages Lin Xian Village was paying.

The restaurant staff’s overflowing joy was quickly noticed by the diners.

They asked the servers what good news they’d had, but the staff didn’t mention their salaries.

However, the diners still managed to overhear from private conversations that it was payday in Lin Xian Village.

They grew curious about just how much Lin Xian Village was paying to make every single employee in the restaurant so happy.

It wasn’t hard to find out if one really wanted to know. Besides, no one had told the employees to keep their pay a secret.

Pay was transparent in Lin Xian Village, unlike some companies that forbid employees from discussing their wages with each other.

"What the hell?!"

"The women who sort the recycling are making over thirty thousand? And the security guards are making at least forty thousand, and that’s only because they didn’t work a full month?"

"Damn! I’m not jealous that they get to work in a place like Lin Xian Village, but I’m definitely jealous of that salary."

"It hurts! I have a Master’s from a top-tier university, and I’m making less than the recycling ladies."

"..."

The news spread like wildfire among the tourists, and some even approached Lin Xian Village employees directly to ask.

Soon, details about Lin Xian Village’s salaries were posted online.

Now, netizens were truly losing their minds. That salary was too damn enviable.

Lin Xian Village’s high salaries were rapidly becoming a hot topic online.

If everyone at Lin Xian Village were highly educated technical experts, people wouldn’t be so envious.

But now, jobs that any able-bodied person could do were paying over thirty thousand a month. People were practically green with envy.

As a result, resumes began flooding Lin Xian Village’s recruitment email inbox like an avalanche of snowflakes.

The number of applicants was even more staggering than for the national civil service exam. And as the news continued to spread, even more people threw their hats in the ring.

At that moment, in her office at the Clothing Workshop, Gu Yuxi laughed out loud. Many of the people she had once humbly begged to join were now messaging her with inquiries.

"Before, I was begging you. Now the situation has changed, it’s my turn to pick and choose."

She answered everyone’s inquiries politely. But as for those who wanted to apply for a job at the Lin Xian Village Clothing Workshop...

...it wasn’t going to be as easy as before. They would have to pass her evaluation for even a chance at an interview.

When Wei Wuwu heard about the salaries at Lin Xian Village from her friends, she found it unbelievable.

She opened her phone, found the news article, and read it carefully, astonished at how high the wages in Lin Xian Village actually were.

"Wuwu, are you going to apply for a job at Lin Xian Village? Didn’t they invite you before?"

"I turned them down then. Getting a job at Lin Xian Village now won’t be easy."

Wei Wuwu was actually hesitant about whether she should even try. Making historical-style clothing had only ever been a hobby for her.

"Just give it a shot! If you manage to get in, we can come directly to you when we want to buy clothes from Lin Xian Village."

They had already custom-ordered historical outfits from Lin Xian Village and had also bought some of the regular clothing, which they found to be incredibly comfortable.

Wei Wuwu and her friends weren’t short on cash; they came from well-off families. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have been able to afford custom-made historical outfits in the first place.

"Alright, I’ll give it a try."

The situation at the Medicine House was completely different from the Clothing Workshop. They needed Lin Feng’s approval to hire anyone from the outside.

This was especially true for hiring doctors, which had strict numerical limits. The requirements for personnel to process medicinal herbs, however, were not as stringent.

So, they hadn’t posted any job openings. Even so, a flood of their old colleagues from the medical field were calling them.

The salary at Lin Xian Village was just too tempting. Take Wu Xianlin, for example. He had originally left his hospital job and come to Lin Xian Village for the money.

Back then, plenty of people had gossiped behind his back, saying he was throwing his future away by coming to Lin Xian Village.

But after the salaries were revealed, his phone started ringing off the hook. One of the calls was even from a hospital vice president.

"These people... they only get this proactive when they see a profit. Where were they before?"

Wu Xianlin asked, "Dr. Guo, are you getting a lot of people coming to you too?"

"Not just coming to me, there’s a ton of them. Shameless, every last one."

"To hear them talk, you’d think I owned Lin Xian Village."

"Same here. Forget it. Let’s just ignore them. It’s not like we’re the ones making the hiring decisions anyway."

Compared to the other jobs, recruitment for the Medicine House was a special case; they definitely weren’t going to hire people carelessly.

Besides, with salaries this high, they weren’t about to risk their positions by making a bad recommendation for someone else.

After the Lin Xian Village salaries went public, Lin Dongyue and Liu Chunyan were inundated with an endless stream of calls and messages.

Some people even showed up at their door with gifts, asking about job opportunities.

Thankfully, Lin Feng had given them a heads-up, so they just directed all job-related inquiries to their son.

Back in an office in Lin Xian Village, a few people were sitting around, having set their phones to only accept calls from whitelisted numbers.

"This is insane. The company recruitment inbox is about to explode."

Hu Xia checked the back end of her personal account and the official Lin Xian Village account; both were lagging when she tried to open them.

There were just too many messages, and all of them were job applications.

Zhao Shiyun said, "I’ve been getting messages from old friends, too, asking me about what’s going on here."

"Can you blame them?" Hu Zhiming said. "Anyone would be blown away by these salaries."

"It’s mainly the salaries for the entry-level jobs," Hu Xia said. "The shock to the average worker is just too massive."

"For big, publicly traded companies, you hear about people making tens of millions, and netizens don’t bat an eye."

"But here in Lin Xian Village, any able-bodied person with a sound mind can do these jobs."

Just then, Zhou Jun walked in from outside. He had also seen the news about the salaries online.

"Brother Zhou, you’re not here about a job, are you?"

"Do I look like I need a job?" Zhou Jun retorted with a laugh. "I’m here to find Lin Feng and talk about the construction of the new restaurant down the mountain."

He had just reported the situation to his superiors when he got a call from his father. Someone wanted to accelerate the construction of the new Restaurant and had told him to ask for Lin Feng’s permission.

"Lin Feng, about that restaurant at the base of the mountain... someone wants to help you speed up the construction."

"They also want to help you expand its footprint. I was told to ask for your thoughts."

Hu Zhiming cried out in pleasant surprise, "There’s an offer like that?!"

"I don’t have any objection to that," Lin Feng said.

"There’s one more thing. Some people want to help you build more housing at the base of the mountain, following the style of the houses you already have."

"However, they have one condition: they want to take a portion of the newly built houses for themselves, and they’re willing to pay you rent for them."

Clearly, someone had heard about the special properties of Lin Xian Village’s houses and wanted to use this method to secure a place to live there.

Since houses they built themselves wouldn’t have the same special effects as the ones in Lin Xian Village, this was the only way they could get their hands on one.

"Build more houses, huh..."

Lin Feng considered the area at the base of the mountain. There was plenty of space to build, and he was already planning on constructing housing for his employees anyway.

Some employees had come to work in Lin Xian Village without bringing their families, mainly because the village’s amenities were still lacking.

Schooling, for example, was a major issue. That problem could only be solved once the Academy was built.

Having learned his lesson from the small size of the Land God Temple, he had decided to expand the scale of all future special buildings, especially something as important as the Academy.

"In principle, I have no objection," Lin Feng said. "But the number of houses can’t be too large."

This touched upon another issue that was giving Lin Feng a headache: procuring the vast quantities of materials needed for the upgrades was an extremely troublesome affair.

Fortunately, no one had paid any attention to this. Whenever Lin Feng ordered materials, he had the company place one order, while he placed another one privately.

That way, when the company did its books, the company’s portion was accounted for as being used normally, while the materials he ordered were stored in the Warehouse.

No one would check on their usage, which allowed him to secretly use some of them.