Chapter 273: Qin Huairu's Action

In the Steel Rolling Mill of '62, the machines' thunderous roar seemed to carry a hint of long‑missed vigor.

The cafeteria's meals had improved; though far from sumptuous, the slightly thicker porridge, the bun without bran, and the occasional whiff of oiliness all seemed to inject a shot of stimulant into this steel beast.

The workers' faces showed a bit more color, and their backs seemed a little straighter as they walked.

In this man‑dominated world, saturated with the scent of steel and sweat, Qin Huairu was like a supple vine, silently searching for the cracks on which to survive.

She could no longer stay in the Workshop. The blueprints were indecipherable, the parts were iron mountains, Yi Zhonghai's protection was limited, and the foreman's cold stares and the coworkers' faint jeers made her feel as if sitting on a bed of needles.

She knew she wasn't cut out for a technical job; that meager salary, meant to fill the three hungry mouths of the Jia Zhangshi family and the bottomless pit of a greedy old woman, was nothing more than a drop in the bucket.

She had to find another way. And the cafeteria, the most mixed‑crowd spot in the whole plant and the place where "transactions" happened most easily, became her new hunting ground.

That noon, the cafeteria was a roar of voices. Workers lined up with aluminum lunchboxes, eyes fixed on the meager morsels visible through the window.

Qin Huairu did not join the line; she carried her own washed‑out lunchbox, containing two buns mixed with wild greens and a spoonful of braised cabbage without any oil flecks.

She chose a spot near a corner, a place of constant traffic, and sat down without immediately picking up her chopsticks, merely lowering her head and idly fidgeting with the vegetable leaves in the box.

She had deliberately tidied herself today. Her work clothes, washed clean to the point of paling, accentuated her increasingly slender waist; her hair was neatly combed and tied into a crisp bun at the nape, revealing a strip of pale, delicate neck; the lingering sorrow in her drooping brows and eyes, in this setting, oddly transformed into a pitiable charm.

She knew her advantages: youth, a regular appearance, and, most importantly, she was a newly widowed mother with a young child, in a hard situation. This status, in the eyes of some opportunistic men, was a nuisance—but also possibly… an opportunity.

Sure enough, before long someone approached. It was Guo Dapiezhi from the Workshop, a thirty‑something, broad‑shouldered, rotund bachelor. He carried a lunchbox that surprisingly held a rare white‑flour mantou and even a few glossy slices of fatty meat.

"Qin… Master Qin, is anyone sitting here?" Guo Dapiezhi grinned, showing a set of yellow teeth, his gaze flicking over Qin Huairu.

Qin Huairu lifted her head, forcing a strained, detached smile onto her face: "No one, Master Guo, please sit."

Guo Dapiezhi plopped down, nudging the lunchbox toward the center of the table, his tone boastful: "The cafeteria improved today, got a good dish! This white mantou smells great! Master Qin, will you eat this?" He pointed at the half‑black, half‑yellow bun in Qin Huairu's box.

"Hmm, I'm used to it," Qin Huairu said softly, her voice numb with resignation; her eyes flicked quickly to the white mantou, her throat made a slight movement, and that subtle swallow landed squarely in Guo Dapiezhi's sight.

Guo Dapiezhi felt a surge inside, a mix of bravado and lewd intent. He pushed the white mantou toward Qin Huairu again: "Hey, that bun isn't fit for people? Here, you take this mantou! I've got more!"

Qin Huairu recoiled as if scalded, pulling her hand back sharply, shaking her head repeatedly, her face showing panic and stubbornness: "No, no, Master Guo, that's not allowed… I can't take your thing…"

The more she refused, the more Guo Dapiezhi's thoughts stirred. He took it as a woman's shyness, a modesty.

"Hah! Why so polite to me?" Guo Dapiezhi lowered his voice, leaning forward, a whiff of sweat and tobacco on him, "It's just a mantou! Look at you, working so hard in the Workshop, you have no strength to eat that!"

