This scene startled Qin Chu.
There's always a tacit understanding between classmates that outsiders can't interfere with, and Qin Chu and Zhao Yuan are no exception.
That idiot Zhao Yuan always instinctively grabs something to play with with his other hand while doing his homework. Qin Chu doesn't have the habit of capping his pen upside down, so Zhao Yuan always manages to snatch it and play with it.
At first, Qin Chu wasn't used to not being able to find the pen cap, but later he couldn't help but beat the cheeky fellow a few times. After the beating, Zhao Yuan's habit of stealing pen caps didn't change, but whenever he saw Qin Chu look up, he would subconsciously hand over his hand.
Looking at the outstretched hand in front of him, Qin Chu suppressed the rising sense of familiarity.
He was about to thank the hardworking driver when the man in front of him spoke first: "Mr. Lu, if I may be frank, why are you so afraid of being fired by President Qi? Given your situation, you'd probably be better off without him..."
Qi Xuan began his persistent attempts to poach his own partner again.
He looked at Qin Chu with a smile in his eyes, but inside he was seething with jealousy. Forgive him, he simply couldn't understand why his Mr. Gift would fall for Li Hui.
“If you’re willing…” Qi Xuan lowered his eyelashes, concealing the blatant possessiveness in his eyes, “I can help you leave.”
The room was quiet.
What was supposed to be a casual suggestion turned into a flurry of emotions for Qi Xuan after he received no reply from Qin Chu. His heart began to pound with anxiety, a mixture of anticipation and disappointment washing over him, as if what he had uttered was not a tentative question, but a very important request.
With a "click," Qin Chu capped his pen: "President Qi is here, so I won't leave."
Qi Xuan's heart skipped a beat, and his emotions plummeted instantly, but his smile grew even gentler.
President Qi, President Qi, it's all President Qi!
Will he stay as long as President Qi is here? It seems he doesn't need a golden cage at all; he can be kept in check by Li Hui alone?
His emotions were raging so badly that Qi Xuan's entire chest was aching.
For a moment, he desperately wanted to reveal his identity, but he was also afraid that even after learning that he was the real President Qi, this Mr. Lu would still be hung up on Li Hui.
Qi Xuan's eyes grew darker and darker, but in the end he showed nothing. He simply lowered his head, sighed softly, and said in a low voice, "Fine... as you wish."
Li Hui, who was far away in Qi's house, immediately felt a chill run through his body and couldn't help but shiver.
After the driver left, Qin Chu spent a rather boring time in the villa.
"President Qi" didn't come over again, and the Qi family didn't cause any more trouble. Qin Chu's hard work in recording so much information was completely wasted. However, there was one good thing: perhaps because he was too busy, "President Qi" didn't mention asking Qin Chu to leave the villa again.
In this calm before the storm, Qin Chu's phone received a call from an unrecorded number.
Noah cautioned, "Sir, this is probably the number of the second young master of the Qi family. I suggest you don't answer it."
Qin Chu was still pondering when he heard Noah's words and immediately pressed the answer button: "Hello?"
The voice was cold and indifferent. The person on the other end probably didn't recognize her and hesitated for a moment before trying to ask, "Lu Wan?"
After receiving an affirmative answer, the second young master of the Qi family seemed to curse under his breath before continuing, "Has Qi Xuan visited you recently? How is he feeling?"
Upon hearing this question, Qin Chu frowned slightly and tentatively replied, "I came once, but I wasn't in a good mood."
Upon hearing this, Young Master Qi seemed to be thinking about something, and instead of being happy, he hung up the phone with a worried expression.
Noah's face fell: "Sir, why did you accept this? What if President Qi misunderstands that you still have contact with this second young master? The plot could get really dramatic."
Qin Chu didn't care about any of the torture involved: "Know yourself and know your enemy. You can monitor his phone, but you can't monitor his mind."
Thinking about Qi Ershao's behavior on the phone, Qin Chu was a little concerned and asked Noah, "What happened to the Qi family?"
"No?" Noah checked Qi Xuan's condition again. "President Qi is not in danger for the time being."
