The Heiress's Game

When the banquet ended, Gu Mingyue personally escorted Gu Yunjin to the villa entrance.

A cool night breeze rustled the camphor tree leaves under the streetlights as Gu Mingyue stood on the steps, arm in arm with her.

In front of the ladies who had not yet left, she tidied the stray hairs by her ears and said, "Jin'er, you've worked hard today. I'll treat you to a meal alone another day."

Her tone was gentle and her actions intimate. The wives watching the scene all said, "Mingyue is so good to her sister."

Birdsong Valley is located in a mountain valley 40 kilometers west of the city. It is an old tea garden that was bought by a private individual and transformed into a high-end clubhouse.

The owner of the tea garden is involved in cultural real estate development, which is open only to members and only accommodates one group of guests each night.

Gu Yunjin had booked the entire venue. When she arrived, it was 11 p.m., and the mountain mist had already begun to rise.

The bamboo groves on both sides of the stone path rustled in the wind, and a few ground lamps buried in the grass emitted a dim yellow light.

The teahouse is made of wood. Pushing open the sliding door, you'll find a low table on the tatami mat, with a pot of freshly brewed aged white tea on it. The aroma of dried tangerine peel and red dates spreads layer by layer in the steam.

A calligraphy scroll hangs on the wall, which reads "The birdsong makes the mountain even more secluded."

Gu Yunjin placed the computer on the low table, connected to the encrypted network, and put on her headphones.

When the screen lit up, her expression changed, revealing a calm, razor-sharp focus that came from stripping away all pretense of performance.

The video conference has been running for three minutes.

There are six avatars on the screen, distributed across four time zones, with Zhou Ji in the top row.

"Let's begin."

Zhou Jixian reported. His voice came through an encrypted channel, saying that Blizzard Technology's positions had been completely cleared out as planned.

From Series A to Pre-IPO, the entire exit cycle took two quarters longer than expected, but the final exit price was 8 percent higher than the upper limit estimated by the model.

The fund's net profit from Blizzard alone, after deducting taxes and management costs, amounted to RMB 13.7 billion.

There was a two-second silence in the conference room.

On the screen, an analyst named He Zhaoming couldn't resist taking off his glasses and wiping the lenses.

He was Gu Yunjin's classmate at London Business School and was recruited by Zhou Ji to do pre-investment research in the technology sector.

When he joined, he thought he was working for a family office.

After working for three months, he discovered that the entire fund only had one LP—a Chinese girl who sat next to him listening to lectures but never spoke.

"One hundred and thirty-seven." Gu Yunjin repeated the number, her tone completely flat, as if she were talking about someone else's money.

"This project is now complete. The team did a great job, and everyone will receive an additional year-end bonus. Zhou Ji will confirm the specific percentage with me later."

She paused for a moment, swiped her finger across the touchpad, and brought up the next document.

"However, there won't be another case like Blizzard's within five years."

The valuation center of global tech stocks is shifting from consumer internet to artificial intelligence and hard technology. Blizzard's growth model was valid in the previous cycle. "Enough is enough; don't be greedy."

After she finished speaking, she typed a few words on the keyboard and shared the document she had prepared to the channel.

"Next, we will shift to two directions. First, artificial intelligence—not the big, established models, but early-stage projects at the infrastructure and application layers."

He Zhaoming, I've carefully read the multimodal preprint from the Stanford team that you mentioned last time—the methodology is conservative, but the approach is correct.

Give me your team's contact information, and I'll discuss it with you personally.

Second, new energy – don't focus on the already fiercely competitive lithium battery market in China, but move towards recycling technology, solid-state batteries, and key materials, and build core technological barriers.

Also, Anna, your previous analysis of European carbon tariffs was very thorough. Going forward, countries will shift from abstract to concrete carbon constraints on supply chains, proactively securing partners for technology-for-market exchanges, which will extend the timeframe.

Anna is the only member of the team permanently based in Tokyo. She interned at Gu Yunjin's fund years ago, starting as an assistant, and is now the team's most trusted fundamental analyst. She gave a slight bow in front of the camera and said, "Received."

Gu Yunjin pushed the computer aside, picked up the cup of lukewarm white tea on the low table, and took a sip.

The people on the screen were all taking notes; no one was chatting, and no one asked her "why she suddenly changed direction."

They've followed her for years and are used to her style—she doesn't need explanations, she only needs results.

"Is there anything else?" She put down her teacup.

Zhou Ji said no.

He Zhaoming added, "The founder of that artificial intelligence project will be in Singapore next Wednesday. I can arrange a video call if it's convenient for you."

Gu Yunjin nodded: "Arrange it."

The meeting ended. One by one, the avatars on the screen went dark, until only she and Zhou Ji remained on the channel.

Zhou Ji paused for a moment and asked, "How are things on your end?"

Gu Yunjin said she was fine, having just returned from Gu Mingyue's banquet.

Zhou Ji chuckled. "You can sit still in that kind of situation."

Gu Yunjin didn't respond to that, but simply said, "Send me the encrypted files of Blizzard's clearance sale tonight, I'll read them."

Zhou Ji said okay, and then his profile picture went dark.

The teahouse was extremely quiet. Outside the window, the mountain breeze rustled softly through the bamboo forest.

Gu Yunjin took off her headphones and placed them on the table. She picked up the glass of cooled white tea, took a sip, and leaned back on the cushion next to the low table.

She never trusted investment companies.

It's not because the investment company isn't professional enough, but because the investment company's business model is inherently in conflict with its goals.

When you put your money into an investment company, that company has already earned management fees from your money.

They make money by managing other people's money, not by their own investment acumen.

Even if you lose money, they won't lose a single penny of their management fees. So she only trusts herself.

She established her own investment company a long time ago.

It's not the kind of investment company that raises funds from the public; it's an investment company that only serves her.

She is her only LP and her only GP.

Research, due diligence, modeling, risk control, tax planning, legal compliance—she makes the decisions at every stage, and personally approves all important decisions.

This team is her most valuable asset over the years, bar none. She personally selected each member, from background checks to interviews to mental training, which took anywhere from two months to several years.

Zhou Ji had rejected more than one candidate who was either unqualified or had questionable backgrounds.

No one on the team knew her true net worth; apart from Zhou Ji, no one knew her true identity.

All they knew was that the boss behind the scenes was a Chinese female investor with extremely accurate insight and quick action, nothing more.

Gu Yunjin was only nineteen years old when he started working on Blizzard. He repeatedly compared and read the founder's doctoral dissertation and the company's patents on the public computers in the University of London library.

At that time, she had very little capital and used five times leverage to complete the Series A funding round. After that, she used dividends to add more funds in each subsequent round of financing.

After a fifty-fold increase, what she gained wasn't money—it was time.

She earned in five years what others would take fifty years to earn, so she no longer needed to calculate the rate of return.

Her investment portfolio has now fully shifted to artificial intelligence and new energy. Blizzard is just a milestone in her past, not the end.

Gu Yunjin closed her laptop, stood up, and pushed open the sliding door to walk onto the terrace.

The fog in the mountains grew thicker, and the outlines of the bamboo forest transformed into layers of ink wash painting within the mist.

She recalled the blank looks in the eyes of the socialites at Gu Mingyue's banquet tonight—when did the Gu family ever have such a person? So what if she's good at studying?

She stood on the terrace, and smiled slightly at the mist covering the mountains.

Of course they didn't know who she was. Nor did she need them to know.

Investing is like chess; only the pieces don't know they're pieces, while the players are never on the board.