Chapter 30 - The Truth (1/2)
Chapter 30: The Truth
Translated by Shiya of Exiled Rebels Scanlations
Having serious hangovers and insomnia took a toll on Li Sui. The next morning, he felt as if his head was going to explode. Lu Shang wasn’t feeling any better than Li Sui; his face was as white as paper.
After Aunt Lu served breakfast, she noticed that the two of them were especially quiet today—they didn’t have a shred of communication. When their fingers touched as they reached for seconds, they backed away from each other at lightning speed.
Aunt Lu could sense the awkwardness in the air, but she had no idea what had occurred, so she just thought it was a tiny lovers’ squabble. Couples often ran into obstacles, this was nothing special in Aunt Lu’s eyes. Plus, the two were always close, so Aunt Lu wasn’t worry about them. After finishing her duties, she knowingly left the room promptly, hoping the two would clear things up soon.
The outside temperature lowered day by day; the previous layer of snow had yet to melt completely, but a new round of snow already began falling down from the sky.
Li Sui wasn’t at his best, so he made a lot of mistakes during work. When he finally finished all his work and returned home, it was already late at night. No-one was home, only the fireplace was still burning, making crackling sounds. Dinner was on the dining table, the plates still steaming hot, but it seemed like no one had touched them.
It was so late already, but Lu Shang was still not home. Li Sui had no idea where Lu Shang was, nor did he know what Lu Shang was doing. Li Sui was seldom apart from Lu Shang, so this made him feel extremely uncomfortable—as if he had just lost a keepsake which he’d always kept by his side. Li Sui wanted to call Lu Shang, so he pulled out his phone from his pocket. Then, he thought about how Lu Shang might feel if he actually called. He fidgeted with the phone for a while, feeling depressed, and eventually he decided to call Uncle Yuen instead.
“He went to HaiNan Island for work.” Uncle Yuen was a little shocked, he asked, “Did he not bring you along?”
Not only did Lu Shang not bring Li Sui along, Lu Shang didn’t even tell Li Sui he was going to the island. Lu Shang was obviously avoiding him.
“…… I see.”
After hanging the phone up, Li Sui stood in the empty house, his heart was just as empty as the house was.
It was already late at night, but the lights were still lit at the Golden Sands Shore project conference room. In the room were a few project leaders, all of them were calm on the surface, but in truth, they were all extremely worried.
None of them thought that such a tiny construction accident would bring Lu Shang here. Not only that, Lu Shang called all the project accountants and managers for questioning, in the middle of the night nonetheless.
Even if you looked at all the construction projects in the mainland, none would be completely clean, especially when it came to this kind of huge projects with so many parties involved. Tong Yan was no exception, the most important thing was to balance profit with the quality. As long as the final results were okay, every side would benefit, so everyone would be happy. Usually the higher ups won’t be too harsh either, they’d tend to let these little things slide.
T/N: I just know that a part of Lu Shang came since he’s in a bad mood and he’s here to blow off some steam.
Great example of not letting personal emotions interfere with your work, Lu Shang.
It wasn’t like Lu Shang didn’t understand that, but he still decided to review everything out of the blue. Lu Shang made a huge move, his demeanor seemed unforgiving, and that made everyone scared. Everyone in charge knew that Lu Shang was cracking down on them. Putting aside the worst-case scenario of Lu Shang catching every culprit out for now, even considering the best, Lu Shang would find one to two to punish as a warning.
In this freezing winter night, the people in charge were in the huge conference room, sweating in fear that the unfortunate punishment would be on their heads.
Liu XingMing felt like continuing wasn’t going to do any good, so he smiled as he said, “Director Lu, the task of checking the books won’t be finished anytime soon. You just got off the plane, and you must be really tired, too. How about we finish the checking tomorrow and rest for now?”
“What?” Lu Shang turned to him, staring at him coldly, then he said, “The injured workers are still in critical condition now, but we still have no idea what caused it. Rest? Maybe we should just go home for a feast and a massage first, then we can check what had happened, is that what you’re suggesting?”
After Lu Shang said that, even Liu XingMing didn’t dare to smile anymore.