Qin Chu, however, was somewhat concerned.
Judging from the second young master's condition, it didn't seem like he was going to deal with Qi Xuan, but rather that the entire Qi family was in trouble and he wanted to understand the severity of the crisis by probing Qi Xuan's emotional state.
This is extremely abnormal. The Qi family wants to take Qi Xuan's position, and should be hoping he causes some trouble or makes some mistakes, but now they seem to be in the same boat...
After thinking for a moment, Qin Chu said to Noah, "Someone is trying to deal with the Qi family recently. Keep an eye on our mission progress."
Qin Chu's voice was very firm. Although Noah didn't know the reason, he still accepted the order and pulled up the overall mission progress.
The mission progress bar has reached 80%. According to the information provided by Noah, as long as Qi Xuan avoids one more danger, the mission in this world will basically be over.
Although Qin Chu's mission in this world is only to protect Qi Xuan's life, if Qi Xuan were to step down from his position as CEO of the Qi Corporation, or if the Qi Corporation were to collapse, the probability of Qi Xuan being in danger would increase dramatically.
The mission in this world was progressing unexpectedly smoothly, yet Qin Chu had a vague sense of unease, as if something was missing.
He thought for a moment, then asked Noah, "How did the last self-examination go?"
Noah gets angry whenever he talks about it: "Self-test and external hardware checks showed no problems, no data vulnerabilities or logical errors, and no traces of virus intrusion."
Noah concluded, "Sir, I'm perfectly healthy. The progress of the last small mission was assessed correctly. If there was a problem, it was that General Qi's fault. He appeared terrified, but he's actually overjoyed and might even be head over heels in love with you!"
Qin Chu: "..." He couldn't understand and was deeply shocked.
Noah didn't think it was a big deal.
In the real world, aren't many of Qin Chu's fans the same? They're incredibly unrestrained on the StarNet confession wall, wishing they could tie Qin Chu up and take him home to marry and have children, but when they actually stand in front of Qin Chu, they're so scared that their legs go weak and they can't even stand up straight.
Qin Chu was not persuaded by Noah.
He always felt something was wrong, perhaps because there was no one causing trouble, and the missions in this world were going so smoothly as if there was a conspiracy.
"Monitor the Qi family's movements and Qi Xuan's safety in real time."
-
Qin Chu's prediction was correct.
After a remarkably calm two weeks, Qi's products began to be plagued by various problems and were frequently criticized. First, a batch of already-marketed baby products were found to have excessive levels of heavy metals and bacteria, forcing them to be pulled from shelves; then, a senior executive at the head office was suspected of illegal land transfer and was summoned for questioning; the company's long-standing accounting problems were also uncovered and are currently under investigation…
These problems didn't arise recently; it's clear someone had been meticulously gathering information and gathering leverage over them. But for some reason, this extremely patient individual acted swiftly and decisively within the past month, aiming to crush the entire Qi family in one fell swoop.
However, something happened that Qin Chu didn't expect.
During this crisis, Mr. Qi, who was in the eye of the storm, visited the villa twice more. However, he looked disheveled, each time more haggard than the last.
The last time he came, he hadn't shaved his stubble clean and looked like he was about to go bankrupt.
Out of concern for the task's progress, Qin Chu offered to accompany President Qi.
But when Mr. Qi heard this suggestion, he acted as if Qin Chu was trying to assassinate him. He immediately waved his hand righteously and refused, and hurriedly ran out of the villa.
Watching "President Qi" flee in disarray, Noah exclaimed with great emotion, "Is this what love is? The company is in such big trouble, yet President Qi still remembers to come and see you."
Qin Chu felt no sense of "love" whatsoever. He held a magazine in his hand, still pondering whether he felt a growing sense of unease.
"Could it be the Qi family who did this? Are they willing to sacrifice themselves to bring down Qi Xuan?" Noah, thinking Qin Chu was pondering the crisis facing the Qi family, was also somewhat puzzled. Because the core data of this world he downloaded clearly didn't include this business war scenario.
