A few days later, the situation at the Ren family's company was slowly beginning to deteriorate. Mui was forced to step down from her position while Alix hadn't quite given her answer to take up the responsibility.
The elderly couple, Ren Cuifen and Ren Luoyang, once again approached Alix in hopes of a firm decision from her end. Alix leaned back on her chair, pressing the space in between her forehead. On the table before her laid stack of important business files and documents.
She wasn't unaware of the family business but she wasn't so deeply involved with it to know the specifics either. She recalled the parents' hopeful gazes and a feeling of discomfort crawled in her chest.
Do I really have to do this?
That idiot sister. If she hadn't messed with me, then I wouldn't have had to deal with this...
Alix casually grabbed a file from the pile, intending to only glance through the details. She flipped through the papers and at one point, her brow arched. She picked up a second file and found similar details as in the first one. She frowned.
That idiot woman was really running the business like this?
Alix spent the rest of the day reviewing each file despite her own disinterest in the beginning. By the time she ended her last call, Alix's expression didn't look so good.
There were problems. If swift action wouldn't be taken to mend the gaps, then it was only a matter of time before the Ren family company would have to shut down.
Alix's expression turned saltier. She got up and stood in front of the mirror, staring at herself.
"This is not what I want to get into," she said.
She wasn't expecting an answer.
"Unfortunately, you are a big part of why I am able to stand here in the first place. The least I can do is set some things straight." Your next chapter awaits on мѵʟ
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"We need to set some things straight."
Yuze blinked at Alix, who had walked into his office without any prior notification the next day. She simply knocked and took her seat opposite his CEO's chair.
"When I say you, I mean the Kang family."
She smiled at him and slid a file towards him. "This is a report of our quarterly earnings of the last two years."
Yuze took it and glanced through the report. "This is correct. The Ren family's designs have not been doing well in the market since the last two years. The clothes aren't selling and the stock is just piling up in the warehouses. Everything is in red here."
"Why do you think that is?"
"Because the designs are not attractive. They are not grabbing people's attention. I was going to hold a meeting with Uncle Ren about this anyway," he shook his head. "At first, the Ren family's designs were what everybody wanted. But there has been a steady decline."
"Steady decline because we are lacking or because you are?"
Yuze was taken aback. "Us as in the Kang family? What are you talking about?"
Alix raised her brow. "Refresh my memory. Why is it that my family is in exclusive contract with the Kang family for raw materials supply? You are the sole supplier of fabrics and underlying raw materials which we use to design. But why is it only you?"
He blinked. "There is a long history between the Kang and Ren family that includes being business partners. Aunt Cuifen had a great design sense but Uncle Luoyang was a little conservative with the business idea. There were lots of people outside wanting to take advantage of Aunt's talent and my dad came forward to help. The exclusive contract was only to protect their designs from falling into wrong hands."
"Which ultimately ended up in the wrong hands anyway. The Kang family wanted to protect Mom and Dad? Or did you want to monopolize the market through their designs?"
Yuze's expression turned bitter. "How can you even say that? Especially after our long years of-"
"Long years of friendship and partnership between the families will make you serve us substandard quality of raw materials?" Her eyes narrowed.
"We are at a loss not because we lack in the creative department but the base on which we are showing creativity isn't up to the par. The fabrics that you have been sending our way are of bad quality. The threads start to fray away quickly. The color of the fabric fades away after a few washes which ruins the whole design. It is not my designs that are defective - it is the raw materials that you are supplying us and the blame is conveniently falling upon us."
Alix leaned forward, her cold gaze demanding answers from him.
"And I absolutely won't believe that my idiot sister wasn't aware of this. She was the CEO until now. Obviously, she would have come to know the source of our losses. If she couldn't, then her brain is just a piece of decoration.
But I don't think it is. She knew, yet she let things remain as they were anyway. I will grill her later but for now, you start talking Mr. Kang Yuze. What is the Kang family exactly doing in the name of protecting my family?"