A One Piece Novel

At noon, Zhou Qi checked his messages. Zhou Mingde had been highly efficient and had already found a warehouse for rent.

Nanan City, Longzhen County. Hazardous chemicals warehouse, covering 2,400 square meters. Minimum lease: 500 square meters. Rent: 0.75 per square meter per day. That came to 76,500 a month, or 918,000 a year.

"Damn it, they made money lying down. I'm so jealous..." Zhou Qi immediately calculated the warehouse's price, and envy followed.

Back then, he had worked himself to the bone and only earned three to five thousand a month.

Look at them. Just one warehouse, and without doing anything for a year, they could net the price of an Audi A8.

"Negotiate it down. Push the price down hard. Calculate it based on a one-year lease—whatever you manage to cut, I'll give you one-fifth!" Zhou Qi replied.

"This!" Zhou Mingde's eyes lit up. Nearly 920,000 a year—if he got it down to 500,000, wouldn't he get 80,000?

He had only been a branch manager before. His income had not been high!

Why would he turn down 80,000 that had practically fallen into his lap?

Besides, he was certain they would agree. Very few people leased warehouses like that for an entire year; most only needed them temporarily for a day or two.

Could short-term and long-term leases possibly cost the same?

"Alright, I'll go negotiate right away!" Zhou Mingde replied at once.

He switched to another message. It was from Xu Shiqin.

"Boss, Lu Xiaowan wrote a long post on her personal account badmouthing you!"

"Huh?" Zhou Qi was stunned. He had heard of those kinds of posts before, but he had never expected one to happen to him someday!

What did she write?

I'm curious!

He opened Xu Shiqin's link, which took him to an app that would probably pop up if you searched for a public restroom.

"Stinking boss used despicable tactics. To get me, he actually resorted to this kind of method to suppress me!"

"Huh?" Zhou Qi perked up and hurriedly scrolled down.

The post went on at length below, and the writing was unexpectedly decent.

It said that the author worked at a pharmaceutical company that had recently been acquired. The new boss was in his twenties, ugly and greasy-looking. When he saw that she was pretty, he hinted at taking her out to dinner. After she refused, he threatened to fire her. Later, he dissolved her department and transferred her under a coworker she hated. Then he hinted that as long as she paid a tiny, insignificant price, she could return to her original department.

She had even attached WeChat chat logs below!!

Zhou Qi examined them one by one. The WeChat avatar was Katsuragi Keima, the same one he used. At first glance, it really did look like him.

When he scrolled down to the comments, they had already become unbearably foul.

"Trash companies are all like this. Support this sister in defending her rights."

"Big sis, what's your company called? Let's expose them online!"

Lu Xiaowan had even replied below: "I can't say the name. It has a lot of influence locally, after all. All I can say is that these things are unavoidable in the workplace. I'll hold on a little longer. Maybe things will turn around..."

"Sis, don't wrong yourself! If the job makes you unhappy, just quit. And dump a basin of water over that idiot's head before you leave!"

Who knew how Lu Xiaowan felt seeing comments like that? She was probably cursing them out. After all, there were not many jobs that paid 14,000 a month, involved little work, and could help her gain followers.

If I quit, will you give me a job?

"You're sure this is her account?" Zhou Qi asked. After all, he was neither fat nor ugly, so this clearly was not describing him.

She's talking about Brother Bing, isn't she?

But she had used his WeChat avatar.

"It's definitely hers. I've followed her ever since she joined the company!" Xu Shiqin said. "And look at her Bilibili and Douyin accounts. Before she joined, she had fewer than 600,000 followers across both platforms combined. Now she has 2.7 million. The company accounts they operate only post four videos a month, but she posts twelve videos a month on her personal accounts—all filmed and posted during work hours!"

Zhou Qi opened Lu Xiaowan's Bilibili homepage. Most of the videos were dance clips, with a small number of workplace skits.

In most of the dance videos, she wore work clothes on top, while the bottom had been changed into short shorts or a short skirt, paired with stockings.

