Chapter 124.1 – Dinner Party

Ying City.

After Zhou Sheng finished his presentation, he took a short break at his seat and sent Yu Hao a text. Yu Hao answered:【Accompanying the leaders for dinner】.

Zhou Sheng:【Then don’t look at your phone anymore, lest you get scolded. Try not to drink if you don’t need to.】

Yu Hao:【Ye Ge helped me take quite a bit, he’s too good at drinking, his expression doesn’t even change in the slightest】

Zhou Sheng:【Everything went smoothly on my side.】

Yu Hao:【That goes without saying. You’ve never failed before, no one in this world can beat you.】

Zhou Sheng smiled modestly and replied:【You can’t say that. For example, when I got hit in the head with a heating pad, I did feel quite defeated.】

Yu Hao:【Are you a freaking Cancer or Scorpio? How could you still remember such a small thing! And in the end it hit Gege’s head!】

Zhou Sheng:【It hit Gege’s head, but it was my heart that suffered the pain. Okay, don’t chat anymore, be a good kid. I’m going out for dinner too, and I’ll be flying to Beijing in three days.】

Zhou Laichun darted into the Major Business Department’s “18 layers of Hell” and patrolled it once. All employees who were waiting to get off work immediately started searching for something to do; those who chatted idly picked up files and pretend to discuss work, while those who were playing on their phones immediately looked up and opened half-written forms.

Zhou Laichun pointed outside as a signal to Zhou Sheng. Zhou Sheng hadn’t even caught his breath before he had to get up and leave with Zhou Laichun.

“I’ll go wash my face.” Zhou Sheng said.

“There are hot towels prepared in the car.” Zhou Laichun said, “Do you have anti-alcohol drugs ready?”

Zhou Sheng answered, “It’s okay, I can more or less drink.”

“Don’t drink, just give it to me.” Zhou Laichun said.

Zhou Laichun got into the car. The chauffeur turned around and handed him a hot towel, which Zhou Sheng used to rub his face vigorously.

We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.

“Your get-up with the glasses isn’t bad.” Zhou Laichun said, “Refined, like a scholar. What I regret the most now was not kicking your mother down from the building, and forcing you to study finance.”

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“You should know what to do tonight.” Zhou Laichun said, “From tomorrow onwards, you’ll be leading your own team.”

Zhou Sheng said, “What about my salary?”

Zhou Laichun said, “What do you mean? How much do you want?”

Zhou Sheng said, “You have to pay me a monthly wage ba! Do you think I’m stupid? If it wasn’t for supporting my family and wife, who would serve an overbearing bully like you?”

Zhou Laichun, “……”

“You’ve finished spending all the money on that card?” Zhou Laichun said, “You invested it all in that qun guy’s company?”

Zhou Sheng said, “Oh, I thought it was a betrothal gift for the Yu family na, I let him take it to Beijing.”

Those words nearly made Zhou Laichun vomit blood out of anger. Zhou Sheng said, “But you should at least pay me a wage ba. I know the past three months have been an internship, but I did work for you ah. Do you think that with Wu Bin’s capabilities, he would’ve been able to finish the entire proposal for the project? That other departments would have been willing to cooperate with him to get him the data and information? Even if something as ludicrous as that did happen, and he managed to do everything, would he have been able to present like how I did today? For such an important occasion, he wouldn’t even be able to speak steadily once he stands on stage ba!”

Zhou Laichun, “You……”

Zhou Sheng continued, “I even helped you kneel and lick the asses of all those officials, ran around each shop coaxing the store managers to work, sorted out the manpower required for the general manager office’s project, kept watch over all the employees on the floor to see if anyone wanted to rebel and set up a huge banner on their own on some other mountaintop, I did all the work for you that I was both supposed to and not supposed to……”

“Alright! I’ll pay you your wages for the past three months.” Zhou Laichun said, “Do you only have those miniscule tens of thousands of dollars in your eyes?”

Zhou Sheng said, “That’s the money I earned with my blood, sweat, and tears! Since you promoted me to the manager of a department, you’ll also need to give me base salary and a commission ba. What about my year-end bonus? How do we calculate that?”

Zhou Laichun said, “I’ll pay you the wages of a senior assistant for the past three months, okay? From next January onwards, you’ll pay yourself your own wages. Aren’t you the one in charge of budgeting?! It was sent over the day before yesterday, finance has approved it, and I signed it yesterday! It’ll be approved tomorrow morning. If you really want money, don’t pay the team their wages. I won’t say anything even if you take it all for yourself.”

Zhou Sheng, “Well, I don’t need to go that far. I’m not like you who docks your employees’ wages for a living.”

Zhou Laichun, “……”

Zhou Laichun drank his tea, and the more he thought about it, the more unreasonable it seemed. “Are you seriously discussing a monthly wage with me?”

“It’s only right and proper to be paid for my work!” Zhou Sheng was baffled, “What’s wrong with demanding remuneration for the legal toil I’ve done?”

Zhou Laichun couldn’t do anything with Zhou Sheng at all now. He had already proven his capabilities. In fact, aside from him, Zhou Laichun really couldn’t find anyone else who was suitable to nurture.

