Transmigrated as the Domineering Scumbag Alpha Forced into Marriage by a Delicate Subordinate (GL) - Chapter 26

Tang Yun was very surprised, because during the day, Qin Jue’s words had been a warning not to be impatient, but after she went out once, her tone had changed to coming to work tomorrow. Tang Yun didn’t know Qin Jue’s thoughts, but CEO Qin’s word was law, and the biggest crisis since she started working seemed to be over.

“Thank you, CEO Qin,” Tang Yun smiled broadly.

CEO Qin looked up at Tang Yun. Tang Yun seemed genuinely happy. Her world was simple and direct, and it seemed easy to placate her.

“Let’s eat,” Qin Jue said.

Qin Jue’s piece of tripe was completely lost. She casually scooped a piece of beef that Tang Yun had put in earlier. As Qin Jue chewed, she suddenly realized that she had a constant smile on her face.

When did she start smiling? She was not fond of smiling, and certainly not of inexplicable, silly grinning.

The next morning, Secretary Tang officially resumed her post. Qin Jue noticed that one of the new standard items on her breakfast table, hot milk, had been replaced by Tang Yun with fresh juice. It was sweet and tart and tasted excellent. For a moment, she even began to wonder how she had managed to live on iced coffee for so many years.

At the company, Tang Yun still entered the main gate right behind Qin Jue. Since her first day of employment, the gossip behind the company’s back had never stopped, but at least no one, except for Lin Hao, that clueless fellow, had asked Tang Yun about the gossip to her face. They were all colleagues who saw each other frequently, maintaining surface-level harmony.

However, after the farce in the conference room, Tang Yun was publicly dismissed, only to return legitimately a few days later. This time, the eyes of the colleagues she encountered on the way nearly popped out. A strange silence followed Tang Yun wherever she walked.

“Go find Jian Zhen first, and return to the Secretarial Group,” Qin Jue instructed.

Tang Yun rode the elevator up with Qin Jue. The colleagues on CEO Qin’s floor didn’t show surprise at suddenly seeing Tang Yun. The staff in the Secretarial Group office even actively greeted Tang Yun, as if her return was already common knowledge on this floor.

Tang Yun felt a little awkward and went to find Jian Zhen to inquire about her job handover. She had previously been studying in the Project Department and had hardly touched on the core duties of a secretary. Now, with no work assigned to her, Tang Yun was completely idle.

Assistant Jian’s desk had two monitors, one horizontal and one vertical, and several documents were spread out before her. She looked up from the pile of documents, her gaze first falling on Tang Yun’s glasses, then revealing a knowing smile.

“The new glasses look very nice,” Jian Zhen said.

Tang Yun pursed her lips and smiled: “They do, don’t they? I think so too.”

“These look like a designer model. The person who bought them has excellent taste,” Jian Zhen subtly complimented herself.

Jian Zhen logged into the company’s internal system. The mouse cursor hovered over various employee profiles, finally stopping at one she had starred. She looked up and smiled at Tang Yun: “Secretary Tang, our work is generally more flexible, unlike in the Project Department where you had relatively clear and long-term tasks. I have a small assignment now that I think might be suitable for you.”

“What kind of work?” Tang Yun asked.

“The company might have a batch of employees leaving soon. According to company regulations, every employee needs an exit interview before leaving. The HR department will be quite busy lately. Could you help share some of the workload? Is that okay?” Jian Zhen asked.

“No problem, but…” Tang Yun frowned, “I don’t know what to talk about.”

“That’s fine. You’ll know when you get there,” Jian Zhen smiled.

Tang Yun got the exit interview records from previous years from Assistant Jian and prepared her own interview outline. Although she had no experience in this kind of work, she felt that Jian Zhen’s arrangement was odd in every way.

What did she mean by “You’ll know when you get there”? Was it supposed to be standardized, or just a formality? Jian Zhen was too vague, exactly like Qin Jue. Tang Yun suspected this was why Assistant Jian was Qin Jue’s most trusted confidant.

Soon, Tang Yun received an employee departure file in her email. It was her interview subject. Tang Yun clicked to download the attachment. The progress bar finished in an instant, and Xiao Jianming’s name was prominently displayed.

Tang Yun’s mind went blank.

