He Desheng was extremely excited as he continued speaking. “Boss Pei, you made a brilliant move!
“If we had entered into proper negotiations with them, they would not have paid us so much money. Instead, they would have kept trying to oppress us, bargain, and push the price down.
“Yet, your resolute rejection made them realize that we would not have entered any negotiations or business discussions with them!
“In other words, two simple words from you earned us another twenty million US dollars!
“Boss Pei, each word from you was worth ten million US dollars! In fact, each letter was worth about three million US dollars or twenty million RMB!
“Boss Pei, you embody the principle that words are valuable!”
One tael[1] of gold was now worth 17,500 yuan in the market. Since each letter from Boss Pei was worth twenty million, his words were indeed worth a thousand taels of gold.
What’s more, it was each letter that was worth a thousand taels of gold, and then some.
Pei Qian felt his limbs go numb. He silently sipped his coffee and said, “So… we don’t have management rights of IOI’s local server anymore, do we?”
He Desheng’s eyes widened in shock. “Boss Pei, Dayak Corporation has already gone to such lengths to buy the shares from us, and yet you’re still unwilling to let them have the management rights?
“There’s no need for that! They were already so desperate that they resorted to a squeeze-out. The price already includes their compensation for breach of the agency contract. We’ve already earned a significant amount!”
Pei Qian fell silent.
Once He Desheng finished reporting the good news, he placed the documents on the table and said, “Boss Pei, if you have no further questions, I will inform Shang Yang Games of the good news, finish up the handover, and then toss the mess out of our hands!
“Boss Pei, your battle strategy has really taught me a lot!
“I’ve benefited significantly—I really have!”
Before He Desheng left, he stabbed Pei Qian one more time.
The hand that Pei Qian was using to hold his coffee cup trembled non-stop. He set the cup back down, picked the document up, and read it again nervously. After that, he started calculating.
He had just made five hundred million yuan, which he could convert into five hundred thousand yuan. However, he had also just lost his loss-incurring machine, IOI’s local server.
It had taken a lot of effort for him to find a stable and boundless avenue to spend money, but it had been snatched from his hands!
Pei Qian was beyond furious.
Most importantly, the loss-incurring tool would have been very useful to him but absolutely useless to Dayak Corporation.
Do you guys have so much money to waste that you would do something to hurt others, even when it doesn’t benefit yourselves?
Pei Qian had been in a good mood earlier, feeling like he was formidable because of his lack of desires. He had thought that, no matter what Dayak Corporation did, he would not be hurt.
Yet, now, Pei Qian realized how wrong he had been. They had harassed him using a squeeze-out and caused a lot of damage to him!
Dayak Corporation, I’m going to freaking fight to the end with you! Alright, you want to hurt me? I won’t let you off! I’ll make sure to take revenge within two months!
Pei Qian picked up his coffee and gritted his teeth.
…
…
In the afternoon…
At Shang Yang Games…
After receiving the news from He Desheng, Ye Zhizhou and the others began preparing to hand over IOI’s local server.
As Wang Xiaobin organized the documents, he said emotionally, “What are we going to be in charge of next?”
Ye Zhizhou shook his head. “I don’t know. I think it’s safe to say that we have done a good job of carrying out Boss Pei’s plan now, right? Next, we should take a good rest and start planning for the next game.”
Wang Xiaobin: “Did you understand a word that He Desheng said today?”
Ye Zhizhou shook his head. “How would I? Broadly, I just know that Boss Pei had it all figured out. He dealt so well with Dayak Corporation that he earned twenty million US dollars with just two words.
“Now that I think about it, I wonder if Boss Pei already knew that all of this would happen when he bought the shares in Finger Games.
“Look: when Finger Games was at its lowest point, he bought twenty percent of their shares for less than three million US dollars. He even managed to obtain the management rights of their local server.
“After that, he tasked the core members of Tengda Games with researching and developing GOG, using IOI to create dog-eat-dog competition and as a stepping stone for GOG.
“During this period, no matter how much Finger Game’s value increased, Boss Pei held on tightly to his shares without showing any signs of wanting to sell them.
“Then, he made us manage the local server and fight head-to-head with GOG. Finally, he milked every drop of value from IOI’s local server, gained a huge gamer base, and won all of them over with GOG.
“Once IOI ceased to be of any use to him, Dayak Corporation made a move to acquire Finger Games. With two words, Boss Pei managed to earn twenty million US dollars—about twenty times his initial investment.
“Just look at that. Every bit of resources had been put to good use, and none of it was wasted!”
Wang Xiaobin could hardly believe it. “According to what you said, Boss Pei must have been able to foresee that Dayak Corporation would acquire Finger Games. That doesn’t seem possible, right?”
Ye Zhizhou answered, “It’s impossible for him to know for sure that it would happen—who would have been able to? I can only guess that half of it was foresight and half of it was pure luck.
“Think about it. Finger Games wanted to push IOI out to the rest of the world, but they lacked the money to do so and could not market it fast enough. Of course, they would have to sell the company to a bigger one that would have enough money to fight in the global market.
