Chapter One Hundred and Seventy: The Aftermath of the Dismissal
Zhang Yuji was frozen in shock.
What did Qin Xi just say?
I’m being fired?
How is that possible? I’ve been at YL for almost three years now. They wouldn’t be that disrespectful to their long-time employees, right? Even for layoffs, it’s definitely not my turn yet.
Zhang Yuji had been a.s.signed a task that she had to complete. If she didn’t need to keep such a low profile, she would have kicked Qin Xi out of the company long ago using her authority.
Plus, in the first place, who the h.e.l.l did Qin Xi think she was? She had only been at YL for a year at most and had just managed to catch the right timing when she joined. Once the Mystery Designer joined, YL might not have been interested in her, especially with her ice-cold personality. What ability did Qin Xi have? She always depended on others and probably relied on seducing men to be promoted so quickly. How could this kind of person have the power to fire her?
With these thoughts racing through her head, Zhang Yuji walked forward with the same haughty att.i.tude as if she hadn’t understood Qin Xi.
She stopped in front of the doc.u.ments offered by Qin Xi.
Statue-like, Qin Xi didn’t move.
Zhang Yuji’s arrogant demeanor quickly deflated. She backed up half a step, but the words that followed were still quite disdainful. “What did you say? You must be insane. What severance package? Don’t make me laugh. I haven’t been fired; why would I need any severance package?”
Qin Xi ignored Zhang Yuji’s irritating rambling. She saw that Zhang Yuji refused to accept the situation, so she shoved the termination contract into Zhang Yuji’s hands and walked away without a second glance.
From a certain perspective, Qin Xi was perhaps the worst-suited person to work for the human resources department.
She felt that there was no need to explain things that were so obvious. The conditions of termination were clearly listed on the contract. If it were someone she was on better terms with, she might take some time to explain it, but for Zhang Yuji… There was no need.
Zhang Yuji retreated another two steps after having the contract thrust into her hands. When she looked up again, Qin Xi was already walking away. She immediately went to stop Qin Xi, but before she could do so, she saw what was on the doc.u.ments.
Zhang Yuji had thought that Qin Xi was merely threatening her. But, once she saw the official seal on the doc.u.ments, she knew that it wasn’t so simple.
She herself worked in the human resources department. She instantly understood the significance of the doc.u.ment.
A termination contract.
Qin Xi hadn’t gone more than few steps when she heard a scream of despair.
Alright, now Qin Xi couldn’t ignore Zhang Yuji any longer.
Without any other choice, Qin Xi turned around with a cold expression to see Zhang Yuji wildly charging at her. Now that Zhang Yuji finally understood what was happening, she had lost all reasoning and aimed for mutual destruction.
However, Qin Xi didn’t retreat or dodge. She didn’t move at all.
The third floor was entirely occupied by the design department. Only one room separated the interns’ offices from Qin Xi’s. It took less than fifty seconds to walk between them. The two security guards had followed Qin Xi out of the office just in time to see the conflict erupt. Seeing that Zhang Yuji was about to get physical, the two security guards immediately stepped in.
Zhang Yuji’s fingernails flashed over Qin Xi’s eyes. In the next second, she was bodily lifted to the side by the two burly men.
“Alright, stop making such a fuss. It’s almost lunchtime,” Qin Xi said.
“Shameless! You wh.o.r.e! Did you climb into Chairman Yan’s bed? You dare to mess with me? I’m going to kill you!”
Qin Xi turned a deaf ear to the curses and walked away.
……
When Designer Zhang [TLN: The intern manager Zhang. NOT the same person as Zhang Yuji.] came out of his meeting, it was already ten minutes past twelve. The lunch period had begun ten minutes ago. Normally, at this time, everyone would already be long gone. But today, all the interns had chosen to wait for Designer Zhang.
Well, all the interns except for Zhou Mang. He’d gone to buy food for Nan Wei.
“Sorry everyone. Meetings with Chairman Yan don’t usually end five minutes late,” Designer Zhang apologized the moment he entered.
The interns saw that Designer Zhang’s manner was much more reasonable and sighed in relief.
The interns hadn’t been completely idle when waiting for him. At the very least, they had concluded that the lady from the human resources department might have made a mistake. Designer Zhang was their last lifeline.
“Brother Zhang, earlier a person said that none of us pa.s.sed our interns.h.i.+p and that we were allowed to leave…” A pretty young lady started speaking.
Now that someone brought this up, everyone quickly joined in.
“Yeah. That has to be a mistake, right?”
“Wasn’t it determined that the pa.s.s rate would be ninety percent…?”
“Brother Zhang, what is actually going on?”
Designer Zhang made a motion to get them to settle down. He opened his mouth, but the words that came weren’t the words they had hoped for. “Yes, it’s true. This is already set in stone. In view of your feelings, the company has decided to grant you your interns.h.i.+p certificates after just one month. This isn’t a bad deal at all. YL is…”
The spark of hope in their eyes was once again extinguished.
