Mind Reader

Soon after, the warehouse manager hurried over.

The moment he saw Zhao Jinglan, he immediately walked up to her and bowed slightly. "Eldest Miss!"

Zhao Jinglan looked coldly at the warehouse manager and asked, "Tell me, do you know that the group's new medicinal solution is at a critical stage of development?"

The warehouse manager could tell that Zhao Jinglan had come with ill intent and hurriedly replied, "I... I know."

"The document I issued yesterday—'To prevent the new medicinal solution formula from being leaked, the group will not receive any outside visitors for the next half month'—did your warehouse department receive it?"

"W-We received it..." The warehouse manager wiped away his sweat.

Zhao Jinglan said coldly, "Then explain to me why two people were able to use visitor passes from the warehouse department to enter the group building and sit openly in the reception room."

"This... I truly don't know about this. Please give me five minutes, Eldest Miss. I'll investigate immediately."

After saying that, the warehouse manager saw that Zhao Jinglan had not objected and immediately hurried away.

Before long, the warehouse manager returned to the first-floor lobby, bringing along Wang Hui's cousin, Meng Jing.

Meng Jing's face was filled with panic.

Since he had been on leave yesterday and had not come to the group, he naturally had no idea that senior management had issued a document banning outside visitors. Otherwise, he never would have dared to get Wang Hui a visitor pass.

Now that the Sunflare Group's highest leadership was holding him accountable, he had a feeling that this job would be very difficult to keep.

"Eldest Miss, I have investigated the full sequence of events.

A supervisor in the warehouse department named Meng Jing was responsible for this. Because his cousin wanted to purchase first-stage vitality supplements at the group's internal discount price, Meng Jing used his managerial privileges to purchase supplements produced by the group at cost price through the expired purchasing eligibility of several former employees. He also gave his cousin a warehouse visitor pass and told him to wait in the reception room.

In addition, I have confirmed that Meng Jing resold twenty jin of natural exotic beast meat to his cousin's friend.

The supplements and natural exotic beast meat that Meng Jing obtained through his privileges are all here."

As he spoke, the warehouse manager placed the illicit goods before Zhao Jinglan.

Zhao Jinglan glanced at the goods and sneered. "Vast rats, vast rats, do not eat our millet. I never expected the rats within the group to be this rampant.

Warehouse supervisor Meng Jing abused his authority for personal gain and resold group assets. Notify Human Resources: dismiss him from his position and hand him over to the judiciary. None of his direct descendants for three generations are to be hired in the future.

Warehouse manager Xie Cheng failed in his supervisory duties. Issue him one internal group warning and dock half a year's salary."

Zhao Jinglan's words struck Meng Jing like a thunderclap.

His father had spent millions of star credits and pulled countless strings to secure this job for him, and now it was gone?

Meng Jing could not help thinking of the pride on his wife's face whenever relatives and friends enviously mentioned his job at the Sunflare Group. He also thought of his child, who was about to apply for the martial arts track.

Nearly forty years old, he had already become the pillar of his family. Now that he had lost his job and fallen, could he still afford to support his child's martial arts training?

How was he supposed to explain this to his parents and wife?

Within the Sunflare Group, executive president Zhao Jinglan was heaven itself. She had just said he would be dismissed and handed over to the judiciary. Did that mean he might even face prison?

Meng Jing was utterly disheartened.

The warehouse manager was also trembling with fear.

Having half a year's salary docked was nothing to him, but one internal group warning would prevent him from being promoted for the next ten years. Of course, he had not held much hope for promotion anyway, but if he received two internal group warnings within a year, he would be demoted.

"Security, why haven't you thrown the two people in the reception room out yet?"

At that moment, a sharply dressed executive spoke up.

"Yes."

After responding, the two security guards rushed toward the reception room, intending to seize Chen Lie and Wang Hui.

Chen Lie stood up, walked to the side door at the back of the reception room, pushed it open, and quickly headed toward Zhao Jinglan.

When he reached Zhao Jinglan, Chen Lie said, "When the water is too clear, there are no fish. A large corporation with hundreds of thousands of employees cannot possibly be free of every filthy affair.

As a manager, you need to be able to tolerate a little sand in your eyes. Sometimes, turning a blind eye is more beneficial to the company's internal balance than being utterly impartial.

So, Miss Zhao, why not show some leniency in this matter?"

Zhao Jinglan swept her gaze over Chen Lie but found nothing remarkable about him. Her red lips parted as she called, "Security."

The moment Zhao Jinglan spoke, seven or eight guards around them began walking toward Chen Lie.

The guard closest to Chen Lie quickly reached him, grabbed him, and began dragging him toward the front entrance.

As for Wang Hui, he had long since been seized by two guards. Looking utterly dejected, he was carried toward the entrance like a chick in their hands.

Chen Lie did not resist as the guards dragged him to the lobby entrance.

Just as he was about to be thrown out, he turned his head and calmly said to Zhao Jinglan, "Your spiritual power cultivation has gone down the wrong path. Let me guess—over the past year, every time you circulate your spiritual power, your head feels like it is splitting apart, so painful you wish you were dead. Am I right?"

Zhao Jinglan, who had already turned to leave, immediately stopped when she heard Chen Lie's words.

She spun around sharply. "Wait!"

"Bring him over!"

The guards looked utterly stunned as they released Chen Lie.

Chen Lie adjusted his collar and once again walked over to Zhao Jinglan.

The instant he had first seen Zhao Jinglan in the reception room, Chen Lie had recognized that she was a Mind Reader.