“Xiao Ye, go order dinner.” Lu Shang said.
“Yes.”
Lu Shang continued, “Call your family and tell them that until this problem is investigated completely, no-one is going home.”
For a long time, Lu Shang managed the company in an extremely humanitarian way. He seldom got mad, and he also seldom held anyone responsible directly. Though he seemed distant and hard to approach, he treated all his employees kindly. After getting used to that for a long time, everyone had the misconception that he was a person of zero fury and was easy to talk to. It was only today that they remembered this man was able to stabilize and manage Tong Yan all on his own—and that was ten years ago when he was still very young. A person with that kind of leadership skills was definitely not someone easy-going. Most of the time, people thought Lu Shang was easy-going only because he didn’t have the leisure to deal with every little problem. If Lu Shang were to put his mind to it though, no one would stand a chance against him.
When the investigation reached the materials’ purchasing records, the picture became clear. It was already late at night, everyone in the conference room turned from initial nervousness to giving up and preparing for the worst. Finally, everyone only had tiredness and sleepiness left. At long last, the accountant made a final conclusion, and that was when everyone woke up. Lu Shang picked up the report, flipping through the pages, then he scoffed, throwing the stack of paper on the desk towards Liu XingMing.
“Using such petty tricks.”
Liu XingMing picked up the report; after seeing the contents, his face turned pale. “I will immediately contact the material suppliers,” he said.
“There’s no need to contact them anymore, cancel our contract with them and ask them to get the hell out.”
After finishing the order, Lu Shang scanned everyone in the room, “I don’t know who took the money. The price doesn’t matter, but the materials must be replaced. After the construction is done, each and every one of you will have to sign for its completion. If anything happens, everyone here will be responsible—no one can run away from that. I’m making an amusement park here, not a killing machine. If I can’t ensure the safety of the users, why build an amusement park? I should have just built a graveyard.”
Lu Shang’s words were sharp, and everyone seated in the room was drenched in cold sweat. The conference room was terrifyingly quiet; at that exact moment, Lu Shang’s phone vibrated, cutting into his speech.
Lu Shang frowned; he picked up the phone and looked at the caller’s ID. For a split second, he froze.
“Director Lu. So, what suppliers are we changing to?” someone in the room asked.
Lu Shang secretly turned his phone off, then he said, “Send out a notice, we are opening a public bid.”
Li Sui waited for the whole night, yet he didn’t get a reply to his call. Li Sui had a hard-to-describe feeling—he was anxious, and at the same time, he was worried. It was as if he was a child who had done something wrong, wanting to apologize but just couldn’t through to the other.
Li Sui didn’t want to stop contacting Lu Shang, but he wouldn’t dare contact him relentlessly, afraid that Lu Shang would find him annoying. For the next couple of days, Li Sui chose the time slots when Lu Shang was off work to message him, most of the contents were just reporting daily stuff or nuisances with work as a pretext. Unfortunately, the messages he sent were like rocks thrown into the ocean, they sank and never returned.
It was as if Lu Shang was intentionally ignoring him—no matter what Li Sui tried, he didn’t succeed. Li Sui couldn’t but feel glum.
On a certain day, SiMa JingRong called Li Sui; he was inviting Li Sui over for dinner at the SiMa family for the New Years. Having dinner or not didn’t matter to Li Sui, but he was finally able to find someone whom he could talk to, and that mattered a lot to him. Li Sui changed the subject, coating the facts a little. He told SiMa JingRong what had occurred through the phone, hoping for some advice.
After hearing what Li Sui had to say, SiMa JingRong laughed, “Isn’t it normal that he’s angry? I mean, think about it. If he didn’t get angry at all, and didn’t care about it one bit as if nothing had happened, would you be happy with that?”
What SiMa JingRong said enlightened him, and Li Sui immediately stood up.
“If he’s hiding from you, that means he cares about you. If he really just sees you as a kid he had just picked up, would he let you do that to him? With his resources, you would have been long thrown into a lake as fish bait if he wanted to.”
Li Sui’s breathing sped up, he said in a hurry, “Do, do you mean…”