They all understood this official jargon very well, but it was the very last thing they wanted to hear.
Compared to Qin Xi who hadn’t wanted to waste any breath at all and needed to be accompanied by two security guards, Designer Zhang was clearly much more experienced in these matters. The green interns had nothing to say to his casually spoken official language.
In design aspects, Designer Zhang was a very average and consistent performer that couldn’t compare to geniuses like Xiao Yu. However, Designer Zhang had overseen every batch of YL’s interns. In terms of management, Designer Zhang was worth more than even ten of Xiao Yu.
“But, why do they get…”
Finally, one of the interns asked this question. Everyone simultaneously glanced at Nan Wei.
They should have looked at Zhou Mang as well, but Nan Wei had sent Zhou Mang away.
Designer Zhang was initially caught off guard, but then he calmly replied, “Of course, this is because Nan Wei and Zhou Mang are the most remarkable interns of this batch.”
“But whenever we see him, he’s never working. By what metric—”
Some people felt awkward about bad-mouthing someone in front of them, but others were already beyond caring.
Okay, we weren’t recognized by YL. Fine, no full-time conversion was offered. But the most useless one, Nan Wei, and the stupidest one, Zhou Mang, both pa.s.sed. How can we accept this?
Compared to not being offered full-time conversion, the other interns felt more strongly dissatisfied that Nan Wei had made it past the interns.h.i.+p. They wouldn’t have felt so bad if everyone had been rejected.
Nan Wei coldly watched them without saying a word.
“He’s useless? How could that be? He always delivers his designs the earliest, and they are all directly accepted. Some of them have already been selected for the Summer Release. But for the rest of you, many of your designs aren’t even accepted after ten revisions. Furthermore, those that are accepted aren’t usable,” Designer Zhang said.
“What?!” The interns were shocked.
Could it be that the only reason they’d always seen him lounging on the sofa was because he’d already finished all his work?
But how was that possible? They were all top students that had majored in design. How could they lose to a freelance designer that hadn’t even gone through the standard design education?
“You must be joking. He must be engaging in some illicit relations.h.i.+p with Mr. Mystery.”
Someone brought up such an extreme idea. Although the voice wasn’t loud, it was clear enough that everyone could hear it.
A strange silence enveloped the room. An air of negativity clashed with an unwillingness to publicly criticize others.
Finally, Nan Wei opened his mouth. “My teacher already has a lover. Please don’t bring up any more nonsense.”
Everyone was at a loss. They had been talking about Mr. Mystery. Why had he randomly brought up his teacher?
Wait.
His teacher…
“Mr. Mystery is your teacher?!” Some people finally reacted.
Nan Wei laughed sarcastically.
“That’s correct. Mr. Mystery didn’t want his disciple receiving any preferential treatment, so he didn’t announce anything,” said Designer Zhang. “Anyway, we found out very quickly about Nan Wei’s extraordinary skills.”
Then, Designer Zhang thought of an idea. He walked over to a computer and sat down. “How about this: I’ll collect all of Nan Wei’s work and put it on the company’s network. If anyone has any questions after seeing them, you’re welcome to talk to me.”
When Zhou Mang brought in the takeout noodles, he was scared by the dead atmosphere.
“There’s coriander in here. I don’t want this.” Nan Wei pushed the noodles aside in disgust.
“That’s the wrong one. This one is yours.” Zhou Mang pa.s.sed over the other box of noodles. He asked curiously, “How come the rest of them are like that? They look like they have no spirit left.”
“It’s obvious. If you couldn’t convert to full-time, wouldn’t you be the same?”
Nan Wei carefully mixed his noodles. Once he was certain there wasn’t anything resembling coriander, he felt at ease and began to eat.
“People should look forward towards the future. It’s bad to dwell on losses.”
Nan Wei almost spat out his noodles looking at Zhou Mang’s earnest expression.
It was good that he didn’t.
Nan Wei pulled out a napkin to wipe his mouth and looked at Zhou Mang with a complicated expression.
If it wasn’t for him, this blockhead would have probably been ground down to the bone by others.
At that moment, the other interns had all deflated after seeing Nan Wei’s work. Then, one of the interns jumped out and loudly said, “Okay, forget about Nan Wei. Why does Zhou Mang get to stay?”
Caught off guard from being called out, Zhou Mang blinked innocently before turning to Nan Wei with a pleading expression.
As he was eating, Nan Wei indistinctly muttered, “Because he kissed the right a.s.s.”
“Huh?” Forget the other interns, not even Zhou Mang, who was sitting next to Nan Wei, had heard him.
“Because—” Nan Wei swallowed a mouthful of noodles. He glanced around at the other people looking at him before deliberately saying, “I’m Mr. Mystery’s star disciple. Is it so hard to request a full-time conversion for a friend?”