A Mind Reader, fully known as a spiritual power thought practitioner, walked a path of cultivation that could touch the soul.

Even in the Central Galactic Empire, Mind Readers were an exceptionally noble profession. On Blue Star, where martial arts were so impoverished, they were one in ten thousand at most.

Zhao Jinglan studied Chen Lie again and asked, "You know?"

"Of course I know."

"Then... can you help me solve it?"

A glimmer of hope flashed through Zhao Jinglan's eyes.

"If I couldn't solve it, I wouldn't have brought it up."

Zhao Jinglan snorted coldly. "Why should I believe you?"

Chen Lie said, "You do not have to believe me. Perhaps someone on Blue Star can solve your problem, but they definitely will not be in East River Province.

And even if you find someone capable of solving your problem, you may not be able to hire them."

After hesitating for a moment, Zhao Jinglan said to the group executives in suits behind her, "Temporarily revoke the punishment for warehouse supervisor Meng Jing. Change it to retained employment under observation."

"Yes, Eldest Miss!"

Zhao Jinglan then looked at Chen Lie. "Come to my office."

Chen Lie nodded and followed Zhao Jinglan into the elevator.

Meng Jing and Wang Hui looked at each other.

After a while, Meng Jing finally asked, "Ah Hui, what kind of background does your friend have?"

Wang Hui smacked his forehead. "Background? He's a student, a martial arts student! From a key provincial high school, too!"

Meng Jing had worked at the Sunflare Group for more than ten years, while Zhao Jinglan had only been its executive president for three. Yet over those three years, Zhao Jinglan had always kept her word and never shown anyone any favor. Her sudden reversal of his punishment would surely leave everyone in the group astonished.

It seemed his job really had a chance of being saved.

Meanwhile, Chen Lie followed Zhao Jinglan to the president's office on the twenty-eighth floor.

Once they arrived, Zhao Jinglan shut the door and had Chen Lie sit down, while she seated herself across from him.

"Go on. How do you plan to help me solve this problem?"

Chen Lie said, "Before asking me how I will solve your problem, at least let me understand what your problem is."

Zhao Jinglan nodded. "What do you want to know?"

"Tell me, when did you successfully awaken Mind Sense?"

Zhao Jinglan thought for a moment before answering, "Ten years ago, when I was seventeen."

Chen Lie gave an acknowledging sound and asked again, "Then when did you become a first-rank Mind Reader?"

"Seven years ago, when I was twenty."

"I roughly understand your situation now. There are two reasons why circulating your spiritual power causes splitting headaches.

First, your Mind Reader aptitude is insufficient. You awakened Mind Sense at seventeen but only became a first-rank Mind Reader at twenty, a gap of nearly three years. That means you are simply unsuited to the path of a Mind Reader."

"My aptitude is insufficient?"

Seeing Chen Lie's serious expression, Zhao Jinglan could not help finding it amusing. "Do you even know what you are saying?"

"What, you think your aptitude is good?" Chen Lie asked, somewhat puzzled.

In his previous life, he had never seen a living Mind Reader on Blue Star, so he naturally did not know Blue Star's standards for judging Mind Reader aptitude.

But in Tai'a Star Province of the Central Galactic Empire, taking three years to go from awakening Mind Sense to breaking through to first-rank Mind Reader was considered exceedingly poor aptitude.

"Enough!" Zhao Jinglan said coldly. "If you intend to blame everything on my insufficient aptitude, then there is no need for us to continue this conversation."

Chen Lie remained calm and continued, "Setting aptitude aside, the main reason for your condition is that you neglected the root and pursued the branches while cultivating spiritual power.

If I am not mistaken, when you look inward at your sea of consciousness now, you will find two clusters of spiritual power.

That is because, while cultivating, you sought to increase your spiritual power quickly and deliberately gathered it in a second sea of consciousness. This made your cultivation speed progress at double the rate. I am sure you experienced that yourself back then.

Ordinarily, doing this would not be a problem, so long as your aptitude allowed you to fuse the two clusters of spiritual power into one. But clearly, with your aptitude, you cannot do that.

Your second sea of consciousness has now grown strong and repels the spiritual power in your primary sea of consciousness, creating disorder among the spiritual power within your sea of consciousness. That is why your head feels as if it is splitting apart whenever you circulate your spiritual power."

Hearing Chen Lie's analysis, Zhao Jinglan froze slightly. When she looked inward at her sea of consciousness, it truly was exactly as Chen Lie had described.

"Then how should I solve this problem?"

Chen Lie said, "There are two methods. The first produces immediate results: I intervene personally and help you sort out and guide the disordered spiritual power.

The second is for me to teach you a Mind Reader circulation method. However, at first, you will need to endure the headaches while circulating your spiritual power. Within two months at most, your headaches will lessen or even disappear."

Zhao Jinglan asked skeptically, "You are capable of helping me?"

"Of course. But if you want me to act, you will have to pay a price."

"What price?"

Chen Lie said, "Two jin of Mind-Nurturing Flower."

Zhao Jinglan narrowed her eyes slightly. "Do you know what two jin of Mind-Nurturing Flower means?"

"Of course I do. Blue Star itself cannot grow Mind-Nurturing Flower.

These Mind-Nurturing Flowers must have been purchased from beyond the planet at great cost. While Mind-Nurturing Flower is not scarce off-world, countless remote and impoverished planets like Blue Star need it. Once the supply is allocated, Blue Star can probably purchase only tens of millions of jin per year at most.

Given your social standing, the amount of Mind-Nurturing Flower you can obtain in a year should not be very much either, right?"