400: Chapter 399: The news about the 'fake' boyfriend went viral, attracting countless people's attention.

Meanwhile, at Shenjiangwan Community, Xu Qian sat alone on the living room sofa, her phone screen dimming and lighting up repeatedly.

"The user you have dialed is out of the service area, please try again later..."

The operator's voice prompt rang out time and again, causing doubts to sprout in Xu Qian's heart.

Opening WeChat, there were more than a dozen messages she had sent to Qin Yi in the chat box, but all were in an unread state.

After much deliberation, Xu Qian decided to call Shen Jianan to ask about Qin Yi's situation.

However, although the call went through, Shen Jianan looked at Xu Qian's incoming call on her phone and hesitated, neither daring to answer nor hang up. She just let the phone keep ringing until it automatically disconnected after timing out—with Qin Yi's life or death currently unknown, Shen Jianan really didn't know how to explain it to Xu Qian, so it was better to just not answer.

"Sigh," Xu Qian looked at the unanswered call interface and sighed deeply, leaning her body back against the sofa. She gazed wistfully at the ceiling and muttered to herself, "Young Master Qin, where on earth have you gone? Please come back soon. If you don't return, the company will fall into chaos even before it officially opens."

Rewinding time to this morning.

From the start of the workday, the phone number Wang Tengfei left when registering Yiqin Capital Company hadn't stopped ringing.

Reporters from various media outlets called one after another, inquiring about the relationship between Yiqin Capital and Southwest International Group, when the big boss Qin Yi would return to Modu, and whether the 'romance' between Qin Yi and Si Yao, the daughter of Southwest International Group's Si Hongjun, was true...

At first, Wang Tengfei was a bit confused and went through them one by one to 'debunk the rumors' with the reporters.

But when that news from the Southwest Evening News hit the trending searches and many people in the company saw it, Wang Tengfei realized something was wrong in hindsight.

However, by then Qin Yi had already entered the mountains and couldn't be reached by phone, so Wang Tengfei had no choice but to find Xu Qian.

Although Qin Yi had already reported the situation to Xu Qian the night before, she hadn't expected the matter of Qin Yi pretending to be Si Yao's boyfriend to cause such a massive stir.

Xu Qian had no other choice; although she had previously promised Qin Yi not to disclose the matter, now that it had been exposed by the Southwest Evening News and was causing a lot of gossip within the company, she had to tell the truth to Wang Tengfei and the others. But she still urged them not to reveal it to the outside world.

Since it involved Qin Yi and Si Yao, both of whom were shareholders of the company, Wang Tengfei and the others nodded in tacit agreement.

However, to keep the truth hidden, they couldn't let the company employees know. Consequently, the way those employees looked at Xu Qian inevitably became somewhat complicated.

According to Qin Xiaoyue, rumors had even begun to circulate within the company—all sorts of things were being said. The most outrageous rumor was that the heiress of Southwest International Group was the real girlfriend of the company's big boss, Qin Yi, and that Xu Qian was actually a 'mistress' kept by the boss!

Of course, these kinds of rumors were only spread in private; no one dared to bring them to the table, let alone disclose them to those media reporters!

After all, these people had just joined the company, and the boss had offered such generous benefits, not for them to engage in idle gossip.

Moreover, the four hundred million investment promised by Southwest International Group had already arrived in the company's account that morning.

Wang Tengfei had already conveyed this news to all the employees through the mouths of middle and senior management.

Afterward, Wang Tengfei, Xin Mingyuan, Xu Qian, and Qin Xiaoyue gathered to discuss it and finally decided that they had to get everyone in the company busy first. Otherwise, these messy reports would surely become even more chaotic as they spread.

