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

The door was kicked open.

It wasn't a full kick; Xie Yu twisted the handle and pushed it directly. He used so much force that the doorknob hit the wall, causing a calligraphy scroll hanging on the wall to tilt.

Lin Che sat behind his desk, his laptop open, displaying the logistics monitoring panel of Ark Cloud Warehouse—real-time footage of twelve nodes, each showing a dense array of express boxes on the conveyor belt.

He looked up and saw Xie Yu, and then Xu Mingyuan, Chen Xuan, and Zhou Ting behind Xie Yu.

Four people.

Xie Yu clutched the "Emergency Subsidy Follow-up Plan" in his hand, a twelve-page A4 sheet of paper, which was crumpled in his hand.

"President Lin."

He didn't call him "boss," he called him "General Manager Lin." This title is only used in formal settings within Weiguang.

Lin Che remained silent and waited.

Xie Yu walked to the desk and slammed the document on it.

The slap was loud, and a glass of water on the table sloshed around, creating ripples on the surface.

"This is the subsidy follow-up plan. I had operations and finance rush to come up with it in forty minutes. The core content is just one point—immediately unlock 20% of the 50 billion credit line, which is 10 billion, for cash subsidies across the entire network, to directly compete with BAT (Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent)."

Lin Che glanced down at the document but didn't open it.

"What's the DAU?" he asked.

"Seven hundred and twenty thousand. A figure of nine point fifteen." Xie Yu's voice was a little tense. "It might be less than seventy now."

"Um."

Ok.

Just one "um".

Xie Yu's temple throbbed.

"President Lin, I know we can't afford to burn through 10 billion in subsidies, but at least we can allocate 10 billion to stabilize our core customer base and retain users—"

"Then what?"

"Then we'll—"

"How long can 10 billion yuan last, given the current subsidy levels of BAT (Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent)?"

Xie Yu opened his mouth to speak, but Lin Che didn't give him the chance.

"Twenty days. Do the math. BAT (Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent) are burning through 300 to 500 million yuan every day. If we want to keep up, we'd need to match that level of intensity. 10 billion yuan in 20 days, and then what? Unlock another 10 billion? Another 20 days? Burn through 20 billion in 40 days, and they still have 600 to 700 billion yuan in market capitalization to back them up. What do we have?"

Xie Yu didn't say anything.

Xu Mingyuan, standing behind him, didn't say anything either. He ran his fingers back and forth along the seam of his pants, not even noticing that the cigarette tucked behind his ear had fallen and rolled to his feet.

"This 50 billion," Lin Che took his hands off the keyboard and leaned back in his chair, "is not ammunition."

He looked at Xie Yu.

"It's the foundation."

"What foundation?" Xie Yu's voice rose. "The traffic is almost zero! Without users, any foundation is empty! The credit purchase gray-scale version has been online for a day and a half, how many people have registered? Seventeen thousand! Seventeen thousand! That's more than the amount of red envelopes they send out in a single second!"

"Seventeen thousand is enough."

Xie Yu was stunned.

"Enough?" His voice was choked as if something had pinched it. "Enough what? Enough for a feast?"

Lin Che didn't respond to him.

He turned the computer screen around so Xie Yu could see it.

The screen doesn't display traffic data; it shows the internal banking account management system of Weiguang—the interface for joint credit granting by the three major banks. At the top of the page is a line of large red text:

"Fund transfers in this account require confirmation by the authorized person's signature. Authorized person: Lin Che (only authorized person)"

only.

Xie Yu stared at the word "only" in parentheses and suddenly understood something.

The authority to allocate these 50 billion yuan has always been solely in Lin Che's hands.

No board vote is required, no CFO signature is required, and no one's consent is required.

The company's articles of association clearly state that the founder has a veto power over the transfer of funds from the core capital pool.

in other words--

Even if Xie Yu brings the entire company to pressure him, as long as Lin Che doesn't sign, the 50 billion will be an insurmountable barrier, and no one can touch it.

"You won't sign." Xie Yu didn't say it as a question.

"I won't sign."

Chen Xuan closed her eyes briefly from behind.

Zhou Ting's lips moved slightly, but she didn't make a sound.

Xu Mingyuan bent down and picked up the cigarette from the ground. His fingers were trembling, whether from anger or fear, he couldn't tell.

