The paternal aunt’s family was not wealthy. After being laid off, the couple opened a small shop, but business was slow. Their daughter, Huang Qian, was in the eighth grade, and the private middle school tuition was a huge expense. While they might have managed to save a little, it was merely a drop in the bucket against a terminal illness. Now, the couple had one person hospitalized and the other providing care; the shop was closed, and their source of income had vanished.
“Uncle, a friend of mine is getting an injection downstairs. I’ll go check on him and be right back.”
The aunt’s husband nodded. “Okay, go take care of that.”
Having concocted an excuse to leave the ward, Wang Zhuo went downstairs to the hospital cashier's office and handed over all the seventy-nine thousand yuan he had brought with him.
As he left the cashier, a kind, elderly woman stopped him. “Young man, paying out so much money at once, the doctors will surely use the most expensive medicine on your relative—it’s not cost-effective.”
Wang Zhuo thanked the well-meaning woman and strode back, murmuring to himself, “If it’s expensive, so be it. Saving a life is the priority.”
He located his aunt’s chief physician and explained his intentions: he wanted the best private room for his aunt and the finest medication, regardless of the cost.
The chief physician looked surprised. “If we use imported drugs, the daily treatment cost will run into several thousand yuan. Are you authorized to make this decision?”
Wang Zhuo spread the receipt for seventy-nine thousand yuan and pushed it toward the doctor. “Please pass this to the patient’s family. I’ll trouble you to handle the private room arrangements.”
Seeing the substantial payment receipt, the chief physician asked no further questions. He instructed a nurse to check on the room availability and told Wang Zhuo, “I will immediately rewrite the prescription for the patient, and we’ll secure the room as quickly as possible. You go attend to your business.”
“Thank you, Doctor.” Wang Zhuo shook the doctor’s hand with a subtle firmness. “I will return tomorrow.”
The doctor nodded and escorted Wang Zhuo to the door. From the grip of Wang Zhuo’s handshake, he understood the unspoken message: the hongbao (red envelope/bribe) would arrive tomorrow.
Leaving the doctor’s office, Wang Zhuo bypassed his aunt’s room and pulled out his phone to dial his uncle’s number.
“Uncle, don’t sell the house just yet. I’ve covered some of the hospitalization fees for Auntie; it should last for a while.”
His uncle sounded astonished. “Wang Zhuo, where did you get the money? How much did you pay?”
“I paid seventy-nine thousand. I gave the receipt to the doctor; he’ll give it to you. And don’t worry about the hongbao either; I’ll bring it to him tomorrow.”
His uncle was clearly shaken. Seventy-nine thousand was no small sum, and he knew Wang Zhuo’s financial situation well. Where could he have gotten so much money? “Wang Zhuo, how can we possibly take your money? Besides, where exactly did this money come from?”
“Heh, Uncle, don't worry,” Wang Zhuo fabricated the simplest and most effective excuse. “I won it in the lottery. There’s more where that came from. Your nephew hit the jackpot! Just focus on taking care of Auntie’s treatment. We are not short on cash now!”
The uncle fell silent. The moment he received the diagnosis notice, he had foreseen the result: the ruin of their family. He could not bring himself to refuse this timely, life-saving gift.
“Uncle, stop worrying about the money. Also, I’ve asked the doctor to arrange a private room for Auntie. Please, do not refuse. I’m heading back to school now; I’ll be back tomorrow.”
Hanging up, Wang Zhuo was already reaching the hospital entrance. The lie that deceived others also served as a reminder to himself. He made a sharp turn and walked into the lottery station located right next to the hospital.
Some people always say that the poor have their own joys, and the rich have their own sorrows, that the rich aren’t actually happier than the poor. Right now, Wang Zhuo desperately wanted to spit in the faces of those people and roar at them: The rich can afford treatment when they are sick; the poor just wait to die when they are sick. Are you happy waiting to die?
Life is just that cruel. Money isn’t everything, but without it, everything is impossible! Wang Zhuo, having just acquired tens of thousands of yuan, immediately felt the benefit of money. Money could prevent his aunt’s family from being thrown onto the streets; money could alleviate his aunt’s suffering; money might even save her life! But if you have no money, the hospital will kick you out immediately!
Therefore, Wang Zhuo didn't think about anything else; he had only one goal: to earn money!
