The City of Terror
chapter-10

Chapter 10 – Financial Straits

The environment inside the high-voltage electric room was not very good. The rows of power cabinets emitted heat, causing the entire room temperature to be higher than the temperature above ground by 10-20 degrees.

In short, a person could comfortable sleep here while wearing sleeveless clothes in winter, while the temperature in summer would reach 50 degrees.

In Wei Xiao Bei’s words, this place was not a place for humans.

The only thing that brought cooling was the small air conditioner beside the monitor on the table.

Wei Xiao Bei took the chance to check the night shift records while Tian Xue Cun was changing his clothes. Luckily, nothing was wrong.

Wei Xiao Bei waited for Tian Xue Cun to finish changing and saying goodbye before he began making his rounds in the high-voltage electrical room.

He took the day shift record book and begun to copy the values of the power cabinets, converters, etc. After that, he sat down in front of the monitor and rubbed his stomach, feeling a bit hungry.

Why am I hungry again?

He grabbed the mop and went to the toilet. He washed it and brought it back to begin cleaning the room.

After one round of cleaning, he looked at the spotless electrical room, feeling cheerful about it. Any good results born from human effort would make people happy.

He looked outside to see if there was anyone around before closing the door. Then, he began hitting the sandbag behind the door.

Wei Xiao Bei only had a few hobbies such as reading light novels, playing games and training his body, like hitting the sandbag.

This sandbag was secretly brought in by Wei Xiao Bei. Other people would treat the work inside the electric room as a pleasant task. They just needed to sit down, stay idle, walk around the room and work without leaving their station. The night shift could even sleep during their hours. This would be a  wonderful job for anyone, except for the unbearable heat.

Wei Xiao Bei was different. He felt that working there was too dull, so he had no choice but to find a way to have fun.

As a result, he decided to train his body, which was not even a bad choice.

If he did not do this, his body would have already been a complete wreck.

‘Exercising while releasing electricity could slowly stimulate the growth of his strength and agility’, was it?

Wei Xiao Bei remembered the description of his special skill.

Let’s try it and see if there are any results.

Wei Xiao Bei’s heart shook. His skin felt a bit numb as he felt the electricity moving throughout his body.

Pa! Pa! Pa!

However, it did not take long for him to realize that maintaining electrical output while exercising was actually very draining.

He weakly sat back down on the chair after about a hundred punches.

The feeling of the electricity going through his body remained as the muscles in his body trembled.

This kind of feeling felt very unpleasant.

Wei Xiao Bei was not yet adapt in using the special skill. As a result, his body suffered a bit while using it when boxing.

Groan. Half an hour had passed. I should go copy down the numbers again.

Wei Xiao Bei endured the pain and tried to pick up the pen.

Just as his hand approach the pen, a spark appeared between his hand and the pen. It was very small but it was visible.

His hand numbed a bit as he pulled it back.

He had already stopped releasing electricity, so he was bewildered at what had just happened.

Looking  at his hand and then again at the pen, he thought for a bit before picking up the pen again.

This time, a spark did not appear so he guessed that it must have been the static electricity that accumulated in his body.

Wei Xiao Bei recorded down the values in the monitor while his brain tried to make out an explanation.

There was one thing he understood; the steel plate on the ground must have had a bit of static electricity and it had passed though his body. There was simply no way for his body to accumulate enough electricity to release a spark.

He understood this point even though he had only been working as an electrician for 3 months.

The high-voltage room’s floor was made of steel plates that were elevated by half a meter. Doing this would not only make it easier to manage the cables, it would also protect the power cabinets and prevent the accumulation of static electricity.

Static electricity was the bane of electrical rooms. If the place did not use steel plates, he might have fainted from the discharged accumulated static electricity in his body the moment he left the place.

This was not even a joking matter since this had actually happened in other places that did not use these steel plates.

After using these steel plates, the amount of these incidents happening had become close to none. The thicker the steel plate, the quicker it would direct away the accumulated static electricity in the body.

Wei Xiao Bei walked as he once again recorded the numbers in the rows of power cabinets again.

The power cabinet was covered in thick rubber pieces. This was a safety measure used in order to prevent the electrician from being electrocuted.

Wei Xiao Bei took one step and suddenly sensed something wrong with his body as a numbing pain began assaulting his body.

An electrician would be very familiar with this phenomenon.

This was the feeling of having an electric current pass through the body.

It seems that spark that happened when I touched the pen was not an illusion.

My control over this special skill must still be quite bad.

He looked at his hand that was glowing with electric light as he touched the metal covering of the power cabinet. Wei Xiao Bei’s mind was in disarray as he tried to think of a way to train his control over the electric current.

When he walked to the front of the two meter tall voltage converters, he suddenly felt the hidden fearsome energy hidden inside the transformers. He felt an indescribable reverence towards the huge electrical energy stored within it.

Wei Xiao Bei always felt that time passed by quickly in his day shift. He would just record the data in the monitors and follow Engineer Zhang’s instructions to turn on or off some of the electrical circuit switches. He often passed the time with satisfaction, making him feel the shortness of time.

The only problem he felt was that during noon time, his stomach became extremely hungry.

Originally, a 3.5 yuan box meal was already enough to fill his stomach. Now, he had to buy 5 boxes before he was full.

Damn!

Wei Xiao Bei became slightly anxious at the amount he was eating.

He had eaten through 17.5 yuan for lunch. If this continued on, wouldn’t his three meals cost him 45 yuan?

Wei Xiao Bei had just finished his probationary work period and became a full time employee. But, the monthly wage was only 1200 yuan. Although this amount was not small in his hometown, in Cui Hu City, 1200 yuan would eventually become 200 yuan due to rent, food expense and other expenses.