Extraordinary Pedigree.

Chapter 640: Flower of Blood and Bone: One-Dimensional Society I
"Human life is worth living, or ought to be worth living. This judgment is the basis of all intellectual work; it is the premise of social theory; to deny it is to deny the theory itself.

Yes.

If you do no intellectual work of any significance in your life, your life will be meaningless.

Work and labor are topics that humans can never avoid.

But look at our society today.

A highly industrialized and technological social structure in which individual thoughts and behaviors tend to be homogenized, and critical thinking and heterogeneity are suppressed.

Work has been alienated, and, ironically, the more wealth the worker produces, the poorer he becomes, and the greater his productivity and the greater the scope of his production, the poorer he becomes.

In the past, happy was the man who found his own work; for, he needed no other happiness.

Nowadays, many people feel dull and helpless in their daily work and life.

Is their job a good fit for them?
Or, do they have work they are proud of?
Do they take pride and honor in their work?

Can they bring joy to work and bring perfection to the work?

Can they achieve the state where love and skill work together with the expectation that they are creating a masterpiece?

Unfortunately,
—Most people lead lives of quiet desperation.

"Fourteen Inscriptions of Incarnation - Work and Labor"

***********
01: 40 PM.
Edici Federation.

5650 Dolly Ave., Buena Park, Golden State.

The Golden State, the economic heart of the federation, has a GDP of $2.67 trillion, ranking first among all states in the federation. Los Angeles and San Francisco are the second and third largest metropolitan economies in the federation.

When outsiders mention the Golden State, this is the image that comes to mind: On a beach, the sun is glaring, a big blond boy with tanned skin, wearing flowery shorts, carrying a surfboard in one hand and a beer bottle in the other, wearing sunglasses and saying "Hi, beautiful" to a bikini girl lying in the sun next to him, then walking to an old convertible Ford Mustang, getting stuck in traffic on the highway, buying a big bag of Golden State oranges on the way, and driving home to find that his neighbor is a Vinewood star.

Of course, people who don't like it only associate it with massive forest fires, home to 47% of the nation's homeless population, and a stronghold for politically correct lunatics who spout vegetarianism.

If you personify the Golden State, its haters will say it without hesitation: This is a skinny, gender-ambiguous, tattooed left-wing idiot.

It is sometimes so stupid that it can pass laws that defy nature, such as, "To protect Terra, ban the use of plastic straws."

Here, your dog can be taken away by the police for not having complete vaccination certificates, but 600 million illegal immigrants will not.

When the Federation announced that it had entered a semi-normal and semi-abnormal society, the Golden State undoubtedly became an abnormal state.

Today's weather is exactly what people think of the Golden State: the sun is shining, the sky is blue, and there are a few white clouds floating on the horizon.

The sun shines on the huge Amazon warehouse at 5650 Dolly Avenue in Buena Park, and the silver-gray exterior of the warehouse sparkles brightly in the sun.

There was a faint smell of sea salt in the air around us, and occasionally the cries of seagulls could be heard from afar.

The environment around the warehouse seemed extremely busy, with trucks coming in and out of the door from time to time, and loaders sweating profusely in the sun, busy moving various goods.

The factory warehouse itself is a huge building with an off-white reinforced concrete exterior that looks solid and modern.

The huge Yama Zong logo is hung on the exterior wall of the building, which is conspicuous and easy to identify.

The entrance of the factory warehouse is equipped with several spacious unloading areas, equipped with efficient loading and unloading equipment to facilitate the rapid processing of goods.

There is a vast parking lot surrounding the building, which can accommodate a large number of employees and delivery vehicles.

Inside the warehouse, in the main aisle, you can easily spot the dark gray conveyor belt.

Squeak, squeak, squeak————

Squeak, squeak, squeak————

The conveyor belts are constantly running, transporting various goods from one area to another.

They meander along the long passages, like the arteries of the warehouse, transmitting the "vitality" of the warehouse.

On both sides of the conveyor belt, there are several rows of packaging workbenches.

Each workbench is filled with a variety of items, some of which are newly arrived goods, and some of which are already packaged packages.

Workers are busy working at these workbenches, skillfully sorting, packing and labeling goods.

Buzz buzz buzz——

On the packing table, the automatic carton sealing machine makes a rhythmic humming sound, and the packaged goods are arranged in an orderly manner on the conveyor belt, waiting for the next processing.

In the corner of the warehouse, there are stacks of dazzling light yellow storage baskets.

These storage baskets are neatly stacked together and look like a work of art from a distance.

The surface of the storage baskets gleams with a soft light, and each one is polished to an extremely smooth finish.

