The elevator descended in a silent, golden plunge.
Jiang Yue's hand was still on Li Chen's arm, but her grip was loosening, the shock wearing off, replaced by a cold, trembling reality. She pulled away, hugging herself, staring at the mirrored doors. The woman reflected back was a stranger—a tear-streaked phantom in a ruined dress.
"Why?" The word was a shard of glass, sharp and fragile.
Li Chen watched the floor numbers blink downward. "I told you. The market undervalues you."
"Stop with the investor talk!" she snapped, whirling on him, her eyes blazing with a fury that had finally found a target. "No one does that. No one risks public humiliation for a stranger. What do you really want? A mistress? A puppet? Someone to kick when you're down, just like everyone else?"
Her Potential Value flickered before his eyes: 3 (Volatile). The fear was crushing the nascent growth.
He turned to face her fully. His expression was calm, but his eyes held no deception, no hidden lust. Only the sterile focus of a surgeon assessing a unique specimen.
"Jiang Yue. Your father's company, Jianghai Holdings, collapsed due to a liquidity crisis triggered by the Luo family bank calling in its loans prematurely. You personally guaranteed several debts using your personal assets, which were seized. Your former fiancé, CEO Wang Jin of Stellar Media, publicly dissolved your engagement the day the news broke. Your current net worth is approximately negative twelve million credits. Your social capital is zero. Your emotional state is fractured."
She flinched with every sentence, as if he were slapping her with facts. "How… how do you know all that?"
"Basic research," he said. The System had fed him the core data the moment he focused on her. "You are, by every conventional metric, a catastrophic failure."
A sob caught in her throat. She looked away, defeated.
"But conventional metrics are for conventional minds," Li Chen continued, his voice dropping, becoming almost intimate in the confined space. "I saw you, three years ago, at the Young Innovators Summit. You weren't on the social pages that day. You were in a back room, presenting a logistical optimization model for your father's shipping division. You reduced their fuel costs by seventeen percent. The old men on the board patted your head and called you 'clever.' They ignored the model. I saw it. It was elegant. Brutally efficient."
Jiang Yue's breath hitched. She remembered that day. The condescending smiles. The way her ideas were treated as a cute hobby.
"You have a mind for systems, for patterns, for ruthless efficiency," Li Chen said. "A mind they forced into a box labeled 'heiress' and then discarded when the box got empty. That mind… that potential… is what I am investing in."
The elevator doors opened with a soft chime. It was the underground parking garage, cold and echoing. He led her out, towards a modest, clean electric sedan—a far cry from the limousines she used to take for granted.
"Get in," he said. "This isn't a rescue. It's a job interview."
Bewildered, she got into the passenger seat. The interior was sparse, functional. It smelled of clean leather and ambition, not old money.
He drove out into the neon-washed night. He didn't speak for several minutes, letting the city's glare wash over them.
"My offer is this," Li Chen began, his eyes on the road. "I will provide you with capital. I will provide you with a legal shield. I will handle the wolves at the door. Your job is to do one thing: rebuild. Not Jianghai Holdings. That corpse is gone. You will build something new. Something entirely yours. I will own fifty-one percent. You will own forty-nine. You will be the CEO. The face. The brain."
She stared at him. "With what capital? You saw my numbers. I'm a financial black hole."
"I have transferred five hundred thousand credits to a secured, private account," he said.
Her eyes widened. It was a pittance compared to her old life, but now, it was a king's ransom. A lifeline.
"It's not a gift. It's a seed round," he said. "The first 'Fortune Injection.' My system—my method—tells me your potential ROI is 9,800%. My job is to create the conditions for that potential to be realized. Your job is to realize it."
'System'? 'Fortune Injection'? The terms were bizarre, but the concrete number, the clear structure, was the first solid ground she'd felt in months.
"What… what would I even build?" The question was a whisper, the first tentative spark of planning, not just surviving.
"You tell me," Li Chen said, glancing at her. "What did you want to build before they told you your only job was to be beautiful and marry well?"
The question hung in the air. The memories flooded back—not of galas, but of late nights with spreadsheets, of designing supply chain software just for the thrill of solving the puzzle.
"…Logistics," she murmured, almost to herself. "Not shipping. Too capital-intensive now. But… data. Logistics data. A platform that predicts regional supply chain bottlenecks for small to mid-sized manufacturers. A SaaS model. Low overhead, high-margin."
As she spoke, her voice grew stronger. The fog of despair began to lift, burned away by the heat of a genuine idea.
Above her head, Li Chen watched the golden number climb.
[Current Potential Value: 7… 12… 19…]
A new System alert popped up.
[Target's 'Vision' aligned with Locked Potential.]
[Shared Trait Upgraded: 'Unyielding Pride' -> 'Founder's Resolve (Basic)']
[Li Chen's Acquisitions: Financial Instinct (Minor), Supply Chain Terminology (Novice)]
A warmth, a new sliver of knowledge, settled into his mind. He now understood, instinctively, the gross margin potential of a software-as-a-service business model.
"Good," he said, a faint, almost imperceptible smile touching his lips. It was the smile of a craftsman seeing raw material take shape. "We start tomorrow. First, we get you settled."
He pulled up to a modern, secure apartment building—not luxurious, but clean and safe. He handed her a keycard. "Temporary headquarters. Apartment 1204. Your new identity starts tonight. No more running. No more hiding."
She took the keycard, its weight profound. "And what about… them? The people from the lounge? Wang Jin? The Luo family?"
Li Chen turned off the engine. The sudden silence was heavy.
"They are not your concern right now," he said, his voice cooling several degrees. "They are liabilities on your balance sheet. Emotional debt. My department is liability management. You focus on creating assets. The time for facing them will come. And when it does…"
He looked at her, and in his eyes, she didn't see comforting fire. She saw the cold, patient glint of a scalpel.
"…we will not be asking for apologies. We will be conducting a hostile takeover of their peace of mind."
He got out, came around, and opened her door. A gesture of professionalism, not chivalry.
Jiang Yue stepped out, standing straighter. The broken heiress was gone. In her place stood a woman with a fire in her eyes and a fifty-one percent partner in the shadows.
"Thank you, Mr. Li," she said, the formal title a deliberate boundary, a professional line.
"Call me Li Chen," he replied. "We are partners now. Get some rest, CEO Jiang. Your first board meeting is with your laptop at 7 AM."
He watched her walk into the building, a lone figure marching into a new war.
Above his own vision, a new line of text appeared, glowing with silent promise.
[Portfolio Value: 1 Asset (Jiang Yue). Projected Valuation: Increasing.]
[Liquid Capital: 0 Credits.]
[Next Phase: Secure Operating Capital. Identify 'Undervalued Asset' #2.]
He got back into his car, the silence now a companion. He was broke. He had a single, volatile asset. And a city full of enemies who didn't yet know he existed.
He smiled. It was the most balanced his books had been in years.
The investment was active.
The real work began now.