CH 1

As Wanzhu Corporation’s number one assistant, Lin Hui’s day started with him signing his name.

Wanzhu Corporation’s headquarters was located on the west side of Beijing. It was right next to Wenfeng Road. This was a road that ran through the entire city from east to west. He left the house at 8:00 in the morning. After exiting his neighborhood, he turned right and drove down East Wenfeng Road. His black car was like a drop of water, silently merging into the endless stream of traffic, all of them racing against time towards their respective destinations.

At 8:45, Lin Hui arrived at his office on the twelfth floor of the company building. In fact, there was only one office on the entire twelfth floor—he shared it with the CEO, He Jianshan. The rest of the rooms on the twelfth floor were conference rooms. When the custodian saw him open the door, she quickly greeted him, “Assistant Lin, good morning.”

Lin Hui smiled as he nodded. “Good morning.”

The custodian walked into the office. As she was wiping the table down, she asked, “Assistant Lin, do I need to clean up the boss’ office?”

Lin Hui and He Jianshan’s office was a large suite. It only had one door. He was in the outer room, and He Jianshan was in the inner room. There were a lot of documents in the office, and He Jianshan would often place them wherever he pleased. Sometimes, he would cover the entire floor with a single blueprint. The custodian didn’t want to mess anything up, so she usually waited for Lin Hui to arrange everything before going in. At this time, Lin Hui had already sat down at his desk. He glanced at his watch. It was nine o’clock sharp. Usually, An Ni from the general manager’s office would come around in about thirty minutes from now to check over the arrangements for the next two days. She would also pick up any documents that were signed or sent back. Lin Hui pinched the stack of papers in his hand. On the very top-most document, he scrawled out his first signature of the day. Then, he shook his head and said, “No need for now.” The custodian nodded and went back to work. After a while, she finished cleaning the rest of the office and left. The hum of the vacuum cleaner vanished, and the office became quiet once more.

At 9:35, the sound of heels began to ring out from the hallway. It got closer and closer before finally stopping in front of the door. Lin Hui had just finished signing his name on another document when a knock came from the door. He raised his voice and said, “Come in.”

An Ni walked in with a stack of documents in her left hand and a paper bag in her right. As soon as she saw Lin Hui, she smiled and said, “Good morning, Assistant Lin. Here’s your salted caramel latte and a sandwich.”

“Thank you.” Lin Hui took the paper bag. Then, he picked up a neat stack of receipts and handed them to An Ni. “It’s all signed. Look over it to see if there are any omissions.”

“I don’t need to look. I’m sure it’s fine,” An Ni said. She quietly glanced at the closed door to the right. Then, she asked in a low voice, “Has President He still not arrived?”

Lin Hui rolled up the sleeves of his shirt. Then, he got up and opened the door to He Jianshan’s office. There wasn’t anyone inside. There were piles and piles of documents stacked upon his desk, and there were random files scattered here and there. The cups that were originally placed on the coffee table had been moved to the ground. A large blueprint sat in its place. Even the sofa was taken up by books full of reference material.

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.

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An Ni felt a headache coming on. “The people from the bank will be here at 2:30.”

“It’s alright. I’ll chat with them first. Let each department know that they need to condense the content of the meeting as much as possible. Focus on key points. The meeting needs to end before 3:00.”

“Okay, Assistant Lin.”

Lin Hui quickly divided the documents into two neat stacks. He added, “Tell the custodian to clean the lounge up a bit at noon. Also, open up the windows to air it out a bit. It hasn’t been used in a while. The president’s picky. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have insisted on driving back home despite it being so late last night.”

An Ni was surprised. “If she cleans up at noon, won’t it affect his rest?”

Lin Hui fed a discarded contract into the paper shredder. As the paper shredder clicked away, he said softly, “He never takes naps.”

An Ni gave him a thumbs up. “Sounds like our boss.”

“It should be fine if he gets used to it. Also—” Lin Hui picked up the scraps of paper that had accidentally fallen onto the carpet and asked, “The person that was recommended by President He Zhao, has she started working yet?”

The President He Zhao that Lin Hui mentioned was He Jianshan’s father, He Zhao. In order to distinguish him from He Jianshan, everyone in the company called him President He Zhao. Wanzhu was originally built from scratch by He Jianshan’s grandfather. Unfortunately, his son’s abilities were mediocre. Rather, it was his grandson, He Jianshan, that was the outstanding one. He’d had a steady personality ever since he was a child. It didn’t matter whether it was his appearance or his character. Everything about him was excellent. Therefore, once the old man’s body started failing, he skipped right over his son and handed Wanzhu over to his grandson. He Jianshan’s mother had passed away early. He Zhao married his secretary a few years later. They had a child together and started a new family. As for the issue of successor, He Zhao didn’t actually care. Either way, that was his son. All he needed to do was hold onto an empty position within the company and the money would come rolling in. It wasn’t a bad deal.

“She started today. Her resume says that she graduated from a pretty good university. Her focus was also in this field. Although she got the job through connections, her abilities shouldn’t be too bad.”

Lin Hui nodded when he heard this. “That’s good.”

After checking over everything, An Ni thought of one more thing. “Our real estate division said that President Liu from Yuntai Electric called several times asking for the funds.”