Workers move storage baskets filled with merchandise onto conveyor belts and let them move along.

Behind each workbench are the diligent workers in the Amazon warehouse.

With their diligent hands, they move back and forth between the workbench and the shelves with ease.

They were wearing blue work clothes, safety helmets on their heads, sweat on their faces, but their hands never stopped moving.

Everyone is concentrating on completing their work, as if the entire warehouse is a huge machine - they are the indispensable parts of this machine.

Among these busy workers, Old Jack was driving a forklift around the warehouse.

Old Jack drove the forklift carefully through the narrow passage, his hands tightly gripping the steering wheel, his eyes fixed on the front, beads of sweat oozing from his forehead.

The forklift made a low roar and moved steadily. The goods in front were stacked neatly, waiting to be moved to the designated location.

Old Jack is an elderly man, and his eyes have become numb from working 80 hours a week.

When he was working, there was no light in his eyes, no humanity in them, his face was covered with deep wrinkles, his eye bags were sunken, and he looked exhausted.

His hands were covered with calluses, showing the marks of years of work.

While moving the goods, he occasionally stopped, wiped the sweat from his forehead, and then continued working.

As the forklift was moving forward, Old Jack noticed that there were a few fewer people in the factory. He muttered to himself, "They are fired again because of the flexible work schedule. It's not the peak season recently, but the supervisor has brought in so many temporary workers and fired them so quickly. What is he doing?"

"Also, I haven't seen the supervisor recently. It seems that Brady is the one who passes messages for the supervisor. That boy... is a bit weird."

He shook his head and continued to operate the forklift, his heart full of confusion and helplessness.

Everything he saw made him feel exhausted, but he had no intention of stopping his work.

Because he knows,
This job is his entire life.

Old Jack opened the goods, and after all the goods arrived at the warehouse, they would be transported together and transferred to the "iron cage".

The iron cage is a shelf that is taller than several people, and different commodities are placed on different levels of different shelves according to their categories.

Every layer of the shelves is filled with a wide variety of goods, from electronic products to daily necessities, from clothing to food.

The iron cages look heavy and cold, and the cage frames are covered with iron mesh, forming narrow passages. Employees shuttle through these passages, busy and mechanical.

After receiving the order, a dedicated employee is responsible for running around the shelves, scanning the items in the order, and putting them into storage baskets.

These employees were wearing uniform work clothes, with scanners hanging around their waists, and operated quickly and skillfully with their hands.

Their eyes were the same as Old Jack's, focused and numb, executing each step like a machine without any extra emotion.

They placed the storage baskets on the conveyor belt, and the storage baskets slid slowly forward as the conveyor belt moved, making a low humming sound.

Conveyor belts carry the storage baskets all the way to the packers on the first floor.

The packers also wore blue work clothes and were packing boxes with their skillful hands.

Each box is labeled with a barcode to ensure that all items can be clearly tracked throughout the process, and anyone can see the barcode to understand the current process of the order.

The packer will pack the boxes one by one according to the order and put all the boxes on another conveyor belt.

These neatly packed boxes gradually disappear from the packers' eyes as they move on the conveyor belt, officially starting their journey of "embracing their owners."

Whether it is a storage basket or a packing box, everything here exudes a cold and mechanized atmosphere.

The workers were like gears on an assembly line, repeating monotonous movements every day, with expressionless faces and no life in their eyes.

Long hours of mechanical labor have made their faces lose their luster, becoming numb and pale, as if they have been corroded by the factory's ruthlessness.

Old Jack put the goods away, got off the forklift, and prepared to start his own packing work.

His movements were quick and precise, and the wrinkles on his face were deeply engraved with the traces of time.

Just as he was about to turn around, he met a tall "new employee".

Old Jack looked at the other person with his somewhat cloudy eyes. He was a handsome young man with blond hair and golden eyes. He was wearing an Amazon work suit, looking neat and energetic.

The blond young man had a handsome face, but he always gave Old Jack a feeling of being exhausted, and his temperament was very similar to that of a certain type of person who was always working at a high frequency without taking a break.

He also noticed that the other person had a silver metal stick on his right ear that looked like an e-cigarette, flashing a faint light.

"Are you new here?" Old Jack asked helplessly.

"Ah."

The fourth sword bearer of the Kingdom of Heaven, who had just traveled thousands of miles from the Blue Grass State through the shuttle channel to the second high-frequency sensing point, nodded.

"Temporary worker?" Old Jack glanced at Xia Xiu, then looked around. He did not see the supervisor, nor Brady, who had recently taken over the management of the working group.

“I am indeed a temporary worker.”

Xia Xiu nodded.