“At the same time, a bigger company that wanted to acquire Finger Games would surely want a hundred percent of the shares! No matter which big company it would be, Boss Pei was probably confident that he could earn a huge sum from them!
“It was just a matter of chance that Dayak Corporation was the one who got hurt. It’s really satisfying!
“Dayak Corporation is a malignant tumor in the gaming industry, and everyone knows that!
“I think that, mixed within Boss Pei’s ‘f*ck off’ and the seventy million US dollars that he snatched from them, there was a hint of righteous anger.
“Perhaps Boss Pei would not have been so harsh and aggressive if it had been some other company. Maybe he would have said several polite things to this other party and sold his shares for fifty to sixty million US dollars.
“Dayak Corporation, though… hehehe.”
Wang Xiaobin fell into deep thought and then nodded. “That makes sense!
“Boss Pei is a game developer who takes his games as art pieces. He probably hates malicious companies like Dayak Corporation to the core, and so he’s taking this opportunity to cuss at it and deal damage to it!
“Awesome! So awesome!
“Based on that analysis, we shouldn’t say that Boss Pei had everything planned out; he was practically controlling a wealthy multi-national corporation in the palm of his hand!
“He’s probably the only game developer who has achieved something like that!”
Ye Zhizhou smiled. “Boss Pei is no ordinary game developer. He’s also a business genius and an investor! One man’s wisdom could control the entire think tank of Dayak Corporation in the palm of his hand!”
As the two men continued discussing, they increasingly realized how amazing Boss Pei’s plan had been and could not help but feel awestruck.
The disappointment they had been feeling about IOI’s local server had completely dissipated by now. Since all of this had been planned by Boss Pei, what was there to be upset about?
Being able to play such an important role in his plans was their honor!
When they finished discussing, they suddenly saw a familiar figure entering the room.
“Boss Pei?”
Ye Zhizhou and Wang Xiaobin were shocked.
Speak of the devil! They had just been talking about Boss Pei, and here he was!
Boss Pei’s expression was extremely dark as he walked towards the conference room. “Meeting, everyone!”
Ye Zhizhou and Wang Xiaobin exchanged a look, feeling like there was something amiss with the atmosphere. They quickly packed everything, picked up their little notebooks, and entered the conference room.
…
Soon, all the core members of Shang Yang Games were gathered in the conference room. They were all confused.
IOI’s local server should have been all settled by now, right? Why did Boss Pei still make a trip down, then? Could they be starting on a new project now?
Boss Pei scanned the group and cut straight to the chase. “Translate GOG into other languages and prepare its international servers. Release it as soon as possible.
“If you have any questions, raise them now.”
Everyone was stunned.
What was going on?
They had just failed in managing IOI’s local server, and yet Boss Pei was trusting them with such an important task like developing GOG’s international servers?
Boss Pei… really trusts us!
After recovering from the initial shock, everyone felt moved!
Although Boss Pei had planned for IOI’s local server to be defeated, a failure was still a failure. At least, it proved that Shang Yang Games was not as good at managing a game as Tengda Games was.
Yet, Boss Pei still trusted them enough to put them in charge of such an important task. How could they not be moved?
Still, as moved as they were, they had to clarify all the management issues upfront. After all, this was no simple task.
Ye Zhizhou was the first to raise his hand. “We might have to release a few special heroes targeted at the overseas gamers, edit some heroes’ concept art…”
Pei Qian immediately said, “I’ll tell Min Jingchao to cooperate with you unconditionally. Come up with heroes that would appeal to the Western audience from now on.”
Lin Wan pondered for a moment and said, “We also have to manage the overseas marketing. As for the actual plan…”
Pei Qian: “You can decide on that.”
Wang Xiaobin slowly raised his hand. “Boss Pei… how much funds will we have?”
Pei Qian took a second to look at everyone else in the room and then said, “Seventy million…”
He paused for a split second and added, “US dollars.”
The entire conference room fell silent.
Five hundred million yuan!
No one dared to doubt Boss Pei’s trust in Shang Yang Games. He had placed the company’s trump card and five hundred million yuan worth of funds into Shang Yang Games’ hands. If they failed again, they would not be able to face Boss Pei!
At the same time, to insiders like Lin Wan and Ye Zhizhou, there was more to this sum of money. Seventy million US dollars was the sum that Boss Pei had won over from Dayak Corporation. Could Boss Pei not be done with his attack on them?
Was this going to be the fatal blow?
Had he sliced off some flesh from Dayak Corporation to start up GOG’s international servers, to win over the IOI’s global market share and turn from passive to active?
Was Boss Pei not going to stop at placing GOG at the top of the MOBA game genre in the country? Was he going to fight for more and cause Dayak Corporation to lose everything after acquiring Finger Games?
Everyone gazed at Boss Pei’s dark expression and detected an intense killing aura. Every step of Boss Pei’s plan was lining up to cause a massacre!
In fact, all of them started to feel nervous for Dayak Corporation.
Dayak Corporation was extremely unlucky to clash with Boss Pei! An infamous multinational corporate giant was now reduced to sashimi on a platter in the hands of Boss Pei.
[1] This is China’s historical name for gold that weighed 37.5 g. It’s a donut-shaped coin with a hole in the center.