A $50 million margin call? I'll short Wall Street.

745 Seventh Avenue, Manhattan, Lehman Brothers headquarters.

This 38-story building was once Richard Fuld's proudest fortress.

Its exterior is made of granite and glass, solid and cold, just like the style he has maintained for the past forty years of running the company.

But this afternoon, the air pressure on the top floor of the fortress was so low that it felt like it could crush the bulletproof glass.

No one dared to knock on the door of the CEO's office on the 31st floor at that moment.

Behind the large mahogany desk, Richard Fuld stared intently at the television screen in front of him, which was broadcasting a live CNBC broadcast, like an enraged silverback gorilla.

On the screen, David Einhorn has just finished his presentation at the Sohn Investment Conference.

That slide in the PowerPoint presentation, which read "Excessive Leverage, Opaque Valuation, and Management's Breach of Trust," was like a resounding slap in the face to Fuld in front of the entire American financial community.

"Bang!"

Fuld suddenly grabbed a crystal ashtray worth several thousand dollars from the table and slammed it hard onto the leather sofa opposite him.

The sound of crystal shattering was particularly jarring in the empty office, with several shards even bouncing to the edge of the floor-to-ceiling window.

"That Jewish bastard!"

Fuld's voice was hoarse and rough, smoky from decades of cigar use, but now it was distorted by extreme anger.

"Who does he think he is? A hedge fund manager who dares to point fingers at Lehman Brothers just because he draws a few lines on a blackboard?"

He's not even qualified to look at Lehman Brothers' Tier 1 balance sheet, so what gives him the right to say our commercial real estate valuations are inflated?

Fuld stood up and paced back and forth in the office like a beast surveying its territory.

His eyes were bloodshot and red, and the veins on his forehead were throbbing.

"He's committing murder! He's creating panic!"

He pointed at the television screen and roared into the air.

This is no longer a simple short selling.

In Fuld's view, this was a blatant insult to Lehman Brothers' 158-year history and a direct challenge to his personal authority!

On Wall Street, you can short sell, but you can't stand in the spotlight, dissect someone's underwear page by page, and then tell the world that the company is completely naked.

This broke the rules and violated Fuld's cardinal sin.

The office door was carefully pushed open a crack.

Joe Gregory (President and COO) and Erin Cullen (CFO) walked in. The loud noise they'd just heard told them that their boss had seen the live stream.

Both women looked extremely grim, especially Karen. As the CFO, every financial loophole pointed out by Einhorn in his PowerPoint presentation was directly aimed at her.

If outsiders investigate further, she, as a CFO without a strong background in financial auditing, will be the first to be implicated.

"Richard..."

Gregory tentatively opened his mouth.

"go out!"

Fuld whirled around like a lion whose tail had been stepped on. "I didn't let you in!"

"Richard, we need a solution."

Gregory did not back down; he knew that if he did not stabilize the situation at this moment, Lehman's stock price would spiral out of control before the market closed today.

"The market reaction has been terrible; the stock price has already fallen by 7%."

Fuld stopped and stared intently at Gregory.

"A solution?"

He sneered, walked to his desk, and pressed the speakerphone button on the internal phone.

"Get me into contact with the public relations and investor relations departments! Immediately!"

The assistant's trembling voice came from the other end of the phone: "Richard, they're already waiting for you in the conference room..."

"Tell them,"

Fuld's voice sounded like he was issuing a battle order: "Prepare a press release immediately, the strongest possible wording! Tell the market that Lehman Brothers has the best capital adequacy ratio on Wall Street, and that our commercial real estate portfolio is a severely undervalued quality asset. Greenlight Capital's allegations are pure nonsense, malicious conclusions based on erroneous and one-sided information."

"Then we contacted the SEC and said that Greenlight Capital was spreading rumors and manipulating the market!"

He paused, his tone becoming even colder:

"And, Eileen."

He turned to Karen, his eyes conveying an undeniable sense of pressure.

"exist."

Karen instinctively straightened her back.

"Right now, immediately, go find a few analysts we have good relationships with and call them. I don't care what methods you use, I want them to keep our liquidity rating stable in tomorrow morning's meeting report! I want that bastard named Einhorn to be liquidated within ten minutes of the market opening tomorrow!"

Karen swallowed hard. "Richard, this... given the current market sentiment, if we try to artificially inflate it, the analysts might..."

"Impossible!" Fuld slammed his hand on the table, making the pen holder next to him jump.

"That's an order! Tell them that if Lehman Brothers goes bankrupt, they won't earn a single penny of trading commission!"

Karen lowered her head: "I understand."

Gregory looked at the frenzied Fuld and felt a sense of unease.

He knew better than anyone that the figures Eindhoven mentioned were not unfounded. Lehman's exposure to commercial real estate was indeed a huge black hole.

But he knew even better that he absolutely could not say things like "we need to admit our mistakes" or "we need to divest assets" in this office.

That would be to offend the dragon.

"Richard," Gregory said in a gentler, more submissive tone.

"We also need to reassure our prime brokerage clients. Several large hedge funds inquired about our liquidity this morning; they seem somewhat concerned about impulsive actions..."

"Who?" Fuld's eyes swept over like knives.

"Who's swaying?"

"Several European funds, and..." Gregory hesitated for a moment.

"Who else?"

"Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley slightly increased the discount rate on some of our collateral today."

These words were like a block of ice, causing a brief but fatal pause in Fuld's anger for a moment.

He knew all too well what this meant.

He attributed his concerns about hedge funds to "foolishness and panic."

However, the tightening of collateral discounts by peers like Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley is a hidden attack from within the system.

This sends an extremely dangerous signal to the entire market: the core circle of Wall Street is beginning to be wary of Lehman Brothers.

"These ungrateful wretches who kick someone when they're down."

Fuld gritted his teeth and forced out those words. His eyes grew deep and somber, like a mafia boss who had discovered his betrayal by an ally.

"Go and start connecting with funds in the Middle East. Go and connect with Asians."

He turned around, his back to Gregory and Karen, and looked out at Manhattan.

"Once we secure new funding, all the rumors will fall apart. We will make everyone who shorted Lehman Brothers at this time pay the price."

"Go out. Do as I say."

Gregory and Karen exchanged a glance and silently left the office.

Fuld walked to the shattered crystal ashtray, bent down, and picked up a sharp shard.

The shard cut a tiny gash on my fingertip, from which a drop of blood seeped out.

He didn't feel any pain.

He simply stared at the drop of blood and silently uttered a name in his heart.

David Einhorn.

He vowed to crush this rat, along with all those lurking in the shadows trying to take a bite out of Lehman.