Mr. "Mi"'s Wealth

Li Qiang, a deliveryman struggling on the edge of the city, has recently become the "Mr. Mi" of his community. Not because his rice bin is full, but because he always says "mi" instead of "yuan" when he speaks. At first, people laughed at his accent, but later they discovered that the unit displayed on his phone when making payments had also become "mi." Unable to explain it, he simply went along with it, jokingly calling himself a "rice farmer in the digital age."

Li Qiang's life was originally as bland as water. He got up early and worked late, shuttling through congested streets, delivering all kinds of packages. His greatest pleasure was to watch short videos during his lunch break, where those glamorous internet celebrities seemed to live in a parallel universe. Until one day, he discovered that the influencers in the videos had also begun using "mi" to calculate their income.

What’s even stranger is that he discovered that the unit of his account balance displayed when he made mobile payments had also become "mi". At first, he thought his phone was broken, but after trying several phones, even old-fashioned button phones, the unit displayed was still "mi." He went to the bank, and the counter lady stared at him as if he were an alien, saying it was a newly launched "metaverse currency unit," designed to give everyone a more concrete understanding of wealth. Li Qiang found it absurd. He worked hard all day as a courier, only earning a few dozen "mi." What exactly was "mi"? Could it buy rice?

He tried to buy things, and the convenience store owner also used a calculator to calculate in "mi." Li Qiang spent two hundred "mi" to buy a bag of rice, and the owner gave him thirty "mi" in change. He found that the exchange rate between "mi" and "yuan" didn't seem to be fixed, sometimes high, sometimes low.

Mr. "Mi"'s reputation spread. Some were curious, some laughed, and some treated him like a walking "mi" bank. Every day he received all sorts of strange payments, some were one "mi" tips, some were hundreds of "mi" transfers, with all kinds of notes attached. He even received an anonymous transfer with the note "You're hilarious." For some unknown reason, Li Qiang also started doing things he never dared to do before: he went to an upscale restaurant and paid with "mi." Although the waiter was puzzled, he still accepted it. He even used one thousand "mi" to buy himself a month's membership at a premium gym.

Li Qiang discovered that "mi" seemed to be a completely new form of currency, freely circulating in the metaverse. He couldn't understand it, but he found that he was suddenly "richer" than before. One day, he was walking down the street when he saw a familiar figure, the internet celebrity he used to watch. She was crying to the camera, saying that the "mi" she received from live streaming rewards had devalued again, and her life was a mess. She was crying her heart out, just like Li Qiang used to be.

Li Qiang smiled. He took out a crumpled paper bill from his pocket. The unit on it was still "yuan". He handed the bill to the influencer, "Forget the mi, take this and go buy yourself a bowl of hot noodles." The influencer was stunned. Li Qiang turned and left. The sun was shining on him, and he felt lighter than ever before. It turned out that those ethereal "mi" were never wealth at all. Real wealth was the "yuan" that could buy a bowl of hot noodles, the solid life itself. And he, the former deliveryman, finally understood it.