Chapter 639: I Have no Doubts about It
The sudden last scene completely stunned He An. There was a list of producers’ names on the screen by the time he snapped out of it.
It was just that... what was broadcasting along with the producer list were not the exciting parts of the game... but a news report.
“The President issued a eulogy on the death of Jeff Eleanor, current President of the Luxury Group. The full text of the eulogy is as follows:
“Michelle (Mrs. President) and I are both shocked and saddened to hear about the death of Mr. Jeff Eleanor. Jeff is diligent, self-disciplined, and noble. He is an entrepreneur, philanthropist, a best-selling author, and also our good friend.
“He is good at thinking out of the box, believing that he could work hard to change the world and help others. His charitable foundation had helped tens of thousands of homeless people. His book, ‘Struggle and Get Rich’, inspired countless young people to fight for their dreams.
“The world had lost a visionary. He would be missed forever. Michelle and I want to send out thoughts and prayers to Jeff’s wife, family, and those who love him.”
“...”
“It was reported that Mr. Jeff Eleanor was brutally killed by a criminal when he signed for a bookstore in the Bronx District. Tens of thousands of people were excited and demanded that the law punish criminals.
“At present, the real motive of the murderer was not clear. The police had not discovered any feud between him and Mr. Jeff. The murderer seemed to have a mental disorder and refused to answer any questions from the police. He just kept repeating the word ‘liar’. This channel will continue to track this case...”
On the final news screen, the protagonist’s parents, his wife, and his children were crying at his funeral.
That was the end of the rich version of the game.
...
He An was a little confused.
That’s it?
Finished?
What did this ending mean? My career just took off and then everyone disappeared? Who was the murderer? Why did he want to kill me?
Did I choose some wrong option that ended up with this tragic ending?
That didn’t seem a little right. It really felt wrong somewhere.
He An thought about it carefully. The flow of the entire game seemed to be okay. The transition between the various scenes was very natural; the details were also very good. There was a sense of substitution.
Only the ending was too abrupt, there was no foreshadowing about what was going to happen!
He An thought about it and felt that perhaps he had missed out on certain links or steps. He might be able to hit another ending if he played a second time or if he were to play the poor version.
There were at least a dozen routes to choose from after all. There might be some other options that could change his fate.
However, He An did not plan to try a second time now since this ending had caused him serious psychological trauma.
The game was made very well as a whole, be it the story, plot, lines, screen details. There was nothing to fault it with. The only thing was that this ending made the person playing confused.
Such a feeling was as though he was at a banquet; good dishes were brought up one by one. However, the table was hacked after the first bite.
“Could there be some hidden content relating to the rich version in the poor version?”
He An could not help but think that way.
The poor version’s introduction might be enough to dissuade him, but He An harbored some hope.
What if there was really some special content?
He thought about it for a moment before opening the poor version and starting the game.
The poor version began with an inner monologue, similar to the rich version.
...
“I’m very grateful to my father.
“If it wasn’t for him, I might have gone to study at Borgia Elementary School which is the worst public elementary school in the country. Half of their graduates would be promoted to ‘Sinkhole’ Middle Schools. There would be more than 40% who would not be able to graduate from there. It was therefore known as the ‘Dropout Factory’.
“There are about 2,000 of such ‘Dropout Factories’ around the country. They will continuously send idle young people into society.
“In our state alone, 68% of the offenders are high school dropouts. The state government’s financial spending on a prisoner every four years is enough for a child to finish K12 from kindergarten, there would still be 20,000 grand extra for university.
“There are about 70,000 homeless people in the largest city in our country. There are countless beggars, disabled and mentally ill people, alcoholics... criminal convicts on the streets and in subway stations.
“36% of them are underage, the rest of the 64% are generally single mothers or single males.
“In this country, you need a certain amount of money before you can start building your life in an affordable way.”
