In the entire morning, Chu Yunsheng was fidgeting. It was not because of the resignation, but the things that happened last night and this morning. The more he thought about it, the more he felt something was amiss. However, no matter how he tried to think, he still could not tell exactly what it was. He could only sit before his computer, click on “my computer”, close “my computer” repeatedly while thinking that once he got the money from selling his flat, where he could get supplies.
“Engineer Chu, manager Wen wants everyone to go to the No. 2 conference room for a meeting.” Xiao Yang, the administrative assistant, put a meeting sheet on the table of Chu Yunsheng and said quietly.
“Got it.” Chu Yunsheng nodded and packed up his things.
As soon as he entered the office in the morning, the first thing he did was to submit the resignation letter to the HR department, but since it has not been approved, he could not just leave immediately. The main problem was that he needed to make sure that he would get his salary first.
Chu Yunsheng has been working in the company for several years now, he also had some sentimental attachment to it. But when facing the impending upheaval, which would happen after two months, this feeling was not enough to let him stay here. In any case, he must get the salary and bonus of the projects he did, which should be more than Thirty thousand Chinese Yuan. And this amount of money, to him, was extremely precious at the moment. Because he needed money to get more supplies.
The No. 2 conference room is the largest conference room of the three conference rooms in the company. When Chu Yunsheng came in with his notebook, most of the people had already arrived. There was even a blond hair, and blue eyes foreigner in the conference room, it seemed like the big boss was determined to work with the American company now.
The Vice manager Wen was sitting on the center seat. With a short neat bob haircut, a blue business suit, she looked very competent. At the moment, she was using English to talk to the representative from the American company.
It was also the first time that Chu Yunsheng met her. Glancing around, he quickly found a corner place to sit down. Since he wanted to leave the company, he did not want to join any discussion they were going to have. He just wanted to make sure that HR would not find any excuse to deduct his money.
Seeing almost everyone had arrived, the manager of the engineering department, manager Zhao, cleared his throat and stood up. Glancing around, he forced himself to make a smile and said, “everyone, let me first formally introduce you to the new Vice General Manager of this company Miss Wen Luo, and Oricel of American GTM company!”
As soon as he finished, there was a burst of applause in the conference room and a suitable smile on everyone’s face.
Wen Luo nodded to everyone, and the manager Zhao continued, “the manager Wen graduated from Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, a place full of business elites. In the future, if you are lucky enough to work under the leadership of the manager Wen, you must learn more from her… ”
The manager Zhao fully displayed a unique spirit of talking nonsense, gushing words of compliments and praises non-stop. When he was still talking enthusiastically, The eyelids of Chu Yunsheng, who was sitting in the corner suddenly jumped.
‘University of Pennsylvania. Why do I feel that I have heard of this name from somewhere else? It seemed like someone also graduated from that school?’
It was a strange feeling. Clearly, he felt that he had heard it before, but no matter how hard he tried to think about it, he just could not recall the details. It was just like clouds and fogs, once you touched it, it would disperse.
The meeting did not stop because he was distracted. As soon as the manager Zhao’s speech was over, the new vice manager Wen Luo began to preside over the meeting. Her style seemed to be simple and straightforward. She asked the assistants to hand out documents to everyone while she only explained the key points.
Of course, Chu Yunsheng did not listen. He was thinking about something else while frowning all the time.
…
“… So, starting from today, the engineering department will be the starting point. It will be the first department to implement the standardized management system to form the core competitiveness using technology. All documents must be completed by the end of this month, the workload is very huge, of course, you will be asked to work overtime, I will request for your additional bonus from the company. In addition to that, in order to improve efficiency, the engineering department will be divided into four groups, they will be working directly under me. The following are the four group leaders that are temporarily appointed… ”
…
“Engineer Chu? Engineer Chu? Chu Yunsheng?”
Wen Luo called Chu Yunsheng’s name several times, but no one responded. All the colleagues in the meeting room had already turned around to look at him. But they did not expect that Chu Yunsheng was biting the end of his pen absentmindedly.