To be fair, dance videos filmed in blue-gray work uniforms might really have been more appealing than ordinary dance videos. After all, they showed the wisdom and beauty of the working people!

"Tsk..." It was obvious. She had used the company's convenience to build up her own following.

Still, Zhou Qi did not think there was anything wrong with that. Wasn't it only natural to fleece capitalists? He often slacked off at work and got paid to use the bathroom too.

Liu Cixin had written novels while he was still employed.

Besides, she was fleecing Luo Baofeng, so what did it have to do with him?

But twisting the facts in a long post and fabricating chat records was another matter entirely!

"Find a lawyer and sue her!" Zhou Qi replied.

"Huh?" Xu Shiqin froze. "Wait, you mean... sue her?"

"Of course. This counts as false accusation and damage to my personal reputation, right?" Zhou Qi said. "Don't be afraid to spend money. Even if it bankrupts us, we have nothing to fear—we must leave behind a clean name, understand? Ask Teacher Zhang San whether he takes cases like this. If he does, hire him!"

"Uh..." Xu Shiqin had never expected the new boss to go this far. And he did not seem to have the slightest bit of tenderness toward women...

Hiring Zhang San? Wouldn't that mean a death sentence right from the start?

At that moment, Xu Shiqin suddenly felt an intense sense of crisis.

The reason she had targeted Lu Xiaowan at every turn was because Lu Xiaowan was the only person in the entire office whose looks could threaten hers.

But if the new boss was not interested in a girl's looks, what was the point of their struggle?

From now on, if I wanted a promotion and a raise, did that mean hard work was my only option?

No!

Though miserable inside, she still had to carry out her boss's orders.

"Yes, I'll contact Teacher Zhang San right away!"

"Oh, right. Zhao Fangquan hasn't been talking nonsense online, has he?" Zhou Qi asked.

"Uh, we're going to be firing quite a few people lately, so I'm a little overwhelmed with work..." Xu Shiqin hurriedly said. "I'll go follow him right away!"

"You're this busy, yet you still had time to follow Lu Xiaowan?" Zhou Qi shook his head. Girls' minds were far too complicated. He could not understand them at all.

"Oh, right. Brother Bing will be handling the factory's affairs from now on. Just report things like this to him!" Going past the factory director and complaining directly to the chairman—what was that called? That was reporting above your level!

Not making her a department head had definitely been the right decision. All she did all day was think about office intrigue. Wouldn't it be better if she put that effort into studying?

There were no more messages on WeChat, but he did have one on QQ, from Laolai, an editor at Yuewen.

"Your last book has been finished for three months now, right? When are you starting a new one?"

*...*

I spent those three months in a factory tightening screws, so of course I had no time to start a new book.

Zhou Qi had been about to refuse outright, but then he remembered something and replied, "In the next couple of days..."

"Alright..." Laolai replied. "I'll wait for your news."

"Mm-hmm!"

Zhou Qi got up and went to find Koshiro.

"Teacher, do you have any novels here?"

"Ah, I do!" Koshiro paused in surprise. "Come with me!"

Zhou Qi had assumed Koshiro only had one or two books, but when they arrived, he discovered an entire room packed full of them!

For a moment, Zhou Qi felt as though he had returned to middle school, standing before a bookstore that rented out novels. He instantly became excited.

Looking at the room filled with novels, Koshiro's face showed a trace of sadness. "These are novels my family collected in the past. They've been kept here for quite some time..."

"Family..." Zhou Qi knew that Kuina had died. Kuina's mother had never appeared, so she was probably gone as well.

"I'll give you the key. If you want to read, feel free to look through them. Just remember to take good care of the books and don't damage them. When you're done, remember to return them!"

"Mm!" Zhou Qi nodded. He loved books too, so naturally he would not damage them.

He had quite a lot of free time. After all, no one could train nonstop for twenty-four hours a day; neither the mind nor the body could endure it.

He trained for two or three hours in the morning and another two or three hours in the afternoon, leaving him five or six hours of free time.

He normally used that time to read novels from Earth, look up information, and watch short videos.

Now, though, he could study the novels here and see which ones he could bring back to Earth.