The outfit he was wearing was originally created through [Personal Customization]. At the same time, he also activated the [Don Quixote Module]'s mind influence and [Ground Collapse].

Under the influence of double cognitive distortion, his existence and identity will be rationalized in an unusually tough manner.

Perhaps the description of the Fourth Sword Bearer in Heaven in the weird and abnormal community is correct, and he himself is indeed a huge weirdness.

A gathering of disaster and death.

Mephistopheles walking among men.

Man in black.

Wherever Hugh Abraham went, he was always accompanied by the end.

"Have you received any training?" Old Jack asked.

Xia Xiu shook his head, while Old Jack looked as if he had expected it, with a complaining look on his face.

"Recently, the supervisors have not been following the normal procedures. You temporary workers have been coming in batches, and you are thrown into the work and let the senior staff take charge. You don't teach anything, you don't say anything, and you just throw the trivial matters and conflicts to us employees..."

As he spoke, he couldn't help but glance at the blond young man again and found that he was standing beside him with a meek expression on his face, looking like a college student who had just entered society.

With that unique stupid clarity and sheep-like gentle temperament.

"Oh, it's a good thing he met me. If he met someone else, this seemingly harmless young man would probably be bullied." Old Jack, who has experienced this, thought to himself.

Then, he spoke earnestly to the harmless and easily bullied Fourth Sword Bearer of Heaven:
"You should familiarize yourself with the process today."

"Okay." Xia Xiu adjusted his blue work hat and smiled warmly.

He happened to be very interested in this factory which was full of the atmosphere of "Inner Temple".

Others might not be able to feel it, but Xia Xiu, a Sin-Eater, could feel the breath of a living thing emanating from this factory.

This factory has two mezzanines.

In other words, he has two worlds, the inner and outer worlds, similar to a hub, but somewhat different from a hub.

He could feel that the next incarnation he was looking for was in the inner world, and what he had to do was to find a way to enter the inner world.

What he has to do now is to kill these BYD guys within three days according to the requirements of the extermination order.

Old Jack had no idea what Xia Xiu was thinking. He began to take Xia Xiu to find his own work group and work unit in the factory.

Old Jack began to take Xia Xiu to find his work group and work unit in the factory.

Walking through the long corridor, there are neatly arranged shelves on both sides, and the items on the conveyor belts are moved in an orderly manner under the operation of the workers.

There was a faint smell of ink and cardboard in the air, and the hum of machines running could be heard from time to time.

"Our main job is to pack," Old Jack said as he walked. "We work 10.5 hours a day. Don't talk to me about labor laws and unions. Amazon managers don't like to hear about these things, and they can't stand hearing these things."

He paused, his voice a little tired, "Remember, you have three breaks in the middle. Two of them are no more than 15 minutes, and one is no more than half an hour. For the rest of the time, you can only stand next to the workbench, turn on the robot mode, and repeat the packing work over and over again."

The scene inside the factory came into Xia Xiu's sight, with rows of workbenches piled high with various cartons and packaging tools.

The workers were busy with their heads down, and their hands were operating the packaging process quickly and skillfully.

The order information is displayed on the computer monitor, the printer keeps spitting out labels, and the scanner gun makes a series of "beeping" sounds.

Old Jack continued, "In the beginning, you will only be responsible for packing small and medium-sized single-item orders: packing DVDs or CDs into cardboard boxes, or small boxes into larger boxes. Everything you need for packing can be found on the workbench."

He pointed to the workbench and said, "On the workbench, there is a computer monitor, a printer, and a scanner. They will tell you what you should put into what, and then where to stick it after printing the label."

Xia Xiu looked carefully at the equipment on the workbench. The computer monitor was flashing with order information, stacks of label paper were stacked next to the printer, and scanners were neatly placed aside.

Around the workbench, piles of unpacked cartons and boxes can be seen everywhere, and tapes, rollers and knives are neatly arranged for workers to use at any time.

Old Jack continued his somewhat mechanical words, "During the prescribed working hours, unless an employee applies for medical conditions, he or she is not allowed to sit down during the entire working time."

His voice sounded like it came from a recording device, devoid of any emotion.

Xia Xiu's eyes scanned the surrounding factory environment.

Every employee at each workstation is like a silent gear, turning silently and mechanically repeating the same actions.

The storage baskets and packaging boxes constantly moving on the conveyor belt form a busy yet indifferent picture.

The ceiling lights of the warehouse emitted a dazzling white light, illuminating the entire space, but it was unable to illuminate the numb eyes of the workers.

"In addition, under no circumstances are you allowed to leave your respective workstations without permission."

