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

"Don't rush to grab it."

Shen Nan placed the briefcase on the table; the leather corners were worn white, revealing a lighter color underneath. He unzipped it and pulled out a stack of documents, the edges of which were neatly pressed together.

"I transferred in Hong Kong and finished revising the second version on the plane."

Lin Che didn't speak, his gaze fixed on the stack of papers.

He Wei leaned closer, wanting to see the words on the cover, but Shen Nan flipped it over.

"Let's look at the architecture first."

He pushed the first page in front of Lin Che. At the top were three letters, LFW, and below them were dense borders and arrows, one inside the other.

"Your current problem isn't whether the mine is in the middle section," Shen Nan pointed to the top box, "it's whether your company can get it."

Lin Che looked at the picture.

"They'll definitely use that Entity List background against them," Shen Nan pointed down. "A Chinese company that's been targeted and wants to compete for a core area here will make the local government very suspicious. If Entitu sends another message, things will become even more difficult."

"I know," Lin Che finally spoke, "this is the biggest hurdle."

"There's no way around this obstacle." Shen Nan shook his head. "So we won't try to avoid it."

He pulled out the second page.

This page was no longer bound by borders, but rather filled with clauses arranged in rows, each numbered. Shen Nan's fingertip traced from the first clause to the last.

"Identity is a disadvantage, but a disadvantage can be turned into an attitude," he said. "What should a company that has been scrutinized do in return?"

"Leave a trace proactively," Lin Che continued.

"Leave a record of every step." Shen Nan's voice was calm. "Where the funds came from, where they went, who signed them, and when they were signed—all of it must be notarized. We're more transparent than the other party."

He Wei paused, her fingers resting on the edge of the table as she flipped through her notebook. She suddenly realized the meaning behind Shen Nan's writing.

"Your opponent wants to use your identity to attack you," she whispered, "but you're cleaner than him."

"It's not clean," Shen Nan corrected her. "It's visible. He can't find anything because everything is out in the open. A company that lays itself bare like this, no one dares to say it's hiding anything."

Lin Che stared at the numbers, not in a hurry to scroll down.

Outside the window, it was a Narobi afternoon; sunlight streamed in through the blinds, casting beams onto the page. In the distance, a car honked its horn, the sound muffled through the glass.

"Which part of this framework is the most important?" Lin Che asked.

Shen Nan's finger stopped on the line slightly below the middle.

"A time stamp that leaves a record," he said. "It's not something you add after signing; it's notarized on the spot. Every action is stamped by a third party the moment it happens. If someone brings up old issues in the future, the discrepancy in the dates will be theirs, not yours."

He clicked on another item below.

"And this is another point. All dealings with the local government must be done through official channels, in writing. Don't engage in any private conversations. The more they try to manipulate things behind the scenes, the more they put themselves in the shadows."

Lin Che read these two lines twice.

"This framework needs to be taken over by someone," he said. "Whether the local government will accept it or not."

"I admit it." Shen Nan pulled out the third page. "I had someone check the newly revised foreign-invested mining regulations here. The shareholding limit has been reduced to 60%. The entity we registered has a 60% stake, not a penny more."

He tapped the line of text indicating the shareholding percentage with his knuckles.

"You see, the very points where the terms were supposed to be strict have become our shield. The opponent suffered because he had it too easy. When things are going smoothly, who would think about leaving themselves a backup plan? By the time he realized he needed one, it was too late."

Lin Che went through the first three pages and stacked them together.

"There's also the issue of money," he said. "The additional funds can't come from the account that's been monitored."

"The route was changed long ago." Shen Nan flipped through the stack of papers again, but didn't pull out the page; he just pressed it with his fingertip. "The overseas reserves first go through the Mauritius entity, then into the project company in Kenya. We keep records for each step. We haven't touched a single penny of the money in the accounts that were tainted."

"Even if they chase after them, they'll only find a clean and transparent account," He Wei added.

"Yes." Shen Nan nodded. "The more aggressively they pursue it, the more it seems like they are making things difficult for a compliant company."

Lin Che did not respond.

He walked to the window and stood there for a while, backlit. The shadows from the blinds fell on his face, one bright and one dark.

He Wei initially thought that Shen Nanfei had come all this way to lead Lin Che in a counterattack. She even mentally rehearsed the scene at the next negotiation table: Lin Che slamming the evidence on the table and immediately reclaiming the core area.

But Shen Nan talked about how to guard, how to stay, and how to expose himself in the open.

When reinforcements arrived, their morale didn't rise; instead, it plummeted.

"So you mean," Lin Che said without turning around, "that I won't move."

"Don't move." Shen Nan watched his back. "Reinforcements have arrived, so you mustn't move either. The more eager you are to take back the land, the more the enemy will think you're guilty. If you remain still, they won't be able to figure out what you're really holding onto."

After those words were spoken, the room fell silent for a moment.

He Wei opened her mouth, wanting to ask if the core area was already occupied and they were just going to wait there. But she swallowed the words back.

"Is what you want to ask?" Lin Che didn't turn around, as if he had eyes in the back of his head, "The land is being occupied, why not seize it?"

He Wei was stunned for a moment.

"Their independent assessment is recognized globally," Lin Che said. "He's convinced the core issue is in the northern section, and even Endritu believes it. If I confront him and tell him he's wrong, he'll just change his tune, backtrack, and come up with a new excuse to shut me down. I'll waste all my effort and get nothing in return."

He paused.

"But what if I don't say anything? The more he thinks he's won, the more confident he'll be, treating his judgment as an ironclad rule. Once he's blocked all his escape routes, the facts will come crashing down on him."

He Wei glanced at the stack of terms laid out on the table, then at Lin Che's retreating figure, and slowly realized what was going on. Shen Nan hadn't prepared a knife to snatch back; he had prepared a shield, waiting for the other party to strike first.

Lin Che turned around and walked back to the table.

"I'm betting on the general direction," he said. "I'm confident that the mine is in the middle section. But how thick it is exactly, and where the boundaries are drawn, we'll have to wait for a third-party report. If I were to jump out now and say I know everything, I'd only give myself away."

"Sixty-eight percent," Shen Nan said.

Lin Che's lips twitched slightly.

"Sixty-eight percent is used to define the scope, not to provide the answer," he said. "I only acknowledge one crucial fact: this land is worth exploring, and the core is in the middle section. As for the rest, let the report speak for itself."

Shen Nan didn't reply.

He pulled out another page from the bottom of the stack of documents.

This page is different from the previous ones. The previous pages were filled with clauses, but this page only took up half a page of text, with the bottom half blank. He pushed it in front of Lin Che.

"There's one more thing."

Lin Che looked down at the half-page of text.

Shen Nan pressed his index finger on one of the lines, his fingernail covering a small portion of the text.

"We don't need this right now," Shen Nan said. "Keep it for now. You can bring it out when the other party really plays their identity card."

Lin Che's gaze fell on that line of text.

He didn't ask what it said, nor did he reach out to take it.

The loudspeaker outside the window blared again, muffled and far away.