Chapter 10

Chu Muchao studied abroad for several years, with a heavy academic workload, and rarely returned home.

Most of the time, it was her parents and Chu Wen who went abroad to visit her, or her friends who went abroad and invited her to go out and have fun together.

After returning to China, most of my friends had already started their own businesses.

Apart from the welcome banquet Qin Ye hosted for her, which invited many of her former friends, they barely had time to meet for the next two weeks.

Hearing that Chu Muchao was planning a party and invited them to come, they agreed without even asking about the time, place, or who would be there.

Chu Muchao: My dad has decided on the location and time. He'll let you know when it's time.

【okk】

Tell me the theme in advance! I just bought two super pretty dresses!

Unless I'm queuing in my pajamas, I always wear a T-shirt and pants.

Chu Muchao: [Kitten nodding.JPG]

-

Monday morning.

After breakfast, when she went out, the driver Chu Wen had arranged for her had already driven the car into the yard and was waiting for a while.

The driver drove the car into the parking lot on the lower level of the building.

The driver got out of the car and opened the back door for Chu Muchao.

"Miss, I will drive here to pick you up at five o'clock this afternoon."

As he spoke, the driver helped Chu Muchao out of the car and then took her backpack from the passenger seat and handed it to her.

Chu Muchao smiled at him: "Okay, thank you for your hard work."

Chu Muchao slung his backpack over his shoulder, looked up, and searched for the way to the elevator.

Turning my head slightly, I saw a figure standing behind a pillar.

Squinting and taking a closer look, she looked a bit like the colleague who had gossiped about her.

She'd already discovered everything, and she still wasn't planning to leave; she was clearly determined to gossip to the very end.

Chu Mu walked confidently toward Jiang Lan.

"Sister Jiang Lan, what a coincidence."

Jiang Lan's expression froze for a moment, but she quickly recovered.

He looked Chu Muchao up and down, then craned his neck to look at the car that had brought Chu Muchao.

"Wow, it's a luxury car. Young and pretty girl, she's got a lot of tricks up her sleeve, huh?"

Chu Muchao didn't understand what "many tricks" meant, but judging from the other party's contemptuous and disdainful eyes and awkward and sarcastic tone, he knew it was definitely not something nice.

Chu Muchao crossed his arms and looked at the other person with a half-smile.

Jiang Lan had been observing Chu Muchao's micro-expressions.

Judging from Chu Muchao's entire outfit, not a single item had a designer logo, so the luxury car couldn't possibly be hers.

She's only been at the company a few days, and she's already changed luxury cars and men twice. She must have some connections, but it can't be many. After all, Chu Muchao is just a 22-year-old girl who just graduated.

Just because she caught her gossiping about her, and this time she happened to see her getting out of a luxury car, Jiang Lan was certain that Chu Muchao would be afraid that she would expose her secrets, and her arrogance grew.

"Be more careful next time. This building belongs to the group; there are a lot of people around, and you'll get caught sooner or later. Understand?"

Jiang Lan spoke in a tone that sounded like an elder giving a lecture from someone who had been through it all.

"Tsk tsk, you're at least pretty and decent-looking, why don't you let men buy you some bags and clothes? You're already hooking up with rich guys, so don't be too cheap, you should rip them off."

Chu Muchao looked down at his clothes.

Designer-made, handcrafted sheepskin-soled high heels, a striped dress from a certain brand's early spring collection, and a limited-edition backpack... Are these really cheap?

Tsk, they don't know what they're missing.

Chu Muchao is not one to engage in internal strife.

If you have doubts, then ask them in return.

"Is three million yuan considered cheap now? Prices in China have indeed risen a lot."

"More than three hundred..."

Jiang Lan laughed in exasperation, "You little girl, you're really funny. What are you pretending for? I was just reminding you."

“Sister Jiang Lan,” Chu Muchao interrupted Jiang Lan in a soft but firm voice, “I’ve received your reminder. I won’t park the car in such an obvious place next time. But you’re really free and bored. Did you wait for me here on purpose today? Or did you see me by chance and then hide here to observe me?”

"Regardless of the reason, your behavior is infuriating and baffling. Stop prying into other people's privacy; we're just colleagues."

"..."

Jiang Lan was speechless for a moment after being directly confronted by Chu Muchao.

She'd gossiped about so many people, but this was the first time she'd encountered someone like Chu Muchao.

Whoever's privacy was violated by her either told her not to tell anyone, or tested her to see if she had actually seen it.

Everyone treated her politely. Although she knew that while she could chat with her colleagues about gossip and gossip, others would also talk about her behind her back. But so what? She couldn't hear it anyway.

But this was the first time she had ever met someone as direct and blunt as Chu Muchao in refuting her behavior.

Coming to her senses, Jiang Lan rolled her eyes and said irritably.

"You ungrateful wretch! I was just offering a friendly reminder, why are you getting so angry after doing something wrong?"

As she spoke, she picked up her handbag and headed towards the elevator.

Chu Muchao followed behind with steady steps.

Speaking in a voice that was neither too loud nor too soft, just loud enough for Jiang Lan to hear, she said, "Don't turn the tables. Spying on other people's privacy and using their private matters as gossip fodder for your conversations with your colleagues shows that you are a dull and uninteresting person. You're trying to attract attention by using topics that cause conflict."

Jiang Lan had just stepped into the elevator when Chu Mu followed right behind her, showing no intention of avoiding her.

