CH 23

Chapter 23: Patriarch, You are obviously being a show-off.

The sound of hurried footsteps from the stairs interrupted Shi Yunnan’s unspoken question.

Qin Jian, who came upstairs, saw the two people in front of the study, and paused unnaturally, “…Patriarch, I’m sorry.”

Shi Yunnan suddenly had an uncomfortable feeling of ‘being caught in the act’, and that little impulsive thought dissipated instantly.

He slowed down for a second or two, pretending to turn away nonchalantly, “Are you busy with something?”

Luo Lingsheng took the glasses back from his hand and put them on again, covering the deep meaning in the depths of his pupils, “There is still another meeting.”

Because of Shi Yunnan’s invitation last night, the meeting that was originally scheduled to be at 1 pm was temporarily postponed by Luo Lingsheng. He returned to his study to get the signed approval document.

“Oh, then I won’t bother you.”

Shi Yunnan straightened his posture in time, without any entanglement.

He looked down at the watch that Luo Lingsheng had worn on his wrist. After enduring it, the laughter still escaped his mouth, “Luo Lingsheng.”

“Yes?”

“I forgot to tell you…”

Shi Yunnan tapped on his empty wrist, his tone was buoyant as if he was dancing, “This watch can only be bought in pairs, I have one too, do you mind?”

Luo Lingsheng’s voice indistinctly rose a little, “Okay, I see.”

Seeing that the other party didn’t oppose this, he turned around and went back to his room with joy lingering on his eyebrows.

Luo Lingsheng entered the study room to get the document, and when he came out again, he saw Qin Jian apologizing in a rare panic, “Patriarch, I will definitely not come upstairs without permission next time.”

He waited downstairs for a long time. Seeing that Luo Lingsheng didn’t come down, he thought that something had happened to the other party because of his inconvenient legs, so he hurriedly ran upstairs to check the situation.

Unexpectedly, he saw that ambiguous picture.

Qin Jian had a very discerning eyesight. He readily concluded that he had ruined his boss’s good deed.

Luo Lingsheng didn’t blame him, but only asked with some deliberation, “What time is it?”

Qin Jian was about to pull out his mobile phone to check, but he caught a glimpse of Luo Lingsheng lifting his wrist, “4:06? Still in time for the meeting, let’s go.”

This seemingly calm self-question and answer, the meaning of showing off the brand new watch was little more than obvious.

“……”

Qin Jian was only a second slow, his excellent professionalism as an assistant made him compliment, “Patriarch, your watch is very beautiful, is it a gift from second young master Shi?”

Luo Lingsheng rubbed the smooth dial, and the corners of his mouth rose upward, “Well, he specially bought it for me.”

The word ‘specially’ was stressed with some deliberation.

“……”

Qin Jian was left speechless, and had a new understanding of his always ruthless and indifferent boss.

Patriarch, you can’t suppress your desire to show off, can it be any more obvious?

Luo Lingsheng was busy with the meeting until late at night, and rushed to the airport the next morning.

Shi Yunnan heard about this as soon as he woke up, his heart inexplicably felt a little regretful, but he quickly put away his emotions and started the design business.

Shi Yunnan was a person who kept his words. Since he promised to help ‘Lou family’ design the appearance of the product, he was determined to accomplish it.

Shi Yunnan entrusted someone to obtain the information on Lou’s flagship products, and asked a few friends in the design circle to help and give pointers.

Fortunately, the product design and the jewelry design have​ some similarities. It was not difficult to get started. He completed a series of drafts within ten days.

At the same time, Luo’s investment company confirmed the cooperation with the Lou family and established a special project team.

Shi Yunnan had a strong sense of responsibility as a designer, and some material selection must be personally done. He greeted Qin Jian, who was far away overseas, and came to the investment company alone.

In the early years, the Luo Group was more inclined toward the conglomerate model. When old man Luo was still in office, the group had many industrial chains, and basically reached a strong monopoly in the industry.

When the old man passed away, his immediate family and close relatives competed and nibbled away each other’s capital, resulting in many misfortunes.

Later, Luo Lingsheng succeeded in gaining control, and the first thing he did was to gather the overly dispersed industrial chain, leaving only a few large and powerful industries. Of course, the momentum of the Luo family had increased in the past two years, and it was only a matter of minutes if he really wanted to ‘swallow’ other small industries.

This was also the reason why companies and business giants in the Imperial Capital Circle still respect and fear Luo Lingsheng.

The investment company of the Luo family was called ‘Jiaolong’, which was considered to be a long-established brand, and its headquarters was in the Imperial Capital.

Shi Yunnan drove to the downstairs of the company, and was immediately greeted by a thin man in his early thirties.

“Hello Mr. Shi, my name is Yuan Hong. I am the person in charge of the investment project arranged by General Secretary Qin. You can contact me for any handover work related to Lou.”

The other party handed a business card with both hands, and the smile on his face was half true and half false. At first glance, he was a workplace veteran who was used to judging the situation.

“Thanks.”

Yuan Hong led Shi Yunnan into the company by swiping his card, and said as he walked.

“The Lou investment project team was just established this morning. In addition to me, there are six team members. If Mr. Shi needs an assistant in design, I can immediately notify the design department to make an arrangement.”

“No need, I’ve finished the design and have personally confirmed the details with Lou company.”

Shi Yunnan replied. His usual reckless speaking manner became very serious when it came to design work.

“It’s all done?”

Yuan Hong widened his eyes slightly, and quickly reduced his expression.

The elevator rose steadily to the sixteenth floor and the door opened. This floor of the office building was divided into seven or eight large single rooms.

The Luo family was wealthy, and even the investment company under it was also very arrogant. A mere joint project team of six or seven people could actually have a separate office area to themselves.

