Chapter One Hundred and Eighty: An Unexpected Development

However, there weren’t so many of those oddities. Most people just silently gave a “like” to the chairman’s romance. That was all.

Right, they “liked” it.

Despite the massive flood of critical comments, most of YL took a positive stance on this. Compared to the Nan Family’s delicate little girl, their very own mystery designer was a much better fit for Chairman Yan. It was preferable to not share such an awesome Chairman with outsiders.

The reaction was somewhat unexpected.

If Yan Jin had foreseen even this, the media would really be surprised.

Chu Ge and co’s worries about discussions of cheating and love triangles also showed up, but they weren’t the main topic. The media was generally gleeful that this had been revealed and secretly captured on camera. The media laughed and felt that this was completely deserved.

The reporters that had been oppressed by Yan Jin’s unpredictable and invulnerable persona could finally let out a sigh of content. They worshipped the brave warrior who had captured the image and treated the photo itself as a delightful spectacle. However, they neither celebrated Yan Jin’s misfortune nor plotted maliciously against him.

In this era, suggesting that homosexual love equated to mental illness was asking to be scolded. The media wouldn’t dare bring up such a silly idea. Compared to netizens, news reporters could only leave short remarks about the lack of a successor. That was all. Yan Jin had already prepared his will long ago. All of his assets would be donated to charity. At the time, reporters thought that Yan Jin was covering his bases if he were killed for money when returning to his home country. Now, it was clear that he was always two steps ahead of anyone else.

Essentially, although the photo had gone viral, the conversation hadn’t gone in a bad direction. Most of the media just treated it as gossip and wished Yan Jin well along the way. Only on the chaotic social media did accusation and conspiracies fly. There, their unknown enemy had paid for fake internet accounts to denounce Yan Jin’s cheating and love triangle. However, it didn’t receive any coverage on the news. When interviewed, Shao Yue could easily deny those rumors and even had the opportunity to plug some free advertisements for next season’s new products.

The reason that the news organization didn’t get involved in these rumors was very simple. They weren’t stupid. Everything that had happened in the past month pointed towards issues with the Nan Family’s one-sided engagement announcement. This could even be traced back to the car accident with the mystery designer and Yan Jin. Furthermore, there were never any intimate photos of Nan Chan and Yan Jin. Even if the news media wanted to dabble in the rumors, they didn’t have much evidence to work with. If they were to start spouting rubbish, Yan Jin would humiliate them when he returned.

They weren’t masochistic. Why would they do such a thankless task? It would be much more efficient spending their energy on the Nan Family’s reaction after their faces had been slapped so hard. Maybe they could even do an exclusive interview with them.

On the other hand, the Nan Family was very powerful. The news reporters didn’t dare to investigate too much into their matters, so it seemed like the Nan Family wasn’t making any moves. But in private circles, the Nan Family’s actions already had become the topic of teatime jokes.

Could the Nan Family endure this? Of course they couldn’t.

It was already the seventh time Chu Ge received an appointment invitation from NN. It was also the seventh time he rejected it.

The Nan Family wanted YL to fire the mystery designer and get Yan Jin to publicly recognize his engagement with Nan Chan. Setting that aside, Shao Yue was completely occupied with influencing public opinion. Only Chu Ge was available to talk to NN…

Chu Ge didn’t dare to show his face. Otherwise, not only would he not be able to get Yan Jin out of the bad situation, he’d get stuck in it himself.

Although Chu Ge had no choice but to reject them, each time he deleted the invitation, his heart would hammer.

Something bad was going to happen.

Chu Ge couldn’t help but feel this way.

Previously in their group discussion, they had decided to limit the damage to YL as much as possible. They planned on ignoring any demands and not involving Xiao Yu. They would drag this on by any means necessary until Yan Jin returned to clean up the mess. They had even eliminated the Nan Family as their potential unknown enemy.

However, it now seemed like they had miscalculated.

It was very good that YL internally hadn’t become chaotic. This was better than what they had expected. On top of that, public opinion hadn’t shifted against them. This was extremely fortunate and wildly exceeded their expectations. It wouldn’t be too much to say their luck had peaked.

So far, everything was proceeding according to plan. In fact, things were going better than planned.

However, they hadn’t expected the pressure from the Nan Family. This was their biggest mistake. This alone destroyed all of their hard work and luck.

The objective of their unknown enemy was still unclear, but it was a certainty that they had used this to trigger a response from the Nan Family. It hurt to think that Chu Ge and the others hadn’t considered this.

As a result, they were forced into a passive situation.

Perhaps Chu Ge rejecting NN’s appointment invitation was the best response.

But, then what?

Would the Nan Family retreat?

How could that be possible?

On the last day of July, NN formally announced that they would acquire SI.

The industry exploded in uproar.

The SI that had comfortably sat at the top of the design industry in City S for so long was ending just like that?

