Courtyard House: My Time Travel is a Bit Too Strong

"With your factory's staff and resources, you could easily build the whole set of equipment yourself," Lin Quan said with a smirk.

The two hit it off immediately, finalized their collaboration, and signed an agreement.

The Third Machinery Factory hired Lin Quan for two months at a rate of 200 yuan per day.

He spent several days drawing a stack of detailed blueprints.

Unexpectedly, the experienced workers in the factory looked at the drawings over and over again for a long time, but shook their heads – no one could understand the dimensions and tolerances on the drawings.

Having no other choice, Lin Quan had to ride his bicycle there every day, stand in the workshop, and explain each part clearly by gesturing and speaking.

Director Li quickly dispatched people to purchase electric motors and also procured all kinds of standard parts and transmission components.

In about ten days, several key pieces of equipment were assembled.

After the power was turned on for trial operation, Lin Quan walked around it several times, nodding frequently.

After another ten days or so of debugging and optimization, he successfully received his 6,000 yuan reward.

A month later, the entire production line of the condiment plant was officially completed and put into operation.

With another six thousand yuan in hand, Lin Quan's steps became lighter.

Just a few days after returning to the courtyard house, Xu Damao personally visited him again, asking him to go to the factory once more.

Three brand-new CNC machine tools have arrived at the workshop, and Director Li is waiting for him to come and inspect them.

"Mr. Lin," Jessica greeted him.

"Miss Jessica," Lin Quan replied with a smile.

With Lin Quan overseeing the entire process, Xingguo engineers meticulously completed the installation and calibration.

He personally operated and tested a set of samples before nodding solemnly.

After inspecting the machine tools, he led Jessica, Michael, and others around to the spice factory next door for a tour.

The fully automated production line before him made Michael exclaim in astonishment, "My God, such cutting-edge equipment?"

The factory was spotless. Apart from a few workers remaining for the initial screening of raw materials and random inspection of finished products, all other processes were handled by robotic arms and conveyor belts.

Recommended by Lin Quan, He Tiezhu, who possesses excellent skills, understands recipes, and is adept at controlling the heat, was officially appointed as the first factory director of the condiment factory.

Jessica opened a few jars, tasted them, and her eyes lit up, so she couldn't help but laugh out loud.

On her last trip back home, she and Michael brought back a large quantity of seasonings. After having customers taste them back in Singapore, their phone lines were almost overwhelmed with orders – many Singaporeans were clamoring to buy them for them.

The two parties signed a new formal purchase contract. This time, the machinery factory not only didn't pay a penny, but also received an advance payment of tens of thousands of US dollars.

Each jar of seasoning weighs one pound and costs one yuan. Jessica ordered 600,000 jars in one go, plus a batch of top-quality truffles.

As soon as the words were spoken, Director Li breathed a sigh of relief, and everyone in the room wore a smile.

The factory set up a lavish thank-you banquet. After eating and drinking his fill, Lin Quan hopped on his bicycle and leisurely rode back to the courtyard house.

"In about ten more days, the winter wheat in Qinjiacun will be ready for harvest."

Before he finished speaking, officers from the Ximen Police Station stepped into the courtyard.

"Lin Quan?" Senior Constable Zhang Qiang asked from the doorway.

"Mm," Lin Quan replied readily.

"Come with us to the police station."

"Okay." He nodded in agreement.

Upon arriving at the Ximen Police Station, I was immediately taken into the interrogation room.

Director Zhang Jianying stared at him, her eyes filled with three parts annoyance and seven parts disappointment: "Tell me, how much benefit have you amassed under the guise of public office?"

"I didn't take any advantage of the public funds," Lin Quan said calmly.

"Someone has filed a formal complaint, alleging that you embezzled 12,000 US dollars from the Third Machinery Factory!" Zhang Jianying's voice suddenly rose.

"That's the fee I earned penny by penny," Lin Quan said, his expression unchanged.

