Time slipped away and passed quickly.
Half a month after Tang Sect changed its name to Great Tang Empire, Tang Xiu felt like his daily life became deeply harrowing. The harem registration stunt his mother pulled and the names of the ladies listed on it had been spread out and known to all members of the Great Tang Empire.
The most distressing part was the fact that even the lady protagonists stated on different occasions and at different times that it was a great honor for them to be registered as harem members of the Great Tang Empire.
There were also some others involved. But one that Tang Xiu had never imagined was Gong Wan'er. She made a statement that she would be faithful and follow the man she married no matter who he was, and getting married to the Sovereign was truly a blessing. Thus, the sudden appearance of the Great Tang Empire's 13 first ladies.
During the last half a month, Tang Xiu spent his daytime busy forming four major regiments and carried out the drills and instructions for them on a daily basis, whereas he spent the nights accompanying the ladies. Even if he just accompanied them and did nothing else, he couldn't help but feel like he was sitting on pins and needles.
I gotta run away.
Eventually, he finally gave in and just left a message to Gu Yan'er and hurriedly set off to Shanghai on a plane. The airport on Nine Dragons Island had been improved during the last 2 years' development and even flight routes from various countries had been running for some time. Therefore, Tang Xiu no longer had to take a flight from Saipan.
In a private jet flying amid the clouds, Tang Xiu sipped fine wine with a slight smile on the corner of his mouth. Only now could he finally relax.
"Master."
Tang Alang came out of the cockpit while holding a thermos pot and put it in front of Tang Xiu. A grin on his face, he said, "Madam Xiaoxue said that porridge works well for stomach and must be served and eaten early. She also said that taking the soup will be great for your body, so Madam Xiaoxue added some congee, saying that not only will it scrape off your fat but also nourish your body and health. That's right, she also said that you've worked hard for half a month and there are some medicines for your kidney added in the Eight Precious Lotus Seed soup as well. She said that it will be very great for you."
Working hard?
Tang Xiu could only feel his scalp going numb. Thinking about it, he indeed worked hard for half a month. Especially because of Kang Xia, Ouyang Lulu, Mu Wanying, and Xue Yu. These four women who accompanied him for four nights and simply turned into hungry wolves and tigers.
"Put this matter off, got it?!"
Tang Xiu then took an array manual he had recently written from the interspatial ring and gave it to Tang Alang. Then, he said, "You've studied the Art of War and familiarized yourself with battle tactics carried out in wars on Earth since ancient times. However, you're also a cultivator, so I'm taking you this time to relax and forget all those battle strategies in your head for a while to prepare to learn the warfare in the Immortal World. This is a record of battle formations and arrays you will be studying later. You need to be proficient in various skills, and array formation is a very important field to study if you want to be the commander of the army."
Tang Ahlang received the arrays manual and took a seat in front of Tang Xiu. After skimming two or three pages, his delicate face looked happy and pleasantly surprised. He had been diligently and tirelessly studying over the past three years, especially in regards to warfare in ancient times and modern times on Earth. Occasionally, he also stayed in the Library Pavilion to read books about arrays and battle formations, so he had a fair bit of knowledge on this aspect.
Yet, he was sure that this battle formation manual was absolutely more profound than its counterparts in the Nine Dragons Island's Library Pavilion.
****
Shanghai Airport.
Right as Tang Xiu stepped out of the cabin's door, he saw two cars parked near the ladder. Four big men came out of the cars the moment the doors opened and a smart and capable-looking female in a white suit came out.
The female's name was Gao Beilei and she was the current General Manager of Magnificent Tang Corporation. She was the person Kang Xia and Ouyang Lulu had repeatedly invited to join previously—a professional manager from the United States' Wall Street.
Tang Xiu himself had never met her in person. But he could recognize her at a glance since he had seen her photo.
"Boss!"
The four big men greeted respectfully as Tang Xiu stepped down the ladder.
Gao Beilei quietly observed Tang Xiu. She had long been curious about this young man. She knew that the famous Kang Xia, as well as her good friend Ouyang Lulu, were this young man's woman, while to her, this young man was her Boss.
"Hello, Boss. I'm Gao Beilei."
Tang Xiu stretched his hand out to shake hands with her, loosened it and then said, "This should be our first meeting. I'm glad you can join the Magnificent Tang Corporation and work for the company. I should give you a gift for this first meeting."
Having said that, he took a jade pendant from his interspatial ring and handed it to her. "Put this on starting today. It will be great for you."
Gao Beilei stared blankly. She didn't expect that the Boss would present her a gift directly the first time she met him. However, after thinking for a while, she received it and smilingly said, "This is a quite late first meeting gift, isn't it, Boss? But it's quite interesting, regardless. I've been working for two and a half years for the Magnificent Tang Corporation and I never thought that it would take such a long time to meet the Big Boss. This would be quite an unbelievable story if the other business people around the world were to hear it."