Jiang Lan pressed the up button a few times in frustration.

Chu Muchao saw what the other party was doing and chuckled.

The elevator stopped for a while on the first floor.

Chu Muchao said, "You can attract attention however you want, but don't pry into my privacy anymore."

"laugh."

Jiang Lan didn't take it seriously and gave a cold laugh.

He cursed inwardly but put on airs.

"bite."

The elevator doors opened, and Jiang Lan went in first.

The elevator was already full of people on the first floor.

Jiang Lan could only squeeze in front of her, barely enough to fit her.

It would be difficult for Chu Muchao to go up again.

Jiang Lan glanced at her and said irritably, "You can wait until next time! Close the door!"

Chu Muchao's eyes crinkled into a smile.

After the elevator doors closed, she turned and went around to the VIP passage.

The elevators in the lobby are too crowded. Everyone's rushing to clock in for work these days, so there's nothing we can do about it.

But what does this have to do with the president's private elevator?

-

Chu Mu Chao clocked in at the designated time.

When I arrived at my workstation, there was a well-packaged Orleans chicken leg sandwich on the table, and a bottle of black soybean milk next to it.

Chu Muchao picked up the bottle of black soybean milk.

It was still hot.

She looked at Shen Jia with a puzzled expression.

Shen Jia was looking at Chu Muchao with expectant and grateful eyes.

Chu Muchao asked hesitantly, "Is this... something you gave me? Thank you, Sister Shen Jia."

"You're welcome! You've helped me a lot!" Shen Jia dragged her chair over and whispered, "How did you report it? It's amazing! A few minutes ago, Lao Zhou was taken away for questioning! I heard it was headquarters that came to hold him accountable! They found several serious problems in our branch over the weekend. Besides Lao Zhou, the heads of the marketing and product departments were also called in for questioning!"

Shen Jia paused, then looked at the sandwich and explained, "But! I didn't know any of this when I bought breakfast. I only bought it to thank you for reporting it to me! Try it, I bought it at the convenience store downstairs, and I think it's the best sandwich I've ever had! I even microwaved it for a bit, it tastes even better when it's hot!"

Chu Muchao poked the sandwich with his finger, and it was indeed still warm.

The bread was soft; if you poked it with your finger, it would leave a hole.

Chu Muchao smiled and said, "Thank you for breakfast, but I've already eaten at home. I'll save it for lunch."

"Oh, you've already eaten." Shen Jia sighed, a little disappointed. "Well, there's nothing I can do about it. You can put it in the refrigerator now and reheat it at noon."

-

Throughout the morning, almost no one in the office was working diligently; everyone was talking about Director Zhou.

They speculated about what would happen if they were called in for a talk, what the people from headquarters found out, and how they would be held accountable.

"It would be best to just fire him! He just takes the money and does nothing, I really... I get annoyed just looking at him!"

"The company certainly wouldn't fire someone casually; they'd have to pay compensation, and what company would be willing to pay that? I guess even if they wanted him to leave, they'd just check his attendance or transfer him to another position to force him to go."

"A job transfer is fine, just get him transferred already! All he does every day is ask about data, revenue, and PPTs. When I report to him, he doesn't understand. When I explain practical issues to him, he still doesn't understand. I'm so fed up with having to explain the same thing to him several times! And he still tries to interfere, but he doesn't actually get to the bottom of it! It's so annoying! Seriously!"

"Me too, I'll take anyone, just get rid of him. I haven't gotten a promotion or a raise since he became the director!"

"Me too! I bring it up every year, and I never hear back! I've met all the company's promotion and salary increase criteria! I'm really fed up!"

So, does the company have rules and channels for promotion and salary increases?

It seems that this wasn't mentioned in her onboarding training presentation.

Shen Jia caught a glimpse of Chu Muchao suddenly moving the mouse and looked over.

"Are you looking for the rules for promotion and salary increases? They were all deleted later. Old Zhou just made empty promises after that, but he never actually applied to General Manager Zhao. Our department is the only one in the whole company that hasn't had a promotion or salary increase in years."

"I don't know what he was thinking."

...

That's very strange.

"I have a tip! People at headquarters told me that this talk with Lao Zhou is to persuade him to resign!"

"ah?"

"Let's go, this is so annoying."

Shen Jia paused.

When she heard the news that Director Zhou was leaving, she sighed again.

Chu Muchao asked curiously, "What's wrong?"

Shen Jia shook her head and said softly, "Actually, he's just not doing his job. He hasn't made any mistakes since becoming the director, so it's not a reason to fire him. After all, he's a long-time employee..."

How can someone be promoted to director if they don't do anything?

Chu Muchao became even more curious, resting his chin on his hand and blinking as he looked at Shen Jia.

Shen Jia said, "A few years ago, I don't know what happened, all the original senior staff in the operations department left. The former director took a group of people under him and jumped ship. It is said that the branch office almost went out of business."

"The operations department only had three people left at that time, and we couldn't find anyone to hire urgently. The other two later left, leaving only Lao Zhou."

"After the company recovered, it hired a batch of new people, which is how Lao Zhou was promoted to the position of director."

Shen Jia's true nature is likely to be kind and soft-hearted; her heart is pure.

That's not bad; she can always see the good in others and doesn't hold grudges.

But.

"If you were promoted to director, would you still think that way?"

Chu Muchao's voice was soft, yet powerful.

"He occupies a high-paying position but does nothing. Inaction is a problem in itself."