Chapter 75 — Gu Pengzhan's Analysis

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Wei Zhao had at first meant to simply march into the restroom, haul the man out, and drag him straight to Gu Pengzhan's office. On second thought, though, anyone working on the top floor of a conglomerate like this was either a shareholder of vice-chairman rank or a general manager, an executive vice president and the like—not a single one of them a minor figure. Never mind whether the man would even admit to anything once dumped in front of Gu Pengzhan; what Wei Zhao feared was that the man was not acting alone, but as part of a faction.

Judging by whom he had been calling, he had plenty of accomplices. Pull him out into the open, and those accomplices would not necessarily come with him. Besides, at the level of vice president and above, a few words from Gu Pengzhan were hardly enough to deal with them. Once a conglomerate grows to a certain size, factions inevitably form within it. Gu Pengzhan was the largest shareholder, but even he could not simply move against another shareholder's people—and it was even possible that the man on the phone was himself one of those other shareholders.

It was precisely because Wei Zhao had thought of this that he acted on the spot: to avoid tipping anyone off, he had disguised himself as a man who had come to the group on business and wandered onto the wrong floor, so that the man in the restroom would not grow suspicious.

Reaching the door of Gu Pengzhan's office, Wei Zhao saw that it stood open. Uncle Qing was standing beside Gu Pengzhan, reporting something to him; Gu Pengzhan kept nodding, a satisfied smile on his face. When he caught sight of Wei Zhao in the doorway, Gu Pengzhan raised his head with a smile. "Xiaoyi, you are here. Come in, sit down."

"Uncle Chu." Wei Zhao closed the office door behind him as he entered; he wanted to talk with Gu Pengzhan about what he had overheard in the restroom.

"Xiaoyi, I heard that yesterday you had a run-in with some underworld thugs?" Once Wei Zhao was seated on the sofa facing the desk, Gu Pengzhan came straight to the point.

Wei Zhao could tell that Gu Pengzhan's tone was not one of reproach but full of genuine concern, and he was deeply moved. He was, after all, nothing more than a live-in study companion hired with money to keep the man's daughter company in her studies and daily life—yet Gu Pengzhan cared about him this much. That was rare indeed.

Still, Wei Zhao was somewhat puzzled. With anyone else, the first thing on the agenda would likely have been to dismiss him, lest he drag the man's daughter into trouble.

"Yes. A man in my class named Zhong Yongliang brought him in to deal with me." Wei Zhao did not hide anything and told Gu Pengzhan the truth. "But I reckon that Black Panther will shoulder the whole thing alone at the police station, and it will not implicate Zhong Yongliang."

"Oh? Zhong Yongliang? You have a quarrel with him?" Gu Pengzhan was all the more puzzled. Wei Zhao had been at the school only a few days—how had he already made such an enemy? And from the sound of it, the man Zhong Yongliang had hired was a desperado who would even pull a gun.

"Heh—" Wei Zhao gave a bitter smile. "That one is on me too…"

"Mr. Gu, allow me to explain." Uncle Qing saw that Wei Zhao had said nothing about Gu Mengyao, and he understood that the boy meant well. But as Gu Pengzhan's trusted man, he could conceal nothing from him and always reported matters as they truly were.

"Oh? You know about this?" Gu Pengzhan was taken aback; he had not expected Uncle Qing to know of the feud between Wei Zhao and Zhong Yongliang either.

"Mr. Gu, the truth of the matter is this…" Uncle Qing nodded with a bitter smile. "That day, the young miss had just met Mr. Lin and was not pleased at the idea of him serving as her shield, so she proposed a test. It happened that this Zhong Yongliang was one of the young miss's suitors and had been pestering her without end, so the young miss told Mr. Lin to take care of Zhong Yongliang…"

"All right, no need to go on. I understand well enough." Hearing Uncle Qing's account, Gu Pengzhan shook his head with a bitter smile. In the end, this whole business had been stirred up by his own precious daughter. "Xiaoyi, Yaoyao loves to make mischief—do not indulge her. She ought to have someone keep her in line. Next time, do not go along with her games. This time it nearly came to something serious; if not for your skill, who knows how it might have turned out."

"Ha ha, Uncle Chu, I am fine." Wei Zhao was speaking the truth; he had never taken Brother Black Panther seriously. A small fry like that was cannon fodder on the front lines—utterly useless.

"This Zhong Yongliang—it seems I will have to speak with Principal Ding Binggong. A student of such character should not be kept at the school." Gu Pengzhan was furious at the very mention of Zhong Yongliang.

"Mr. Gu, this Zhong Yongliang is Director Jin's nephew…" Uncle Qing kept records of all such trivial details and immediately offered a reminder.

"Oh?" Gu Pengzhan frowned. He had not expected Zhong Yongliang to have that kind of connection. Gu Pengzhan might be chairman of the Gu Group and its largest shareholder, but the board still had many other shareholders. Their stakes were smaller than his, yet they still carried considerable weight, so Gu Pengzhan could hardly afford to offend other directors over trifles like this.

The Gu Group was one of the shareholders of First High School, and so Director Jin was naturally one of its shareholders as well. That being the case, Ding Binggong really would be in a difficult position. Gu Pengzhan thought it over; graduation was not far off anyway, and so he let go of the idea of doing anything about Zhong Yongliang.

"Uncle Chu, you need not put yourself out. I imagine that after this business, Zhong Yongliang will keep his tail between his legs at school from now on." Wei Zhao had never taken the man seriously at all.

"Yes. Xiaoyi, I am truly sorry about this… I may steer a conglomerate, but there are many things beyond my power." Gu Pengzhan sighed.

"Uncle Chu, I was just about to bring this up with you." Seeing that Gu Pengzhan had steered the conversation toward company management, Wei Zhao seized the opening without having to invent one. "Uncle Chu, have you figured out what was behind that bank robbery the other day?"

"For now we can only suspect that something unusual lies behind it; we have not sorted out the thread yet." Gu Pengzhan did not hide anything. "One thing is certain, though: their people were after Yaoyao. The bank robbery was merely a pretext. They did not move against Yaoyao earlier, nor later, but chose the very moment I was out of the city negotiating business—that motive alone is worth suspecting."

Wei Zhao praised him inwardly: Gu Pengzhan really was the helmsman of a great conglomerate, to be able to reason so much from such faint traces was no small feat. His suspicions were not far off from the truth of the matter.

"My first reaction was that someone was trying to extort us, but then I felt that was not right either. Thinking back on the strange attitude of the other side when we went to that other city to discuss business, I had a vague feeling that the whole thing might be connected to them." Gu Pengzhan did not conceal anything from Wei Zhao; after all, Wei Zhao was now one of the people around his daughter, and telling him his suspicions would let him prepare his response in advance, just in case.