The meeting room was already reserved. It wasn’t until Tang Yun sat across from Xiao Jianming that she gradually felt a sense of reality.

Times had changed, and their positions were reversed, but Xiao Jianming, who was at a disadvantage, seemed to be handling it better than she was.

Xiao Jianming was still wearing his familiar plaid shirt. After a period apart, the lines on his forehead seemed deeper, but the look behind the thick lenses of his glasses was more relaxed than before.

“Secretary Tang, we meet again,” Xiao Jianming nodded and greeted Tang Yun.

Facing Xiao Jianming, Tang Yun’s pre-prepared standardized interview outline was completely useless, because she truly had something to ask Xiao Jianming.

“Do you agree with the investigation team’s conclusion?” Tang Yun asked.

“I do,” Xiao Jianming admitted very generously. “You are very talented. It seems our alma mater’s teaching standards have improved greatly over the years.”

Tang Yun was speechless at Xiao Jianming’s matter-of-fact attitude. In her mind, Xiao Jianming should have at least shown some guilt when facing her, but the person in front of her showed nothing.

“Why?” Tang Yun asked.

“Why what? I’m just a rotten person. I ran out of ideas, and I’m jealous of others, unable to stand newcomers getting ahead,” Xiao Jianming shrugged fearlessly.

Tang Yun frowned. Xiao Jianming’s attitude made her uncomfortable.

“You don’t have to say that on purpose. You were instructed by someone else. We both know that,” Tang Yun said.

Xiao Jianming was stunned. After a second or two, he suddenly laughed with a sigh, leaning back in his chair and shaking his head loosely.

“When under someone else’s roof, you have to bow your head,” he said abruptly.

“Since the company found out, there’s no need for me to keep pretending. I’m not young anymore. Maybe I’ve just been waiting for a reason to retire,” Xiao Jianming said.

“The first project you took over ten years ago when you joined the company was the development of the previous generation of Brave. According to the investigation, your hands were clean back then,” Tang Yun said.

“They were,” Xiao Jianming gave a bitter smile, “But sales were dismal.”

The meeting room was large. Tang Yun and Xiao Jianming sat across a long table from each other, separated only by the clatter of her keyboard.

“Brave is a dying IP. I don’t know who will take over this mess. I’ve prepared all the handover materials, but I hope the person who comes after me is smart enough to give it a merciful end sooner rather than later,” Xiao Jianming said.

Tang Yun’s hands paused on the keyboard. She whispered, “I liked Brave a lot when I was little.”

Xiao Jianming scoffed, taking no offense: “Who didn’t like it a decade or more ago? That was ages ago.”

“What are your plans after leaving?” Tang Yun pulled the topic back.

“Don’t worry, I won’t be working in the industry after I leave. Now that I can finally take a breath, I might go to Country M to find my younger brother.” Xiao Jianming said.

Tang Yun had seen his brother on Xiao Jianming’s phone screen. At the time, she and Xiao Jianming were sitting at a smoky barbecue stall, listening to the tired old programmer speak with expectation about how proud he was of his brother.

“How many years until he graduates?” Tang Yun asked, curious.

“Hard to say, but his advisor is very promising, and the client for the project he’s working on with his advisor recently took a liking to him. His post-graduation path is pretty much set,” Xiao Jianming said.

Even now, Tang Yun found it difficult to reconcile the enthusiastic Xiao Jianming who planned others’ futures with the cunning person who stole the fruits of juniors’ labor and then backstabbed them. It only proved that people truly change.

Perhaps a decade ago, he was also enthusiastically and spiritedly planning his own future. If someone had traveled through time to tell him his career would end so miserably, she wondered if he would have punched them.

Tang Yun finished filling out the form, closed her laptop, and stood up. Xiao Jianming also stood. This was perhaps her first and last handshake with Xiao Jianming.

“I wish your brother all the best,” Tang Yun said.

“Thank you,” Xiao Jianming was surprised.

Tang Yun turned to leave, but Xiao Jianming suddenly called out to her from behind.

“Schoolmate, you are very talented, truly. Being a secretary is wasting your talent.”

“I don’t know what you think, but I advise you to stay away from both CEO Qin and CEO Guan.”

