Chapter Forty-Four: Incapable Ruler (2/2)
“Very good, we’ll settle on these few pieces.” Yan Jin supportively set aside those drawings that Xiao Yu had picked out and put away the ones that were not.
“We’ll throw these seven pieces to the design department and let them choose five, okay?”
“Squeak.” Of course.
At this moment, Yan Jin was like the last king of Western Zhou, who had fooled the nobles of the various vassal states of Zhou¹, showing off the traits of an incapable ruler.
It did not matter if King Zhou You was an incapable ruler. In fact, he did that because he was obsessed with making his beauty smile. He was not the only example of a ruler who loved his beauties more than his country – In addition, the concubine Baosi appreciated what her ruler did for her. In Yan Jin’s case, it was more interesting than that – to be obsessed with making his hamster smile? What kind of setup was that?
You would never have guessed, but there was such a setup.
Xiao Yu nodded his head reservedly as if saying ‘this young man is promising’, clearly unaware that he was a hamster-fatale².
Yan Jin watched how cocky Xiao Yu was and couldn’t help but want to tease his hamster.
Thus, Yan Jin picked up one of the drawings from the seven pieces and swayed it in front of Xiao Yu.
“I don’t have high hopes on this drawing though…”
Xiao Yu took a closer look and got angry.
The sales volume for that necklace wasn’t that high, but it had brought a spike in sales figures after it was put on display during his previous life’s Autumn Release Conference – Yan Jin, you illiterate!
So, Xiao Yu forcefully sealed his paw onto that drawing and pressed really hard on the paper.
“Squeakk!!” Must be included!
……
On Monday, YL’s Chairman Yan took a rare leave of absence. The entire company was brimming with vitality as if it was spring.
Without their Chairman, there would be no sudden inspections, no morning nor evening meetings, and no danger of turbulent winds preceding the mountain storm.
It was time to relax themselves. Some of the employees were even planning to go for a drink after work.
The relaxation that was hard to come by before the Autumn Release Conference was also one of Yan Jin’s plans.
It was just that, there was one thing that was promptly arranged even without Yan Jin’s presence.
Secretary Fan handed over the pile of drawings to the design director and asked them to choose five drawings for the Autumn Release Conference.
It goes without saying that this should not be a problem at all. They were all aware that Chairman Yan had collected the drawings last Friday. Now that seven drawings were chosen, and they had to decide which five to choose – it was nothing out of the ordinary.
Except that the other twenty-three pieces were also returned with the seven chosen drawings.
Problems came with having things to compare.
Those drawings had some strange little black dots… What were those?
They all had thought that maybe the dots were ink stains that were left behind when the documents got splattered by accident. Yet all seven drawings had those stains, and that was weird. Upon a closer inspection, those little black dots actually looked quite exquisite.
It was aboutone-fourth the size of a one-dollar coin. If you took a closer look, those little black dots had four forks sticking out, evenly spread out, with deep and shallow parts – very exquisite indeed.
No matter how they looked at it, it was impossible that those were accidental stains, nor were it drawn by a fountain pen.
The design director studied the black dots, but came to no conclusion. So he got the others from the design department to look at them together.
It was supposed to be a joke, but in the end, a few people in the group who loved to fool around, brought out a magnifying glass and crowded around to study it.
With the help of the magnifying glass, the entire black dot was revealed very clearly.
There were two parts – four oval-shaped little dots on the top and a pea-shaped bottom with the sunken parts slightly shallower.
“Are these… footprints?” someone said unsurely.
“I think so.”
“It must be a footprint, no doubt.”
The design director was still puzzled: “What kind of footprint is this? How could it be so small?”
“It shouldn’t be a cat – their paws don’t look like that.”
“Obviously. Where on earth can you find such a small cat?”
“Only the drawings that Chairman Yan picked out had those markings. It must be a seal.”
“What kind of seal?”
“You know, like when you’re in kindergarten, the teachers would give children who performed well a small red stamp.”
The group of people look at each other in dismay.
That explanation actually sounded logical, but wasn’t that… too childish?
Was Chairman Yan this kind of chairperson?
The design director turned to look at the designer who came up with the little red seal logic and sincerely suggested: “Why don’t you ask him?”
“Wow, boss, don’t get me in trouble. No way I’m asking.”
The crowd fooled around again before they finally dispersed themselves.
Eventually, the design director selected four drawings after he evaluated the sales figures. The remaining three weren’t too different from each other, but the factor that led him to come up with a decision from among those three was a small, little finding –
The one drawing that he had the least hopes for had two little black dots on it!
Since then, somehow or another, Yan Jin’s exclusive paw print seal suddenly spread throughout YL. YL’s designers took it as a supreme honor if their drawings could receive such a paw print, especially after the Autumn Release Conference.