Wen Luo was slightly dissatisfied. She has seen all the engineering staff’s file, this Chu Yunsheng was a senior employee, his ability was average, but his interpersonal relationship was quite good, and he was led by the senior employee, the manager Zhao. In order to maintain the stability of the engineering department at this stage to the greatest extent, she still listed Chu Yunsheng as one of the group leaders.
Yu Xiaohai hurriedly pushed Chu Yunsheng and coughed a few times to remind him.
Only until this moment did Chu Yunsheng realize that everyone was looking at him. However, not knowing why they were looking at him, he hurriedly “mhm”-ed in acknowledgment.
The impression of Chu Yunsheng in Wen Luo’s mind dropped two-levels, but she still smiled professionally and said, “Engineer Chu, are you familiar with the points that we have just discussed. Do you have any suggestions?”
‘What discussion?’ Chu Yunsheng did not listen to what they were saying at all. How could he have any suggestions? But as if Wen Luo’s words reminded him of something, he suddenly patted his notebook, and blurted out: “Finally!”
His voice was very loud and clear. The conference room all of a sudden became deadly silent, the colleagues, who usually had a very good relationship with Chu Yunsheng, all looked at him in shock. This tone, this reaction, he was clearly not satisfied with the Manager Wen’s arrangement.
Where did older Chu get this kind of courage? Did the manager Zhao prepare to take him with him? But even if he wanted to quit, he should not have done this in front of everyone.
Everyone was thinking this way, even Yu Xiaohai was no exception. He secretly thought that no wonder why brother Chu said he wanted to quit, so it was this reason.
Not only his colleagues thought this way, but Wen Luo also frowned, and the corner of her eyes glanced at the manager Zhao, while still smiling as if she did not keep it in mind.
The manager Zhao was speechless. He indeed wanted to take Chu Yunsheng to another company. Privately, he had also asked him, but he was rejected by Chu Yunsheng resolutely. But he did not expect that Chu Yunsheng would do this in the meeting. After all, everyone was still working in the same industry, even if they leave the company, they would still need to see each other from time to time. Causing troubles for the old company in the meeting before leaving was a big no-no! His reputation would be ruined by this.
No one knew why Chu Yunsheng was doing this, apart from himself. Since last night, strange things happened one after another, and there was also a strange feeling that always haunted him. Only until now did he just realized that the word that he was looking for to describe that strange feeling was “familiar!”
That’s right. Apart from “familiar” this word, he could not find a more suitable word to describe this feeling. He did not expect that Wen Luo’s question would help him to solve the question he had since this morning.
Familiar!
Although he could not remember much about the nightmare, there was definitely a sense of familiarity, and the shadow and the bloody face, whether it was an illusion or a ghost, it was still that strangely familiar feeling. And even worse, the girl who caused the car accident this morning, he also had a familiar feeling, as if everything had happened in the past before.
And that the University of Pennsylvania, too, he also had a familiar feeling. But where exactly had he heard it before? Chu Yunsheng was very frustrated.
The more he thought about it, the more he could not sit quietly in the meeting room. This strange familiar feeling caused a tremendous panic deep inside his heart. It had already exceeded the panic that the ancient book had brought to him.
One was from the inner self panic, the other was the external fear and pressure, those two were completely different.
“I’m sorry.” Realizing that he had done something inappropriate, he stood up and said, “excuse me, manager Wen and manager Zhao, I have submitted the resignation letter this morning, HR may have not given it to you to approve it. I, I feel a little uncomfortable, I need to leave first.”
After he said it, the whole room was shocked. In any workplace, openly talking about resignation in the meeting in front of a new boss, was a big taboo. Unless the employee really hated the company, otherwise, nobody would do such a thing. Even if people were dissatisfied with the new arrangement, at most, they would just talk to each other in private. Chu Yunsheng has always been a nice guy in the company. He has never offended anyone before. So even if Wen Luo was not familiar with Chu Yunsheng, seeing him suddenly acting like this, she also realized that if something really did not happen to this man, then he definitely did it on purpose.
