The Story of Collecting Fortune Cards

Old Wang was a well-known "Fu collector" in his company. Every year during Alipay's Five Fu collection event, he would get as excited as if he had been injected with chicken blood, searching everywhere. This year was no exception. He opened Alipay on time every day, scanned for Fu characters, watered energy trees, and wished he could poke a hole through his phone screen.

This year was different. Alipay had launched a "Universal Rare Card." The official promotion stated that this card could be used to randomly redeem any Fu card, greatly increasing the probability of collecting all five Fu. Old Wang, of course, was no exception. He put in all his effort, running around, and asking people to scan his Fu characters. Finally, on the last day of the event, he got what he wanted, a golden, sparkling Universal Card.

Old Wang's heart was pounding. He cautiously opened Alipay and clicked to use the Universal Card. A dialog box popped up on the screen: "Dear user, you have chosen to use the Universal Rare Card. Please select the item you wish to redeem."

Old Wang was stunned. This was different from what was advertised. Shouldn't it directly redeem a Fu card? He looked closely and found that besides Fu cards, there were other options: such as "a free lunch," "a free physical checkup," "a movie ticket," "a time-off for overtime," and even "an opportunity to talk to the leader."

Old Wang scratched his head. What was going on? He hesitated and clicked on "a time-off for overtime." He thought that he had been working overtime too much lately, and this was a real godsend.

He happily waited for the system prompt, but what came was a cold line of text: "Redemption failed. Your time-off for overtime has reached the limit. Please choose another item."

Old Wang was completely dumbfounded. There was a limit to time-off for overtime? What absurd rule was this? He was not giving up and tried to redeem a free lunch, but it failed again, the reason being, "Your lunch subsidy has expired." Checkup? Failed, because "Your annual physical checkup has been completed."

He began to feel a little panic. What could this Universal Card actually do? He trembled and clicked on "an opportunity to talk to the leader."

This time, the system did not show a failure but popped up a video call request. Before Old Wang could react, his leader's serious face was already on the phone screen.

"Old Wang, do you have anything to discuss with me?" His leader's voice was as calm as ever.

Old Wang stammered, unable to speak. He wanted to explain that he just clicked by mistake, but facing the leader's gaze, he couldn't utter a word.

"Is there any difficulty at work? You can bring it up," the leader continued.

Old Wang, in a moment of inspiration, quickly came up with a work-related issue as an excuse. The leader listened and responded with a few simple sentences before ending the call.

Old Wang slumped into his chair, feeling exhausted. He looked at the Universal Card on his phone screen and felt it was a huge black joke. He originally thought it was for collecting Fu, but it turned out to be a tool for him to be exploited by the system.

That night, Old Wang tossed and turned in bed, unable to sleep. He suddenly remembered hearing two colleagues chatting while eating at the company cafeteria that day. One said, "I used the Universal Card to redeem two months' salary increase, it went straight into my account, it was so great!" Another said, "I redeemed the early completion of a project, and the boss gave me a week off, I'm so happy!"

Old Wang suddenly sat up in bed. He finally understood that this was not a Universal Card at all, but a magnifying glass for his inner desires. What you truly wanted was all in this card, and what you usually accepted as normal was all priced clearly on this card. And he was only thinking about what he thought he deserved, while ignoring the fact that he was being exploited.

The next day, Old Wang opened Alipay and found that the Universal Card was still there. He took a deep breath and clicked to use it again. This time, he did not choose those petty advantages, but directly chose "Freedom".

The system prompted, "Dear user, you have chosen to redeem freedom, please enter your definition of freedom."

Old Wang smiled. He picked up his phone and slowly typed on the screen: "Refuse overtime, refuse meaningless internal friction, refuse all unreasonable rules."

The screen flashed instantly, and then the phone went black. Old Wang thought his phone was broken. He shook the phone, but it was still black. He pressed the power button, and the phone started again. The Alipay app was gone. He looked at the empty phone screen in confusion. He knew that he was finally free.