Chapter 93 - Nice surprise.
Edited by Noks
Towards the end of the year, all of the netizens posted their own year-end summaries on Weibo. The hashtag #YearEndReport soared to the top of the trending hotlist.
Many big verified accounts followed suit, in order to also gain some popularity.
[XX electric appliances: #YearEndReport #2018Lookback, we sold X electric appliances and received X pieces of feedback, with a high praise rating of X%….]
[XX Video: #YearEndReport #2018Lookback, XX video brought you X self-made plays, of which the number of views for has exceeded X billion]
……
And what stood out from amongst these big verified accounts wasn’t the video platform with the highest number of views in the whole network, nor the brokerage company with the largest brand of artists under its banner, but a livestream platform.
To be frank, although this livestream platform was the leader in its own industry, when placed among all the big verified accounts, it generally wouldn’t even be mentioned. The number of fans any star had could drown out the comment section of the livestream platform’s official account.
So why did it get so popular?
Because the content of the year end report released by the live platform went like this—
[StarTV official blog: #YearEndReport #AnotherYearHasPa.s.sed, Little Star is here to give you the year-end report la. This year, there were x.x.x contracted anchors on this platform, and the number of new users has reached X billion!
Among them, the most popular male anchor is “Good Show” @XKTVGoodShow, with a total of X million fans.
The most popular female anchor is “Tuan ya Tuan” @XKTVTuantuan, with a total of X million fans.
This year, the most ambitious stream follower on the platform is “Yanyan’s Daddy” @Yi Chen, who has given x.x.x million yuan worth of gifts in 2018!
…… ]
At first, this Weibo post only became a little popular in the world of e-sports, but after being forwarded by a big verified account in the esports circle… it traveled out of the circle.
Netizens didn’t understand what was going on at first, but they woke up after they clicked through the @s that the official blog had attached to the post.
[Thank you to stream follower Yi something for his great contribution to his own enterprise, thank you to this stream follower!]
[Sure enough, it’s like a game for rich people to start up a live platform.]
[This is a real big boss here, he’s Yida Group’s boss. StarTV is probably barely a speck in his eye. The key is that he is 28 years old, unmarried, and you can Baidu his photo yourself.]
[I Baidued it and am back. I can say one thing: this concubine is tired.]
[Jiejie is willing, Meimei is also willing.JPG]
[[ChickenCoopWarning.JPG] Sorry, I’m about to break all of your Jiejie’s/Meimei’s hearts. Yi Chen’s gifts were all for the same anchor, and I think they will be getting married soon ba. It doesn’t matter if we can’t be Jie/Mei, we can nibble on this CP hand in hand ya!]
The a.s.sistant braced himself and looked at his boss, who was currently holding an iPad and flipping through such Weibo comments.
“President Yi, StarTV said your name is hanging in the livestream studio’s… you are No. 1 on their list of local tyrants, and they’re asking if it’s necessary for them to take it off.”
“No need.” Yi Chen flipped around randomly and came across many unfamiliar words.
He opened Baidu, searched “I’m willing” and “Chicken Coop warning”, saw the explanations that jumped out, and couldn’t help but raise an eyebrow.
The a.s.sistant nodded. “Then on the Weibo side, do you need them to get rid of the threads concerning you?
Yi Chen finally looked up from the iPad.
He asked, “Have you been very bored recently?”
The a.s.sistant’s heart jumped, and he hurriedly replied, “No…”
“Then how can you have the time to be concerned about these small matters every single day?” Yi Chen said, “It was also your idea to have someone blur out my features last time.”
The a.s.sistant suffered in silence. He reminded him in a small voice, “President Yi… Didn’t you say three years ago that you didn’t want to appear on camera?”
Yi Chen frowned.
Three years ago?
The a.s.sistant added, “At that awards banquet.”
Yi Chen remembered.
Three years ago, at an awards banquet, he had been stalked by a female celebrity. He had gotten extremely irritated because the camera was in front of him and he couldn’t blow up in public.
At the end of the banquet, he had given orders to the other party to remove all his scenes.
The organizer was very sensible. While cutting out all his scenes, he also cut out the scenes of that female celebrity completely. This matter spread very quickly, and after that, no one dared to cling to him openly in public.
Yi Chen asked, “Then if I say today that I don’t want to eat, will there be no need for me to eat at all in the future?”
That was to say—the list of local tyrants wouldn’t need to be removed, nor did the Weibo post need to be re-edited.
