Chapter 555 - Couldn’t Help It

Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio

Gu Nianzhi looked at the email account and password that He Zhichu had just sent her and contemplated for a while before logging in. The moment she managed to access his account, the uncountable emails in English almost blinded her. At that moment, she understood how it felt to be working in an all-English environment.

She immediately began to focus and read the emails. In the beginning, she was merely trying to get accustomed to He Zhichu’s work, trying to see the types of emails he received on a daily basis. However, after an entire night of looking through his emails, she arrived at a conclusion. No matter what your occupation was, the moment you’re at the top of the mountain, money would just be god damn easy to earn! Of course, the journey to get there would be extremely tough, but the moment you pulled through, it’d be the same for all occupations. Therefore, actually, money didn’t come easily...

Most of He Zhichu’s emails came from people from listed multinational companies who wanted to have a lawyer to draft some legal documents. Some also offered him directorship in their company. They did not offer him shares but merely invited him to sit in during their meeting, and he’d be paid in tens of thousands of US dollars every minute.

Gu Nianzhi coughed a couple of times, exited He Zhichu’s mailbox, and sent him a text. Professor He, I’ll sign it. It wouldn’t be too hard to be the assistant of someone like that. Hell, it’d even be easier than being his assistant at B University. She didn’t think that there was any problem, so she signed the contract, scanned it, and sent it to He Zhichu.

Upon receiving her signed copy, he merely added in his digital signature and sent it to his law firm in America to have it stored in the HR archive. He was one of the partners in that law firm and had a say in employment. The HR department received the contract and entered it into the system immediately. Gu Nianzhi was officially employed by the biggest law firm in America, even though she was just a rookie assistant.

After receiving confirmation from America, He Zhichu called Gu Nianzhi and informed her, “Okay, you’re officially my assistant now. They’ll contact you and provide you with an official email address. Remember to provide them with your bank account number for them to transfer your monthly salary.”

“Sure thing!” Gu Nianzhi replied cheerfully and closed her laptop. Looking at her watch, she was surprised to see that it was already 11 o’clock. “You’re not turning in yet, Professor He?” Gu Nianzhi wanted to go for a nice shower.

Shaking his head, He Zhichu replied, “There are still things to finish up.”

Gu Nianzhi remembered one of the official emails from He Zhichu’s mailbox and leaned against the doorframe of her bathroom, smiling. “You have such an easy job; just attend some meetings each month and pick up your iPad to draft some organizational contracts, and that earns you such a crazy amount monthly.” He Zhichu’s fees were 50,000 US dollars per minute. Yes, you saw correctly; he charged by the minute.

However, there were still many organizations who wanted to engage him. He wasn’t short of money, so he did not accept all cases. Usually, he’d accept a couple of significant cases per month and delegate them to his subordinates. He’d collect half of the earnings, and the other half would be given to his employees as their salaries. For a lawyer of his rank, a two-minute job would be equivalent to a novice lawyer’s annual salary.

“Meetings can be tiring, as well you know. Don’t think that earning money is easy for me.” The corners of He Zhichu’s lips twitched, and his smile disappeared. “I don’t usually accept criminal and civil cases. Most of my cases are related to corporate law. However, if you wish to be slightly busier, I can give those cases a try.”

“No thanks!” Gu Nianzhi quickly stopped He Zhichu. “This is good as is. Wait ’til I pull through my year and get enough credits. Then you can think of accepting other types of cases.”

“Okay, let me know whenever you want to try handling other types of cases. I’ll grab some of them.” He Zhichu really went according to her preference, including at work. Gu Nianzhi was getting to know him better and understood his style of doing things. Of course, she wasn’t as resistant towards him as before.

Hanging up, Gu Nianzhi entered the bathroom for her long awaited shower. However, He Zhichu was still looking at the darkened screen of his phone. Even though his expression was cold as usual, the occasional sparkling of his eyes showed that he felt something. He had never thought that it would be like this after managing to find her.

After a while, he finally put his phone down. However, right at that moment, his phone vibrated with an incoming text message. Chu, it’ll be your birthday soon. Come home. It was from Father. He Zhichu gripped his phone tightly and turned it off. He pretended not to have seen the text and headed to bed. He intended to reply the next day, as he did not want his father to call him if he knew that he was still online.

...

The prime ministerial election candidate, Tan Dongbang, whose daughter had been missing (kidnapped) in America for a while now, had been the hottest discussion topic in the Hua Xia Empire. Minister of Internal Relations, Bai Jiancheng’s, news of garnering popularity barely surpassed his news, but in no time, Tan Dongbang’s daughter’s kidnapping case had gone up in popularity by five percent. To the candidates who were at the end phase of the elections, this amount was actually a big gap.

Bai Jiancheng had high EQ. Even though he was being surpassed, and his hard work all this time might have been for nothing, he did not show any form of anger nor have any distasteful behavior towards his opponent. Instead, he showed how impressed he was with Tan Dongbang’s results, and this behavior was undeniably gracious, even for Tan Dongbang himself.