“Also, be more wary of people in the future,” Xiao Jianming said seriously.

“I will. Experience is the best teacher,” Tang Yun smiled.

Leaving the meeting room, Xiao Jianming went down the elevator, and Tang Yun went up. They parted ways there.

Tang Yun was alone in the elevator. She looked up at her blurred reflection on the ceiling and slowly let out a sigh of relief.

A wrong righted.

Ding—

The elevator arrived in an instant. Tang Yun adjusted her expression in the reflective door. When the doors opened to both sides, she stepped out with a smile, nodding to the colleagues she passed.

It was like passing a trial, Tang Yun thought.

She now understood why Assistant Jian had asked her to help with the exit interviews. Although it was put in grand terms, it was actually just to give her a chance for a private conversation with Xiao Jianming. Before this meeting, her heart was filled with resentment, but when Xiao Jianming’s decade at Changfeng was laid bare before her, she felt as if she had witnessed the gradual degeneration and aging of a young person. She still didn’t approve of Xiao Jianming’s actions, but she at least understood that people are multi-faceted.

She had to go and thank Assistant Jian. She truly thought a lot for her.

Tang Yun knocked on Jian Zhen’s office door. Jian Zhen was not inside. She went to the Secretarial office to ask around. A colleague said Jian Zhen was most likely in Qin Jue’s office reporting on work. So, Tang Yun sent Jian Zhen a message and returned to her desk to wait patiently.

In the CEO’s office, Jian Zhen stood dutifully across from Qin Jue. In Qin Jue’s hands was a thick stack of Tang Yun’s academic records that Jian Zhen had compiled: her first three years of university transcripts, various campus awards, records of project proposals and completions, and her competition awards. She was quite the outstanding student.

The turning point appeared last year. She suddenly seemed to change completely, skipping classes and failing to show up for exams. Even now, her internship unit hadn’t been registered in the Academic Affairs system.

Jian Zhen observed Qin Jue’s expression. Although it seemed unchanged, having worked by Qin Jue’s side for so long, Jian Zhen could sense that Qin Jue’s mood was fluctuating as she read through the materials.

It was the same as when she first learned about Tang Yun’s background.

In fact, there was more. Jian Zhen had contacted Tang Yun’s counselor and learned some things outside the scope of Qin Jue’s request, such as the reason for these changes.

“Secretary Tang… her family situation is not good,” Jian Zhen began cautiously.

Qin Jue’s gaze never left the materials. She neither hurried nor interrupted, which Jian Zhen took as tacit permission to continue.

“Secretary Tang’s parents passed away last year in a traffic accident. She has a seven-year-old sister who is seriously ill. The college organized a donation, but it was far from enough,” Jian Zhen said.

Even uttering that short sentence felt heavy to Jian Zhen. Qin Jue pressed her lips together, remaining silent for a long time. Finally, she looked up, put down the materials, and asked: “What is Secretary Tang doing now?”

“You instructed her to conduct Xiao Jianming’s exit interview earlier. It should be finished by now,” Jian Zhen said.

“Good, I understand. Any movement on Louis’s project?” Qin Jue asked.

To Jian Zhen’s surprise, Qin Jue neither commented on what she had found nor showed any inclination to care for Tang Yun. It was as if she had only asked on a whim, immediately shifting to work matters in the next sentence.

Jian Zhen quickly switched gears to report. The public tender for the Black Swan project had been released. The Project Department had shown no movement, which suggested that Guan Li was preoccupied with the lawsuits Qin Jue had initiated and simply couldn’t attend to it. Jian Zhen knew what Qin Jue cared about recently, so she had prepared a concise summary of the announcement points in advance, which she could present to Qin Jue logically.

“Put it into a written document and send it to me,” Qin Jue said.

The report to Qin Jue was finally over. Jian Zhen left with a sense of immense relief. As soon as the CEO’s office door closed, Qin Jue’s stiff, elite posture instantly crumbled.

Qin Jue leaned back against the chair, looking up, her fingers resting on Tang Yun’s few pages of resume. She didn’t speak. In the silent office, only her overly heavy breathing could be heard.

“Is the host pitying the main character, Tang Yun?” the System asked.

Qin Jue was silent for a long time, then asked the System: “Are you people or not?”