The instant after the shock had faded, only sorrow and tears flowed endlessly.

Fortunes could reverse instantly and the winner would take all. That was the cruelty of business competition. It was also the greatest charm of competition.

Chu Ge was in the office when he received the news. The pen in his hand didn’t tremble at all and steadily finished writing its last words. Then, he nodded his head in understanding.

Something was bound to happen. Whether it came earlier or later didn’t matter.

“What should we do now?” Shao Yue had only just finished the marketing for the new products when he learned of the shocking news. He felt entirely powerless.

“There’s nothing we can do. We can only wait and calmly observe,” Chu Ge said indifferently while staring up at the ceiling. “The Nan Family hasn’t only been planning to enter the jewelry industry for a few days. If Yan Jin hadn’t come back from overseas five years ago, the Nan Family would probably already have started making a move…”

As the big boss in the clothing industry, NN had come across a lot of jewelry design work as well. However, they had never successfully expanded in that direction, so they had thought of purchasing a conventional jewelry corporation or establishing a collaborator long ago. For them, a marriage between Nan Chan and Yan Jin was the optimal solution. This was both for mutual benefit of the two companies and for a stronger relationship between the two families.

The only reason NN would make such a frantic move was because Yan Jin was out of contact and YL refused to respond.

Thus, they could only resort to such a method to both pressure YL and leave themselves with an avenue of retreat.

If it were possible, NN would have directly purchased YL once and for all. However, YL was at its strongest point in City S currently. As Yan Jin hadn’t openly taken sides yet, the Nan Family definitely didn’t want to financially risk so much to check whether Yan Jin really had switched sides. Hence, they didn’t want to touch YL.

On the other hand, SI had continued their downward trend in the past year and a half. SI was quite unstable and its stock price was at a low. Thus, the Zhou Family’s SI had become one of NN’s subsidiaries.

It was crucial to note that this was the perfect time to acquire SI. Though SI seemed to be in poor shape, their design team and reputation were still strong. It was highly probable that some of their outstanding designers who had left would be interested in NN’s new recruitment. The powerful Nan Family released a new marketing slogan about the king’s return which attracted a lot of media attention. Shortly, public discussion would quickly shift to YL’s crisis.

“… As expected, there’s no option left for us.” Chu Ge was very dejected. He didn’t want to respond to the Nan Family anymore. Such a hopeless predicament left him even less motivated to reply.

“*Sigh*, Yan Jin, this guy only knows how to cause trouble.” Shao Yue was in a very bad mood. “If he hadn’t agreed to the engagement before, they wouldn’t have suddenly made a move like this.”

“Wait, when did this happen?” Chu Ge was shocked.

“*Sigh*, you don’t know about this?”

“I…” Chu Ge recalled, “Because of the funeral, there was a short period where I had a falling out with him. Perhaps I missed something extreme.”

“You did miss something extreme.” Shao Yue nodded. “At the time, Yan Jin agreed to a marriage with the Nan Family. They had already prepared to hold their marriage overseas, but then he suddenly postponed it indefinitely.”

“I understand the reasoning, but why did they want to hold their marriage overseas?”

“He said he didn’t want to stain his motherland.”

“…” Chu Ge was silent.

He hadn’t seen Yan Jin act so naively for a long time. It seemed that break-ups really did make people go crazy.

“So, it’s Yan Jin’s unavoidable responsibility that things have gotten to such an extent. What do we need to worry about then? It doesn’t really matter what we do,” Chu Ge said.

“*Ugh*, I know it doesn’t really matter what we do, but you know how powerful the Nan Family is. If we accidentally let the Nan Family defeat YL, Yan Jin is going to kill us when he comes back. Even if you’re not scared, I’m scared,” Shao Yue unhappily said.

“They can’t defeat YL. It’s too late.”

“Huh?” Shao Yue didn’t understand.

“The Nan Family is too late.” Chu Ge laughed craftily. “Yan Jin is about to come back.”

……

……

The new, powerful SI has emerged!

Similar headlines appeared in fashion news magazines for the entire week.

SI, who had always been disorganized on the operations side, now gained NN’s powerful business acumen. At the same time, NN now had a powerful design team to work with. Together, their potential seemed limitless. YL’s title as the best design corporation in City S was no longer clear anymore.

As SI increased in power, YL naturally decreased. There was a large decrease in orders for YL, and other companies thought twice before signing collaboration contracts with YL. Despite the large effect, fortunately, the company’s employees didn’t lose faith. The adversity wasn’t a disaster. Especially since Chu Ge was now in command of YL, their new external collaboration policies and marketing tactics overwhelmed the competition. The industry vultures’ hopes of profiting from YL’s downturn quickly faded, allowing YL some much needed time.

For YL, time was now more important than number of orders, reputation, and sales income.

It was just as Chu Ge had said. NN had made their move too late.

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