
Qi Si took the medicine but didn’t go upstairs. Instead, he sprawled lazily on the sofa.
Sitting on the floor in front of him, Sheng Wenyin felt his fingers lightly teasing her loose strands of hair, twirling them idly.
Annoyed, she turned her head and glared at him. “What are you doing?”
Qi Si stared at her lazily without answering.
Irritated, Sheng Wenyin stood, grabbed her laptop and the empty bowl from her finished noodles, and headed to the kitchen. After placing the bowl in the sink, she walked past him without a glance, went upstairs, and returned to her room.
In the quiet of the living room, Qi Si’s gaze lingered on the sight of her disappearing around the stairway corner. He raised a brow, murmuring softly as he stood up and ascended the stairs, “Guess I managed to bluff my way through.”
For the next two days, Sheng Wenyin stayed holed up in her room, not even coming out for meals. The housekeeper delivered her food upstairs.
Then came Monday morning.
Bright and early, Sheng Wenyin emerged from her room dressed in a light brown professional suit, holding a laptop bag. Descending the stairs briskly, she was greeted by the housekeeper preparing breakfast.
“Miss Sheng, are you heading out?” the housekeeper asked.
“Yes.” Sheng Wenyin nodded, darting into the kitchen. She grabbed three buns, biting into one and holding the other two. Speaking with her mouth full, she mumbled, “I won’t be back for lunch.”
The housekeeper quickly fetched a plastic bag, packed the buns for her, and added two cartons of milk. “Eat on the way, don’t go hungry.”
Grinning, Sheng Wenyin accepted the food and headed for the door. Before stepping out, she paused, asking, “By the way, is Qi Si’s cold better?”
The housekeeper blinked in surprise. “The young master had a cold?”
Sheng Wenyin shrugged, taking the housekeeper’s confusion as confirmation of his recovery. Waving her hand, she left in a hurry.
The front door opened and closed.
Moments later, the housekeeper turned to see Qi Si descending the stairs, a stack of documents in hand.
“Master Qi, were you sick?” she inquired.
“Not at all,” he replied casually.
“But Miss Sheng said you had a cold.”
Qi Si nodded nonchalantly. “I faked it. She didn’t care, so I dropped the act.”
The housekeeper stood there, speechless.
On the top floor of Rongtian Group’s office building, the atmosphere in the conference room was unusually tense.
At the head of the table sat Sheng Rongtian, his face plastered with a patchwork of band-aids, giving him the appearance of a battered toad. He scanned the room with a dark, furious expression and bellowed, “How did things end up like this?!”
One of the shareholders sneered. “How? Isn’t it because of you? The issuance of original stocks was your call, and that Sheng Wenyin, she’s your adopted daughter! Isn’t this mess your responsibility?”
Sheng Rongtian slammed the table. “Me? Everything’s my responsibility? Should I include your dividends in that too? Lately, I’ve been running around begging for an eight-billion investment to stabilize our finances. What have you been doing?!”
“Well then, since you’re so clear about things, I’ve decided—I’m pulling out! Withdrawing my shares!”
“You—”
“Enough!” The eldest shareholder in the room, Mr. Chen, cut in sternly. “This isn’t the time for finger-pointing. Sheng Rongtian, you said she’d show up today. When?”
Before the words were fully out of his mouth, the black conference room doors were suddenly pushed open with a crisp bang. A slender, fair hand appeared first, followed by a voice.
“Apologies, I’m late.”
Accompanied by a faint, elegant fragrance, a young woman in a brown blazer stepped into the room. She carried a notebook in one hand and a silver pen in the other.
Sheng Wenyin walked in, slipping the pen into her blazer pocket as she casually explained, “I ran into a fan in the elevator. Signed an autograph, so I’m a little late. My apologies.”
Her tone was light, yet the room remained silent.
The shareholders all stared at her, their gazes filled with scrutiny, hostility, and judgment.
Sheng Wenyin smiled politely and nodded slightly in greeting before making her way toward the head seat.
There, Sheng Rongtian sat with his hands gripping the armrests of the chair, showing no intention of moving. His eyes glinted with disdain, as though looking at an ant.
Sheng Wenyin paused, chuckling softly. She nodded, seemingly unbothered. “No problem.”
Turning to the secretary by the door, she called out, “Bring me a chair.”
Some shareholders exchanged smug, derisive glances. So this was the supposedly arrogant, hot-headed “firecracker”? Clearly just a naive girl who folded in the face of pressure.
Soon, the secretary wheeled a chair over, hands trembling slightly.
Sheng Wenyin took it with a smile. “I’ve got it, thanks.”
But instead of sitting down, she walked to Sheng Rongtian. Without a change in expression, her smile still in place, she abruptly lifted her foot and kicked the back of his chair.
The office chair, mounted on wheels, flew forward with Sheng Rongtian still seated.
“Ahhh!” Sheng Rongtian screamed as he lost control, crashing into the speaker’s podium.
The chair struck the base of the podium, sending him hurtling out of the seat. With a loud thud, he landed face-first, collapsing like a crumpled rag doll. Blood seeped from his forehead as his body jerked weakly once before going still.
The room fell into absolute silence.
Unbothered, Sheng Wenyin placed her chair at the head of the table and sat down, leaning back and crossing her legs.
With a serene smile, she addressed the room, “Sheng Rongtian seems to love that chair so much. Who am I to deny him? I’m not picky—I can sit anywhere, as long as it’s the right spot.”
Her words sent a chill through the air.
Ignoring the shareholders’ ashen faces, Sheng Wenyin opened her laptop. A few keystrokes later, a PPT appeared on the large screen at the front of the room.
“Turn off the lights,” she instructed the secretary.
The secretary didn’t dare hesitate. In moments, the room was dimmed, leaving only the glow of the projector.
“Let’s skip the pleasantries,” Sheng Wenyin said lazily. “Time is money. Let’s get down to business.”
In less than 20 minutes, the meeting was over.
For the entire session, Sheng Wenyin did all the talking. She outlined the financial bidding project’s cooperative details and future profits with crisp precision. At the end, she flipped to the last slide, her voice cool.
“This is the projected profit distribution for year-end dividends. The figures here represent the first-phase earnings each shareholder can expect.”
The shareholders, initially unimpressed, froze when they saw the figures on the screen—staggering numbers of zeroes.
“Is this for real?!” one gasped.
Sheng Wenyin smiled. “Yes. Per person.”
“What?!” The room erupted as the shareholders scrambled to process what they had just heard. Even the composed Mr. Chen couldn’t help but lean forward and ask cautiously, “Miss Sheng, are you certain this project is viable?”
“Absolutely,” she replied without hesitation.
The room buzzed with murmurs of agreement, the mood shifting entirely.
Finally, someone suggested a celebratory meal to welcome her officially.
Sheng Wenyin smiled lightly, waving them off. “Soon, perhaps. But first, let’s discuss one more thing.”
She leaned back and said, almost offhandedly, “Don’t you think ‘Rongtian Group’ is a bit outdated? New leadership calls for a fresh start. How about we rename the company?”
Shock rippled through the room. A name change for a publicly listed company?
“But…” Mr. Chen hesitated. “Do you have a name in mind?”
“Yes.” Sheng Wenyin’s smile deepened. “Hua Zhang Financial. It’s my father’s name. Don’t you think it has a nice ring to it?”