!
"Old Li, I'm just here to collect my back pay and commission. Clear my ledger, and we're officially done."
Inside his former company's office, Su Jin sat across from his old manager, dressed sharply and wearing a cold, cynical smile.
"You still have the fucking nerve to show your face here!" Old Li slammed his hands on the desk, shooting to his feet with a purple face. "Su Jin, you completely fucked me over! That bastard Wang Yuntong dumped all his rage on my head. The department is dead in the water, and that thug practically extorted me!"
"And that's my operational failure?" Su Jin shrugged lazily. "Don't offload your incompetence onto me. In this jungle, if you have the skills, you eat meat; if you don't, you eat dirt. Are you really blaming me for stopping an assault?"
"Stopping an assault?" Old Li craned his neck forward, his veins bulging. "How can you be so utterly shameless? Just had to play the hero, didn't you? Had to show off your unbending spine? Is this your first day in the real world?"
"You can't afford to provoke Wang Yuntong, and neither can I. Do you think Xiaojing could? She's a temp from a rural village! What options did she have besides rolling over? Let me spell it out for you—you're just a fucking clown."
"If you had the tactical sense to secure evidence, I would have stuck my neck out and held the line with you. But you went in blind and tried to act tough... Stop drinking my premium tea!"
Su Jin took a slow, deliberate sip from the porcelain cup. "Why are we still debriefing this? The mission is over. Wire my salary and commission."
"Are you... kidding me?" Old Li was so apoplectic he nearly blacked out, trembling violently. "Su Jin, our operations are halted! You dragged me into this crossfire, and you still want your cut? Are you a complete sociopath?"
"You dragged yourself out of a garbage-tier university. Who authorized your hiring? Who took you to your first executive hostess club? Have you zero corporate loyalty?"
Old Li viciously smacked the back of his hand into his palm, spitting curses.
"Do you realize how easily this could have been mitigated? Fine, you assaulted a VIP without securing video evidence. Why couldn't you just authorize a payout and apologize? You let a minor skirmish escalate into total war. I've mentored you for years; don't tell me you don't have a few hundred thousand stashed away!"
"You actually have the sheer audacity to bring up my finances?" Su Jin arched an eyebrow. "Let's be clear: my accounts are empty. And you know exactly why."
"My name was never on the corporate expense accounts. I ran operational logistics out of my own pocket, and you never authorized the reimbursements for those club runs. With that burn rate, how the hell would I have savings?"
"This entire clusterfuck is your fault! If you had just bribed me properly and corrupted my morals from day one, I wouldn't have had to play the unbending paladin."
"You forgot the absolute bullshit you pulled, didn't you!" Old Li spat, practically vibrating with rage. "I reimbursed you the first two years! Do you have zero self-awareness as to why I cut your funding?"
"The client had already hailed a cab and extracted, and you were still inside ordering escorts! Two at a time! Why the hell would I subsidize that!"
"I have future clients to entertain, don't I? When new talent arrives, it's standard procedure to run quality assurance before deploying them to a VIP," Su Jin fired back with clinical detachment.
The remaining color drained from Old Li's face. He stumbled back a step, pointing a trembling finger at Su Jin. "Where the hell did you undergo training? Have you purged your sense of shame entirely?"
"Save it, Old Li. Let's keep this strictly professional. You don't need to leverage fake camaraderie with me. How many financial quarters have you exploited my labor?" Su Jin's eyes narrowed to dangerous slits. "I've optimized this department for years. I was overdue for an executive promotion, yet you kept me running low-level grunt work. Why?"
"Because you're too damn efficient to promote!"
"Hah! The truth finally breaches protocol!" Su Jin pointed a triumphant finger at his former boss. "I knew it! You finally admitted it!"
"Damn right I did!" Old Li glared, utterly unrepentant. "I utilized you like a corporate pack mule! I squeezed the output of three employees out of one! It was highly profitable! So what?"
"Beautiful. Utterly ruthless." Su Jin let out a cold, cynical laugh. "Don't think I'm blind to your localized corruption. Last year, that new secretary you hired? Giving you oral under the conference table. You think I didn't clock that public exhibition? She was going at it like the Cart Titan in lipstick. I'm shocked you didn't contract a biological hazard."