Tang Xiu chuckled and said, "Well, let's just say that I don't care much about things in the market, so I let Kang Xia handle it and left everything in her hands. Regardless, I hold the same trust in you since they trust you too. Let's set off. It's been more than 2 years since the company's HQ was moved to Shanghai. I've never been there before."
Gao Beilei nodded with a smile and personally opened the car's door for Tang Xiu. After Tang Xiu took a seat, she pondered for a moment and finally decided to sit in the front seat. She had learned about Tang Xiu through various channels for the last two and half a years. Although she dared not say that she really understood Tang Xiu, she still knew a fair deal about him.
Further, Tang Xiu was also one of the few people around the world she admired. After all, he was able to create the Magnificent Tang Corporation before his twenties. He even had the ability to pull Kang Xia to work for him. Aside from that, nearly all the products produced by the Magnificent Tang Corporation came from his hands, all of which could cause a huge sensation in the business sector.
As of today, the Magnificent Tang Corporation's assets had already exceeded 1 trillion yuan. But what she admired the most was the set of rules Tang Xiu made previously and his decision not to list the company. Otherwise, the company's valuation could have been 10 times greater than its current valuation today.
"Would you like to have a meal first, Boss? Or would you like to see the financial statement? But your visit is rather sudden, so the Financial Department can only provide the financial statement from last year, as we have yet to compile the statement for this year." Sitting on the front seat, Gao Beilei turned and asked.
"Nah. I'm not interested." Tang Xiu waved and said, "It's fine as long as the company can make enough money for me to spend. Let's have a meal first before heading to the industrial park. I also need to tend to some other things afterward. Anyways, Mo Yi should be in the industrial park too, right? Has he been well in recent years?"
"Professor Mo has indeed been working in the research institute inside the industrial park." Gao Beilei nodded and said, "His health is great, and he keeps looking younger even though he has a very heavy workload and schedule."
"That's great to hear." Tang Xiu nodded.
The two cars left the airport and entered the highway less than 10 minutes after. Tang Xiu then saw the new sight in the surrounding in the sky. Many people were standing on Aerogliders and flying fast. Some were flying alone, some looked like couples, and husbands and wives hugging or holding hands while flying. Further, the interesting thing was that they were flying on certain flight routes and followed fixed routes above the roads. After a few minutes of observation, he saw at least hundreds of people flying on Aerogliders, but to his surprise, none of them left the flying routes above the roads.
"So, how were the sales of the Aeroglider?" Tang Xiu took back his vision and asked.
"It's been great even though the Aeroglider sales are kind of limited due to the limited number of the product." Gao Beilei nodded and explained, "Yet, the price is very high due to that as well, and we can only sell 1 million units annually. Thus, we only sold 2 million units in the last 2 years at home. We exported 20 million units overseas, so a total of 40 million units have been sold in two years. So far, the total number of the first generation Aeroglider sold by our company is 42 million units."
Tang Xiu was secretly dumbstruck since he himself didn't expect that the Aeroglider's sales volume would be this high. The revenue earned from selling 42 million units was simply an astronomical figure.
"By the way, what about the joint venture between us and Jin Xingkui?" Tang Xiu suddenly asked.
"It has been finalized. The final net income is of 9.1 billion yuan," Gao Beilei answered. "However, I decided not to withdraw the funds and invested in the new project instead. The new project itself has been starting to sell and the funds are flowing back. Jin Xingkui's Jinda Estate just transferred 4.5 billion last night, while it is expected that they will gradually pay us a total amount of about 20 billion within the next 2 months."
Tang Xiu nodded in response. He didn't care about these numbers and just asked casually since he remembered Jin Xingkui a moment ago.
Gao Beilei turned and narrowed her eyes when she saw Tang Xiu fall into silence. After thinking for a while, she said, "Boss, our company is actually a bit short of money recently."
"Come again?"
Tang Xiu couldn't believe his ears for a moment. The Magnificent Tang Corporation was definitely a money-making machine, yet… how could it be short of money now?
Gao Beilei forced a smile and said, "The company's monthly revenue is calculated and summed up at the end of the month before the final statement is summarized. Except for the 10% monthly overhead of the company, the rest of the money is transferred. It's due to a big project I just started recently, so the company is now short of funds."
"What project is it exactly?" Tang Xiu asked curiously.
He originally thought that the Magnificent Tang Corporation's coffer was brimming with money, so he could receive quite a big amount of money every day. It was rather unexpected to hear that the company was short of funds right as he returned to Shanghai and met the company's General Manager.