Comparing Zhou Sheng to that bunch of deputies who all had their own ulterior motives, who was as open and upright as him, or as vibrant and energetic as him? Even though he wasn’t well acquainted with business affairs, that could be slowly trained. But he wouldn’t be able to find another such dazzling talent throughout the whole company.

Zhou Laichun would sometimes feel that it was such a great pity that his son was gay. Isn’t it good enough to just be bros? Why did he have to poke the other guy’s ass?!

If his son wasn’t gay with Yu Hao, Zhou Laichun had it all planned out —— get Yu Hao to be his assistant and be little director Zhou’s general assistant. One was firm while the other was soft, Yu Hao could suppress Zhou Sheng’s temper, and he was someone who could be taken out to meet other people. Properly assist Zhou Sheng in the takeover, accumulate experience until they were about 30 or so years old, then who in the company would be a match for these two kids?

Yu Hao really wasn’t too bad — he was a fine-looking boy and a wolf in sheep’s clothing, and he was even able to grow together with Zhou Sheng while their personalities complemented one another. In a few years, he would have another chess piece in hand, introduce a suitable girl to him for marriage……yet he turned out to be so ambitious and scheming! 7 percent! Does that beggar really understand the concept of 7 percent? Someone must be teaching him behind the scenes! He had really underestimated that hooligan son of a bitch!

When the car arrived at its destination, Zhou Laichun secretly cursed the Yu Hao who had ruined his well-conceived plans as he brought Zhou Sheng out of the car.

“Why are you wearing sports shoes?” Zhou Laichun just realised.

“I like them.” Zhou Sheng answered, then walked straight ahead. Zhou Laichun saw the shoes on his son’s feet and thought they seemed a little familiar.

“Ai, hello beautiful Jiejie!” Zhou Sheng found Xiaoqin waiting outside the restaurant.

“Ai!” Zhou Laichun said angrily.

Zhou Sheng walked over, but Xiaoqin smiled as she hooped her arm around his and walked into the room with him in this cordial manner. Zhou Laichun finished ordering the dishes, the guests came, and Zhou Sheng’s expression turned ugly.

Their guests were also a family of three — the father was Zhou Laichun’s old comrade-in-arms, the mother was very beautiful, and they brought along a daughter who was about Zhou Sheng’s age. Zhou Laichun said to Zhou Sheng, “Sit next to Xiao Pei.”

Xiaoqin smiled, “Sheng’er just ended a meeting today, do you feel sleepy?”

“No.” Zhou Sheng smiled. He glanced at his father, but didn’t say anything and went to sit next to the girl. He tilted his head slightly sideways and asked politely, “What tea would you like to drink?”

“I won’t be able to fall asleep if I drink tea now, so just water is fine.” That girl said, then Zhou Sheng personally poured a cup of water for her. They chatted idly for a bit, Zhou Laichun began talking about the past with his old comrade-in-arms, while Xiaoqin smiled as she exchanged pleasantries with the other party’s wife. The girl was evidently quite interested in Zhou Sheng, but she wasn’t good at socialising. Zhou Sheng would ask one question, then she would answer it in turn, and sometimes she would even remain silent for a full minute. Even her mother started feeling anxious while she watched this, and really wished that she could take her stead in battle and answer for her in person.

“Xiao Pei isn’t the type to talk much in school.” The old comrade-in-arms said.

“Aunt has always said that I’m too quiet.” The girl named Xiao Pei answered.”

Only then did Zhou Sheng knew that this was a niece. The other party’s family didn’t have any kids and only had this one niece, who they loved as dearly as they would their own child.

Zhou Sheng said, “Oh, then that’s good, I thought the cassette tape got stuck.”

Everyone laughed. Xiao Pei said, “I always get stuck, as soon as I get anxious I won’t know what to say.”

Zhou Sheng made her laugh with just a few words, as an indication to not be too distant. After getting a bit more familiar, Xiao Pei asked Zhou Sheng what kind of meeting he had. Zhou Sheng explained to her patiently, but Xiao Pei actually understood it all. When he talked about their competitors, Xiao Pei said, “I have a teacher who audits for that company. Their accounts, ai, I’ve never seen such false accounts with absolutely no sense of aesthetics in my life……it’s practically a disgrace to the world of falsified accounts!”

Zhou Sheng, “……”

Zhou Sheng didn’t expect that this quiet girl was actually studying something related to auditing. The two began discussing listed companies. Xiao Pei gave him some opinions, and after Zhou Sheng thought about it, he thought that it did seem reasonable so he casually noted quite a bit down on his phone.

“To tell you the truth, I’m a sports major.” Zhou Sheng, “And training for the Iron Man Triathlon. I only started coming into contact with all these things three months ago, so there’s a lot I don’t understand.”

Xiao Pei immediately looked like she had just heard something funny and bowled over laughing. Zhou Sheng poured some water for her, then he thought silently and didn’t say anything.

“It’s my first time seeing her talk so much.” Xiao Pei’s aunt had just discovered a New World and said to Xiaoqin, “Usually at home, there are times when she wouldn’t even talk to us for a whole day.”

“Youngsters have more in common to talk about.” Xiaoqin laughed helplessly.

“Actually, I’m a sports major too,” Xiaopei joked as well, “I play shot-put.”

Zhou Sheng, “I really am a sports major.”

Xiao Pei said, “Un, me too.”

Zhou Sheng said to himself, “You’re too funny.”