The a.s.sistant said, “I understand, President Yi.”
With that, the a.s.sistant picked up the doc.u.ments on the desk that needed to be printed and sent, and glanced at the small objects lying beside the doc.u.ments.
His boss always liked a clean and tidy desk. There was almost nothing on the desk except for the necessary computer, pens, and paper. He didn’t even have any decorative flowers or picture frames. Recently though, one thing had been added.
A small calendar.
From his point of view, he could also see that the other party had drawn a circle around a certain date.
He had just helped his boss in booking a ticket to Manyang on this specific date last week.
Yi Chen raised his eyes. “What else?”
The a.s.sistant came back to his senses and hurriedly said, “Yes. President Yi, that Mr. Liu has been continuously trying to get an appointment with you at the front desk these past few days. Today, he said that if he still couldn’t meet you… then he was going to directly contact Mrs. Yi.”
Normally, this kind of thing was easy to deal with; the number of appointments they refused were many. However, this person was different; this was a distant relative of their boss. How could they dare to refuse him? They could only find an excuse to procrastinate day after day.
Upon the mention of this person, Yi Chen’s expression grew colder by several degrees.
After a long time, he said, “Tomorrow afternoon, set aside ten minutes for him.”
——
“Yi Chen, just because you can make the company grow larger doesn’t mean you can just disown your close relatives.” A bald middle-aged man stood at his desk with an unhappy expression. He was Yi Chen’s distant uncle .
“We’re all relatives here, what need is there to have arrived at this step? Must you put him to death?”
Yi Chen looked at him and asked sarcastically, “I’m putting him to death?”
The middle-aged man said boldly and straightforwardly, “Of course! Although he was the one who ran into you, and he was wrong first, but he has already been locked in for so long, so his punishment should be enough by now ba? Are you really going to let him squat there for a year and a half?! And he’s still young. If the sentence really gets handed down, then he will be considered to have a stain upon his life!”
“Was forced to leave by his school, almost went to juvenile detention, and a few years ago, was nearly accused of rape…” Yi Chen’s tone was light as he retorted, “I don’t think him having this matter added onto his life would make much of a difference.”
The middle-aged man took a deep breath. “He was framed for all those matters! He’s a good boy, it’s just that sometimes, he’s easily impulsive.”
Seeing that Yi Chen wasn’t going to let go of the matter, he said again, “How about this then ba. Yi Chen, as long as you let him go this time… I will give you that house in the western suburbs, just count it as Uncle giving you a New Year’s gift.”
“A house?” Yi Chen turned his pen. “This son of yours is worth a lot of money.”
“Don’t be greedy, that house is worth millions! I know it’s nothing to you, but this house counts as a sign of the greatest sincerity from our side. And in the end, you won’t need to do anything, you just need to write up a dispute settlement. If you feel that’s troublesome, I’ll ask someone to print it out, and you can just copy it—”
Yi Chen glanced at the time.
His ten minutes were nearly up.
Instead of talking nonsense, he tossed his pen on the table and said, “How about this then ba?”
The middle aged man straightened his back. “What?”
“I’ll give you two houses.” Yi Chen’s tone had not changed at all, it was as if he was really discussing it with him. “You give me complete peace and quiet, don’t bother me again. Otherwise, the security guard will drive you away, and I’m afraid it won’t look good for you.”
The man became so angry that his blood pressure suddenly shot up. “You!!”
“No.” Yi Chen raised his hand and held up three fingers. “I’ll add another one. In exchange for your son staying in there for another year, how is that?”
“Yi Chen!! Don’t go too far in bullying others!!!” The man stood up, his face a mottled red. “Do you really think that just because you have money you can bully others? Let me tell you, there’s no such thing!”
If he hadn’t already known that he couldn’t beat Yi Chen up physically, he was afraid that by this point, he would have already tried something.
Yi Chen leaned back and said, “Take care, I won’t be seeing you off.”
“I will have to make this matter today known to all our relatives!” The middle-aged man took a few deep breaths. “I want them to know that your entire person, including your blood, is ice cold!”
“No wonder your parents talked about adopting a child a few years ago and visited welfare homes everywhere. I actually thought it was strange at that time, but now I understand. If it was me, I would also have to find myself a son again, so that I can be rest a.s.sured of having support for my old age ah!”
Throughout this tirade, Yi Chen looked at him with a calm face. Once he fell silent, Yi Chen asked, “Are you done?”
