54: Chapter 54 The Little Thoughts of a Divorced Woman

The air conditioning in the middle of the interview room was a bit chilly, and Liu Ruyan's fingers, clutching her canvas bag, turned white.

"Student Liu, please introduce yourself first." Sister Zhou pushed a cup of warm water over.

Liu Ruyan's voice was very soft, yet her words were clear: "My name is Liu Ruyan. I graduated from the Computer Science Department of Jiangcheng University of Technology. I specialize in C++ and the Unity engine, and I have two independently developed small game demos."

Gu Jingshen whistled: "Yo, a tech-savvy beauty."

Liu Ruyan's face flushed slightly, and she lowered her head without responding.

Wang Chengsi pushed up his glasses and took out the prepared test questions: "This is the character modeling for our company's new work. There are a few details that need optimization. Would you like to try?"

Zhang Fan leaned back in his chair, observing calmly. The system intelligence didn't mention Liu Ruyan's specific technical focus, but judging from the awards on her resume, she was definitely no ordinary person.

Liu Ruyan took the laptop. As soon as her fingers touched the touchpad, she relaxed. The nervousness in her eyes faded, replaced by a touch of focus. She didn't rush to start; instead, she first brought up the model's wireframe. Her fingers tapped rapidly on the keyboard, and lines of code emerged like flowing water.

"She is refactoring the collision volume algorithm," Wang Chengsi whispered to Zhang Fan. "It's 30% more concise than the method we are currently using."

Zhang Fan raised an eyebrow. This wasn't something a fresh graduate could easily do.

Half an hour later, Liu Ruyan pushed the laptop back: "It's done. I optimized the polygon count at the joints, increasing rendering efficiency by 15% while retaining the cloth physics effects."

As the interstellar warrior model on the screen rotated, the folds of the cape looked as natural as if a real breeze had blown through, and even the reflections on the weapon details were handled perfectly.

Gu Jingshen leaned in and looked for a long time, clicking his tongue: "Oh, I have to say, the little beauty is quite skilled!"

Sister Zhou checked off the resume and looked up to ask: "I see you only wrote 4000 as your expected salary on your resume. Is there any special reason for that?"

Liu Ruyan's fingers curled: "I... I just graduated. I want to accumulate experience first, so the salary isn't important."

"We don't keep idlers here, and we don't mistreat people either," Zhang Fan suddenly spoke up. "Tell us about your family situation. Do you have a boyfriend? We often work overtime here. If you live far away, do you need to consider the commute?"

This question was like a needle, piercing through Liu Ruyan's calmness.

Her eyes flickered violently, and she avoided Zhang Fan's gaze: "I don't have a boyfriend. I'm currently living at school, but I will be finding a place nearby soon, so there's no need to consider the commute."

Sister Zhou's heart sank slightly. When Zhang Fan asked about her family and boyfriend just now, the focus in his eyes made her panic for no reason. She didn't understand why Zhang Fan suddenly asked if this girl had a boyfriend.

She was ten years older than Zhang Fan, divorced, and had a child. Watching him run around for the company these days, she occasionally felt that they were like two parallel lines that just happened to intersect.

Perhaps a girl like Liu Ruyan, young, clean, and with a bright future, was more suitable for him.

She took a deep breath, suppressed the bitterness in her heart, and smiled to smooth things over: "Since there's no problem with her technical skills, I suggest hiring her as an exception. She can start as an assistant, also responsible for project document organization. Her monthly salary will be 80% of a full-time employee's, which is 6400. How about that?"

This position would allow Liu Ruyan to familiarize herself with the project quickly without putting too much pressure on her, which was very suitable for her current state.

Zhang Fan nodded: "It's settled then. Can you come to work tomorrow?"

Liu Ruyan was stunned, as if she hadn't expected it to go so smoothly. After a few seconds, she nodded vigorously: "Yes! Thank you, Boss Zhang! Thank you, Sister Zhou!"

When she walked out of the interview room, her steps were still a bit light. The zipper on her canvas bag wasn't closed properly, revealing half an unfinished piece of bread inside.

Early the next morning, at 7:30, there weren't many people in the studio yet, but Liu Ruyan had already arrived. She was squatting on the floor with a rag, wiping the coffee machine, her bangs hanging down and covering most of her face.

"Morning. You don't need to clean so early." Sister Zhou put down her bag and handed over a wet wipe. "The cleaning lady will come at eight to clean."

Liu Ruyan was startled and hurriedly stood up: "It's okay, I just did it while I was at it."

Her movements were quick. In less than half an hour, she had cleaned up every corner of the office area, even neatly stacking the empty beverage bottles that had been piling up on Wang Chengsi's desk for three days.

