28. Snow in a silver bowl
◎My dear little girl, I'm showing you my world. ◎
"Heal me?" Li Xiran's eyebrows curved slightly, and his smile deepened. "It's already very healing that you can sit here and talk to me."
Shang Xinuan knew he hadn't understood, so she rolled her eyes at him, picked up the full A4 paper, and sat back down in her seat.
She had previously thought the desk was in a perfect position, so that she could see Li Xiran's face whenever she looked up.
Now the young lady wishes she could put up a screen in front of her to block him out.
Despite the limited resources, the young lady still picked out an architecture book from Li Xiran's bookshelf, opened it from the middle, and stood it upright in front of her.
Looking at the world architectural map in front of her, she felt much happier.
Even A4 paper documents that I couldn't focus on before, I can now calmly examine them.
White paper.
It seems to have written about Li Xiran's personal life.
Li Xiran was born in London, England, on February 1st.
He graduated from the Department of Finance at MIT and worked for the Li family during his undergraduate studies. He took over as chairman in the spring of his twenties.
Shang Xinuan knew all of this, but she only found out by searching on Baidu or by asking people around her.
This was the first time she had been passively introduced to someone like this. And it seemed very much like Li Xiran was doing it on purpose, revealing his hidden self to her.
Shang Xinuan used to think that Li Xiran was 188 cm tall, but today she learned that he is 191 cm tall. She guessed that it was because of the Li family genes and his white ancestry.
No wonder she once wore eight-centimeter high heels, and her chin still only reached his shoulder blade.
The young lady remained indifferent, took out her phone, snapped a picture, and sent it to Qiao Xi: "Did your uncle grow up eating animal feed?"
Qiao Xi replied: 【Have you made up?】
Qiao Xi: [They're already researching my uncle's height?]
Qiao Xi: [With the young lady's 170cm genes, her future children will surely grow to two meters!]
The young lady was speechless, then snapped, "You can't expect anything good to come out of your mouth!"
As I continued reading, I discovered that he actually enjoys so many extreme sports.
Rock climbing, paragliding, skiing, surfing, and scuba diving, among other activities.
In her eyes, Li Xiran had always been as composed as a Buddha statue in a grotto, and she thought he only liked sports like golf.
Then came his personal achievements, which most of the young ladies already knew about and weren't interested in.
The above only occupies one-third of the paper.
The rest describes Li Xiran's daily work schedule.
Li Xiran goes to bed at midnight and gets up at 5 a.m. At 5:30 a.m., he holds a 15-minute international meeting at home with the New York subsidiary. He has breakfast at 6 a.m. He likes Chinese food but needs to replenish his energy with beef, and sirloin is his first choice.
He arrives at the company at seven in the morning to review the important documents submitted by various departments the day before. By nine o'clock, the commercial building where Mr. Li works becomes noisy. He doesn't like to work in overly noisy environments, so he sits in the rooftop garden of the boardroom with a coffee cup, stealing a moment of peace.
Shang Xinuan had previously heard from Xiao Su, the receptionist, that the female employees in their board office called this a special perk of being the boss. No matter how tedious the work was that day, they would be full of energy just looking at Li Xiran's outrageously handsome face.
The young lady might have felt sentimental before, but now all that's left is endless eye-rolling in her heart.
Then, with an unusually rebellious spirit, she peeked out from inside the architectural blueprints.
Li Xiran was flipping through the documents, his brow furrowed slightly, as if he had noticed something questionable in the proposal.
Even his slightly pursed lips and aloof gaze exuded an unpleasant air of authority.
Then, as if sensing her gaze, Li Xiran suddenly looked up.
In the instant their eyes met unexpectedly, the sorrow that had been shrouding his brows eased, and his eyes became gentle and warm, like spring sunshine melting away the snow-covered valley.
The young lady's heartbeat went out of control at this moment, as if she had returned to that spring day when she was eighteen.
The first rain, arriving swiftly with the wind, poured down on the entire city and filled the once silent lake with the girl's thoughts.
"Finished reading?" Li Xiran asked gently.
Feeling guilty for being caught, the young lady happened to see where the fingertip had landed and asked, "You have to meet with the project manager at 9:30. Do you need me to leave?"
Li Xiran clasped his hands together and rested them on his chin. "No need."
"Won't this involve classified information?" Shang Xinuan muttered.
“You previously said that you could only learn about my plans and business goals through news reports and other people’s oral accounts. Now that you’re sitting next to me, I’m willing to tell you about them in person.”
Li Xiran's voice became even more doting, and his upturned eyebrows and eyes were like those of someone offering a piece of candy to coax a kindergarten child.
But it also gives people a sincere attitude, as if to say: Dear little girl, I am showing you my world.
Shang Xinuan suppressed the sudden cessation of her inner turmoil and, feigning composure, stiffened her neck and said, "Who wants to hear your plans and business goals?"
After saying that, she was afraid that she couldn't hide the crimson blush on her ears, so she picked up the A4 paper and stood up, saying, "I need to leave."
Watching her disappearing figure, Li Xiran let out a low laugh from deep in his throat.
This was the first time he felt that going to work could be something to look forward to.
-
As Shang Xinuan stepped out of her office, she saw an older man rushing toward Li Xiran's office.
He was followed by two security guards, and it looked like he had been stopped the whole way.
She recognized the man; his name was Cheng Guoan, and he was one of the shareholders on the board of directors of the Li Group. He usually only participated in some major decisions and supervision.