“If you get to the point where you require relief, then you would not be able to get a job if you get relief. You can’t rent a house if you don’t have a job. You can’t do anything without a house. Once you become homeless, it means social death.
“You might be healthy, but you will not be able to return to your previous life. You can only wander about, homeless, on the streets for a lifetime.
“I am very sensitive towards numbers. I don’t know if this is a gift or a survival instinct. Perhaps the life of a poor person is a series of numbers.
“Many poor people would blame their parents.
“But no matter what, I am very thankful to my father. He did not turn me into one of them.”
“My father always told me that I have to learn from the outstanding people, to change the poor people’s mindset, to work hard and struggle... not letting the flow devour me.
“Struggle and you will transform your life.
“I have no doubts about it.”
Unlike the beginning of the rich person, the poor version did not begin from a specific event, but a scene with lots of fragmented glass, abstractly depicting those scenes in the protagonist’s narration.
It immediately turned to the protagonist’s childhood memories.
“After I was born, my mother had to quit her job and became a full-time housewife because she was the only one who could look after me.
“That did not change even after I went to kindergarten because leaving the child alone at home after school ended at one in the afternoon would violate the child protection law.
“Therefore, if my mother’s after-tax salary cannot cover classes or babysitters, then it would be better not to work since it would save more money.
“My father had to work more than 10 hours a day so I rarely saw him. However, his contribution was meaningful. He took me away from Borgia Elementary School to a better school district.
“We lived in low-rent housing, which was quite lucky because you could only live in such a place if your income was in the range of 20~25% percentile. You have to be poorer than 75% of the people yet richer than the lowest 20%. It was very strict.
“Hobbies? No, that’s something I cannot afford.”
Scenes flashed across the screen with the protagonist’s narration. The mother of the protagonist was taking care of the baby alone while the whole low-rent housing was in a mess.
The protagonist’s public school was very different from the rich version’s private school, but what was even more surprising was the after-school entertainment.
In the rich version, the player’s entertainment was in horse-riding, archery, music, and art while in the poor version, the players’ entertainment was running in and jumping in his own backyard, riding a bicycle, or playing football.
These mini-games were done very well, but they were dull compared with the rich version.
He An wanted the protagonist to learn through his habit instead of running wildly in the yard every day. However, he soon found that he was out of funds.
Getting the teacher to teach him the cello at home cost 75 US dollars an hour.
Parents bring their children to swimming lessons for 20 US dollars per 30 minutes. If it was a professional course, it would be 200 dollars per hour.
A 30-minute gymnastics class, with five to ten children per class, would have the teacher leading the warm-up for two minutes and then the rest of the time would be the parents and children playing with props and equipment. That caused 20 dollars per class.
These courses were of inferior quality with not so cheap pricing, which had to be booked more than two months in advance.
The most obvious difference between the rich and poor version to He An was the dullness.
He had only a few options to choose from because he had no money. No matter whether it was running around in the yard or riding a bicycle, he could feel very obviously that he was wasting time.
At the same time, the poor version was also very typical—with serious obesity problems, which was completely in line with the stereotype.
After his childhood came his youth. The protagonist entered high school by studying hard and went to college with loans. In high schools, there were more activities. He could participate in choirs and orchestras; he could also participate in debates.
The rich and the poor protagonists were working almost as hard, but there was a big gap in the resources they could obtain.
His type of work would be determined by whether he managed to enter university or not.
If he did not possess any professional skills, he could only work as a waiter in the restaurant, a cleaner, a caregiver for the elderly, or a tally in the supermarket. He would still go bankrupt even if he worked two jobs seven days a week.
His colleague accidentally sprained her leg while cleaning. She dared not call an ambulance or even return home to rest. She could only continue kneeling on one foot and continue cleaning. That was because she could not even afford to lose a day of salary. The team leader told her to ‘calm down and work hard to get over it’.
If they wanted to get a job in the low-end service industry, they could only find such a job in big cities. However, the rent in these cities had been pushed up to an almost unaffordable level by the rich.