Inside the lottery station, thick smoke hung in the air, and a few seasoned smokers were puffing away, creating a rather heavy atmosphere.
Wang Zhuo distinctly felt that the vibe here was different from other stations, but he quickly understood: these people were likely families of patients, weighed down by crushing treatment costs, trying their luck with the lottery.
Wang Zhuo found a chair and sat down, positioning himself directly facing the boxes of scratch-off tickets. He grabbed a discarded newspaper from the table, pretending to read, while his sharp X-ray vision darted out, searching for winning tickets.
Scratch-offs had many ways to win: level-clearing, matching numbers, or symbol groupings. Wang Zhuo disdained the small prizes; he skipped anything under five hundred yuan. After half an hour, he finally spotted a big win—a third prize worth twenty thousand yuan.
With that discovery, he bypassed even a ticket that might win a thousand yuan. He stood up, spent one hundred yuan to buy a stack of tickets covering several variations of games, including the twenty-thousand-yuan winner.
He pulled out a five-jiao coin, breathed on it, and began to scratch. After revealing the twenty-thousand-yuan ticket, he slammed his hand down on the table with a loud bang.
The noise startled the surrounding people. Just as someone was about to complain, he burst out laughing. “Hahahaha! I won twenty thousand!”
The station immediately erupted. Winning twenty thousand was a rare event, and Wang Zhuo was instantly surrounded by onlookers.
“Make way, make way!” Wang Zhuo forcefully pushed aside those standing closest. Who knew if someone might turn greedy? It was better to be cautious.
He handed the ticket to the station owner. After verifying it was legitimate, the owner unexpectedly said, “Follow me,” and led him into a locked room inside the station.
Seeing Wang Zhuo’s puzzled expression, the owner explained with a chuckle, “My store has a high volume of transactions, so I set this up.”
Saying that, the owner opened the safe inside the room, took out two stacks of hundred-yuan bills, counted out sixteen thousand yuan using a money counter, and paid Wang Zhuo on the spot.
This was slightly unexpected for Wang Zhuo, but he quickly reconciled himself to it. If there were a few regular customers playing large combination bets, the station’s daily turnover could easily reach tens of thousands. A safe was necessary for that amount of cash.
What he didn’t know was that this was also a source of gray income for lottery stations. After redeeming large winning tickets, they could resell them at a markup to corrupt public officials who used this method to launder money. The illicit funds were transformed into legitimate lottery winnings that they could spend openly.
Tucking the money away, just before leaving, Wang Zhuo curiously used his X-ray vision on the safe. He saw the positions of the locking mechanisms with surprising ease.
In other words, that behemoth, weighing at least two hundred kilograms with ten-centimeter-thick steel plates, was an undefended castle before him!
Wang Zhuo gave a self-deprecating smile. He never realized he had a talent for thievery.
Amidst looks of envy and jealousy, Wang Zhuo left the station, immediately hailed a taxi, took a circuitous route to a bank to deposit the money, and then walked into the next lottery station.
He continued this pursuit, capitalizing on his luck, dedicating the entire day to scratch-off tickets.
However, his luck was not as good as the first two times. After visiting over ten stations, he only won ten thousand once, plus a few wins of one or two thousand. By the time the stations closed for the night, he had earned just over thirty thousand yuan.
This left him slightly dissatisfied. It seemed buying lottery tickets wasn't the best way; mining jade was much faster for making money.
Reflecting, Wang Zhuo realized that ever since gaining his X-ray vision, earning money had become incredibly easy. On the first day, he won five thousand from the lottery; the second day, he won eighty thousand from jade speculation; and today, he made over thirty thousand more from the lottery. It was quite effective.
Wang Zhuo collapsed onto the sofa, staring up at the gray ceiling. Having money allowed him to do many things he couldn't before; at the very least, he could get the walls repainted.
Money couldn't change everything, but it could change a lot. The antique television could be replaced with a new one, he could buy a thick padded coat for winter, order takeout when hungry, and maybe even move to a bigger house!
Daydreaming about the happiness of being rich, Wang Zhuo suddenly remembered something vital and shot up from the sofa with a jolt.
Money makes the world go round, and while Wang Zhuo might not be able to find a demon to turn the millstone, he could certainly find someone to help reduce his father’s sentence!