However, Chu Yunsheng was not joking. He immediately stood up, moved back the chair, and walked out. Yu Xiaohai quickly pulled him while his forehead was covered with cold sweat and said in a low voice, “Brother Chu, the door is over there.”
Chu Yunsheng was dazed for a moment, then immediately turned around. At this time Wen Luo suddenly said, “Engineer Chu, if you are not feeling comfortable, the company can give you a holiday to rest for a period of time, in terms of the resignation letter, we can talk about it in the future.”
It was not that Wen Luo wanted to give in, she had just arrived at the company, it would only cause panic if she fired someone on the first day. Although it was Chu Yunsheng himself who wanted to quit, rumors could always confuse people. Especially at this critical stage, even if it was not related to her, people would think it was because of her.
But the thing about this man openly resigned in the conference room, would make the new policy became very difficult to implement, and it would also make her look very incompetent. So she did not think that it was really Chu Yunsheng’s personal problem. Someone must have incited him to do it.
Of course, she wouldn’t give the person behind Chu Yunsheng a chance.
But she did not expect that Chu Yunsheng suddenly stopped at the door, turned around, and asked a very strange question in a stern tone, “Miss Wen, Miss Oricel, you two just came back from the United States, do you believe in the apocalypse?”
…
That afternoon, Chu Yunsheng got the resignation confirmation, at the same time, a rumor also began to spread in the company, “Chu Yunsheng from the engineering department seemed to have lost his mind.”
But there were still quite a few people who had a very good relationship with Chu Yunsheng. They all wanted to help Chu Yunsheng as much as they could. Led by Yu Xiaohai, those people were discussing where they should host a leaving-do for Chu Yunsheng. Those people were mostly ordinary employees. In terms of the management level, it seemed to be very calm. However, no one knew that a global catastrophe was approaching every day!
When Chu Yunsheng was going through the procedure of handing over his job to his other colleagues, Wen Luo, in the vice manager’s office, picked up the phone that was vibrating, walked toward the floor-to-ceiling window, looked down at Shanghai city and answered, “Hello…”
On the other side of the telephone, a woman’s delicate voice appeared, “Wen Luo, why didn’t you tell me that you just came back?”
Wen Luo’s stern face showed a faint smile and said, “I just came back a few days ago. But I heard that you were busy with an important experiment, so I did not dare to interrupt you.”
The woman on the other end of the phone seemed to be very upset and said, “the experiment failed again, Wen Luo. Let’s have dinner tonight. It’s been a long time since we got together.”
Wen Luo said with a smile, “How can I say no to Miss Zhao’s invitation? Talking about the frustration, I have just met the most unruly person in my life!”
******
At the other end of the city, in a villa’s study room, a middle-aged man was holding a camera photo in his hand. He gently placed it on the desk and raised his head and said, “Older Yang, are you sure, that he is the only one, who has ever appeared on the scene?”
Across the desk, a man, who was wearing a glasses and about 40 years old, nodded, “I have read all the information about the scene, he is definitely the only witness, Comrade Wang Fushun from the public security bureau has already gone to the neighborhood to investigate, as long as he is willing to testify, Lawyer Chen said that there will be no legal problem.”
The middle-aged man was silent for a while, and then said, “check his information, as detailed as possible, including the family background, economic situation, working relationship, and so on, but all materials, do not send them to me, keep them in the police station.”
Secretary Yang nodded and left the room.
…
Three o ‘clock in the afternoon.
Chu Yunsheng was in the toilet when his phone rang. Seeing that it was a strange number, that he didn’t recognize, he thought that it might be the estate agent, so he answered the call.
“Hello, are you Chu Yunsheng?”
A man’s deep voice came from the other end of the phone. There was something strange in his tone, but Chu Yunsheng could not tell what it was.
“Yes, who are you? Century Estate?” Chu Yunsheng shook a little, pulled up the zipper, said while walking to the basin, he did not seem to pay any attention to the tone of the man.