Most importantly, there's the faction of Cheng Guoan and Chen Shaoyi.
Shang Xinuan originally wanted to go to the tea room, but after seeing the aggressive Cheng Guoan, she turned around and went into the lounge which was separated from Li Xiran's office by only one wall.
"Chairman Li, restricting someone's personal freedom is an illegal act!" Cheng Guoan said preemptively, his voice filled with anger.
Li Xiran, however, remained unhurried and spoke in his usual gentle tone, "My mother's health has not been very good recently, and she needs to rest at home. Besides, this is my family matter, and President Cheng is probably not qualified to interfere."
"Li Xiran, do you really think everyone believes this story? You're clearly disregarding the bond between mother and son and trying to force Shaoyi to hand over power."
"Mr. Cheng, this is the company, please watch your words."
"You should really tone down your current behavior!"
For more than a month, Cheng Guoan's London project has been suppressed by Li Xiran at every turn.
Although Li Xiran had made many challenges to them in the past, they were all like playing games in lukewarm water. Even if there was really no room for maneuver in the end, they still had the opportunity to change sides, just like a centipede that does not die easily.
But Li Xiran now uses deadly moves, sometimes even disregarding the risks he faces, determined to deliver a thunderous blow to them.
The sudden change in the way things were handled caused great anxiety among Cheng Guoan's subordinates.
"President Cheng, I've already given you chances time and time again out of consideration for my mother." Li Xiran's voice was low and deep at this moment, exuding the innate pressure of a person in a high position.
Cheng Guoan considered himself Chen Shaoyi's most trusted person, so he always ignored Li Xiran's warnings and regarded him as a junior, lacking any sense of awe.
"Give me face? You were still a kid when I was fighting alongside Li Qianyun to build this empire. Every brick and tile of the Li family's estate bears my name." Cheng Guoan wanted nothing more than to rush into Li Xiran's face.
"I heard you're pursuing the Shang family's daughter and even got her into the company. Are you planning to give away the Li family as a betrothal gift?"
Li Xiran pinched the bridge of his nose, his patience finally running out.
"Is Mr. Cheng finished speaking?" He opened his desk drawer, took out a file folder, and laid out notices with legal documents printed on them for Cheng Guoan to see.
“If Mr. Cheng hadn’t mentioned it, I would have forgotten that you are an old friend of my father. So the miscalculation was that I only had people investigate Mr. Cheng’s great achievements since I took over the Li family.” He looked at Cheng Guo’an, whose face was contorted with rage, but he didn’t even frown.
"Leaving aside other things, the amount of public funds you have embezzled from the procurement department and project department each year has reached hundreds of millions."
"Further back, when I had just taken over the Li family, we were competing with the Feng family for a piece of land. It was President Cheng who deliberately leaked the news, causing the Li family to not only lose the project but also almost declare bankruptcy. In the end, if it weren't for the help of the Shang family, the Li family would probably not exist in Shanghai now."
“I’ve turned a blind eye to this all these years, only because of my mother.” Li Xiran said, dialing Chen Ti’s number. “Notify the legal department that we can clean up President Cheng’s mess.”
The two security guards who were originally waiting in the office entered Li Xiran's office together and dragged Cheng Guoan out like a fat pig.
The person who was just moments ago so arrogant and domineering has been emptied from the board office like a lump of mud.
When Shang Xinu walked out of the lounge, she saw a group of people gathered in the board office.
"President Cheng used to cause trouble in the company a lot because he was the Empress Dowager's man. He would often barge into Chairman Li's office and yell at people, expecting everyone in the company to kneel down and serve him. Now that Chairman Li has cleaned him up so decisively, it's really gratifying."
"That pig-like devil really thinks he can seize someone else's property just because he has some connections."
"Only when the Empress Dowager relinquishes power will the Li family truly enjoy peace."
"The Empress Dowager has finally stopped coming to our board office to rage lately, but I reckon it won't be long before she graces us with her presence again."
"Prepare for battle! Prepare for battle!"
Shang Xinuan stood there for a long time before she came to her senses.
This was something she had never seen before.
In the Shang family, she had never heard of anyone daring to barge into Shang Zun's office, slam their fist on the table, or act arrogantly.
Even when Shang Chenxi and Shang Dan took over some positions in the company, the group of old shareholders who had followed Shang Zun to build the empire were always respectful and never negligent.
"What are you standing here daydreaming about?" Suddenly, Li Xiran's voice came from above her head.
Shang Xinuan turned around, still trying to find some sadness on his face, but found that his gentle smile had not diminished at all.
The young lady was amazed; this person's patience was truly remarkable.
"We're getting ready to go back."
"I'm about to get off work. What do you want to eat for lunch?"
Shang Xinu stared into his eyes and asked, "Li Xiran, aren't you angry?"
“If we were to get angry over every person who displeases us, we would have accumulated far too much anger in our lives.” He nodded and smiled, his eyes slightly narrowed. “The best outcome is when things can be resolved perfectly, achieving our ultimate goal.”
After saying that, he patted her head and asked gently, "Have you thought about what kind of ending you want for the thing that Nuannuan is angry about?"
A note from the author:
Mr. Li's words: If we were to get angry over every person who displeases us, we would accumulate far too much anger in our lives. The best outcome is when things are resolved perfectly, achieving our ultimate goal.
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