"For the record, when your wife launched a surprise audit on the office, I ran interference for you! I maintained your cover, Old Li! Frankly, I sympathized with you. Your wife's face has more wrinkles than a burnt scallion pancake..."
"I will fucking terminate you!!" Mortified and blinded by rage, Old Li let out a feral roar and lunged over the desk.
Su Jin casually deflected him with a single, kinetic shove. Old Li crumpled back into his executive chair, reality dawning on him that his atrophied limbs were zero threat. Defeated, he silently pulled out a cigarette and lit it.
Su Jin retrieved his own pack and sparked a cigarette.
The two men sat entrenched in a toxic haze, a temporary ceasefire settling over the office.
Amidst the heavy silence, a subtle friction echoed from the exterior corridor.
The executive suite was soundproofed, but Su Jin's upgraded auditory receptors easily bypassed the acoustic foam, intercepting the conversation outside.
"President Wang, President Wang! Manager Li is off-site today! If you require his authorization, I can initiate a comms link..."
"Stand down. I need a face-to-face negotiation with your Manager Li."
Su Jin rapped his knuckles against the mahogany desk, locking eyes with Old Li. "Old Li, your hostile VIP just breached the perimeter. You sure he's not here for another shakedown?"
"How do you know he's in the building?" Old Li's head snapped up, a sickly pallor washing over his face.
Su Jin didn't waste breath answering; he instantly transitioned into a desktop-clearing Master.
He violently surged to his feet, sweeping his forearm across the desk and sending files and corporate awards crashing to the floor. Then, he cranked his vocal cords to maximum volume. "Li!! If you don't authorize my wire transfer right fucking now, I will end you!! You want to terminate me? Let's see whose vitals flatline first!!"
At that exact second, the office door was violently shoved open.
A morbidly obese, grease-slicked middle-aged man froze in the threshold.
The intruder was none other than President Wang, Wang Yuntong.
The moment Wang Yuntong processed Su Jin's face, his eyes dilated with feral malice. "You little piece of shit! You finally broke stealth, huh!"
The veins in Su Jin's neck bulged as he leveled a furious finger at Wang Yuntong, then pivoted it to Old Li. "You... you colluded with Old Li to raid my apartment! Let me make this clear, Wang... if you two think you can assassinate me... I... I..."
Su Jin's eyes rapidly scanned the debris field. He seized a heavy glass trophy and charged Wang Yuntong.
"I'll put you in the fucking ground first!!"
Old Li, as if hijacked by a sudden surge of adrenaline, launched himself forward and executed a flawless takedown, pinning Su Jin to the carpet.
"President Wang, fall back! Leave this little bastard to me!!"
"Excellent! Fucking excellent, Old Li... You little shit, you still want to engage? I'll make you bleed." Wang Yuntong's jowls quivered with rage as he tactically retreated from the danger zone, slamming the door.
"God damn it, I'm going to beat you into a coma!" Old Li put on a crazed performance, winding up a massive backhand aimed at Su Jin's face.
Su Jin effortlessly brought his knee up. Old Li was instantly launched sideways, crashing heavily onto his back.
Sitting casually on the floor, Su Jin let out a dark chuckle. "Old Li, the hostile has evacuated. Were you actually trying to deal damage?"
"Don't think this makes us allies!" Old Li pointed a shaking finger at him from the floor, gasping for breath.
Su Jin pulled out his phone, pulling up his payment QR code. "Hurry it up. Settle my salary and commission. The corporate routing takes too long. And throw in a carton of cigarettes, or I'm breaching that hallway to drag Wang back in here."
Old Li wheezed a few times from the carpet, scanned the digital code, and let out a soul-crushing sigh at the ceiling. He dragged himself to a drawer, yanked out a premium carton of smokes, and hurled it at Su Jin's head.
"Get the fuck out! I never want to see your face in this sector again!"
"Old Li, off the record? I've been MIA for a month, and I actually missed your miserable face..."
"Get out!!!"
...
Down in the lobby, Wang Yuntong was stomping toward the exit, barking into his comms.
"Liu? Mobilize a strike team. That little shit from last month just broke cover and tried to engage me again. If I don't put him in a wheelchair, my reputation is glassed!"
"... Affirmative. Rally the crew. We breach immediately!"
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