The Heiress's Game

Li Chunjing had been agonizing over this for several days. She stared at the latest broadcast schedule plan sent by Lao Ma on her computer screen, her brows furrowed into an unresolved knot.

The plan reduced the promotion period from three weeks to ten days, citing "limited budget".

However, the same budget sheet listed a considerable amount of expenses for an offline press conference. The venue was one of the most expensive hotels in Dahai City, and the venue rental alone was enough to fund an entire video challenge campaign.

She highlighted the two lines of numbers in yellow, and the more she looked at them, the more something seemed off.

This wasn't the first time—last time, when Lao Ma negotiated a broadcast schedule with a video website, she didn't even understand their content review process before agreeing to a release date that was impossible to achieve. In the end, she had to call them and go over everything with them one by one to barely manage to salvage the situation.

Li Chunjing is not the kind of person who hesitates when faced with a problem—the most important thing she has learned in the past few months of following Gu Yunjin is to make a judgment before taking action when the information is incomplete, rather than standing still and waiting for all the conditions to come together.

But this case is different. Lao Ma is a professional manager at Xingyao Media. He was personally invited by Gu Yunjin. He did put in a lot of effort in the early stages, from setting up the company structure to building the team.

She, a work assistant who had just been promoted to a permanent position, went to her boss and said, "The manager you hired isn't very good." It seemed like she was tattling on someone who was above her authority.

Calling it not understanding the rules is called committing workplace politics suicide.

She had worked so hard to climb from personal assistant to work assistant, and every step she took was like walking on thin ice. She didn't want to fall back down because of one wrong step.

But she didn't want "Walking with Brilliance" to die in the hands of an unreliable person.

This is a project she launched single-handedly, transforming Chen Cui from a single person into Chen Cui's entire family, and from a rural stage into a high-quality production where Zheng Dahai chases after her shouting "Gold!"

She stayed up countless nights, argued countless times, and reshot an entire episode before finally turning this piece of trash into gold.

She couldn't let someone who couldn't even balance a budget sheet ruin it.

She went to find Lu Xiao first.

He didn't answer immediately after listening. He took off his glasses, wiped them, and put them on the table.

"Do you think Miss Gu doesn't know?"

Li Chunjing was stunned for a moment.

"Although Lao Ma works for Xingyao, has a signed contract, and is currently employed, Xingyao is ultimately a wholly-owned subsidiary of Ms. Gu. Do you think she'll let an unreliable person stay in that position for long?"

"But--"

"Even if you don't tell her, she'll find out eventually; it's just a matter of time."

Lu Xiao put his glasses back on and looked at her.

"But whether you say it or not makes a difference. If you say it, it means you are overseeing the project."

If you don't speak up, and Miss Gu finds out herself, she'll reassess your judgment as her assistant.

He added, "Also, if you don't say anything, and Old Ma really makes a huge mess, he might not be the one who ends up taking the blame. You need to think this through."

After thinking about it for a few days, Li Chunjing decided to go into Gu Yunjin's study.

Li Chunjing didn't beat around the bush. She placed the printed broadcast schedule on the table and, in the most objective tone, listed out Lao Ma's recent mistakes one by one.

She only pointed out specific problems, without a single emotional comment, not even "I think," and only stated things like "this data doesn't match the actual execution," "the other party's platform can't confirm this timeline," and "this is the feedback from General Manager Zheng."

Gu Yunjin leaned back in her chair and didn't speak immediately after listening.

She glanced down at the proposal highlighted in yellow, then looked up at Li Chunjing.

"I'm actually considering this too."

"It's true that I invited Lao Ma, but when I invited him, Xingyao was just an empty shell. I needed an experienced person to set up the framework first."

Now that the framework is in place and the project is entering the substantive implementation phase, it's normal that he can't keep up with the pace. Different stages require different personnel.

"I have already notified the headhunters to look for new candidates."

But until a suitable person is found, Lao Ma has to stay in his position—if an outsider is suddenly parachuted in to take over, the team will be unstable.

So I'll have to work hard during this time and keep a close eye on things; the progress can't be delayed.

Once the successor is in place, work with him to streamline the internal processes, and then let Lao Ma leave gracefully.

Li Chunjing slowly loosened her fingers on her knee.

Gu Yunjin took a document out of the drawer and placed it on the table. "This is a draft framework agreement with two video websites. The legal department has already reviewed it, but the business terms still need to be refined. You will be in charge of following up on this matter."

Li Chunjing took the document, turned to the first page, and was immediately confronted with a dense array of clauses and figures.

"You understand the value of 'Walking with Brilliance' better than anyone else. I feel at ease entrusting it to you."

Li Chunjing took the agreement and walked out of the study. The corridor was quiet.

She took out her phone and sent a message to Zheng Dahai: "Mr. Zheng, there are some adjustments to the broadcast schedule. I'll go over it with you at 10 a.m. tomorrow."

After sending the message, she thought about it and sent another message to Lu Xiao: "You're right, things are definitely different after you said it."

Lu Xiao replied almost instantly with a thumbs-up emoji, followed by another message: "You'll be so busy from now on that you won't even have time to like this post."

Li Chunjing smiled, put her phone in her pocket, and walked towards her office with the documents in her arms.

She thought, "Being busy is fine; being busy means I'm valuable." She wasn't afraid of being busy; what she feared was that after working so hard for so long, all her efforts would be wasted on someone unworthy.

Now there's no need to worry, Gu Yunjin won't let anyone waste her efforts.

And she wouldn't either.