When Wang Chengsi was showing her the workflow, he pointed to the project schedule on the wall and frowned: "This table is too messy, and yesterday's progress hasn't been updated yet."

Liu Ruyan stared at the table for a few seconds and suddenly said: "I can make it into a Gantt chart and use different colors to mark priorities. That way, the daily progress will be clear at a glance."

"Can you do that?" Wang Chengsi was a bit surprised.

"I've done something similar at school before." She opened Excel, her fingers flying. In less than twenty minutes, a clear, visualized table was finished, even marking potential delay risks from the testing team with red warnings.

Wang Chengsi nodded repeatedly as he watched: "Not bad, Ruyan. With this level of skill, I have to report it to Boss Zhang and give you a raise."

The corners of Liu Ruyan's mouth curled up, but she quickly pressed them back together, whispering, "Thank you, Brother Wang."

During lunch break, Liu Ruyan didn't go to the cafeteria; she hugged her canvas bag and hid in the stairwell.

She took out bread and mineral water from her bag. Just as she took a bite, her phone rang, and the name "Liu Mengyao" flashed on the screen.

She hesitated for a moment, then walked into the shadows of the fire escape and answered: "Hello."

"Liu Ruyan, where are you?" The voice on the other end of the phone was sharp and sweet, carrying undisguised mockery. "You're graduating soon, haven't you found a job yet? Tsk tsk, that's true. For someone like you who can't do anything but study, it would be strange if anyone wanted you."

Liu Ruyan gripped the bread tightly, her knuckles turning white: "Is there anything else? If not, I'm hanging up."

"Don't be in such a rush." Liu Mengyao chuckled. "Mom asked me to tell you not to come to the family dinner next week, so that Aunt Li's son won't see you looking so shabby and think that our Liu family has mistreated you. Oh, right, don't ever tell anyone you're from the Liu family. We can't afford to lose that face!"

"Beep, beep, beep—"

The call was disconnected. Liu Ruyan stared at the screen, her eyes slowly turning red. She took a hard bite of the bread, and the dry, hard crumbs got stuck in her throat, making her chest ache as she swallowed.

"Eat this."

A hand handed over a bottle of yogurt, the blue cap standing out in the shadows. Sister Zhou stood at the stairwell entrance; she didn't know how long she had been waiting, her eyes filled with pity.

Liu Ruyan hurriedly wiped her eyes and stuffed the bread into her bag: "Sister Zhou..."

"I heard everything." Sister Zhou shoved the yogurt into her hand. "At Singularity, it doesn't matter whose daughter you are or what kind of background you have; we only look at ability. The model you optimized yesterday is better than what half of our Technology Department could do, and that's enough."

Liu Ruyan gripped the cold yogurt bottle, her fingertips trembling slightly. It had been a long time since someone had affirmed her so straightforwardly.

At home, her mother always cautiously urged her to "let Mengyao have her way," her brother frowned whenever he saw her, and Liu Mengyao went out of her way to embarrass her, saying she was "stupid from studying too much" and "couldn't do anything but take exams."

"Thank you, Sister Zhou." She lowered her head, her voice choked with emotion.

"What are you thanking me for? We're all colleagues from now on." Sister Zhou patted her shoulder. "Go on back up; Brother Wang has to show you the server architecture this afternoon."

Liu Ruyan nodded and followed her upstairs.

Sunlight shone in through the stairwell window, casting mottled shadows on the floor. Her fingers, which had been gripping the yogurt bottle, slowly relaxed a little.

In the office, Zhang Fan was discussing the itinerary for the AI Conference with Gu Jingshen.

Gu Jingshen suddenly pointed at the door: "Hey, Fan Zi, look at Liu Ruyan and Sister Zhou walking together. Don't they look a bit like sisters?"

Zhang Fan looked up. Sister Zhou was whispering something to Liu Ruyan, and Liu Ruyan's mouth curled into a faint smile, not as tense as she had been in the morning.

He remembered the line in the system intelligence about her "mistakenly believing she was unwelcome," and a thought suddenly occurred to him—perhaps Singularity Technology could be more than just his battlefield; it could also become a sanctuary for others.

Wang Chengsi walked over with a document: "Fan Zi, the schedule Ruyan organized is so useful. How about... letting her officially join the Technology Team?"

Zhang Fan smiled: "Let her get familiar with things for two weeks first. What's the rush?"

He watched Liu Ruyan sitting at her workstation, taking notes seriously, the sunlight falling on her profile, as if covering her in a soft glow.

This "real vs. fake heiress" storm had only just begun. And he, it seemed, had already found a reason to intervene.