Another six months passed. Cen Yu successfully passed Cen Lan's test, left Cen Lan's wing with Feng An, and established her first company of her own.

Cen Lan gave her a house to use as her office building.

Most of the employees in this office building are college graduates, with only a small number having come from Cen Lan's company. Cen Yu also clearly signed contracts with these people—she did not give any preferential treatment to anyone.

If you do well, you can get promoted; if you don't do well, you'll stay a hotel receptionist or waiter forever.

Her all-female hotel was very simple. All the staff were women, and it only catered to women. Once the media reported this, her hotel was packed with onlookers.

Cen Yu hired security guards to stand at the entrance for a year, which reduced the number of onlookers.

She also gained a stable group of customers—female students who rented her hotel rooms to study.

When the new year came to an end, Cen Yu and Ai Cao were invited by Cen Lan to return to the Cen family home.

The two sat down at the table. Having not seen each other for a year, they had nothing particularly to say to each other. They simply sat there in silence.

Each of them had a stack of year-end summary reports in front of them.

Cen Lan pretended not to see the subtle attacks between them, smiled and called the housekeeper to set the table, then asked with a smile, "Did you make a profit this year?"

Artemisia was the first to honestly shake her head.

She created her first game that year, but while the game received a good market response, the revenue was mediocre—only then did she realize that she had not done sufficient market research or developed enough revenue streams.

In order to control production time, she even cut some of the revenue streams.

Cen Yu also shook his head.

That year, she expanded her business empire—if you could call a negative-profit empire an empire. She dedicated the majority of her budget to upgrading the facilities in every hotel to the latest models.

In addition, her relatively high hotel fees also deterred some people.

Overall, it has a good reputation, but few people actually buy it.

If it weren't for the family fortune Cen Lan had given them to squander, they probably would have declared bankruptcy within just one year.

Cen Yu and Ai Cao looked at each other.

Cen Yu wore a smart suit. Her long, curly hair, which used to be casually draped over her shoulders, had receded slightly due to frequent tying, revealing a shiny forehead.

Ai Cao was still wearing a suit. Her short hair had grown a bit longer, with most of the stiff hair standing up in different directions, and only some longer strands softly framing her face.

They both gave a wry smile.

Cen Lan chuckled and asked, "If you'd like, I can make room for two of you in my company right now." She poured herself some tea. "You can also bring your original teams with you."

But the two young men still shook their heads.

Cen Lan stopped trying to persuade him. The three of them ate together, and then Cen Lan asked Feng An again, "What has Feng An been doing lately?"

Cen Yu was silent for a moment, then said, "She's busy with work."

Are you still busy tonight?

"Mmm," Cen Yu said softly. She lowered her head and quickly stuffed the rice in her bowl into her mouth.

Cen Lan then stopped asking.

The system whispered to Ai Cao, "How about we leave this world as it is? The male lead is already dead, and there are no male supporting characters in this world, so we don't have to worry about the female lead encountering danger again; besides, I really don't want you to suffer any more losses..."

Ai Cao tightened her grip on the chopsticks and the meat she was picking up.

She said, "No."

It took Ai Cao and Cen Yu four years to turn their companies’ consecutive years of losses into positive profits.

Artemisia's game company has developed several new games, some with female protagonists and others with female protagonists as the main characters and male characters as supporting characters.

Having tried the first game—even if it was a failure—the subsequent games were much more profitable than that one.

When discussing "female-friendly" games online, her games are occasionally mentioned.

Cen Yu then began developing ancillary products based on the hotel, such as hotel collaborations and catering services. She also participated in several charity events, which at least helped to promote the hotel's reputation. She also lowered the hotel's rent and helped develop public transportation near the hotel…

For the time being, the income covered the expenses, and they no longer had to ask Cen Lan for money.

They were all too busy to attend Cen Lan's year-end family gathering. They each called Cen Lan, chatted briefly with this kind and elderly mother, and then went back to their own work.

It wasn't until Ai Cao saw a young woman named Xia Moli on the interview list that things changed.

Ai Cao asked the system, "Isn't Cen Yu the female lead of this world?"

The system said blankly, "It's Cen Yu." Only then did it notice "Xia Moli" in the list, and it couldn't help but exclaim, "This... why is the female lead from the first world here!"

Artemisia shook her head in confusion.

The first female protagonist in the small world she encountered was Xia Moli.

Xia Moli is brave and courageous. Living with her and traveling around in that world where there are only men is an interesting experience.

Ai Cao said, "It's probably just a coincidence of names."

She dialed the internal line and told them she wanted to attend the interview.

Soon, she was sitting next to the main interviewer.

The main interviewer was the long-braided woman who had talked a lot to Ai Cao before. She was now Ai Cao's secretary, helping Ai Cao manage all the big and small matters in the company.

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