Old Jack continued, with a hint of fatigue and helplessness in his voice, "If the conveyor belt breaks down, you will find colleagues suddenly running around in the warehouse. They will constantly put new order storage baskets on your workbench and make sure you don't have nothing to do."

Yamazong was well aware of this fact.

Therefore, the employees have no chance to breathe at all.

Their jobs are all linear, they just have to pack, pack and pack.

Everything else can be solved by packaging.

He followed Old Jack to a workbench where an employee-specific tracking wristband was placed.

Old Jack picked up the wristband, handed it to Xia Xiu, and said, "I'm telling you, Amazon has applied for a patent for employee tracking wristbands."

"This is not irony, this is reality."

Xia Xiu took the wristband and felt its weight and texture.

The wristband looks like an ordinary electronic watch, but it has some tiny sensors on the back that seem to be able to sense the wearer's status and activity.

He looked at it carefully before putting the wristband on his wrist.

"You have to remember," Old Jack continued, "this wristband can monitor the employee's work dynamics. When the system detects that the employee is in a 'relaxed' state, the wristband will vibrate continuously and urge the employee to work seriously and efficiently."

There was a hint of helplessness and boredom in his voice.

Old Jack continued: "In the Amazon employee handbook, they boast that the work standards for employees are set to be 'incredibly high'. Take my job as an example. My job goal is nominally to complete 104 orders per hour. But in fact, my assessment goal is at least 120 orders per hour."

"According to the data provided by the intermediary responsible for supervising my packing, my average packing speed is always lower than the packing efficiency tracked in real time according to the desktop display."

Old Jack continued, his voice filled with helplessness and fatigue, "They also temporarily cooperated with several organizations to add several 'eyes in the sky' inside the warehouse. These 'eyes in the sky' are responsible for monitoring the work of employees and notifying them through writing boards whether they have completed their target tasks. Once you reduce your work efficiency, they will come to notify you soon."

"At Amazon, you get two 15-minute paid breaks a day, plus a half-hour unpaid lunch break."

Old Jack continued to explain, "The computer on the workbench is connected to Amazon's product database. When you scan the goods, the system will prompt you what size packaging box you need, print the relevant product labels, monitor your packaging speed, and calculate the number of items you scan per hour."

“For paid breaks and unpaid breaks, you also need to sign out via different barcodes.”

Old Jack said angrily, "I initially thought that the data discrepancy was because the system artificially reduced our packing efficiency, but in fact, when you need to take a paid break and log out of the system, the system's recording does not stop, so it directly lowers the average packing efficiency."

Xia Xiu nodded, a glimmer of understanding in his eyes.

This mechanism actually forces employees to work harder to make up for the decline in performance during the rest period.

"It is in this way that Amazon is able to encourage its employees to work even harder and make up for the poor performance caused by the statutory paid rest period as much as possible."

Old Jack said with a somewhat painful expression:
“With an average of 104 packs per hour, it’s hard to be efficient and fast, but you also have to pick the items in batches and complete a series of operations - picking the right items according to the order, scanning and checking the product details, printing labels, selecting the right size box and completing other packaging preparations until the package is completed, labeled and placed on the conveyor belt to the next destination.”

Old Jack paused and looked at Xia Xiu seriously. “If you want to complete 120 packing tasks per hour, you basically need to complete all the above operations within 30 seconds.”

Xia Xiu couldn't help but point to the "Flexible Work" sign above the factory and asked curiously:

"Flexible working hours, how flexible is it?"

Old Jack sneered:

“Generally speaking, during the peak season when the volume of packages is huge, Yama Zong will employ a large group of people and be flexible when needed.

Flexible working hours basically means adding an extra hour to your working time.

Normally I work a four-hour shift, but when they ask for an extra hour of flexibility, I end up working a five-hour shift.”

"What if you say you don't want to work overtime for another hour?" Xia Xiu asked.

"Amazon uses a point system. For example, if you are late by less than an hour, you get 0.5 points.

If you're more than an hour late, you get one point. If you're absent for almost the entire class, it's 1 points. If you get five points, they give you an attendance warning, which basically says, 'Hey, you're getting kicked out because your attendance is so bad.'

If you accumulate 6 points, they will fire you immediately.

So if I leave an hour or two early, they'll give me those points.

I'm not sure if so-called flexible working hours are part of the plan.

But if I say I don’t want to work overtime, I guess they’ll either say, ‘No, sorry, you’ll have to keep working,’ or, ‘You can go home if you want, but just know you’ll get a few demerit points for it. ’”

At this point, Old Jack couldn't help but spit and curse:
"These byd****** who give birth to babies without anus, they are all *****"

"Flexible work, nml *****"

(End of this chapter)