“Keep pushing it off. Then, tell him to come to me. They took their sweet time when it came to delivering the goods, yet now they’re rushing us for the money. If it wasn’t because of Wang Ju, we wouldn’t even be using their goods. Just look at the power switches. We can’t even use them. We didn’t get all the holes filled in either. Li Fenghai complained to me about it several times.” As Lin Hui spoke, he tidied up the files, put the books back on the bookshelves, and wiped down the table. He even heated up a kettle of water.

An Ni noticed that his hands hadn’t stopped moving throughout the entire conversation. She said, “Maybe you should get a secretary. You just need to mention it to President He. He’ll definitely agree.”

Lin Hui looked down. He put the cap back on the pen and placed it in a pen holder. “It’s not that big of a deal. If I didn’t want to do it, I could just call the custodian.”

An Ni wasn’t satisfied. “President He sure is hard to deal with. He says that he doesn’t like places with too many people, but the only people on this entire floor are the two of you. It all lands on you. Plus, everything within the company has to go through your hands. You’re even busier than he is.”

Although An Ni’s words sounded a little exaggerated, they weren’t exactly false.

Lin Hui joined Wanzhu as He Jianshan’s assistant right after graduating from university. He handled a lot more issues than He Jianshan did, and the issues he handled were a lot more tedious. They ranged from minor reimbursement approvals to major project developments. Lin Hui was very capable. He controlled everything with such precision. He arranged timetables and deadlines, making sure everyone knew what needed to be done by when. He was pretty much the only person in the company who could keep up with He Jianshan. Most importantly, he had a good temper as well. He was essentially the perfect assistant. Very early on, there were higher-ups in the company that believed his potential was being wasted. They suggested that Lin Hui be promoted to a management position at one of their subsidiaries. He Jianshan thought that it was a reasonable proposal. Thus, he transferred Lin Hui onto one of their projects in order to get some more experience. As a result, Lin Hui wasn’t even gone for half a month when He Jianshan couldn’t take it anymore. Ultimately, he ended up transferring him back. For eight years now, Lin Hui’s position had never changed. The work he did had long since exceeded the scope of an assistant’s responsibilities. He Jianshan didn’t mistreat him either. The salary Lin Hui received was close to that of a vice president. Everyone in Wanzhu was happy to see it. Unless there was some kind of special circumstance, nobody wanted to face He Jianshan. Anyway, if they had any issues, they could just look for Assistant Lin.

An Ni had mentioned this a few times before. Lin Hui knew that she was saying this for his sake, so he smiled and said nothing. Upon seeing this, An Ni didn’t bother to keep persuading him. “Do whatever you want. If you ask me, President He’s pretty smart. He raised your salary early on. Otherwise, how would he be able to keep you?”

Lin Hui thought to himself, even if the salary wasn’t that high, he would probably still stay with He Jianshan. In fact, it wasn’t that He Jianshan wouldn’t assign people to him. Rather, it was Lin Hui who was selfish. He wanted to be the only one staying on this floor with He Jianshan.

At 10:15, He Jianshan arrived.

While Lin Hui was looking through a contract on his computer, he heard the sound of footsteps. The footsteps were slow and steady, as steady and reliable as the person himself. Lin Hui’s ears were a little hot. He willed himself to stop thinking about it and focused his eyes on the computer screen. He didn’t even lift his head when He Jianshan walked through the door. He just lightly glanced at him from the corner of his eye. “Good morning, President He.”

Today, He Jianshan wore a dark shirt. He had his sleeves rolled up to his elbows, revealing his well-defined forearms. His suit jacket was casually draped over his arm. When he passed by Lin Hui, he carried a small breeze along with him. He Jianshan casually gave him a reply and walked into his office.

At 10:20, the faint scent of coffee started creeping through the huge office space.

Lin Hui stood up. Just like every day before, he held his notepad, walked over to He Jianshan, and started reporting on work matters. He Jianshan listened carefully and didn’t raise any objections. There was no doubt that Lin Hui was the most suitable person for this position. He Jianshan trusted all of Lin Hui’s decisions and arrangements. Eight years was enough time for the two of them to develop an amazing understanding of each other.

“Ah, by the way—” Just as they were wrapping up, Lin Hui spoke up once more. “An Ni brought me breakfast, but I’ve already eaten. President He, would like to have it? If you don’t want it, I’ll give it to the girls in the administrative department.”

This was an incredibly trivial matter. He Jianshan could’ve made a decision right away, but he hesitated. Lin Hui knew what he was thinking. It was too troublesome. At this time, he might as well go ahead and have lunch. Lin Hui was even willing to bet that he hadn’t had breakfast. And he was right. Either way, the meeting had pushed for the afternoon. He was planning to go downstairs for brunch after half an hour. With this plan in mind, the words of refusal had already made its way onto his lips. “I—”

As soon as he looked up, he saw how tense Lin Hui’s beautiful face was. His brows were furrowed, and his expression was quite serious. It was as if the discussion wasn’t about breakfast, but rather national affairs. He Jianshan paused for a moment. His words got stuck in his throat.

Lin Hui had never looked this troubled regarding his work. He Jianshan couldn’t help thinking.

Another thought popped into his head. He probably wants me to eat it.

When he thought of this, He Jianshan changed his mind almost immediately. He tapped his finger against the table and said, “It just so happens that I didn’t have breakfast this morning.” This was a normal thing for him. He Jianshan was willing to accept any reasonable advice from Lin Hui, whether it was regarding his work or his personal life. He didn’t see anything wrong with it.

Within Wanzhu, no one could refuse Assistant Lin. Not even the CEO.