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

My fifth day in Beijing.

Lin Che sat in a chair in the hotel room, his laptop open.

The screen displays the CCPS backend, and he is checking the signing progress of the Chengdu node.

The words "Pending Approval" are still there, in yellow, just like two days ago.

It neither turned green nor reverted to red.

It hung there, motionless.

The same applies to passports that are "under review".

Yellow, still.

He's gotten used to waiting.

From the moment the message about "supplementary value" was sent to the meeting on June 607th, five days had passed.

Five days have passed since the meeting on June 607th.

Ten days in total.

For ten days, the thing he did most was sit in this chair and watch the screen.

The numbers and status on the screen are the same every day, but he still looks at them every day.

It never snows in Beijing outside the window, it only snows dust.

The sky was gray, the buildings were gray, and the road was gray.

Occasionally, a gust of wind would blow a crack in the gray sky, revealing a small patch of blue, which would then close again a few seconds later.

He was used to the traffic on elevated roads in Hangzhou and the gray skies in Beijing.

He closed the CCPS page and opened his email.

There are no new emails in my inbox.

There's been no news from Shen Nan either. Since the end of 607, she's only sent one message, which reads "Take care and get some rest."

He replied with four words: "You too."

He Wei's compliance report arrived on time, and there were no abnormalities.

Xie Yu's CCPS nodes are running normally, the parameters for Zhengzhou have been completed, and the SM4 in Wuhan is stable at 16.8.

There was no news from Fang Yuan.

Old Zhou didn't have any either.

Everything at the company was running normally, as if nothing had happened.

Everything is normal.

It's so normal it's almost abnormal.

A company that is functioning normally, reports that are being submitted normally, and CCPS that is running normally.

It's as if 607 never happened.

It seems he never revealed Abyss's full hand on that oval table.

Five days have passed since 607.

He showed everything he brought, but the joint oversight plan remained with the other party.

After shaking hands, the other person said, "I need time."

Five days have passed, and there has been no follow-up.

There were no phone calls, no emails, and no messages relayed through Shennan's channels.

Passports and the yellow alert in Chengdu are the only responses we have so far.

But the signal is not an answer.

A signal is just a signal.

He leaned back in his chair, staring at the ceiling.

The hotel ceiling was a uniform white, without the tiny cracks that you'd find in riverside rental apartments.

He closed his eyes, his mind blank.

It's not that I don't want to think about things; it's just that I've thought about everything I could think of in the past few days.

The phone rang.

It wasn't a phone call; it was a WeChat message notification sound.

The short, sharp sound was clearly audible in the quiet room.

He opened his eyes and picked up his phone.

The screen displayed Shen Nan's portrait.

Shen Nan's WeChat profile picture is a gray circle with no pattern whatsoever.

She hasn't changed her profile picture since she set it.

An extra line of text appeared in the dialog box.

"Someone asked me for a backup of the LM-X."

Eleven characters.

Lin Che's finger stopped on the screen.

My thumb hovered over the dialog box, but I didn't click on it.

He glanced at the eleven characters, then glanced at them again.

LM-X.

Case filing and response documents.

It was encrypted, and only he and Shen Nan knew the password.

Shen Nan checked it the day before he set off, confirmed it was in place, and then checked "hidden".

She said at the time, "Save it for later, it might be useful."

Someone has now asked her for a backup.

who.

Shen Nan did not say who it was.

She only said "someone," not "National Security," not "Advisor Xu," not any specific name.

"Someone" means she may not know who it is, or she may know but not feel comfortable saying it on WeChat.

LM-X is the worst-case scenario solution.

It includes a legal risk assessment, listing three possible directions for filing a case and corresponding strategies for each direction.

There is also a worst-case scenario plan called LFW, Legal Firewall.

It was written by Shen Nan himself and revised four times.

Some people are looking at the worst-case scenario.

But there are two possibilities when "looking at the worst-case scenario".

The first possibility is that they are preparing to hold those responsible accountable.

The purpose of reviewing LM-X was to understand where Lin Che's legal bottom line lay, so as to gain the upper hand in subsequent proceedings.

"We can discuss the direction" is just a delaying tactic; the real action is behind the scenes.

The second possibility is that they are conducting a comprehensive risk assessment.

The purpose of reviewing LM-X was to understand how Lin Che would respond in the worst-case scenario, providing a complete risk map for reporting to superiors.

It's true that "the direction can be discussed," but they need to explore all the possible paths.

Two possibilities, one good and one bad.

The same action, in two directions.

He couldn't tell which one it was.

Shen Nan also made no judgment.

She only presented the facts without providing any analysis.

Facts are facts, and judgments are judgments.

She gave Lin Che the facts and left the judgment to him.

That's her style.

Lin Che placed his phone on the table; the screen was still lit.

Those eleven words in the dialog box, black text on a white background, were as clear as the files on the 607 desktop.

He did not reply immediately.

It was completely dark outside the window.

In Beijing, night falls early in December; it gets dark before five o'clock.

The streetlights came on, their orange light drawing a circle on the windowpane.

Several tall buildings in the distance still had their lights on, their lights appearing like a few blurry stars in the gray night sky.

Lin Che stood up and walked to the window.

It's not about looking at the traffic flow on elevated roads; Beijing doesn't have elevated roads.

It's about looking at the lights in the distance.

He remembered three things.

Passport, yellow, "Under Review".

Chengdu stamp, yellow, "Pending approval".

The LM-X backup has been taken.

Three lines, three directions.

The passport and Chengdu are good signs; they've turned from red to yellow, indicating that things are moving.

The LM-X is uncertain; it's a mixed bag, with both positive and negative aspects.

The three lines do not point to the same answer.

There was a gray cat crouching by the roadside under the streetlights outside the window.

It licked its paws a few times, looked up at the window, then jumped off the curb and walked away.

I walked into the alley and couldn't see it anymore.

Lin Che watched the cat disappear.

He didn't know the answer.

But he knew one thing.

It's not over yet.

He returned to his table, picked up his phone, and glanced at Shen Nan's message.

Eleven words are still on the screen.

He typed three words.

"knew."

send.

The message is displayed as "Sent" in the dialog box.

Shen Nan did not reply immediately.

She might be thinking about what to do next, or she might already be doing it.

The phone screen went dark.

The only light in the room came from the laptop in standby mode and the streetlights outside the window.

The two lights blended together, casting a faint shadow on the ceiling.

Lin Che stood by the window, looking outside.

The nights in Beijing at the end of December are very long, and it takes several hours until dawn.

He's not in a hurry.

There's no use in rushing.

We've done all we can; the rest is no longer up to him.

But he did not leave the window.

He stood there, looking at the few tall buildings in the distance that were lit up.

In every building, someone is doing their own thing.

No one knows what kind of person is standing behind the window of this budget hotel, or what kind of answer they are waiting for.