Xie Yu braced his hands on the desk, leaning forward, less than half a meter away from Lin Che.

"Lin Che."

He doesn't even call me "General Manager" anymore.

"Do you really want to see Weiguang die? Are you only happy when its DAU drops to zero? Everyone outside is saying Weiguang is finished, and people inside are all resigning. You know Zhang Lei, right? The Zhang Lei you asked to adjust the livestream promotion yesterday, he handed in his resignation today. Your people are all leaving, you—"

"Zhang Lei is gone?"

Lin Che interrupted him.

"They're gone."

"Is the live stream setup finished?"

Xie Yu was momentarily speechless after hearing that.

"It's finished...but—"

"That's all that matters once it's done."

It's quiet now.

The air conditioner in the office was humming, and the air vent was blowing directly at the back of Xie Yu's head. His hair was swaying slightly in the wind, but he seemed to be rooted to the spot.

"It's done, that's all"—Xie Yu understood something in those four words, but he didn't want to think about what it meant.

That means that, on Lin Che's chessboard, Zhang Lei only needs to complete the task of "debugging the live stream".

Once the task is done, it doesn't matter whether I leave or not.

Xie Yu pulled his hand away from the table, his knuckles turning white.

"What are you thinking?"

He said it very softly, as if he were asking Lin Che, or perhaps asking himself.

Lin Che stood up.

His chair slid back a bit, the wheels making a sharp screech on the floor.

He wasn't tall, only 1.78 meters, but when he stood up, Xie Yu felt the air in the entire office was compressed.

It wasn't some vague term like "aura," but the way he stood up—unhurried and deliberate, like picking up a knife from the table, not to chop anyone, just to pick it up—yet everyone present felt its weight.

"This 50 billion," Lin Che's voice wasn't loud, but every word landed squarely on his lips, "is the underlying anchor asset for credit purchases. With this 50 billion, Weiguang can release a total of 150 billion in credit lines and 150 billion in purchasing power to compliant users, without costing me a single penny of real money."

He glanced at Xie Yu, then at the three people behind him.

"You're asking me to dig up the foundation and skip stones? What happens after that? The building collapses, and the entire 150 billion yuan credit ecosystem goes to zero. That's true death."

Xie Yu didn't reply.

He wanted to argue, but he suddenly realized that his mind was a complete mess—the number 720,000 had been exploding in his head all night, to the point that he couldn't even do basic math problems.

The 50 billion is anchored to a credit line of 150 billion.

He should be able to figure this out, but he can't now.

"Now."

Lin Che's voice suddenly hardened.

"Everyone back to your workstations."

Xie Yu didn't move.

"The servers will be under unprecedented load tonight. The risk control model of the credit purchase system needs to run online the entire time. Abyss cannot afford even a millisecond of downtime."

He picked up the "Emergency Subsidy Follow-up Plan" from the table.

Twelve pages of A4 paper, rushed out in forty minutes.

He tore it in half, then stacked the two halves together and tore it again, leaving four pieces of paper on the table.

Xie Yu looked at the shredded paper as if his last lifeline had been snapped.

"Anyone who dares to touch a single cent of this 50 billion is out of here immediately."

Lin Che's eyes swept across Xie Yu's face, then over Xu Mingyuan, Chen Xuan, and Zhou Ting, looking at them one by one.

"Now, go back and monitor the server."

He paused for a moment.

"The real war has not yet begun."

The office fell silent again.

Xu Mingyuan was the first to turn around and leave. His footsteps were heavy as he went out, making a thumping sound on the floor.

Chen Xuan followed, without looking back.

Zhou Ting stood there for two seconds, then lowered her head and left.

Finally, there's Xie Yu.

He looked at Lin Che, opened his mouth as if to say something, but in the end said nothing.

He looked down at the scraps of paper on the table, reached out and picked up one of them. He could still make out half a line of text: "...It is recommended to immediately activate a Level A response..."

He put the shredded paper back on the table, turned around, and left.

The door wasn't closed properly, leaving a crack. The light from the corridor cut through the crack, casting a white line across the floor.

Lin Che stood still.

The computer screen on the table was still lit, and the images of the twelve nodes of the Ark Cloud Warehouse were quietly flashing. The conveyor belt was turning, the express boxes were moving, and everything was in good order.

He glanced at the time.

9:37.

Two hours and twenty-three minutes remaining.