The man on the other side of the phone, “Mr. Chu, I am a lawyer, and my client was involved in a car accident this morning on Qiulin road. I hope that I can talk to you alone in detail about the accident. I don’t know if you have time now, I’m just right outside your company.”
Chu Yunsheng was startled. He hurriedly switched off the tap, quickly walked through the office area without giving the man an immediate answer. Arriving at the corner of the windows, where he could see the street outside his company building, he looked down to the street, however, he didn’t see any suspicious person. He frowned and said, “I am still working, wait for me after 5:30 when I finish my work.”
The man on the other side cleared his throat and said, “Mr. Chu, the comrades of the Public Security Bureau will arrive at your company soon. I have heard that you just resigned, however, it won’t look nice with those people coming up to invite you, right?”
“What do you mean? It was not me who hit the person. Why do I need to be scared?” Chu Yunsheng lowered his voice and said. It seemed that he was quite very angry about it.
Although he said this, saying that he wasn’t panicking was lying. What kind of background did those people have? Just looking at the car number plate, it was more than enough for him to know. At noon, he had specially checked it online, with that car alone, it was worth millions of Chinese Yuan. Those people and he were from two completely different worlds.
The man from the other side of the phone, “no, no, Mr. Chu, you have misunderstood me, I just want to know the details of the accident. It won’t delay you too much time, and I promise that the comrades from the public security bureau won’t appear in your company.”
Chu Yunsheng hesitated, he understood the hidden meaning in the man’s words. What he said was that if he didn’t come down now, the people from the public security bureau would come to his company to get him.
Although he did nothing wrong, being taken away by those people would have a huge effect on his plan of hoarding materials later on. So he had to treat it seriously.
Whatever is meant to happen will eventually happen, there is no use in resisting it. Gritting his teeth, Chu Yunsheng said, “Okay, let me tell my colleague first, I’ll be there in a minute.”
The man at the other end of the line, “I’ll wait for you on Song Hui road, inside a black Audi.”
After hearing it clearly, Chu Yunsheng immediately hung up the phone, returned to the office area, and found some random reasons to ask for a break from manager Yang.
Manager Yang also didn’t make things difficult for him. Chu Yunsheng has been working underneath him for more than two years, the relationship between them was quite good. Not only did he not ask any more questions about why he suddenly wanted a break, but he also asked with concern, that if he was okay, and if he really didn’t feel well, he could finish work early today. After all, handling his tasks to other people couldn’t be done in one day.
Chu Yunsheng thanked him, and then hurriedly walked out of the office. While he was in the elevator, his both eyes were gazing at himself in the elevator mirror, the image of himself was also gazing back at him. When “two people” were looking at each other, Chu Yunsheng didn’t know why, the longer he looked at it, the more scared he was.
Absent-mindedly, he went out of the building. Across the road, he could see a black Audi parked under a green parking sign. Chu Yunsheng tightened his collars, calmed down, pretended to be very casual and walked over. Looking around, seeing that there were no police around, he knocked on the car window.
Actually, the way he behaved was very strange. He was just the witness of a car accident, there was no need for him to act like he had done a serious crime.
Inside the car sat a 30ish years old heroic-looking man, short hair, dressed in a black suit. If Chu Yunsheng wanted to use a phrase to describe this man, it would be, “Tall, rich, and handsome.”
“Hello, Mr. Chu, my client is the owner of the car. I want to know the details about the incident from you.” The tall, rich, and handsome man waited until Chu Yunsheng seated down and closed the door before he reached out his right hand and said with a smile.
Seeing the man didn’t seem to want to introduce himself, Chu Yunsheng guessed that someone probably didn’t want this conversation to be known by the public. Since it probably mattered to someone, who had an important background, Chu Yunsheng also didn’t bother to ask. He just shook the man’s hand softly and asked, “how did you find me?”
“It wasn’t hard to find you. Don’t worry. I just wanted to know what happened to my client at that time.” The tall, rich, and handsome man dodged the question and said.