"What did you do? Why would they give you so much money?" Zhang Jianying pressed.

"This story has to start from the beginning—initially, the machine factory wanted to introduce CNC machine tools, but they lacked a translator who was both technically proficient and fluent in foreign languages. Xu Damao from our compound, who was showing movies at the factory, asked me to help make the connection. I wasn't a factory employee, so I wasn't obligated to work for free, and I received a 200-square-meter fee for running the errand. At the time, the factory originally planned to spend 2 million square meters to buy two outdated first-generation machines from abroad."

"After I facilitated the connection and negotiated item by item, they finally won three superior second-generation CNC machine tools at a price of 180,000 US dollars per unit..." Lin Quan recounted the whole story in a calm and unhurried manner.

"Is that really true?" Zhang Jianying frowned.

"The factory director and deputy director are both on site. You can just make a phone call and ask," Lin Quan said with a slight smile.

Zhang Jianying stepped out of the interrogation room and pressed several buttons on an old-fashioned dial phone.

Lin Quan had just stepped out of the Ximen Police Station when he knew perfectly well that he had been stabbed.

Nowadays, 12,000 yuan is no small sum; it's enough to buy a brand-new Phoenix bicycle and a complete set of enamel washbasins.

Many people were envious, but Lin Quan thought and thought, and still couldn't figure out who would stab him in the back.

He had never had a grudge against anyone in the entire courtyard. Even Xu Damao, who loved to gossip, might not dare to complain about this matter.

"Could it be Liu Haizhong? That can't be... I was the one who got their two sons into the spice factory."

After pondering for a while, Lin Quan became certain that the mastermind behind this was definitely not one of the neighbors in the courtyard.

"Since they're not targeting me, they're probably targeting Director Li. From now on, I won't get involved in anything related to the Third Machinery Factory."

Seeing him push open the door and enter the courtyard, Yan Bugui immediately came to greet him: "A-Quan, are you alright?"

"Uncle, what could possibly be wrong with me?" Lin Quan waved his hand with a smile.

"I just saw you being led away by the police, and I was thinking of finding an old man and the others to discuss this with..." Yan Bugui said, rubbing his hands together.

"It's a small matter. Just because I earned more than ten thousand from the machine factory, someone reported me to the police station." Lin Quan's tone was light, as if he were talking about how many cornbread he ate this morning.

"You earned over ten thousand from the machine factory?" Yan Bugui's eyes almost popped out of their sockets—his monthly salary was thirty-two yuan and fifty cents, and this amount of money was enough for him to work for thirty years with interest.

"I thought you'd already heard about it?" Lin Quan glanced at him sideways, not noticing anything amiss.

"Didn't I tell you to hand over the money?" Yan Bugui lowered his voice.

"I earned it through my own hard work, I didn't steal or rob, so why should I hand it over?" Lin Quan retorted crisply.

"That makes sense." Yan Bugui nodded, then changed the subject, "A-Quan, wanna go shrimp fishing today?"

"No, I have to study lately, let's reschedule for another day," Lin Quan declined.

After dinner, he visited each household and got a general idea of ​​the situation: the matter of reporting it had absolutely nothing to do with his neighbors in the compound.

After practicing several rounds of marksmanship, Lin Quan felt relaxed and at ease, so he fell asleep immediately and slept soundly until the sun was high in the sky.

Early Saturday morning, he rode his old-fashioned bicycle with Qin Jingru on the back, heading straight for Qin Family Village outside the city.

The winter wheat on the two-acre plot of land was bent low with its heavy ears of grain.

Upon reaching the village entrance, the villagers rolled up their sleeves and helped with harvesting, threshing, winnowing, and weighing the wheat.

"Two thousand nine hundred and seventy-eight catties! More than one thousand three hundred catties per mu?" Qin Shijie calculated with the abacus beads, his hand trembled, and the abacus beads rolled all over the ground with a clatter.