When the man left, he slammed the office door shut so hard that it seemed as if a crack of thunder had just fallen, and the sound reverberated throughout the whole floor.
Seeing this, his a.s.sistant hurried in. “President Yi, you’re alright ba…”
Yi Chen picked up a doc.u.ment and said lightly, “If he comes again, let the security guard drive him away.”
“Alright.”
The a.s.sistant gently closed the door behind him, and silence immediately returned to the office.
Yi Chen stared at the doc.u.ment in front of him. He felt that the words and figures in front of him were all piling together in a blur, and making his head hurt.
Adoption.
Plainly speaking, their biological son was almost 30 years old, completely healthy, and had a smooth career. The couple themselves were nearly 60 years old, but they suddenly wanted to adopt a new child?
It was too ridiculous.
Although he knew that he shouldn’t believe all of this distant uncle’s words, his first thought after hearing this wasn’t to question it, but rather a— “so it’s like that”.
When he had taken over the company a few years ago, his parents had often nagged into his ear, especially Mother Yi, and kept telling him to not spend all his time on work and to come home more and accompany them some more.
But in the past two years, these words had become fewer and fewer.
They flew all over the world, going to Paris today to watch a show, and then going to New York the day after tomorrow to see an exhibition. They hadn’t even made many phone calls to him during the whole month.
So it turned out that they had already decided to adopt another child.
Outside the office, the secretary first looked at the closed office door before asking in a low voice, “a.s.sistant Chen, the argument just now was so intense, do I still need to go inside to remind President Yi about the meeting in a bit?”
“Of course,” the a.s.sistant said, “Is this the first time you’ve met President Yi? What can stop him from working?”
The secretary was about to nod when he heard a snap, and the office door suddenly opened.
Yi Chen, wearing only a white shirt and carrying the suit jacket in his arms, stepped out of his office.
“Today’s meeting is cancelled.”
Only after he had walked far away did the secretary come back to his senses. “Didn’t you just say…”
The a.s.sistant was shocked as well. He looked away after awhile and said, “It’s over, it’s over….these next few days, just run away with the tail between your legs ba. You definitely don’t want to provoke the boss.”
Finally, after he got in the car, Yi Chen’s tense expression loosened a little.
He frowned and raised his hand to loosen his tie. Because he used too much strength, his collar also got messed up.
A few minutes later, a black car sped out of the parking lot.
When he got home, Yi Chen threw the car key on the living room table and directly lay on the sofa.
Yi Ran had gone to Mo Nancheng’s party today, so there was no one at home. He was about to close his eyes for a short rest when he felt a sudden weight on his leg.
Little Fool jumped on him, and because he was hungry, he kept rubbing himself on him.
Yi Chen stared at him for a while, and his eyes cleared up again. He raised his hand and rubbed his head. “You already finished off the bowl?”
Little Fool: “Meow.”
Yi Chen picked up the cat and poured some cat food into his bowl.
Little Fool jumped down at once, opened his mouth wide, and began to eat.
Yi Chen sat next to him and watched for a while. He couldn’t help but take out his cellphone, take a picture, and send it to Yu Yan.
He didn’t receive a reply even after a long time had pa.s.sed. It was only then that he figured out that right now was Yu Yan’s livestreaming time.
He was about to open up the live platform when his cellphone screen flashed, and a phone call came through.
Seeing the ID on the call display, Yi Chen paused in his movement of petting the cat, and there was a short pause before he picked up the call.
“Yi Chen.” Mo Nancheng’s voice was a bit weak. “Are you still angry with me ah?”
“I’m not angry,” said Yi Chen.
“I was too hurried in the way I talked that day, don’t fuss over it too much, I’m apologizing to you now. I’m sorry ah.” Now that Mo Nancheng had already made up his mind to apologize, his manner of speech was nimble. “Why don’t you come here? Let’s meet and talk.”
Yi Chen remained silent, not answering.
Mo Nancheng let out a “h.e.l.lo” and said, “Can you hear me? It’s a bit noisy on my side…”
“Didn’t that group of people laugh at you at the get-together?” After a while, Yi Chen asked, “Why did you still come to find me?”
Mo Nancheng was then struck dumb.
He hadn’t been angry at Yi Chen that day for no reason.
Just a few days before their quarrel, some of his friends had gotten together and had a few too many drinks. As soon as they opened their mouths, they started mocking Mo Nancheng that he was a dog owned by Yi Chen that was loyal to his owner and flattered him every day, but still didn’t get any benefits from Yi Chen.