Chu Yunsheng was not a fool. Although he didn’t know much about the law. He had read quite a lot of news. There was one case in the past he read, of which the parents of the suspect were trying to bribe the witness. In the end, both the witness and the parents of the suspects were locked up by the police. Because the incident was so unprecedented, it caused a huge discussion at that time. Although the incident didn’t happen in China, he believed that there must be similar laws to prevent this kind of thing from happening in China as well. Therefore, although he didn’t know if the man had some other intentions or not, he must be careful.
“And what do you want to know?” Chu Yunsheng was very straightforward. Clearly, those people were not someone that he wanted to have problems with. They were even able to stop the police from looking for him. And the reason why this man was here, would be more than just asking about some information. However, no matter what he wanted him to do or say, he would cooperate fully. After all, he didn’t want to cause any more trouble.
In this magical land, making a person disappear from the public was not a strange thing.
The man probably often dealt with such a sudden incident before, he seemed to come prepared. No matter what kind of response he got from Chu Yunsheng, he just simply carried on, “okay then, please tell me the incident from the beginning.”
Chu Yunsheng thought for a second and then began to tell him what happened from the very beginning, “probably about four o ‘clock, I don’t remember the exact time. At that time, I was waiting for my bus, and then I saw an orange Lamborghini drive past in front of me. It even splashed a puddle of water over me, and then I heard a crashing noise. I thought that it must be an accident, so I ran towards the place where the noise came from, then I saw the mini cleaning car was knocked over… But I couldn’t see anyone, so I asked the car owner to call the police. And then my bus also arrived… So this is the whole thing.”
When Chu Yunsheng was telling the incident, the tall, rich, and handsome man leaned slightly forward. He seemed to be listening to what Chu Yunsheng said very carefully, not wanting to miss a single word. Sometimes, he frowned his brows, and some times his eyes flashed strange gleams. When Chu Yunsheng finished talking, he took out a photo from the black briefcase, showed it to Chu Yunsheng and said, “do you know this person?”
Chu Yunsheng looked at the tall, rich, and handsome man for a second, not knowing what he meant. But he still took the picture and had a close look. The man in the photo was around 50 years old, wearing work clothes, very skinny. His eyes were sunken, and his skin had a very unhealthy color.
“No.”
After seeing the photo, Chu Yunsheng said with certainty and returned the photo back to the man.
The man smiled and said ambiguously while still holding the photo, “he is the owner of the mini cleaning car, 56 years old this year, not from the local area and lives alone. His wife has already passed away, but he still has a daughter back in his hometown, and he has not gone back to his hometown for many years. Three months ago, he was diagnosed with lung cancer, so he coughed very often. Are you sure that you did not see him or hear any noises at the scene?”
Chu Yunsheng shook his head. He understood what the man was trying to hint at him. Saying that the man had cancer in front of him so bluntly, he meant that even if he did not want to cooperate with them, they could still use the money to solve it. They needed Chu Yunsheng’s statement, so they could finish the case smoothly, but it was not absolutely necessary.
That man, Chu Yunsheng indeed did not see him, but the cough, he had heard it. However, that was on the street outside his own balcony, it was on a different road, even if he said that he heard it, it was not much evidence. So he simply just chose to avoid providing unnecessary information.
The man seemed to appreciate Chu Yunsheng’s cooperation. He took back the photo, thought for a second, and then said sternly, “okay, Mr. Chu, thank you for your time, I think I know how it happened. What you saw was that my client lost control of her car because of the slippery road and hit a mini cleaning car, but you didn’t see my client hit the cleaner, am I correct?”
The man’s eyes fixed firmly on Chu Yunsheng. There were a few words in this sentence, he intentionally spoke with emphasis. The intention was self-evident, he also believed that with the imposing aura that he had developed over many years after working in a law firm, it was more than enough to intimidate this ordinary small employee before him.
But he was wrong, very wrong. What he shouldn’t have done the most was to stare into Chu Yunsheng’s eyes.