One could only live in a pay-by-day capsule if they could not afford a monthly rental. Most of the time, they would become poorer as they stayed in it. They run a higher risk of bankruptcy or even sleep in the streets once they became sick or the rent were to increase.
If you were to find a job through your own hard work and earn about 4,000 US dollars a month, then the situation would be a little better. However, various expenses would still be overwhelming. Fixed expenses would account for 80% of your income—which included 25% for tax and insurance; rental would take up 29%; children’s education 26%; car 5%; water and electricity 5%; and clothing, food, and transportation 10%... not including medical care.
Basically, it was very difficult to save even 400 US dollars a month. Any accident meant bankruptcy and homelessness.
If one could make all the right choices, one would be able to obtain a relatively high-paying job. Their life would be relatively richer, but all sorts of expenses would grow linearly. Some expenses that they did not have to spend became necessities for expenditure.
That was what made He An feel outrageous. He could have saved a lot of money, but the expenses were forcibly deducted by the game.
Purchasing luxury suits and bags to look the part.
Spending 2,000 US dollars during his children’s birthday for a three-day trip to sea paradise.
Social expenses, including the community where they lived, children’s extracurricular studies were also huge expenses.
To save money, he became used to paying by credit card installments. The number of credit card installments each month was very high; he had totally no idea where the money was spent.
These choices seemed inevitable. The luxury suits and bags for example. The protagonist did not want to buy them, but all his colleagues were using them. If he did not follow suit, he would become an outcast.
Therefore, the protagonist bit the bullet and purchased them anyway.
He An seemed to have finally understood what the protagonist meant in his very first words now.
The life of the poor was like a series of numbers, and these numbers represented all kinds of expenses.
In the end, however, this number would still collapse.
As the protagonist’s consumption level became higher, sudden unemployment destroyed everything. The entire chain collapsed in no time: loss of income, unable to pay back his credit card bills, the bank came to take away his house, the interest snowballing on the card debt...
Therefore, the protagonist’s living environment became like his father.
The protagonist’s voices sounded again in these scenes.
“My father always told me that I have to learn from the outstanding people, to change the poor people mindset, and to work hard and struggle... not letting the flow devour me.
“Struggle and you will transform your life.
“I tried, but everything seemed to have returned to its original state. Nothing had changed.
“Was my struggle meaningless? I think not. At least I have not become one of those homeless people.
“I often thought:
“If I did not lose my job...
“If I had more savings...
“If I could have spent less...
“If... I had made more right choices, could I have changed my own fate?”
The last scene was the protagonist returning home after a long day at work, coming to the door of his child’s room. He looked at his child under the moonlight, fast asleep in the dark. He covered him with the blanket.
At that moment, his child woke up, rubbing his eyes with his small, soft hands, asking. “Daddy, why are you back so late every night? Why don’t you have any time to accompany me?”
He paused for a while before patting the child’s forehead. “Because Mom is not working, Dad has to work hard to earn money.”
“Then, when will Dad be able to accompany me?” the child asked again.
“When Dad earned enough money,” he replied.
The child’s eyes shone. “Dad, will you be able to accompany me every day when I grow up and earn enough money?
“Then, Daddy, how can I earn enough money?”
The protagonist paused for a long while before replying. “Money will not drop from the sky. Our lives will only have the possibility of becoming better if we are not content with the current situation.
“Learn from the outstanding people, change your poor-person thinking, struggle with all your might... and don’t let the flow devour you...
“Struggle, only then can you transform your life.”
The child’s big eyes shone under the moonlight and nodded.
The game ended, and the credits started rolling.
The ending image this time was of a young man burying his head deep in study. At the same time, there was a voice-over by a person whose voice was different from the protagonist.
“My father always told me that I have to learn from the outstanding people, to change the poor people mindset, and to work hard and struggle... not letting the flow devour me.
“Struggle and you will transform your life.
“I have no doubts about it.”
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