"Summoned for tea?"
Few people could... summon him, the current secretary to the President.
"Forget it! Since they let you go, they must not be afraid I'll know!"
Chu Ying stood up, gazing at the night outside the window. His expression seemed to darken. "Or perhaps, even if I knew, I'd be powerless to change anything!"
He wondered if a sense of powerlessness accompanied these words.
As the president of a nation, to have even those close to him coerced... It was rather regrettable.
It seemed that holding this position was not as glorious as outsiders perceived.
"Let's talk about what happened first!"
Chu Ying walked to the window, looking up at the not-so-bright night sky. His emotions seemed to be buried with it.
When the secretary beside him heard Chu Ying's slightly sighing tone, the gaze behind his glasses flickered. This seemed to indicate... shock.
In his memory, Mr. Chu rarely spoke in such a tone.
However, the secretary was unaware that such a tone had become frequent for Chu Ying recently.
Then, the secretary recounted what had happened online to Chu Ying.
It took less than half a minute.
He knew that Mr. Chu didn't need him to elaborate on details.
"I see!"
After listening, Chu Ying merely sighed softly, offering no comment.
Or rather, such a sigh was already a comment.
The secretary chose to remain silent.
The current situation and the information at hand required some quiet time for both of them to process and grasp the core of the problem.
"What a performance!"
Chu Ying spoke again after half a minute.
Upon closer observation, one would notice a faint smile playing on his lips.
The ever-vigilant secretary naturally picked up on this detail.
"This forces that young man to return to streaming. And..." At this point, Chu Ying no longer hid his smile. "Moreover, it has created a situation of... heroic return."
Seeing this, the secretary seemed perplexed by the smile but said nothing.
Was it his imagination, or did he detect a hint of... admiration in that smile?
"Mr. Chu! Should we continue with our previous plan?" The secretary did not finish his sentence, pausing deliberately in the middle.
"You!"
Noticing this subtle pause, Chu Ying shook his head. "It seems you've had a bit too much tea today!"
"Yes! I shouldn't have asked!"
The secretary smiled and said no more.
"It's no longer realistic to try and stop it now. Moreover, they are holding back!"
Chu Ying withdrew his gaze and returned to his seat. After a moment of contemplation, he looked at the secretary and said, "After Gu Taiyi's defeat, they don't seem eager to find another compliant spokesperson. What do you make of that?"
"Hmm?"
Hearing this, the secretary paused and smiled, "Mr. Chu rarely asks me such questions!"
"Oh! Is that so?"
Chu Ying did not perceive the secretary's impertinence.
"Mr. Chu! Could there be a possibility that they've reached some kind of cooperation?" he said, though he was offering his personal opinion.
However, it was unclear who "they" referred to in his words.
"Cooperation?"
The secretary's words seemed to broaden Chu Ying's thoughts. He retorted, "What do you think a clever young man would do when facing a thousand-year-old fox?"
A young man facing an old fox?
Hearing this analogy, the secretary seemed to understand something. "Mr. Chu! It seems you are the one with foresight!"
However, Chu Ying seemed indifferent to the secretary's compliment. "It's not that I have foresight... it's that I understand what the old fox is thinking!"
"This..."
Seeing his response, the secretary felt awkward continuing the conversation.
He couldn't exactly say, "Mr. Chu, you're also an old fox, that's why you understand the other's thoughts!"
"Then Mr. Chu, what do we do next..."
Regarding the decision, the secretary still needed to seek guidance.
"That..."
Chu Ying glanced at a photo in a frame on his desk. The photo seemed to be of a father and daughter.
However, the photo looked old, likely taken fourteen or fifteen years ago.
In it, the man playing the role of the father bore some resemblance to the current Chu Ying. He was holding a little girl's hand.
The little girl looked about ten years old, with a round and delicate face, a delicate nose, and red lips. Her large eyes clearly showed the innocence of childhood.
The little girl in the photo was smiling happily.
"Counting the time, she should be back!"
Perhaps moved by the scene, Chu Ying said something unrelated to the topic he was discussing with the secretary.
"Yes! In these fifteen years, she's only been back twice!" Seeing the little girl in the photo, the secretary's gaze softened.
"Alas! Do you think her return at this juncture might be... destiny?"
Chu Ying seemed to enjoy posing questions to the secretary today.
"Destiny...?"
The secretary recalled memories of the little girl, shook his head, and smiled contentedly. "She is different from us now. We... are destined to be in different worlds!"
Different worlds?
What did that mean?
"Yes!"
This was Chu Ying's third sigh of the day, and the last. "Perhaps! Matters concerning another world should be handled by people from that world!"
This statement sounded somewhat... dispirited.
"Alright! You may go!"
Chu Ying waved his hand and said, "Everything will wait until she returns!"
"Yes!"
...
At this moment, Ye Ming was unaware that someone had discreetly handled some matters for him.
Otherwise, his plan might not have gone as smoothly as imagined.
Now, due to the actions of those in the shadows, a plan formulated by the presidential palace had been forced to a halt.
It hadn't even been initiated.
It seemed that Ye Ming's previous actions, while not achieving their intended goals, had still yielded some unexpected benefits.
However, he was oblivious to all this.
Meanwhile, it was one minute before eight o'clock in the evening.
The incident of "forcing Teacher Ye to return" online was now known to almost everyone, with eight out of ten people discussing it.
It had reached its peak in public opinion.
"Do you think Teacher Ye will come back in the end?"
"He will! I believe he definitely will! Think carefully, many people are threatening Teacher Ye with their lives right now. With Teacher Ye's compassionate heart, he absolutely cannot stand idly by!"
"Right! Teacher Ye will definitely return!"
"..."
While everyone was engaged in heated discussion, a livestream room, silent for twenty-four hours, quietly lit up.
The moment it went live, the entire online world... exploded.