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

Microlight Headquarters, 28th Floor, Small Conference Room.

The blinds were drawn tightly shut, blocking out the glaring midday sun, letting in only a few gray beams of light, on which countless dust particles were swirling erratically.

A faint smell of ozone permeated the air, a distinctive odor that lingers after a high-powered projector has been operating for an extended period.

The fan hummed, like the only living thing in the room.

At the end of the long table, Lao Zhang, the head of the public relations department, was staring intently at the data on the screen, his pen in his hand already deformed from gripping it so tightly.

His Adam's apple bobbed several times before he managed to squeeze out a single sentence.

"Boss...this involves more than two million families."

Old Zhang's voice trembled slightly, carrying a naive unease that seemed overly immature for someone in this industry. "If Abyss's prediction comes true, it will be a tsunami. Should we... do something? Like give the regulators a heads-up, or issue an announcement to subtly hint to users?"

A deathly silence fell over the conference room.

All eyes were on the young man at the other end of the long table.

Lin Che was playing with a coin in his hand. The coin spun and bounced between his slender fingers, making a crisp metallic clanging sound.

"bite."

The coin was slapped onto the table.

Lin Che raised his eyelids, his gaze as calm as a stagnant pool, without a ripple.

"Old Zhang, you've been working at Weiguang for about six months now, haven't you?"

"Yes...yes, boss." Old Zhang subconsciously sat up straight, his back already soaked with cold sweat.

"Then you should know that we are a commercial company, not the Red Cross, much less a savior."

Lin Che's voice wasn't loud, and his speech wasn't fast, but every word was like a nail, precisely driven into the nerves of everyone present: "If you go out now and shout 'Fire!', do you think those investors will thank you?"

He stood up, walked to the whiteboard, and picked up a black marker.

"Sizzle—"

The sound of the pen nib scraping against the whiteboard was somewhat grating. He wrote down a huge number: 15%.

"This is the current average annualized rate of return in the P2P industry. On leading platforms like Jubaopen, with the addition of rebates and interest rate coupons, this figure can reach 22%."

Lin Che turned around, tapped the number with the cap of his pen, and a mocking smile curled at the corner of his mouth. "In this crazy casino, every gambler thinks he's the lucky one who can walk away with the money. If you went up to them and told them, 'Stop playing, the house is going to run away,' what do you think they would do?"

Old Zhang opened his mouth, but no sound came out.

"They will hate you."

Lin Che coldly gave the answer, "They will think you are the evil ghost blocking their path to wealth, that you are creating panic, that you caused the platform's funding chain to break, and even that Tang Jun, who is not ready to run away, will directly use all his resources in the media circle to portray you and Weiguang as 'public enemies of the industry'."

"In that case, you won't even have to wait for an avalanche; those angry snowflakes will bury you first."

The atmosphere in the conference room was so tense it was hard to breathe.

This is a "Dark Forest Theory" that is extremely contrary to common sense, yet logically impeccable.

"So... we're just going to stand by and watch?" Old Zhang still couldn't get over the hurdle in his mind. "Wait until they're completely dead before going in?"

"No."

Lin Che shook his head, his eyes revealing a chilling rationality. "We won't be nannies, we'll be funeral directors."

He wrote two words on the whiteboard: order and corpse collection.

"Every reshuffle in the financial market is essentially a transfer of wealth. When those inferior assets explode, the superior assets—real debt, massive user data, and scarce financial licenses—will become ownerless corpses."

Lin Che's gaze swept over every executive present, his eyes not looking at his subordinates, but scrutinizing a group of soldiers about to go to the battlefield.

"Our task is to wait until they are completely dead, clean up these valuable things, and then use the 'micro-light fraction' as a unit of measurement to establish a new order in this ruin."

"Do you understand? We're not here to rescue people, we're here to take over."

That naked ambition and ruthless scheming sent chills down everyone's spines, yet also gave them a faint sense of bloodthirsty excitement.

This is business warfare.

There is no tenderness, only a life-or-death struggle.

Lin Che walked back to his seat and pulled out a list from the pile of documents.

It was a pre-prepared "List of Top Industry Platforms for Monitoring." At the very top of the list was that incredibly popular name—Jubaopen (Treasure Bowl).

"Now that the strategy has been set, let's talk about tactics."

Lin Che unscrewed a red pen, the tip hovering above the name.

"I've studied Tang Jun. He came from humble beginnings, is extremely arrogant, and loves to show off in big situations. Right now, he's like a grasshopper that's sucked its fill of blood, thinking he can jump to the sky."

Lin Che suddenly exerted force on his wrist.

A glaring red cross line was fiercely drawn across the three characters "聚宝盆" (treasure basin), its force penetrating the paper.

"I'm going to give him a big gift at tomorrow's 'Micro-Light Financial Security Ecosystem Conference'."

He pushed the crossed-out list to the vice president in charge of conference affairs, "Have the invitations been sent out?"

"It's been sent out; all the top 100 companies in the industry have received them," the vice president replied immediately, then hesitated for a moment, "But boss... what about Jubaopen? Are we really not going to send them out? After all, they're the industry leader. If we don't invite them, won't it seem like we're being petty, and might we easily anger him...?"

"Provoke him?"

Lin Che laughed, a hint of mockery in his smile.

"What I want is to provoke him."

Lin Che leaned back in his chair, interlacing his fingers, and said calmly, "If he doesn't come, how can this charade be performed? If he doesn't cause trouble, how can we show how strict our 'rules' are?"

"Remember, the 'Weiguang Financial Security White Paper' to be released tomorrow is our life and death register. Anyone whose name isn't on it will be 'blacklisted' in Weiguang's payment system from now on."

He pointed to the list.

"Tomorrow, I will personally deliver this clock to him in front of the entire industry media."

……

As the meeting ended, the executives filed out, each with a much more somber expression than when they entered.

They knew that a brutal war was about to break out.

Lin Che was the only one left in the conference room.

He walked to the window and gently parted a corner of the blinds with his fingers.

The CBD downstairs is still bustling with traffic, as prosperous as a never-ending feast.

Meanwhile, in an office building a few kilometers away, Tang Jun might be sipping red wine, dreaming of ringing the bell at the company's IPO.

Lin Che glanced down at the draft of the White Paper that was about to be sent to print on the table.

The pristine white cover features a subtly glowing logo.

In the "First Batch of Compliance Whitelist" on the inner page, that once invincible "treasure trove" has long been erased from the world by him.

Enjoy your last supper.

Lin Chesong opened the blinds, blocking out the sunlight once again, and the office returned to darkness.

Only the red cross looked particularly menacing in the dim light.