Thus, Wang Tengfei immediately convened a meeting for the middle and senior management of Yiqin Capital Company, assigning tasks to each of them and establishing the preliminary organizational structure of Yiqin Capital—namely:

The Investment Research Department, with three positions: Industry Researcher, Quantitative Analyst, and Macro Strategist;

The Investment Trading Department, with two positions: Investment Manager and Trader;

The Risk Control Department, with two positions: Risk Manager and Compliance Officer;

The Operations and Support Department, with three positions: Operations Specialist, Investor Relations Specialist, and IT Technical Support;

In addition to these four main functional departments, there were logistics and support departments such as the Human Resources Department, the Finance Department, and the General Affairs Department.

As the company's organizational structure was established, personnel in each department began to take their places. Once people got busy, the various rumors naturally fell apart.

As for Yiqian Media, since it was still under renovation and the staff hadn't reported to the company yet, most of them had naturally seen the news on the trending searches.

As soon as Qin Xiaoyue learned the news, she sent a message in the company's WeChat group, telling everyone to watch their mouths. If anyone couldn't control themselves and revealed the relationship between Qin Yi and Xu Qian to media reporters, they wouldn't need to report to the company for work anymore!

Who would be willing to throw away a newly acquired job for the sake of a hot topic? Everyone replied with 'Received!'

After this series of operations, the internal situations of the two companies were temporarily stabilized.

Seeing that they couldn't dig up any valuable information from Yiqin Capital or Yiqian Media, those media reporters shifted their attention to Modu University.

Around noon, at Modu University, Li Xitong—Qin Yi's counselor during his university days—called Xu Qian.

She said that a large number of media reporters had suddenly appeared on campus, randomly interviewing students to ask about Qin Yi's situation.

Fortunately, the university reacted quickly and immediately drove the media reporters off campus. Although it was summer break and there weren't many students staying at the school, it couldn't be ruled out that some students had already disclosed Qin Yi's situation to the reporters.

Li Xitong had intended to contact Qin Yi directly, but unfortunately, the call wouldn't go through. Thus, she had no choice but to call Xu Qian, the 'official' girlfriend, to explain the situation.

Xu Qian naturally did not tell Li Xitong the truth. After a brief exchange of pleasantries, she ended the call.

...

But the ability of media reporters to dig up news was truly impressive. Although they hadn't unearthed news of the 'romance' between Qin Yi and Si Yao, they learned another piece of intelligence from many Modu University students staying on campus—and that was Qin Yi's ex-girlfriend, Su Mo!

At this moment, at Zhijiang City People's Hospital, Su Mo had just finished wiping down her father, who had suffered a cerebral infarction, when her phone rang.

The caller ID showed an unknown number. After she picked up, the other person's voice carried a professional enthusiasm: "Hello, may I ask if this is Ms. Su Mo?"

"Uh, I am. And you are?" Su Mo asked in confusion.

"Ms. Su, hello. I am a reporter from the Modu Evening News, and I would like to learn about your ex-boyfriend, Mr. Qin Yi..."

Su Mo's hand froze abruptly. Before the other person could finish, she hung up the phone.

Immediately after, another unknown number called, and Su Mo hung that one up as well.

Just then, an app on her phone pushed a trending news item—it was exactly that report from the Southwest Evening News about the 'romance' between Qin Yi and Si Yao.

Looking at the photo in the news report of Qin Yi standing hand-in-hand with a girl, Su Mo felt an indescribable sensation in her heart—how could Qin Yi have found a new girlfriend so quickly? And she was even the heiress of Southwest International Group... What about Xu Qian then? Could they have already broken up? That's impossible, they've only been together for how long before breaking up... Could it be that Qin Yi has changed too?

However, this report was very detailed, even including the investment funds from Southwest International Group.

After a moment of hesitation, she still clicked on that long-silent chat box and composed a message: "Qin Yi, some media found me to ask about you. Don't worry, I didn't say anything about you."

The message was sent successfully. After waiting for a long time, it remained in an unread state. Su Mo gave a bitter smile, set her phone to only accept calls from her whitelist, and went back to taking care of her father.

...

As time passed minute by minute, the hour of Zi approached. The ink-black clouds over Zhuilong Valley had accumulated so densely they seemed solid. Muffled thunder rolled deep within the cloud layer, sounding like an ancient giant beast roaring inside.