A month and a half later—meaning Yang Xiao had been coming to the beach park for two months now. He woke up early and went to bed late every day, training hard for two months straight.
But due to financial reasons, he had to find a part-time job to make a living.
The two months of training had allowed Yang Xiao's physical fitness to improve rapidly. Now he could start training his Quirk. There were still eight months left. If he trained his body and Quirk simultaneously, he should have no problem with the entrance exam.
That day, Yang Xiao checked part-time job listings online and found an interesting shop nearby that was hiring. The shop's name was "Broken House." The shop's profile stated that no matter what problem you had, you could find the Broken House, and it would definitely solve it. If it couldn't solve the problem... well, please solve it yourself.
"Oh my, this profile is pure nonsense." Yang Xiao smiled wryly, but the salary offered by this Broken House wasn't bad, equivalent to about 4,000 Chinese Yuan per month. And you had to remember, this was just a part-time job.
Huh? Seems like there's not much difference between part-time and full-time here...
Yang Xiao decided to go check out this 'Broken House.' He felt it was a bit like the Yorozuya from the Gintama anime. The setup was similar; it all depended on the actual operation.
After breakfast, Yang Xiao took advantage of the sunny weather to go to work, put on his shoes, took his keys, and locked the door. The Broken House was less than a kilometer from his apartment building. Yang Xiao walked for less than ten minutes and was already standing at the door of the Broken House.
This Broken House was truly living up to its name. The three characters for "Broken House" on the sign were tattered, as if they hadn't been replaced in over a decade. The rolling shutter door was also closed. Yang Xiao could even make out some dirt and graffiti on it, probably the work of mischievous kids.
The Broken House was located in an alley. There was a telephone pole right outside the shop. Yang Xiao could smell a faint stench under the pole—who knew which scoundrel had urinated there.
In the middle of the shutter door, two large black characters read "Hiring." Clearly, these words had been there for a while, but it seemed no one was willing to come work here?
Yang Xiao felt a bit discouraged. This Broken House was definitely an unmanaged shop. Even the boss was probably very lazy; how else could you explain the scene in front of the shop?
Forget it, since he was here, he might as well check out the situation first. Yang Xiao walked to the shutter door, knocked on it with his hand, and waited for a response.
After a few minutes, there was no sound from inside the Broken House. Yang Xiao knocked again, this time putting more force into it and knocking for longer.
"Who is it! So noisy this early in the morning!" Sure enough, Yang Xiao's method worked. A somewhat irritable voice came from behind the door.
A few seconds later, the shutter door was pulled up. A man with silver hair and a toothpick in his mouth looked at Yang Xiao blankly. "Huh? Not a brat?"
"What do you want?" Finding that Yang Xiao wasn't one of the brats he despised, the silver-haired man became somewhat polite.
The 'brats' referred to children under ten. They usually liked to draw on his shutter door and even pee under the telephone pole outside. The smell really wasn't pleasant.
Silver hair? Yang Xiao was stunned. Was this really the owner of the house? Although his appearance was somewhat similar to a certain character from a manga, there were differences. At the very least, this owner looked more... decadent.
"Are you the owner of the Broken House?" Yang Xiao asked, covering his nose with his hand. The smell from under the telephone pole was drifting over.
"I am. Come in and talk..." The silver-haired man invited Yang Xiao inside and then pulled the shutter door back down.
The light inside was very dim. After the silver-haired man turned on the light, Yang Xiao could clearly see the interior of the Broken House. It could be described as... unique. It was incredibly messy. It didn't look like an office at all, more like a private room.
"Heh, don't mind the mess," the silver-haired man had already guessed some of Yang Xiao's purpose but still asked, "What brings you here?"
"Oh, right," Yang Xiao nodded and said, "I saw your hiring notice posted online, so I thought I'd come see if I can apply?"
"Yes, of course you can! You can start work tomorrow," the silver-haired man said immediately, excitement in his eyes.
Yang Xiao should have been happy, but seeing this guy's expression and attitude, he felt that coming to work here might not be a good thing.
"By the way, I forgot to introduce myself. My name is Shi Yin, you can call me Gin-san. I can offer you 70,000 yen a month, paid monthly, no credit issues." Shi Yin said this very smoothly, as if he'd said it countless times.
70,000 yen was equivalent to about 4,200 Chinese Yuan. Not bad for a part-time job. But Yang Xiao always felt this Broken House was a bit strange, like stepping into a wolf's den.
Seeing Yang Xiao still hesitating, Gin-san said directly, "Three meals a day are included! Three meals!"
"Deal! I'll come to work tomorrow!" Yang Xiao agreed without a second thought. He hadn't even fully considered the three-meals-a-day factor. In most workplaces, getting two meals a day was good; three meals were basically unheard of.
Some places even only provided one meal a day—lunch—and you had to solve breakfast and dinner yourself.
"Come report at 8 AM tomorrow. Alright, I'm going back to sleep. You can head off now." Gin-san yawned.
Yang Xiao said goodbye and left. Although he knew there might be some problems with this Broken House, he couldn't afford to be picky. The money he had left could only sustain him for three or four more days at most. After that, he'd be starving.
Now it was fine. The house provided three meals a day. Regardless of the food quality, he couldn't refuse this noble job just because of three meals a day.
"Kid, it's rare for an applicant to show up here. How could I not use some tricks to snag him?" Usaki Gin (Shi Yin) smiled slyly, stretched, went to his desk, put his feet up, picked up his phone, and made a call: "Hey, boss, I'm hiring an employee. Starting tomorrow, we need monthly meal deliveries. Just deliver them. Remember, one meat dish, two vegetable dishes is enough. Less meat, more veggies, make it cheaper."
"Congratulations, House Owner. I'll deliver it to you tomorrow," a man's voice came from the other end of the line. After a moment's thought, he still warned, "By the way, House Owner, you should be more generous this time. You're already reducing the meat portion for each dish. I doubt it'll last."
"You just focus on cooking. Otherwise, why don't you pay my salary? I get three meals a day, why do I need so much meat? Isn't it enough if I can just eat?" Usaki Gin's voice grew louder.
"Alright, alright, don't worry, I'll deliver the food on time tomorrow." The boss said, half exasperated, and hung up. What he hadn't expected was that Yashiroki (Shi Yin) was actually providing three meals for the employee this time. No wonder he wanted to reduce the meat portion. After all, the business at the shoddy house had been slow for a while.
The most important thing was that Usaki Gin was lazy and didn't clean up the shop regularly. Who would want to come to such a messy environment?