The eyes of Chu Yunsheng, who knew the intention of the man, suddenly constricted. It seemed like a normal psychological reaction, but in a flash, at the deep end of the pupils, there seemed to hide a stormy black vortex. All of sudden, countless fragments rushed out from both of his eyes, and in the next moment, there seemed to be an overwhelming force sucking his soul into Chu Yunsheng’s black eyes. Then everywhere around him became completely dark. There was no light, but he seemed to be surrounded by the raging roars.
“Yes, I didn’t see it, and I don’t think there were other people there at that time.”
Chu Yunsheng didn’t want to lie, but he also didn’t want to get into trouble. Fortunately, he indeed did not see the cleaner at that time. The tall, rich, and handsome man was playing the trick on the words, although they were exactly the same word, by simply rearranging the order of the words, a criminal case was turned into an ordinary traffic incident.
“If there’s nothing else, I need to go now.” Seeing the man was staring blankly at him. Chu Yunsheng just opened the door and left the car. From the beginning to the end, he didn’t seem to realize the changes in his eyes.
After he left, the face of the tall, rich, and handsome man suddenly went pale, as if he had just had a nightmare. He was having cold sweat, and even his fingers were still trembling very hard as if there was a great fear spreading inside his mind.
The police car then “timely” drove out from the corner of the street slowly, however, there was no siren. After the police car drove past the black Audi, the driver of the Audi nodded at the two police officers inside the police car, then the police car stopped Chu Yunsheng and then asked him to go with them.
Wait until the police car took Chu Yunsheng away, the tall, rich, and handsome man finally calmed down. Since he became a lawyer, it was the first time that he had lost his composure. Taking out his phone with his still shaking hand, he coughed for a few times and finally returned normal.
…
When Chu Yunsheng came out from the police station, it was already over eight o ‘clock in the evening. It was not that the police officer had asked him a lot of questions, but he had been left alone in a room and ignored by all the people since he entered the police station. Only until half an hour ago, after an older police officer simply asked him a few words, did they finally let him out.
The police station would not give him a meal while he was in there. Even if they do, it was not the meal that Chu Yunsheng wanted to eat. As soon as he came out of the station, he immediately called Yu Xiaohai back. When he got the name of the place that they were going to eat dinner, he immediately stopped a taxi and left the place.
Around eight colleagues that had good relationships with Chu Yunsheng, had already been waiting in the restaurant for a while. Seeing Chu Yunsheng finally appeared, they quickly led him to the booth.
“Brother Chu, what happened? Someone in the company saw you were taken away by the police?”
“Older chu, is everything all right?”
“Xiao Chu, I have a relative in the police station, do you want me to ask him about what happened?”
…
Inside the booth, a girl suddenly shouted, “come, come, brother Chu, there is news online now. ‘A bizarre car accident on Qiulin this morning’ Huh? Qiulin road? Brother Chu, isn’t that place near your home? Is it because of this? Wait! Don’t take my tablet! There are still some more information, ‘The cleaner is still missing!’”
“What?!” Originally, Chu Yunsheng didn’t really care about it. He knew that those bored friends of his were just pulling his legs. But when he heard this sentence, he unexpectedly had a chill down to his spine.
Those people were simply too audacious! How could they ignore the law completely!
Chu Yunsheng hurriedly walked around the round table, to see the tablet in the female colleague’s hand in the hands, but Yu Xiaohai suddenly grabbed and pointed at the door nervously.
“Excuse me, which one of you is Chu Yunsheng?”
In the doorway stood two tall men, in dark suits with earphones in their ears, and something faintly around their waists.
“It’s a gun!” Yu Xiaohai saw it and quickly whispered to Chu Yunsheng.
“I am.” Chu Yunsheng suddenly calmed down, although he did not know where he got the courage from.
“There’s something we need to ask you. We’d like you to go with us. I hope you’ll cooperate.” One of the men said gravely.
“Who are you?” Chu Yunsheng did not seem to be afraid at all. He was strangely calm and collected.