Yuan Hong took Shi Yunnan to the innermost zone with familiarity.

The door of the office was closed. As soon as the two walked to the door, they heard a discussion from inside.

“They must be out of their mind, why did the top management go crazy and invest in a small and broken company such as Lou?”

“This Lou family almost went bankrupt in one fell swoop. It is a waste of time for the headquarters to allocate funds for investment.”

“Have you seen the prospect of the project? With Lou company current products, the profit is likely to increase by 2% at most, there is a greater possibility of not earning anything at all. Why do we have to do such a thankless job?”

“No one was willing to join this investment team at the big meeting yesterday, and it  seems that our resistance was not obvious enough, today we were forcibly assigned to this team. When I saw the allocation notice, I almost thought my eyesight had turned bad!”

“Don’t mention it, the more I think about it, the angrier I am. Old Yuan choosing people to do this is too unkind.”

Three or four old employees were discussing, their tone was not very happy.

The final profit of the investment project was linked to the salary of the team members. When they thought of how small the Lou company final profit was, they felt that it was a waste of time and energy.

Yuan Hong was about to push the door to make a sound, but Shi Yunnan quickly stopped him.

“This……”

“What’s the rush?” Shi Yunnan’s index finger was put on his thin lips, and he looked askance at Yuan Hong, “These people are the ones you chose?”

Yuan Hong was flustered by his sudden gaze, and lowered his voice to explain.

“The five employees inside are all veterans with plenty of experience in joint projects. There is only one intern who is responsible for miscellaneous things.”

“General Secretary Qin said that Patriarch Luo values ​​this project very much, that’s why I transferred them over.”

“Is that so?”

Shi Yunnan pulled back his gaze with deep meaning.

Old employees were less likely to obey the disciplines, and the more unprofitable the project was, the more likely there would be dissatisfaction and passive sabotage.

As for the intern, their work experience was so shallow that they had no right to speak in the team.

While he was thinking, there was another round of discussion in the office.

“Seniors, I heard that this investment project is favored by Chairman Luo? Since it is a project that the​ top boss personally favors, we should do it well. Although the profit margin in the prospect report is a bit smaller, everything is possible….”

The remark sounded very naïve, this person should be an intern.

Sure enough, in the next second, he was interrupted by other old employees——

“Do you really believe that Chairman Luo would prefer this kind of small company? I heard that the chief designer of our project team is an outsider who has a close relationship with Mr. Luo, and he is also the direct beneficiary of this project.”

“For real? Last week, wasn’t there a rumor that Chairman Luo got married?”

With that, things developed into gossip.

“When a rich person gets married, who knows how many little lovers he is playing with in private? Although Chairman Luo’s mobility isn’t convenient, with his face alone, many gold-diggers are willing to stick to him.”

“When I think of that designer who doesn’t understand a thing, but can become the core leader of our team by relying on bedroom relationship, I feel…”

Before the ridicule could be finished, the intern cautiously interrupted again in a small voice——

“Brother Chen, it’s not good to talk about others behind their backs like that, right? We haven’t seen that designer yet. Perhaps he is also an honest person who takes his work seriously.”

The wealthy family and ordinary white-collar workers were still separated by thousands of miles. Even if Luo Lingsheng and Shi Yunnan announced that they had obtained the certificate at the Zhao family banquet, not everyone was aware of this fact.

At this moment, Yuan Hong carefully observed Shi Yunnan’s face——

With Qin Jian’s reminder, he had a vague guess about Shi Yunnan’s real identity.

Seeing that the discussion didn’t stop, Yuan Hong falsely coughed, and the discussion inside solidified.

“Who’s outside?”

Shi Yunnan heard the sound, then he gently pushed open the door of the office with a light smile.

Yuan Hong, standing behind Shi Yunnan, quickly shook his head to hint everyone. The next second, he stepped forward, cleared his throat, and shouted.

“Let me introduce to you, this is the designer responsible for the packaging design of Lou products, Mr. Shi Yunnan.”

The six employees inside looked at each other and unanimously fell silent.

Yuan Hong was afraid that Shi Yunnan would be angry because of the discussion just now, so he first brought up the work as a pretext, “Everyone get ready, we’ll have our first group meeting in the conference room in five minutes.”

“Mr. Shi, I’ll take you to a separate office by the window with a good view.”

Shi Yunnan glanced around the room, there were three male and three female employees.

The closest one was a male employee. Although the other party was succumbing to the overall atmosphere and did not speak, there was still a trace of disdain for Shi Yunnan hidden in his eyes.

Shi Yunnan smiled as if nothing had happened, he saw through everything but didn’t speak out. He followed Yuan Hong slowly towards the office.

In terms of look, body shape, and temperament, Shi Yunnan was dazzling among the crowd.

Today, for convenience, he tied his hair to the back of his head, leaving only a handful of short hair strands to hang down casually.

It looked as if he had a kind of unrestrained nature of a designer.

The two female colleagues who were still gossiping enthusiastically a moment ago immediately changed their attitudes and started discussing in a low and excited voice——

“Linlin, this designer seems to be quite handsome?”

“Yeah, yeah, suddenly I feel that being assigned to this group isn’t that bad.”

“I announce that I can take root in this group and look at handsome man to nourish my eyes every day.”

Seeing that the female colleagues were bought by Shi Yunnan’s face and turned their back in a short time, the male employee standing at the forefront subconsciously let out a snicker.

“Tsk, isn’t it just a man who sell his ass to the top.”

By coincidence, no one in the room spoke at this moment.

In an absolutely quiet space, these blunt and derogatory words sounded particularly clear.

The author has something to say:

Ding! Little fox’s “biting” warning!