“Uncle, are you going to just let that Tan Dongbang ruin all your hard work?” Bai Shuang couldn’t stand the injustice. “It had been you all along who was leading, and you were the one who was supporting the entire internal cabinet! How could he just snatch all your hard work away!? He could even use his daughter’s mishap to help him in his election? What a scumbag!”

Bai Jiancheng’s eldest daughter, Bai Yueran, exchanged glances with him before smiling and turning to Bai Shuang. “Little Shuang, don’t say that. No one wanted something like that to happen to Minister Tan’s daughter. Most likely they didn’t ask for this piece of news to be leaked, either.”

Bai Yueran smoothed Bai Shuang’s long hair and said maturely, “Yes Little Shuang. Some things we keep to ourselves. We can gossip about it at home, but let’s not just shoot our mouths off like that in public and give people reasons to pick on your uncle, alright?” She then asked, “Oh yeah, how has Little Ze been? Has he contacted you recently?”

Bai Shuang shook her head. “I heard that he left for a mission. It has already been a month since we contacted him.”

Pouting, Bai Yueran said, “Oh yes. Special Forces’ missions have all along been confidential. You don’t disturb him either, okay?”

“Of course not.” Bai Shuang nodded bashfully. She would never tell her cousin that she sent a text message to Zhao Liangze last night. She knew that he would not reply, but she couldn’t help herself. She was happy whenever she looked at his display picture.

“Hmm, Little Shuang, do you want to work? Ever since you resigned from foreign relations, you’ve rewarded yourself with a long holiday. Isn’t it time to return to work?” Bai Yueran looked at Bai Shuang carefully. She still pitied this cousin of hers whose parents had passed away.

Bai Shuang was contemplating this as well. Supporting her face with her hands, she leaned on the sofa and said, “I’ll discuss it with Little Ze when he’s back.”

Bai Yueran’s hand trembled. She looked at Bai Shuang’s profile. “You’re that close to him already?”

“It’s normal isn’t it? We’re friends.” Bai Shuang wanted to smile again, but she held back. She and Zhao Liangze were buddies who could talk about anything under the sun. She believed that they could be something more after a while.

Bai Yueran smiled while looking at her. “Sure, when he comes back, discuss it with him.”

Since Bai Yueran didn’t have anything more to say, Bai Shuang stood up and said, “I’ll go and check on auntie. It’ll be dinner soon. I’ll call you guys?”

“Sure. Quickly go and see her if you want. I want fried chicken wings. No idea if the kitchen had made them.” Bai Yueran smiled. She was extremely attractive when she smiled, especially her lips. Even though they looked slightly bigger, it was really sexy when she smiled. Bai Shuang pinched Bai Yueran’s cheeks lightly and headed downstairs.

The moment Bai Shuang left, Bai Yueran closed the door of the study and asked Bai Jiancheng, “What do you intend to do, dad?”

Tan Dongbang had been pushing them into a corner. It was impossible that they would not retaliate. However, they didn’t have to mention this in front of Bai Shuang. Bai Jiancheng’s expression remained the same. He was still smiling his iconic smile with his arms folded. Placing his arms on the table, his charisma was immensely strong. “Nothing, I just didn’t expect the Tan’s would be going all out like this.” Bai Jiancheng shook his head. “I really overlooked his potential in the past; however, this popularity in the news must be removed.”

“I’m thinking that as well.” Bai Yueran sat opposite Bai Jiancheng at the table. “Should I visit the media?”

“No, don’t do that.” Bai Jiancheng looked at her. “Yueran, I personally guided you to become who you are today. Do you understand the concept of letting nature take its course? It’d be more efficient to change people’s mindsets than to change the news. If you were to forcefully remove this news, the Tans would be able to use that to threaten us while they looked for another piece of news to garner attention. By then, their popularity would soar again, and mine would continue to drop.”

Bai Yueran clenched her fists and closed her eyes. “I understand, dad. I will not interfere with the freedom of the media.”

“That’s correct.” Bai Jiancheng lowered his voice and said seriously, “The attraction people have towards news is temporary. If you want his news to lose the attention of the people, it’s simple – use another headline to divert the people’s attention...”

Bai Yueran’s heart skipped a beat. “I saw this article that was headline-worthy. It’s also a student from our country who went overseas to study. This could attract more attention that Tan Guiren’s case, but because that family was just a normal family and not some family with a political background, I’m worried that its popularity won’t be sustained for long.”

“Is it really headline-worthy? People from normal families are our citizens as well. How can we just sit back and relax when they need our help?” Bai Jiancheng began to smile. “Tell me, what is it about?”

“This happened in Germany.” Bai Yueran took out her phone and went to a website that wasn’t so eye-catching and found the article. “This article has no popularity now, even overseas, because Tan Guiren’s case has taken up most of the readers’ attention.”n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

Narrowing his eyes, Bai Jiancheng asked, “How did you find this?”

“I didn’t find this. It appeared in the weekly reports from the Special Forces.” Bai Yueran was the main person in charge of the legal department in the Special Forces and received these updates as well.