"impossible."
Qin Chu flipped through a couple of pages of the business magazine in his hand, looking at the sharp drop in Qi's stock price over the past few days, and explained succinctly: "These things have clearly shaken the foundation of Qi's business."
If he wasn't mistaken, the Qi family was now in complete chaos, with no inclination for internal strife whatsoever.
"Then who do you think is targeting the Qi family?"
Qin Chu casually picked up a pen beside him, bit off the cap, and circled a rapidly rising investment company. Kaiheng Investment had previously focused on overseas development, but two years ago it entered the domestic business world. Upon entering, it immediately acquired a piece of land that no one else was optimistic about, but due to policy changes, it resold it and the profit had multiplied several times over.
"But this company has no business dealings with the Qi family, so how could it know so much about the Qi family's internal affairs?"
Qin Chu did not reply to Noah.
He didn't have any solid evidence; he relied purely on intuition.
If I had to say something, it might be because he particularly dislikes the company's logo.
With his eyelids lowered, Qin Chu glanced at the color pages of the magazine, his gaze lingering for a moment on the large, cursive "K".
Chapter 48, The Third Story (8)
"You're back so soon?"
Inside a car parked not far from the villa, Qi Xuan leaned back in his seat, looking at Li Hui who had rushed out of the villa, and said with a smile, "President Qi looks more and more disheveled lately."
Li Hui looked left and right to make sure no media were watching before opening the car door and getting in.
Once inside the car, his expression became even more genuinely somber.
Disheveled? Who made him disheveled? Wasn't it all because of this boss who was so obsessed with his own problems? He just didn't understand, at such a critical moment in the business war, why did he still have to come to the villa to see his mistress?
Li Hui couldn't hold back any longer and asked with a mournful face, "Boss, are we really going to do this? Even if you look down on the Qi family, there's no need to destroy it, right? The Qi family is practically yours now, wouldn't it be better to have another place to make money?"
Although he wasn't the real CEO Qi, watching the profits plummet on the financial statements every day made Li Hui feel like he was going to faint. In the end, this fake CEO Qi seemed to be more distressed than the real CEO Qi Xuan.
After pleading a few more times with a mournful face, Li Hui realized he had only begged in vain.
The person in front clearly wasn't listening to him at all; he simply rolled down the window, leaned half his body against the steering wheel, and stared at the villa in the distance.
"What did he say?" Qi Xuan asked.
These words came out of nowhere, but Li Hui strangely understood them.
This is asking him, seeing how disheveled Mr. Qi looked, what was Mr. Lu's attitude inside?
Li Hui intended to repeat the story truthfully, but paused before he could finish speaking.
He craned his neck, carefully observing Qi Xuan in the driver's seat. Even as he spoke, the man's eyes, carrying a faint smile, remained fixed on the villa.
His gaze was incredibly focused, which could be described as being deeply in love, but it also carried an indescribable sense of obsession, like a cold-blooded animal locking onto its prey. Looking at it for too long made even Li Hui, an observer, feel a chill.
Suddenly, an absurd guess surfaced in Li Hui's mind.
Qi Xuan, their boss, is the founder of Kaiheng Investment and the official CEO of Qi's Group.
This person has been going to great lengths to target the Qi family lately. Could it be that he wants to see how Mr. Lu will react when the Qi family goes bankrupt and Mr. Qi is in such a sorry state?
I want to see if he continues to be devoted to her, or if he will make plans to leave as soon as possible.
Perhaps... Qi Xuan orchestrated all this just to force Mr. Lu to leave?
Upon realizing this, Li Hui's mind went blank.
No wonder they've been pressuring him to come to the villa lately, no wonder they insisted he enter looking "utterly disheveled," even going so far as to have a mask with stubble custom-made...
This is fucking...
Li Hui felt a chill run through his body in the back seat.
He knew Qi Xuan was seriously ill, but he never expected that this person could go to such lengths. The vast Qi family was just a tool to test humanity in his hands.
Li Hui didn't answer for a long time, but the person in the front seat obviously didn't care either.