Later, Mo Nancheng had fallen out with that group of people. It hadn’t been a small matter, and Yi Chen could find out about it at any time.
Mo Nancheng struggled for a long time, then said, “It’s not like that, I didn’t take their words to heart…”
Having said that, he stopped speaking.
Didn’t take it to heart? Clearly the two of them had quarreled that day, and no one would believe what he had just said.
Mo Nancheng scratched his head and hurriedly said, “I was a little angry at that time, but I’ve thought about it these past few days…”
“Alright.” Yi Chen interrupted him, “I won’t go, and you guys play slowly.”
With that, he didn’t bother to listen to what the other side would say anymore and just hung up.
There was silence again.
Looking at the empty screen, he suddenly felt a little lonely.
People with higher positions in the company usually had two phone numbers—one work number and one private number. However, Yi Chen had only arranged for one number.
Because he had no use for a private number.
Apart from work, the only people who would call him were Father Yi, Mother Yi, and Mo Nancheng. He had even less use for text messages and the like.
Now, his parents were about to adopt a new child, and he had broken off relations with his friend.
Yi Chen let out a long breath and suddenly felt tired.
The question Mother Yi asked him the most was what was the point of making money.
He had originally been dismissive of this kind of question, but now, he couldn’t help but ask himself this very question in the bottom of his heart.
What was the point of making money?
Was it wrong that he worked day and night?
Was it wrong that since he didn’t like to stay in nightclubs and didn’t like to waste time on racing or golf, so he often refused friends’ invitation?
Was it also wrong that he had listened to his grandfather’s dying words, and made the company bigger step by step, and wanted his parents to live a life without worrying about food, drink, and fun?
Yi Chen reviewed everything that had happened in these past few months.
In his present situation, it wasn’t too much to say that he had been forsaken by his friends and allies.
Yi Chen leaned back and put his head against the wall. For the first time, he felt at a complete loss.
“Meow.” Little Fool suddenly came to him and gently circled his arm with his tail, calling Yi Chen back to his senses.
He looked at Little Fool’s dark and quick-witted eyes, and suddenly thought of another pair of eyes.
He sat up straight, drove the cat to the side, took out his cellphone from under the cat’s feet, and easily clicked into the livestream.
It was dark inside, without even a single line in the barrage.
——You are early. The anchor is not at home now oh.
Yi Chen frowned, looked up, and saw a line of big characters in the studio— [yanxyan: Today I’m taking a day off.]
A day off?
Why didn’t he hear about it?
He flipped to his address book and was just about to make a phone call when he suddenly heard a few clear beeping noises.
It was the sound of the door pa.s.scode being entered.
He instinctively looked around and only heard the melody of it being successfully unlocked sound out after six beeps.
After the door was unlocked, a young man pushed the door open with his feet, since he was carrying a large cake box in one hand and a suitcase in the other, and squeezed into the house with difficulty and clumsiness.
The young man didn’t look up after entering the room. First, he let out a little sigh of relief, put the suitcase aside and closed the door, before then slowly turning around.
—To face the man sitting next to the cat’s nest.
Yi Chen was in a rare state of astonishment, and Yu Yan was also completely shocked.
Yu Yan looked at the clock on the wall and then at the man sitting on the ground. Then he put down the things in his hand and walked towards him while asking, “You… Why are you off work?”
As soon as he finished speaking, Yi Chen suddenly stood up. Before he could even react, Yu Yan was pulled into his arms.
It was a very strong hug. They weren’t wearing much, so Yu Yan could clearly feel Yi Chen’s body warmth.
After a long time, Yi Chen asked in a hoa.r.s.e voice, “….Why are you here?”
“I……” Yu Yan had been so startled by his enthusiastic welcome that he only then remembered the purpose of his visit.
He put his chin gently on Yi Chen’s shoulder and hugged him back, a smile in his voice as he said—
“I came to give you a nice surprise ah.”
“Happy birthday, Yi Chen.”
—
Juurensha: …Yanyan’s so sweet! And his timing was so good! Poor Yi Chen, having a breakdown over this adoption thing. Really, I feel like only rich people can be like “oh what’s the point of making money.” M’am, without your son earning all that money, how would you be able to be jet-setting around without a care? Although hopefully it’s all a big misunderstanding that this awful uncle started. (May his son rot in jail forever) And I hope the poor a.s.sistant gets a raise, he has to go through so much.
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