His hand seemed to "accidentally" reach to cover Qin Huairu's hand placed at the table edge.

At the moment his fingertips were about to touch, Qin Huairu, like a startled rabbit, sprang up, nearly toppling her lunchbox. Her face drained of color, her eyes reddened slightly, her voice trembled, yet was loud enough for the nearby tables to hear: "Master Guo! Please have some self‑respect! I… I could starve, but I cannot take a man's thing for free!"

After speaking, she lifted her lunchbox and, without looking back, hurried away; that thin silhouette, in the noisy cafeteria, appeared especially resolute and pitiful.

Guo Dapiezhi's outstretched hand froze mid‑air, his face flashing pale and then flushing. A few strange glances from around made him feel like sitting on needles. He had intended to gain a verbal and material advantage, but Qin Huairu's strong reaction left him feeling neither inside nor out.

Qin Huairu hurried out of the cafeteria, leaning against the cold wall, breathing lightly. The panic and humiliation of that instant were real, but the greater feeling was the cold after a successful calculation.

She could not give anyone the impression of being easy to take; once people thought she was "cheap", she would truly be worth nothing. She had to erect a "poor yet fierce" façade, so that those men would both think of her and yet dare not act rashly.

In the following days, Qin Huairu, like an experienced hunter, repeated similar scenes in the cafeteria, this special hunting ground.

The targets were usually male workers with decent wages, light family burdens, or extra connections to obtain something good. Sometimes it was Liu Pangzi from the cafeteria, who could give her an extra half‑spoon of oily vegetables; sometimes it was the transport team driver Lao Zhao, who could quietly slip her two slightly bruised apples from the cafeteria's internal handling; sometimes it was the warehouse keeper Xiao Wang, who could let her "pick up" some leftover labor‑protection gloves.

Her methods were largely the same. She always appeared at just the right moment within the target's sight, displaying her hardship and fragility, provoking the other's sympathy and a hidden desire.

When the other party tried to use food or small favors as a bargaining chip for closeness, she always showed panic and refusal, holding fast to a line that seemed fragile but was firmly controlled by her.

She only accepted help that was "impossible to refuse", bearing a "comrade‑care" nature, and she never accepted it in a private setting alone; it was always in public, and she would always give a trivial "price"—such as mending a worn cuff for the other, or washing an old work uniform.

She employed this aloof yet virtuous high‑level technique, maneuvering cautiously. One white mantou could earn her the chance to mend three or five pieces of clothing; two apples could earn her help in stripping and washing a quilt.

What she gave was only a little time and effort, but what she received was solid food and pocket money enough to fill her children's stomachs.

She knew what those men's gazes concealed. She felt disgusted and scared. Every night returning to that cold home, watching her sleeping child and the old woman counting the meager "harvest", her heart felt like a block of ice pressing down.

But she was even clearer that between toiling to death in the Workshop without earning enough to feed her child, and this current, though humiliating, yet more "efficient" way of survival, she had no choice.

Yi Zhonghai vaguely knew some of it, but chose silence. As long as Qin Huairu didn't cause any misconduct and didn't affect the yard's or his reputation, this "one hits, the other takes" private deal was something he could turn a blind eye to, even feeling that Qin Huairu had finally "woken up", using her advantage to profit the Jia Zhangshi family, sparing him from constantly being forced by Jia Zhangshi to open his wallet.

The cafeteria's clamor persisted daily. Qin Huairu weaved through it like a nimble fish in murky waters, precisely snatching the tiny floating bits that could keep her and her children alive.

The sorrow on her face remained, but beneath that fragility her gaze gradually solidified into a cold, hard core belonging to a survivor.

This road is hard, strewn with thorns and traps, but for that bite of food, she can only grit her teeth and walk forward step by step.

This silent transaction is the tiny yet crucial survival crack she has torn open for herself and her children in desperation.