Rich Brother 0006 transferred me 50.

He spent over ten yuan on a Didi ride back to Changhe Community.

Stopping by the parcel station at the entrance, he picked up the packages he’d recently ordered, then trudged back to his rented room, carrying the bag.

The room was just over ten square meters, furnished with a small cabinet, a 1.5-meter-wide bed, a little table, and a makeshift bathroom added later. It was a partitioned unit carved out of what was once a three-bedroom, one-living-room apartment—now so cramped that even turning around was a struggle.

And yet, Chen Jue was paying 2,300 yuan a month for this.

One month’s deposit and three months’ rent upfront, with utilities higher than residential rates—almost thirty thousand yuan a year went straight into the landlord’s pocket.

He still remembered moving here two years ago with Tai Sheng Company. Back then, the rent was already two thousand a month, but at least the company’s housing allowance and provident fund offset the cost.

Later, in the name of celebrating the Asian Games in Hangzhou and “improving the city’s image,” the rent inexplicably rose by another three hundred.

That extra three hundred came right out of Chen Jue’s pocket.

There was never any point complaining—landlords across Hangzhou seemed to collude as if they’d secretly agreed over a game of mahjong to adjust their prices in unison, more outrageously than fuel hikes.

If you didn’t rent, someone else would. The area was surrounded by industrial parks and countless companies, offering a plethora of jobs and a constant supply of fresh graduates for landlords to harvest.

In the past, returning to this suffocating little room, Chen Jue would have collapsed onto the bed, scrolling on his phone for hours or firing up his laptop for a few rounds of games to kill time—numbing himself with the dopamine from short videos, melancholy music, and gaming.

But tonight, after that stone-skipping session at the park, the simple joy of the activity left him in a remarkably good mood.

Everything seemed more pleasing to the eye than usual!

——————

Character: Chen Jue

Strength: 0.77

Constitution: 0.91

Spirit: 1.05

Skill: [Stone Skipping Lv1 (5/200)]

Available Attribute Points: 0.00

(Character Evaluation: An ordinary corporate drone, your body is in a state of severe sub-health.)

——————

“This stat panel is really something!”

“If I could raise my stats and level up my skill, could I skip any stone dozens of times with ease?”

Glancing at his attribute panel, Chen Jue thought he might try something different this weekend.

This stifling rental was suffocating; if he couldn’t stand it, he’d just go back to the park for a couple more days of stone skipping.

Getting out and moving around was better than lying motionless in his room.

But first, he had to deal with the problem right before him.

After all the exertion tonight, his body was thoroughly exhausted—especially his right arm, which felt limp and useless.

He’d been sitting in an office for years, rarely moving vigorously, so this sudden bout of effort had pushed his arm past its limits.

And it had only been half an hour; the soreness hadn’t even peaked yet.

Chen Jue expected that by tomorrow morning, he’d barely be able to lift his arm.

He’d been through this before—moving house or during company team-building events. After carrying heavy things or hiking long distances, his muscles and joints would ache so badly the next day he wouldn’t want to move.

It was the kind of pain that hurt with every touch or movement, taking over a week to recover.

With these past experiences, Chen Jue knew exactly what to do.

Nearly thirty now, he’d long learned to handle minor ailments himself.

He took a hot shower, changed into loose clothes, soaked a towel in steaming water, and applied it to his aching arm.

Then he dug out two bottles of Yunnan Baiyao spray from his cabinet, spraying on the protectant first, then the medication.

Afterward, he massaged his right arm with his left hand.

To be extra cautious, he even went out to the pharmacy at the complex entrance to buy two boxes of pain relief patches, said to promote circulation and ease pain.

He stuck all five patches from one box onto the swollen areas of his right arm.

“Hopefully it won’t hurt so much tomorrow,” Chen Jue muttered, flexing his right arm and feeling a bit of relief.

Back in the room, he boiled some water and drank it, then settled into bed, propped comfortably on his lazy pillow.

Normally, he’d stay up past midnight—especially on a Friday night, he wouldn’t fall asleep before two or three.

But with his right arm nearly useless, he became a one-armed man for the night, switching on his phone with his left hand.

He didn’t open Quark, nor did he use incognito mode to browse any strange sites.

He was too exhausted for that.

Instead, he opened Bilibili and searched for “stone skipping,” pulling up a flood of videos.

Clearly, the evening’s fun had gotten to him; even lying in bed, he couldn’t stop thinking about stone skipping.

But as soon as he clicked on a few recommended, high-view-count videos, he couldn’t help but exclaim in disbelief several times.

Because after watching just a few, his previously pleasant mood was completely unsettled.

“Over a hundred skips in one throw?”

“There are actually professionals in such a niche activity?”

“There’s even a world record for it!”

Chen Jue sat up straight, stunned, and clicked through several more videos in disbelief.

He realized that the “technique” and “experience” he’d worked out tonight at White Horse Lake were laughable compared to these pros.

The professionals could casually send a stone skimming dozens or even over a hundred times.

There were even all sorts of trick shots—skipping multiple stones at once, creating intersecting or parallel arcs across the water.

The most outrageous were those who could, at the end of the skip, precisely burst a balloon drifting on the surface!

“Incredible!”

“How is this even possible?”

Mouth agape, Chen Jue felt as if he’d discovered an entirely new world.

After watching a few tutorial videos, he compared his own technique at the lake and realized just how off he’d been.

“The optimal entry angle for the stone is twenty degrees.”

“No need for a run-up—the stance is a semi-squat with a twist downwards.”

The more he watched, the more surreal it seemed.

A simple amusement, and yet even foreign scientists had conducted dedicated research, publishing analytical papers on how to skip more and better stones.

Some of these papers were even uploaded to prestigious journals like Nature!

“Do these people have nothing better to do?” Chen Jue couldn’t help but complain.

He toiled away each day just to get by in Hangzhou—never mind buying a house; he was barely getting by.

With the company set to dissolve next month, he’d soon be worried about his income. How could he have had the energy to care about things like this before?

Had it not been for that sudden awakening of his attribute panel, he probably never would have touched stone skipping at all.

But with billions of people on Earth, there were bound to be masters in every obscure niche.

After binge-watching stone skipping videos, Chen Jue was left shocked and bewildered—but also gained a lot.

He didn’t just pick up more professional techniques; he also learned why the experts could skip stones so far and so many times.

It had a lot to do with the stones themselves.

Those flat rocks he’d picked up in the park could work, but weren’t up to pro standards in shape or weight.

So after closing the videos, he searched on Taobao for the same kind of professional skipping stones used by the experts.

“Damn!”

“The guy in this shop’s promo photo—isn’t that the world record holder from the video?”

Seeing several shops with over 9,999 monthly sales of skipping stones, Chen Jue realized just how naïve he’d been.

These professionals weren’t just passing time—they were making a living from stone skipping!

Look at those top-selling skipping stones—easily bringing in millions a year.

Even more outrageous, those machine-cut, polished stones actually had huge numbers of buyers!

He checked the comments section: company team-building events, school activities, always in bulk.

“A stone, with shipping, goes for about one yuan each.”

“You throw it into the water, watch the splash, hear a sound.”

“Is it that I’m just too poor, or are there too many rich folks online?”