The richest man started taking advantage of loopholes after joining Alibaba.

Located in the western part of Hangzhou, at the northern end of Gudun Road.

It's less of a parcel sorting point and more of a giant garbage dump.

The air was filled with the smell of moldy pulp and cheap tape.

The doors were wide open, and thousands of packages were piled up into a crumbling little mountain.

It rained last night.

The damp cardboard boxes piled on the open cement ground had softened and rotted at the bottom due to being soaked in water, exposing the corners of the packaging of the goods inside.

A red banner was hanging on the second-floor railing.

The five large characters, "Give me back my hard-earned money," are shocking.

One end of the banner had come off, and it thrashed weakly against the wall in the wind like a broken tongue, making a monotonous "pat-pat" sound.

The office was filled with smoke.

Dozens of men in different courier uniforms stood around the entrance, looking anxious.

Some people were even clutching half a red brick in their hands.

Old Zhang was surrounded in the middle.

The man who threatened to jump off the building on the phone is now slumped in a chair, his eyes unfocused.

The pair of old Zhang's leather shoes that he used to wear, which were once shiny, were now covered in dust.

His shoelace came undone on one side, dragging back and forth on the cigarette butt-strewn ground as his anxious, trembling leg moved.

Seeing Lin Che push the door open and come in, Old Zhang felt like he had found a lifeline and jumped up.

"President Lin! You've finally arrived!"

Old Zhang's voice was hoarse, "I've been running this branch for ten years. All the customers in this area are in my hands. As long as there's capital..."

"Five hundred thousand."

Lin Che interrupted him.

He didn't sit down, but stood at the door, his gaze sweeping over the packages getting soaked in the rain outside, and then over the fierce-looking employees demanding their wages.

This cut must be made on the artery.

If you show a strong desire for this location, the price won't come down.

It must be devalued to nothing and defined as a "debt" rather than an "asset".

"Old Zhang, this pile of garbage, plus the back wages owed to outsiders, is only worth this much."

Lin Che's voice was as cold as iron.

"You..." Old Zhang's face flushed red, "The depreciation of the equipment alone is worth more than this! This is my life's work!"

Lin Che smiled.

He pointed to the tattooed man outside the door who was holding a brick.

"Can sentimentality be paid as a salary? Or can it keep out the bricks falling from the sky?"

Lin Che took out a printed transfer agreement from his bag and threw it on the tea-stained table.

"Sign, take the money, and leave."

"Or stay here and wait for them to come in and tear you apart."

Old Zhang looked at the flimsy piece of paper, then glanced at the crowd outside that could easily spiral out of control.

His hands trembled as he pulled out the pen.

The signature is complete.

Old Zhang took a check for 500,000 yuan and slipped out the back door like he was fleeing a disaster.

But the trouble didn't end there.

"The boss has changed?"

The tattooed man who seemed to be the leader stomped out his cigarette butt and led a dozen or so men to surround them. "Who's going to pay our wages? Old Zhang owes us three months' wages!"

Lin Che remained seated in that broken chair.

He did not back down, nor did he call security.

At this point, reasoning with them is suicidal, and talking about the law is nonsense.

There is only one way to deal with a hungry pack of wolves: give them meat.

"Fatty."

Lin Che tilted his head slightly.

Wang Pangzi, standing behind him, took a deep breath and slammed the heavy black canvas bag in his hand onto the table.

"Bang!"

Dust rose everywhere.

The zipper of the black canvas bag was roughly pulled open.

The sound of metal teeth snapping together was particularly jarring in the now quiet warehouse.

Zip it all the way up.

A splash of dazzling pink.

A total of 500,000 yuan in cash was piled up in bundles.

In this environment filled with the stench of sweat, mildew, and dust, the pink hundred-yuan bills exuded a unique, dizzying smell of ink.

That is the most primal temptation in the world.

The previously noisy crowd fell silent instantly.

The tattooed man's arm, which had been raised in mid-air, suddenly relaxed as if its tendons and bones had been removed.

"Clang!"

The brick that fell from his hand hit his feet, but he seemed not to feel any pain.

Everyone's Adam's apples were bobbing in unison.

Lin Che took out a bundle of money from his bag and broke the seal.

"Old Zhang may not acknowledge the past debts, but I will."

He picked up a stack of money and slammed it on the table.

"Line up. Get your money."

"But let me make this clear from the start." Lin Che lit a cigarette, his eyes sharp as knives through the bluish smoke. "If you've taken my money, you'll have to change your old ways of just getting by."

"Starting today, we're implementing a bottom-ranking elimination system here. Anyone who doesn't finish delivering their packages is fired."

There was no rebuttal.

There was no question.

The men who were just moments ago fierce and ready to fight were now obediently lined up in a long queue.

As each person received the money, they bowed their head and respectfully greeted the recipient:

"Thank you, boss."

........

late at night.

The warehouse was empty; the crowd demanding their unpaid wages had dispersed.

Fatty Wang was directing several newly recruited technicians to install equipment.

Instead of a conveyor belt, there were dozens of brand-new Zebra barcode scanners.

Classic black and yellow color scheme, industrial-grade rugged shell.

"Beep—"

Red laser scan lines shot out, cutting through the dust particles floating in the darkness.

Lin Che stood in front of the whiteboard in the center of the warehouse.

He erased the original work schedule and delivery phone number and picked up a marker.

The pen tip wanders.

A complex network topology diagram appears on the whiteboard.

With its dense network of nodes and crisscrossing lines, that's the logistics flow of the entire Hangzhou area and even the Yangtze River Delta.

The wiring overhead is severely aged.

That dim, flickering incandescent light bulb went on and off due to unstable voltage.

Lin Che's shadow stretched and shortened, like a giant beast looming over the warehouse, devouring every node on the map.

"Brother Che."

After Wang Pangzi finished debugging the system, he came over and wiped his sweat. "We're only delivering to this area in the west of the city. Do we really need this system? It's way too advanced."

"advanced?"

Lin Che stopped drawing and looked at the circle that was not yet finished.

"We bought this delivery point not to deliver the current few hundred packages."

His gaze pierced through the dilapidated walls, looking towards the future two months from now.

At that time, this place will be the eye of the storm.

"On Singles' Day, all the courier services in the city will be paralyzed, except for our area where they will still be operational."

Lin Che's voice echoed in the empty warehouse.

"What I want to do is not a courier station."

"It's a flood control dam."

Just then.

"boom--"

Two blinding beams of light suddenly pierced through the door and shone straight in, making it impossible for people to open their eyes.

With the roar of its engine, a black Land Rover, like a mad bull, smashed open the rickety iron gate.

The sheet metal twisted and groaned.

The wheels rolled over puddles and rotten cardboard boxes, arrogantly and domineeringly coming to a steady stop in the center of the warehouse.

The car door opened.

A foot wearing a studded leather boot is on the ground.

The local tyrant in this area, and Lao Zhang's biggest creditor.

coming.